subtle moves. coming up on our t.v. is stopping the n.s.a. california lawmakers propose a bill to curb n.s.a. snooping the bill blocks state agencies from cooperating with the n.s.a. will other states join in this effort to stop government spying the latest for this push for privacy ahead. and although the u.s. war in iraq ended two years ago al qaeda has taken over the city of fallujah the u.s. is sending drones to the iraqi government but not troops at least for now what this means for the region coming up. and did you hear about the polar vortex if you turn on the t.v. this week you've seen the mainstream media of sassing over the cold will take a look at how the media has made this cold weather ops story later in the show.

it's wednesday january eighth five pm here in washington d.c. i'm liz wall and you're watching our. the follow from the edward snowden revelations continues at most some of the most significant changes could first be happening in the states in california state lawmakers have introduced a bill that would ban state agencies from working with the national security agency the bill aimed to prevent the n.s.a. from spying on californians it would do this by denying n.s.a. facilities in the state access to basic utilities like electricity and water the bill also bans officials and agencies from cooperating with the n.s.a. those of violate the rules would be slapped with sanctions and a press release senator ted lieu who introduced the bill says quote state funded public resources should not be going toward aiding the n.s.a.

or any other federal agency from indiscriminate spying on its own citizens and gathering electronic met electronic or metadata that violates the fourth amendment for more on the bill that takes a firm stance against the feds i spoke with to head to tar executive director of the bill of rights defense committee my first answer if he could talk more about the goal of this bill. the goal of the bill is to force accountability on the n.s.a. the courts have abdicated their role of sensually of guarding constitutional rights congress has been abysmally dysfunctional and guarding the constitution and passing either legislative checks to restrain executive abuses or effect conducting effective oversight this bill is a state taking the matter into its own hands and it aims to cut off the water cut off the electricity cut off the prosecutors and cut off the universities as sources of talent to fuel the n.s.a.'s next generation it's a very aggressive opportunity for other states also to raise their voices and i

suspect the california will not be the last state and which will see this bill as a very aggressive very bold move first state government to take on a massive agency federal agency like the n.s.a. and i disagree you think it's realistic absolutely and i wouldn't describe it as particularly bold at all i mean if anything that california is asserting a constitutional position while the rest of d.c. is asserting basically a chinese or a soviet position and this is not a left right issue illustrated by the introduction of the bill it was both a democratic and republican state senator who teamed up to introduce it reflecting that this is not at all a fringe issue this is an issue that unites americans from all walks of life all points on the political spectrum and i daresay all corners of our great nation and again we will see this also introduced in other states the particular ones where i think the controversy will be greatest are the states in which the n.s.a. has data centers so utah maryland to figure very prominently in this campaign and i think that that's where the real battle lines will be drawn and in those states

people have also been quite assertive you know residents of maryland were dropping twelve foot banners off a highway overpass outside the n.s.a.'s front entrance saying save america close the n.s.a. over the holidays with dissent like that from so many different corners i don't think the agency can withstand the public pressure and the last thing i'd say is even if for whatever reason you know if it's deemed to be an overreach by a judge somewhere what this legislation can. be very effective in doing is revealing that the congressional and federal emperor has no clothes and forcing congress forcing the courts to take a long overdue action to defend constitutional principles and restrain the n.s.a. well certainly we're seeing demands for action like never before in the wake of these revelations by at weren't so i would add do you think that we would be having this conversation now if it were not for the. massive leak that we're seeing now there's no question we absolutely would not it's the exact same situation as cointelpro in a just earlier this week the peace activists who under oath the f.b.i.

is domestic spying operations forty years ago revealed themselves you know snowden revealed himself a week after his leak broke instead of forty years but otherwise it's the exact same thing what they're leak prompted was a two year congressional investigation which caught the nation's intelligence agencies embroiled in a full frontal assault on the constitution here we are forty years later it's a different federal agency committing a very similarly broad abuse in fact a far greater abuse right the f.b.i. was simply suppressing activist groups of all different kinds you know the movement and the war in vietnam the movement for women's rights movement for native american rights the puerto rican independence movement you name it whereas the n.s.a. is monitoring everyone everywhere at times i mean it's preposterous quite frankly so yeah absolutely edward snowden is a hero and you had mentioned earlier that on a federal level of reforms have been slow to transpire do you think that this is kind of the way that it's going to go that change is going to be to happen on

a state level first do you think this could set a precedent for other states to policy that absolutely could set a precedent for other states i think ultimately as to whether or not it's the state mechanisms the come to control domestic spying it that's really up to congress whether or not congress gets off its hands and passes a far reaching dramatic reform like the usa freedom act or better yet the surveillance state repeal. that would take the matter out of the state's hands i think states will be much less interested in passing these kinds of bills after there are some assurances that someone is minding the store in washington at the moment nobody is interesting and now we're seeing this debate happen in the national dialogue about transparency about privacy like never before i want to bring some kind of related developments later this year car manufacturers will be required to install black boxes in all a new vehicles kind of like the black boxes you hear about after a plane crash the intention is to gather data. in government investigations

insurance companies etc to determine what led up to the car accident so it sounds like a good thing in that regards but the worry now in the wake of these revelations is could this be another avenue for a surveillance there's no question that any kind of geo tracking device like the g.p.s. devices the police use or this kind of device or for that matter aerial surveillance drones or automatic license plate scanners all you know the latter two of which are in widespread use by local police departments around the country those tools can absolutely be used to violate people's rights particularly by chilling the willingness of people to come out in public for instance to a political demonstration or a meeting these are assaults not on the rights of individuals who may or may not feel like they have something to hide this is an assault on democracy fundamental rights that enable our political process and we should all feel very concerted. that wish i had the tar executive director of the bill of rights defense committee

. of the u.s. war in iraq may have ended two years ago but the country remains a war zone the u.s. is rushing to send drones and other weapons to the iraqi government after al qaeda linked militants claimed the city of fallujah are to correspondent paula slayer has more on the struggle for power. well the situation certainly is becoming increasingly volatile but we've now heard from the iraqi prime minister it is him urging all those who have joined a kind of to give up the fight he has hinted at the possibility of hardening these militants if indeed they do so they are facing a massive siege that has been launched by the government troops now i think he was speaking in his weekly televised address and he evolved in that address to continue what he calls the sacred war against al qaida is the local branch which is known as the state in iraq and they live and he also said that he would continue to finish

the push to retake the key and vast cities of the new jet and ramadi which earlier were taken over by the militants and that the militants had a commitment from lucia as they look independent states what we see happening now is that al qaeda linked militants are trying to capitalize on the six hereon tension that is currently inside iraq and this is a tension that the united states failed to resolve you'll remember of course that the united states occupied iraq for eight years and then called out leaving behind this major sick tarion power of the cake at the same time some of the al qaida in its militants who are now fighting in iraq all reports with me coming from across the border in syria now of course the united states has been supporting the syrian opposition which inadvertently has allowed these extremists and islamist militants to flourish in the first place the united states is now saying that it will be sending an emergency shipment of surveillance drones and missiles to iraq in an

attempt to try and prop up its allies in baghdad. that was artie's paulus leader sock more about the fight for flu shot i'm joined now by jake dillard barito political researcher at the university of birmingham hello there jake so there are many people died and wounded in full lucia as a veteran yourself what's going through your mind do you feel like it was worth it . well i think i think i think that the story of the iraq war is very clear the war were initially objectives united states did not achieve them there was no mass weapons of mass destruction the war in general failed to stabilize iraq because if you look at today arac is twice as more violent as a places like afghanistan or something like this. and i think that overall the maliki government and every other government in the future is going to have very difficult problems with these non-state groups such as al qaida and the largely

it's because of complete distrust within the government and the people because of the greater part of sixty years of government abuse prior with saddam hussein so the war wasn't worth it and i just would like to make a point on this developing of al qaida that when we went in to do the surge with general petraeus in two thousand and seven al-qaeda we were able to suppress al qaida were able to manipulate al qaida to go away however they simply went into latency they were never exactly defeated in the sense of putting a white flag up and surrendering they just went back into the shadows hiding waiting for the united states to leak so i think that there was a lot of missed and a lot of mystification about what exactly the surge did the surge did bring violence down but it didn't defeat al qaeda it just pushed al qaeda into latency which is why we see reemerge and what you're saying is basically it was a matter of time before we got into the situation that we are in today yes it

precisely it was only a matter of time and there's not really much that the obama administration could have done because the sofa was agreed to under the bush administration which took us troops out of iraq there is nothing we could do because iraqis didn't want us there anymore and now this is something that they had to deal with themselves resurgence of al qaida in fallujah is akin to a couple reasons one is because there's been abuses. by. these large the shia government that has kind of isolated alienated the sunni populations within anbar and on this attempt of al qaeda to come back is an attempt to sort of reinvigorate some tensions within the sunni and shia populations so there's a general genuine trend that we didn't resolve in two thousand and seven either there is just another myth that somehow betray us women and fix the ongoing tensions no we simply kick the can down the road for them to really surface later

on yeah you know people in the military members of the air force that are very disappointed in his heart and who lost people that we are where we are today basically slipping back what do we do now i mean is there any clear solution what action if any should the u.s. take. well i think i think for sure that there's a series of things united states used to do and that's one staying out of assyria staying out of iraq with our troops staying out of domestic political problems because at the end of the day these are only situations that local syrians or iraqis can fix and can bring solution to are the second thing is i do think that there is a general interest within syrians iraqis and burberry pretty much everyone in the gulf to suppress al qaeda and stop al qaeda from being a dog running around the neighborhood peeing all over the place putting up black flags making their territory so pretty assisting with intelligence assisting with

aid and development sort of helping on a tribal uprising to push al qaeda out is a kind of things that the state department can do very good and the state department should be empowered to do but however i'm looking at military solutions here. to policing a military component really needs to be done by iraqis and that because if it's trying to buy done by a foreign force it's going to make the situation worse they're going to bring have some related news that's causing quite a controversy right now this new book out from former secretary of defense robert gates gates and gave some scathing critique of the obama administration and his new new book we're going to read a quote from it there the book is entitled duty memoirs of a secret memoirs of a secretary of war excuse me quote hillary told the president and her opposition to the two thousand and seven surge in iraq had been political because she was facing him in the iowa primary the president conceded vaguely that the opposition to the

iraq surge had been political to hear the two of them making the as an missions and in front of may was as surprising as it was dismaying so kind of revealing there that he saw firsthand this political game even when it comes to war here how do you feel about this say about how damaging is it to the administration and really should it come as a shock. well i i've never made any bones about my personal belief i think that the obama administration's foreign policy wise is a step up from the bush administration but still very much lackluster performance there's no mystery that the bush administration that the obama sort of cabinet had disputes about politically about everything between the invasion of iraq surge everything else and i generally think that secretary gates was a really stand up individual who gave really really good critique inside and i think this book points out his general distaste of how the cabinet structure itself

i think that secretary clinton and president obama definitely disputed with each other on foreign policy matters merely for politics because if you look at the two of them there's no doubt that obama and hillary simply wanted to win elections that is why that they voted the way they did that is why they've conducted their foreign policy the way it has never ever been in my opinion so sort of. segmented analysis about how the best way to proceed forward in the war on terror because you look at obama's but you look at obama wars by by bob woodward the bob administration is simply conducted its foreign policy based on domestic appeal within the united states and has never been about successfully accomplishing the task or convening with military officials and making some sort of can call me at results. for the basically for our generation and we are going to have to leave it

there but appreciate you coming on the show jacob. clinical research at the university of birmingham thank you. well they were held as the nation's bravest and finest the new allegations say it was all a scam over one hundred public workers including new york city police officers and firefighters are accused of faking depression and anxiety after responding to the september eleventh attacks prosecutors say they were coached to tell military doctors that they were permanently scarred from the tragedy but recorded phone calls and photographs found on their facebook pages paints a much different picture take a look you can see the former members of law enforcement living it up jet skiing golfing taking joy rides on motorcycles shooting seven hoops and more prosecutors say the men made everything up in order to collect social security benefits the lawsuit alleges that some of them continue to work jobs on the side they say the

former officers are perfectly fine and have fraudulently benefited from hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars the lawyers for the accused maintain that the clients were suffering from mental health problems more arrests are expected in this case. and in orange county california closing arguments continue in the case against two police officers accused of beating a man to death kelly thomas' last moments were captured on surveillance video and the footage has been used as evidence throughout the trial but this isn't the only video surfacing that alleges police brutality artie's meghan lopez has more today the family of keith vital is searching for answers after police shot and killed their eighteen year old skids. spring lake's police officers were called to the home of mark and mary wills lee the night of january fifth to help them subdue the ninety pound teenager who had a small screwdriver in his hand when they arrive police taste and then just seventy

seconds into the confrontation shot and killed keith now this north carolina family wants to know why the three officers resorted to such extreme measures have you ever buried a child i have i know how hard it is ok i'm burying my second child because somebody murdered him and this was uncalled for and this is not how mental health patients should be treated this is just one of numerous allegations of brutality coming out from across the country this week on monday a number ask a family filed a lawsuit against thirty two omaha police officers after an alleged parking violation turned violent back in march this youtube video allegedly shows four officers reporting to a complaint of an illegally parked truck twenty eight year old octavius johnson the owner of the truck is then slammed to the ground. he was later charged with

resisting arrest and disorderly conduct his brothers john and demetrius were also arrested and charged while filming the answered and the family claims the officers violated their constitutional rights when they broke into the house and confiscated one video of the confrontation one officer has been temporarily reassigned as a result of this video the a.c.l.u. is helping the family with the lawsuit meanwhile in new hampshire three seabrooke police officers are on paid administrative leave after this two thousand and nine a rest video went viral monday on you tube the video shows nineteen year old michael berger in having his face slammed into a wall by police officers after leaving the booking room he is then pushed down to the floor and pepper sprayed one of the officers even takes a moment to look up and smile for the camera burglar and was arrested on charges of driving under the influence possession of controlled drugs and resisting arrest

a police report describes him as aggressive and uncooperative the incident is now under investigation by the attorney general's office berger and is considering a lawsuit against the officers. all three of these incidents are making headlines at the same time as this ninety nine percent of all complaints over police brutality are left and investigated in new jersey that's according to a report published this week by the courier news and home news tribune the report claims that between two thousand and eight and two thousand and twelve citizens filed hundreds of complaints alleging police brutality bias and civil rights violations only one percent were investigated and the other ninety nine percent police agencies reportedly either exonerated the officers dismissed the complaints as frivolous determine that they did not have sufficient evidence or simply never closed the investigation so what if anything is being done to confront the issue of

excessive force well for now anyway it's up to individual police departments or regulate the actions of their officers watchdog groups like the a.c.l.u. are also keeping a close eye on police departments but perhaps the biggest agent of change is your cell phone after all a picture speaks a thousand words but one viral video can mean the difference between action and non-action in washington meghan lopez r t. well as you probably know it's been cold out but in case you haven't noticed the media was there to remind you just how cold it's bed with the wall to wall coverage are to correspondent on the. explores if the media needs to chill out. more talked about in the u.s. media than the most ridiculous celebrity baby name and the royal wedding combined it's called a polar vortex the polar vortex the polar vortex the polar vortex more frightening than your worst nightmare a whirlpool of dense frigid arctic air ladies and gentlemen meet the cold cold hell

if you can imagine so it is the coldest it has been decades every thirty seconds and all it's really cold out this is the most important mainstream news story for days on end we have a team of correspondents covering this arctic blast it's really obvious that it's cold but just to keep your journalistic integrity you want to first hand account of how cold it is and if a mailman is all bundled up saying yeah it's cold then you know it's actually called here's a hamburger and a steak even though there's really only that much to eventually talk about how does your skin doing since weather is weather no matter how hard you try to keep your attention look at this is aluminum not as deep as chicago pizza hard as a rock you could use this as a weapon if you wanted to ok temperatures dropping to subzero extremes it is a rare occurrence in certain parts of the us but amping it up like there is no tomorrow might be a tad over exaggerated you go through to remember other people know it's cold people know they shouldn't go outside you don't need to go on and on and on and on

and meanwhile the really really important news is that not getting covered then again weather coverage doesn't require bringing up the truly unpleasant you don't to worry about the confusing stuff the stuff with new ones like the syrian civil war like the pros and cons of genetically modified food you just walk outside and go by examples or heart as a result other countries are rolling their eyes at us because we're complaining that it's cold but they're also rolling their eyes at us about everything else it looks like the us mainstream media are taking their tips from an old piece of advice if you don't know what to say just talk about the weather and if they are too. perhaps now more than ever the issue of government secrecy is up for debate and a local station here in d.c. has proved that secrecy is pushed as part of policy and b c for washington's investigative reporter scott mcfarlane put in a freedom of information act request to get some details on the navy yard shooting

their response was an accidental e-mail sent to the reporter from the navy press officer clearly meant for other navy members and not for media eyes in it the navy official urges his colleagues to deflect and avoid the requests from n.b.c. for quote in the memo navy official robin patterson refers to the reporter's requests for navy yard materials as a quote fishing expedition and the memo patterson also suggests staff encouraged mcfarlane to narrow his request for official navy memoranda by convincing the reporter his search would be costly while with unprecedented questions over government transparency accidents like this certainly help feed the scrutiny. of the number one new year's resolution is to lose weight and so it's a night's president looks at a new surgical procedure that may help them. one

than one third of u.s. adults are clinically obese and yet according to market data america has one hundred meat million dieters revenues for the weight loss industry are over sixty billion dollars so we're all obese but we're all diety because we want to look like movie stars and we just can't seem to lose that weight that's the conundrum and a plastic surgeon has an answer for it that is nothing short of amazing and he's offering a procedure where he implant a hard plastic mesh things into a person's tongue that makes it incredibly painful to eat and he's solid food he

implants it for two thousand dollars a person follows a strict liquids only diet for one month they lose a ton of weight and then the match implant is removed there are movies to our doctor should get the cosmetic surgeon who introduced the procedure in the u.s. so the procedure is not unhealthy at all he says it's all about interrupting patterns like when patients throw of ding dongs into their mouths they'll be inundated with terrible pain which will make them stop and think for a second hey i probably shouldn't eat any more horrible ding dongs that's why i have this mess pat. now obesity is a complex social economic issue a lot of it is that people don't have the education or information about just how crappy our polluted is and how to find ways to eat healthy and it's also a time issue when you have to work two jobs just to pay rent it's like more and more americans have to you know. the time or the money to crisp up some kale chips

or tended to your hydroponic garden but this story has nothing to do with any of that because if you're too poor to eat organic or to over of work to have the time to cook then you certainly don't have two thousand dollars to blow on the plastic surgery procedure this story is about how far america has come and it's idiotic relationships with food and body image people who get this done you don't have strong food addictions and need intensive therapy not plastic surgery or they're asleep at the wheel sheeple who have disposable income and want to quick fix doubt that look like a movie star and i don't like to sleep people here are do many of them in this country so i kind of hope this tongue procedure not only messes up their ability to eat but it also interferes with their ability to talk at least for a month because anything that anyone who gets this done has to say is bound to be

as easy as the procedure itself tonight let's talk about that by following me on twitter at the resident. well that's going to do it for now for more on the stories we covered check out our website our you tube channel first go there first youtube dot com slash r t america our web site r t dot com slash usa and follow me on twitter as well see you back here at eight pm. dramas that can't be ignored. stories of those who refuse to notice a. change in the world right now. to make sure folks day's news. poll does not from around the globe.

proclaim don't get me. dangerous entanglements in contradictory alliances is the us housing asli hostage to its many client states how well do these fine states and alliances serve america's national geo political interests and is washington hopelessly overstretched in its foreign policy commitments. i have. a site that i'm a big corporation trying to. do and say. all this all about money and i'm a vastly sick for a politician write a lot of things that. there's just too much.