coming up on r t julian assange the man behind wiki leaks remains in london's ecuadorian embassy but he's not staying silent from the n.s.a. leaks to much more on our team was able to interview the world renowned leaker that exclusive conversation just ahead and according to a new report the obama administration has invoked a chilling effect on the freedom of press from the d.o.j. tracking the phones of george journalists to the prosecution of whistleblowers concerns for press freedom are growing more on that coming up and it's the eleventh day of the government shutdown but the standoff between republicans and democrats continues republicans are pushing for short term raise of the debt ceiling but obama demands no strings attached before saying yes to the deal the latest on this fiscal deadlock later in the show.

it's friday october eleventh four pm in washington d.c. i'm a neera david and you're watching r t we begin today with an exclusive interview with whistleblower julian assange artie's sister spanish channel sat down with the wiki leaks founder in london a song she was granted asylum by quarter last year has been waiting in the country's embassy in london for safe passage in the interview a song shared his thoughts on a number of issues talking specifically about the n.s.a. scandal and the relationship wiki leaks has had with former u.s. government contractor edward snowden artie's eva golinger has more. here at the embassy of ecuador in london he affirmed that the exceptionalism that brock obama president united states is defending is merely an excuse to be involved the last something used by nations such as united states with power to subordinate others found also alerted to the necessity of developing sovereign technology and

sovereignty in general in order to defend nations against the mass surveillance an espionage program of the united states that violates human rights and certain rights under international law look when that whenever you see a president talk about exceptionalism what he's trying to say is there are rules of civil behavior. doesn't apply to him. whether that's invading another country whether that's abusive laws. in relation to. barack obama's use of the espionage act against alleged journalistic sources. and journalists. that's something you so it's very important that people understand that this is not just a bit more it's a radical change. barack obama has prosecuted more people under the espionage

act more journalistic sources on the espionage act than all previous presidents combined going back to one nine hundred seventy s. in fact he's prosecuted double the number so this is a deliberate conscious decision by the white house to create a chilling effect using the espionage act as opposed to some other mechanism he also thanked the russian government for giving asylum to edward snowden the whistleblower and former n.s.a. contractor and he thanked the countries of ecuador venezuela bolivia for offering asylum to snowden and also giving support and asylum to assad himself saying that they are the few nations amongst the few nations that had the courage to stand up to us power and aggression in terms of those nations that stepped forward it was like the america and russia and not all of latin america either but then the square believe you and they quit or your keen interest. that was artie's eva golinger

speaking with julian assange now if you ever take a visit to the white house web page and type in government transparency you'll find a memo from president obama declaring his policy on open government he states government should be transparent transparency promotes accountability and provides information for citizens about what their government is doing now while that's obama's stated intentions his actions speak a little louder than words according to a report released yesterday by the committee to protect journalists president obama has fallen short of his promise to report details how the administration has been curbing routine disclosures of information and how the aggressive prosecution of leakers under the espionage act has created a chilling effect on potential government sources under the obama administration six government employees and two contractors including edward snowden have been charged under the espionage act that's compared to just three such prosecutions and all previous u.s. administrations combined here to shed some light on that discrepancy and talk

a little bit more about the report's findings i'm joined by both the host and producer of breaking the set abby martin and well. thank you guys so much for joining me it's great to have you on so abby the c.p.g. report is saying what you've said on the show thousands of times basically you know the president's crackdown on free speech has been the same if not worse than that of president bush what he stands out as some of the most egregious policies that's been that have been employed by this administration why was a little surprised to see this report coming out from the c.p.g. because this is an organization that for the last thirty years has been really focused on war zones and journalist being killed in the line of fire so for them to kind of take initiative on the home front shows you that there's a really unprecedented move a lot of president trends going on with the obama administration. and really you know the thing that's so tragic about it is that he campaign himself as a transparency president so it's just i think that that's really just so tragic the things that stand out the most to me of course as you just mentioned the eight

people charge of this archaic world war one piece of logic. nation designed to prosecute spies under the espionage act and on top of that you see completely ridiculous seizures of phone records under establishment media organizations a.p. fox news i mean so when you're calling out fox news and a.p. journalists that are actually establishment journalists than you know that something's really in trouble here absolutely i think you hit it right on the mark there are many you know abby mention this but see p.j. does typically focus on war zones on countries that are outside of the united states this is actually the first report that they've done on the status of press freedom in the country in the united states what do you think that says i mean this is an organization organization c p j that's been around for decades and this is the first year absolutely just on that just a ducktail off of what abby so this is absolutely unprecedented seepage is focused on worsens countries and not just worsens become trees where it's actually very just dangerous in general to be a journalist for political reasons places like honduras egypt syria where these are

regarded some of the most dangerous countries in the world to be gentle so why the united states well that what that signifies at least to me from a journalistic point of view is the actual shift that we've taken from the bush administration to the obama administration were under bush what journalists were getting what we're getting were mere threats of like hey look we're not going to be persecuting you but you better stop doing this under obama that's all become a reality and like abby mentioned eight people persecuted in the espionage act that's absolutely unprecedented this includes people like edward snowden and. the other folks as well but i mean i just want to read you one quote this is from jane mayer from the new yorker who said it's a huge impediment to reporting and so chilling isn't quite strong enough it's more like freezing the whole process so really what this shows you is that the obama administration may very well be the worst when it comes to press freedoms since the nixon years and it's amazing how many reporters came out in this report and really talked about how they've never covered a presidency you know with more secrecy and so that's. that was really amazing but

you mentioned edward snowden abbi i wanted to talk to you about him because he was the latest whistleblower charged under the espionage act of course he's not in the united states so he won't be tried at least not not yet what kind of effect would you say that snowden and the entire n.s.a. scandal has really had on the public's perception of their privacy their right to privacy well how sad is that we have whistleblowers seeking asylum in russia and journalists who are covering the leaks hiding out in brazil and their partners in berlin i mean that's the state of the world today where they can't even reside in this country because of the fear of being persecuted completely blew the lid off everything and it's something that we've known for a long time since nine eleven we kind of knew the overreach of the patriot act but really we didn't realize how far it went and even though we've been saying that for years and years we didn't have the proof in our hands so edward snowden really blew the lid off everything everyone in the entire country knows that not only are we

being spied on not only is our meditative being collected but it reaches far beyond just the borders of this country and goes to spying on people in brazil with no constitutional protections whatsoever sharing this data with israel and other allies of the u.s. so i think we are in a state of shock still recovering from the fact that we've kind of had all of our beliefs consolidated and confirmed andy i think it was a really pivotal moment but many i wanted to ask you about you know the administration's defense of this what they say is that you know we have for every four year require a set that has been submitted to the government we have released that information we've been we've been as transparent as we can possibly be and i think that the reaction has been you know pretty pretty fair i guess so what do you think do you think the administration should be getting any kind of credit for. this absolutely no i think that it's ridiculous and i think that the actual term that the users like we've been very speedy when it comes is with the word they choose to use a speedy i don't know what method of time calculation they're using from the state

department alone. to get financial records from the the previous secretary of state hillary clinton it takes upwards of a year to get information that's from the state department let alone the intelligence agencies like the cia and f.b.i. and n.s.a. who will constantly be bouncing back and forth oh you know this is in our jurisdiction you going to need to do this where requests from from n.s.a. and essays like oh you know what we did away with those records you going to have to go check with the archives so i think it's really if they're touting this this is absolutely wrong it's terrible for them to say that oh you know we're being very very speedy and another thing that the obama administration is guilty of is overclassification so when you get your hands on a four year request half that stuff you can't even read because things that may not even be a matter of national security are now of a sudden over classified and that has a chilling effect of its own for government employees to say look we're not sure whether or not this is a gray area where this is classified or not classified so we're just not going to talk to you so that's having its own effect as well absolutely and abbie we know that this is not just about government sources anymore we know that journalists are

being targeted it calls into question another really controversial obama policy the n.d.a. the indefinite detention clause of the n.d.a. can you talk about that provision a little bit and just how it sort of feeds into this this whole thing yeah i think that's why people are so concerned because we've seen this move a really agree just move on part of the obama signing into law the n.d.a. the national defense authorization act section ten twenty one which authorize the indefinite detention of people who are and associated force with al qaeda or terrorists and we already know that that term is so general so subjective that it can really be anyone in journalist chris hedges trying to sue the ministration by saying hey i've been in bed with what you call terrorist what you do in tears and i could be indefinitely detained by the military with no hate. i mean we're talking about a policy that goes back centuries magna carta i mean this concept of be having due process and a fair trial is so foundational to democracy and to just free freedom

and i think that that's just very terrifying when you. that coupled in with the war on whistleblowers in the war on press terrifying indeed it was i love talking you guys i could talk to you for hours thank you so much for coming on host of breaking the set abby martin and of course wonderful producer and he wrote the welcome back to you and you know. still ahead here on our see the government shutdown has reached eleven days and the debate still continues on capitol hill over u.s. funding and whether or not to raise the debt ceiling we'll bring you the latest after the break. and. the fact that. they're going to do the job that you know the price is the only industry specifically mentioned in the constitution and. that's because a free and open press is critical to our democracy correct albus. role. in fact the single biggest threat facing our nation today is the corporate takeover of our government and our press seven we've been a hydrogen right hand full of transnational corporations that will profit by

destroying what our founding fathers once built up my job market it on this show we reveal the big picture of what's actually going on in the world we go beyond identify the problem try rational debate in a real discussion critical issues facing america to find her job ready to join the movement then walk a little bit of. drama as the truth be ignoring the. stories others refuse to notice. since changing the world writes never. killed picture of today's you know. from around the globe.

locally don't. and in other news a fiscal deadlock between the white house and g.o.p. officials continues with the partial government shutdown now in its eleventh day and with less than a week to go before the treasury department runs out of money to pay the government's bills president obama has been urging congressional republicans to end the gridlock that has overtaken washington and crippled the country late yesterday house republican leaders met with president obama regarding a plan they proposed suggesting a short term debt limit increase that would last for about six weeks the white house has hinted that the new proposal is seriously being considered particularly if it means an end to the government shutdown this morning about twenty house republicans and majority leader eric cantor gathered to talk about the possibility of quickly reopening the government but only if there is a commitment by obama to take significant deficit reduction steps however the president has asked for a short term debt limit increase with no conditions attached and he continued to

press his case today in a meeting with senate republicans while there is no definitive deal at this point lawmakers are saying that this six week proposal is the greatest sign of progress since the government shutdown went into effect and locals in the nation's capital say progress can't come soon enough congress controls all of the districts appropriations and that means the city has been caught up in this national political fight here to discuss the latest on the hill and how it affects washington d.c. i'm joined by senator paul strauss he's the u.s. shadow senator for the district of columbia thank you paul for joining me and thank you did it great so let's talk about the latest it seems like there may be progress in this the six week extension proposal on the debt ceiling we know that boehner and president obama the latest is that they've been talking intently on the full on the phone trying to come to a resolution are you optimistic at this point that we're we're nearing that you know i'd like to be but the information i'm getting is that they're still pretty far apart i don't think it's unreasonable to expect that the government be open

that the government pay its bills before. begin to debate about the great issues of . our day this is an outrageous tactic by congressional republicans to hold the entire government hostage and in particular turning my constituents in the district of columbia even worse because although we've been able to keep the d.c. government open temporarily we're about to run out of money and the consequences for city residents are going to be much greater than those around the country can you talk a little bit more about that how is this fiscal deadlock really affecting your residents d.c. residents in particular all locally raise tax dollars have to be appropriated by congress that's wrong it shouldn't be that way we should be treated like every other state locality our local money should be our local money but the rules say that congress controls our budget when they can open up the federal government and pass an appropriations bill the city budget gets tied up in that now our mayor has decided not to close the government by declaring all d.c. government workers essential we've run the city very well we have

a strong budget surplus but we're dipping into those savings to keep the government open and it wasn't designed to pay day to day operations it was a rainy day fund and certainly it's raining today both metaphorically and in actuality but we're going to run out of money and unlike other situations where tourists can't go to parks or passports might not be issued the impact is very severe we have health clinics that are going to be forced to close because our medicaid funds are inaccessible mentally ill people can't get their medication life threatening illnesses are going to go untreated we have public charter schools are going to be forced to close that's not happening in the fifty states so what we really need the congress to do while they work out this national disaster is free d.c.'s budget from this ridiculous deadlock and allow the city to stay open sir and as i'm sure you know a couple of days ago mayor vincent gray you know dropped in on a press conference being given by senate majority leader harry reid to express that

very concerned let's take a look at that really quickly. what i wouldn't have and i don't know what i would stop would still be trying to be able to remember your side when your senator reid says i'm on your side don't screw it up first well what does that even mean and was that response enough for you well i was right there so it was a. it was certainly a memorable moment i don't know what senator reid meant exactly by that the truth is senate democrats have been on the district side in these fights with the federal government but we're getting a little frustrated because it's a lot like the fire department coming to your house and starting to tell you a story about how many times they've put fires out or rescued people in times past when we're saying look this house is about to burn down you need to do something now senator reed is a friend he's a supporter of d.c. statehood and he has the job of trying to keep the entire country on track we respect his position and we're grateful for his help but we really need the district to be treated differently because we are different we're not an agency of

the federal government and we don't belong in the middle of this federal shutdown mess well let's take a look at some numbers washington d.c. has tapped a one hundred forty four million dollars contingency reserve fund to keep thirty two thousand district employees working during the shutdown on october fifteenth a ninety eight million dollars payroll for these workers is due what happens when this contingency runs out of money we really don't know that is something that we didn't plan on nobody expected that congress would be this irresponsible and allow this shutdown to continue in the last government shutdown the district was exempted from the consequences locally within five days it's been many more days than that now that contingency fund was not designed to fund day to day operations for long term periods and unlike the fifty other states this is serious serious consequences to people's health to people's safety trash won't be picked up yeah it'll be fun no

parking ticket for a few days but that's going to get old fast as the garbage begins to pile up in fact right now it's the distro. government that's picking up trash in national parks to avoid a public health calamity i don't know what's going to happen when trash doesn't get picked up in the rest of the city when health clinics are forced to close when public charter schools are forced to close the consequences are going to spiral out of control indeed in the house republicans have passed a bill to allow d.c. to suspend its locally raise tax dollars but reid has not yet brought this to a vote do you feel like there's a disconnect between the needs of your constituents and the national debt and there is a fundamental misunderstanding among many senators that this is not a federal appropriation this is a local government that is trying to spend locally raise dollars if the same time let's not give the republicans too much credit they're being a little cute here they sent a bunch of bills across they're trying to reopen the government piecemeal we know we can't let that happen if we begin on a national level to start passing piecemeal c.r.'s some of the government's never

going to open we're never going to have an e.p.a. again fighting environmental polluters we're never going to have people taking on. consumer fighting for consumers so there's plenty of agencies that the republicans would love to keep shut down the entire government when it opens up past to reopen up but at the same time there's ample precedent for treating the district of columbia differently we are not an agency of the federal government our mayor is right the people of d.c. deserve to be have our budget free from this dysfunction and let's let's hope that d.c. residents do indeed get what they deserve thank you so much for joining me paul strauss a shadow senator representing the district of columbia thank you so much. this morning marked the beginning of a long weekend for truckers rallying on the capital beltway which is the highway that spans across the washington d.c. area the demonstration is called the truckers ride for the constitution with the protesters planning to drive the sixty four mile beltway in eight hour shifts from today through monday given the rain the traffic in the area was already had these so the thirty tractor trailers and pickup that showed up too much to blame for the

slow ride of the commuters in the area the protest has attracted truckers from as far away as the west coast all to call attention to the issues they say are going under the radar artie's parian boring has more. tucker's ride for the constitution is a deep rooted grass roots campaign independent truck drivers and they words they are quote leaving a convoy to deliver their truck or demand and their left hand and the us constitution and non-negotiable rights in their right hand they took off this morning to the interstate surrounding d.c. to bring attention to their cause by backing up traffic they're focused on two things the first is excessive regulation and the trucking industry they say obama's policies are forcing truckers to work under minimum wage and putting a lot of people out of work and here is what one of the drivers told me just about that with people making laws and regulations that have never even worked in the industry. if you haven't been. in your life you don't deserve to be making

for guys that are what they are also upset with and again this is in their words corrupt politicians attacking and the women a being our rights and liberties which are protected by the constitution now this campaign started about a month ago but it has escalated to the administration's response to the government shutdown we are here now at the world war two memorial and on a flight just took place with congressman louie gohmert and truckers were supposed to be here it's a give their list of demands to members of congress but they didn't show up traffic was so bad they couldn't hear but it's at the world war two memorial where the last straw was broken for the trucker as the obama administration closed at the world war two memorial on october first however just a couple feet away from here is the national mall and on tuesday of this week the administration allowed for a protest to take place for immigration reform or to put it bluntly obama allows

for illegal immigrants to enter the national mall while closing this memorial that was built with private funds to honor veterans this is caused a lot of anger around the country here's what representative louie gohmert told me never seen so many children. personnel out here at the lincoln memorial you move a barricade and you get more park service people than a favorite scene in the whole mall so yeah it's not saving any money for the close down to have this many people with this many barricades despite this veterans have been able to enter the memorial they pushed past the barricades the park service police and park police have sensed a change the wording on the signs allowing for first amendment rights to be exercised here now i spoke with general lee he's the truck driver core nader for this event i spoke with him last night here's how he put it people are going to remember all this idiocy and foolishness during the shutdown i believe president obama had a plan that he was going to take and punish the american people but he went

a little too far when he started shutting down war memorials for like the greatest generation in our history and again he was supposed to be here for the honor flight and to give their list of demands to congressman gohmert some other demands might just surprise you take a listen part of our agenda is we're counting for his resignation or impeachment just like marcy in egypt and if we raise one hundred million americans across the country we will demand his resignation or pressure of the house and senate to come for his impeachment on trees and from other than calling for barack obama to leave office they are also demanding that the usa shall not support al qaeda the debt ceiling shall not be raised and the national security agency surveillance of the entire world communications must cease among other they're calling this a gas it roots campaign they probably have one hundred fifty thousand likes on facebook and they have lost

a twitter campaign and hash tag t two s t a s r truckers to shut down and america this is day one of their four day campaign they haven't quite shut down the country but they are tuning their horns loudly and they have been heard in washington d.c. . parian boring party. and in a surprise move by the nobel peace prize committee the organization for the prohibition of chemical weapons also known as the o.p.c. w. has been named the winner of this year's nobel peace prize the committee announced the award this morning in oslo noting the group's quote extensive efforts to eliminate chemical weapons though it seems odd to award an organization instead of an individual this is in fact the twenty second time that a group has taken the top prize last year the highly coveted award was given to the european union to further explain its decision the committee has said quote the conventions and the work of the o.p.c. w. have defined the use of chemical weapons as a taboo under international law recent events in syria where chemical weapons have

again been put to use have underlined the need to enhance the efforts to do away with such weapons the nobel committee states that this award was not given as a direct result of the group's result in syria efforts in syria excuse me however the organization's current work in syria stands as one of the largest endeavors it has taken for out its longstanding efforts to eradicate chemical weapons worldwide and that does it for now for more on the stories we covered today go to youtube dot com ford slash r.t. america and check out our web site r t dot com ford slash usa you can also follow me on twitter at a mirror david see you right back here at five thanks for watching. i think.

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