much stronger a no holds barred look at the global financial headlines. reports. coming up on our t.v. another u.s. drone attack on yemeni soil and another potential mistake that's comes while some members of congress disagree with president obama over whether the pentagon or the cia should control the u.s. drone program that story right ahead and a two p.p. trade deal could benefit hollywood internet activists worry that the pack will put too much power in the hands of the entertainment industry we'll tell you more coming up. and it's been one week since the chemical spill and west virginia's elk river officials have told residents it's all right to drink water unless you're pregnant or have an update on the week later in the show.

it's thursday january sixteenth five pm in washington d.c. and we are david and you're watching our t.v. we begin today with the news that another innocent civilian has become the victim of a u.s. drone strike in yemen the attack was thought to have been intended for suspected islamist militants in the southeastern part of the country however it took the life of a farmer instead witnesses say the farmer had been walking home in the village of a how to early wednesday when he was abruptly killed by the shrapnel of two rockets according to reuters a local government official has confirmed the report but as declining to give further details this attack comes just a month after the massive drone strike killed at least fifteen people travelling in a wedding convoy human rights organizations argue that there were no islamic militants in that convoy and that only recent innocent civilians were targeted these are just two of the most recent drone attacks that have contributed to a heightened concern amongst yemenis and those in the international community. over

the cia's controversial and classified drone warfare program but this news comes just as congress is trying to make it more difficult to bring transparency to the program according to the washington post congress inserted a secret provision and a massive government spending bill introduced this week that keeps lethal counterterrorism operations under the umbrella of the cia well it's still unknown what is exactly in the provision that allegedly prohibits funding from being used to transfer unmanned aircraft from the cia to the pentagon now here to talk about these latest developments on the implications going forward i'm joined by marine shah an advocacy advisor at amnesty usa thanks for joining me thanks for having me so in two thousand and thirteen there was a lot of buzz about the idea that the drone program could switch from the jurisdiction of the cia to the defense department president obama himself really wanted to see this happen here we are with this provision you know what happened bottom line is that congress is not invested in the in getting this program of the

hands of the cia and out of the hands of a secretive agency the department of defense runs a drone program we think in yemen the cia has a drone program we think in pakistan but neither of these organizations is running the program with any kind of accountability to the public about potentially a lawful civilian casualties well the pentagon does have some strong checks and balances that would certainly be more visible in the cia or so you would think do you think it's possible that congress is really trying to keep this program in the dark i think there are certain members of congress who don't see the need to end the secrecy of the program but we're talking about using lethal force around the globe with drone technology and not telling you earlier national community or the american public what's going on who's being killed absolutely and this is not only a funding issue i mean the provision allegedly could do more than just place restrictions on funding what else could be in an approach appropriations bill that could determine how the drone program is controlled well the problem. here is that

we're talking about a classified enix a lot of lawmakers didn't even know that this secret enix and this provision were going was going to be inserted into the appropriations bill we haven't even seen debate in congress about whether this is a good thing so we've got senator john mccain raising questions about it and why it was kept so secret in fundamentally about what the program's all about it's about operating and using lethal force around the world without informing anybody about what's going on and interestingly it's not just president obama who addressed some concern over this even the cia director john brennan and specifically warned that the drone program in some ways is sort of diverting the cia from its primary mission of intelligence gathering. you know can you talk about sort of how the role of the cia is really sort of changed over the years take on this this drone warfare program you know the cia has a record of human rights abuses whether it's torture or secret detention and not only has it committed abuses but it's trying to evade accountability for those abuses so for us to put lethal force that kind of power in the hands of a secretive spy agency it really raises some questions now the military has also

been really secretive about civilian casualties hasn't been willing to say whether in these yemen drone strikes civilians have died or whether it's investigated bottom line be administration needs to commit to reform and if congress is getting in the way of that then there's really a struggle that needs to be had and the administration needs to push back can the administration do anything at this point i mean president obama make a directive and you know can he take sort of unilateral action on this president obama can send people to the hill to talk to members of congress and get this straightened out but what we haven't seen in the last six months is a real push from the administration to end the secrecy about drone strikes it's hard to give away power once you take it but that's fundamentally important to a program that's setting a precedent not only in the united states but around the world did we see a change at all after his speech that he gave his very powerful speech in may of two thousand and thirteen at the national defense university was a trend you know going away from drone strikes or did we see you know. what was the

transport of when it comes to the drummer for a program after that there are few reported drone strikes and that may two thousand and thirteen speech but we don't actually know who is being killed in those strikes and certainly the waiting drone strike of last month where fifteen people were killed raises a lot of questions about whether the rules president obama announced are actually being followed and of course it's incredibly hard to hold the administration accountable to its promises more it won't even tell us what's actually happening and we know that you know the jurisdiction is probably likely to stay under the cia so like you were just mentioning right now you know when we have these drone attacks abroad such as the one in convoy isn't it just so easy then for the cia to say well you know this we can't release this information because it would compromise intelligence and then therefore we get no transparency whatsoever the fact is that that when the u.s. military operates in other parts of the world including afghanistan and iraq it faces a lot of public scrutiny about its actions and the response that public scrutiny it's developed over time an ability to answer the questions investigate acknowledge

what's happening so that when a family sees that it's family members killed it's not just met with silence it's met with some kind of investigation we haven't seen that from the cia and that's because fundamentally they're an agency that operates outside of the law and outside of public accountability well it seems like congress has already passed this sweepingly three fifty nine to sixty seven and then the senate is supposed to vote on it this week and then it supposed to be voted by the president and mean do you think unless the administration comes forward and does something it's pretty much a move forward at this point i don't think it's the end of the ballgame i think there's lots of members of congress who are incredibly concerned about civilian casualties from drone strikes who aren't sold on the idea that the cia should be running the show and should be doing it so secretly thank you so much and i mean shah advocacy advisor at amnesty usa thanks for having me. and what that n.s.a. revelations role we're just learning that the national security agency has collected almost two hundred million text messages a day from across the globe using them to record specific flight the date time and

location of messages sent dissolved of course a result of a joint investigation conducted between the guardian and the u.k.'s channel four news and it's all based off of material provided by former government contractor edward snowden also in the documents are revelations that the u.k. spy agency the g c h q has been using the n.s.a. database to search the private communications of people in the u.k. the n.s.a. programs combing was dish fire and according to g.c. h.q. documents the goal was to collect pretty much everything it can and that means it was used to extract all kinds of information including people's travel plans contact books and even financial transactions this revelation comes just a day before president obama's expected speech on possible changes to n.s.a. surveillance rules americans are waiting to hear what reforms will be made to n.s.a. programs but foreign governments are interested too when leaks files from the agency revealed that the u.s. had been spying on germany's uncle emerge all the german government was furious

comparing the practices to those of east germany's notorious secret police artie's peter all over met with a veteran of that service to find out just how similar the two really are. on finding out that the united states attempt to play that mobile phone call confronted president obama this claim. former offices in the east german secret police which was known as the stars of a warning for the n.s.a. if they think must surveillance is the solution to a nation's problems and who quote if it's even the best qualified and most advanced secret service cannot save the state we showed you that away from the professed shock of the politicians at the n.s.a. spying ability how does it compare with the actions of the east german secret services during the cold war this can now is truly this is exactly as illegal or

some of the tactics that the stasi used to employ it is a breach of human rights but the government machine is so powerful that you can't stop it edward snowden's leaks about the shape and scope of n.s.a. surveillance showing germany as one of the top targets for u.s. snooping again high up on top of the ominously named devil's mountain life the remnants of the last major n.s.a. spying program to look into the private lives of the people of berlin or it's a bond and now back in the day this post with ears to listen in on the private phone calls of thousands of citizens and both the east and the west of the city then it was thousands of calls now it's millions sometimes tens of millions of data connections that are tracked and logged with them electronic the way they do it now is much more intensive your web browsing history credit cards they can build

a profile on you way easier than was ever possible in my day. didn't have access to this type of technology they relied on developing personal contacts when distance version or even those who were working in counterintelligence in the west were ours even they said it we were pretty good even then the fear of being listened into is taken seriously as one former officer charged with looking into nato told us human those fry asked my superior officer is there any trick. knowledge for those i can use to stop eavesdropping on my calls is no answer yes just don't pick it up these veterans of the spy game might be impressed by the capabilities of the n.s.a. but they're cautious about the quality of the information collected for dozens of ships they relied too much on technology that technology might let you locate a person or listen to their calls it doesn't let you know what they think with the usa doing all it can to justify its intelligence gathering the operation dubbed two

point zero by critics looks set to continue for some time yet peter all of a r.t. germany. and believe it or not penis pumps cost the u.s. government one hundred seventy two million dollars between two thousand and six and two thousand and twelve which is about twice the amount the consumer would have paid at the retail level this is all according to a new government watchdog report released by the inspector general for guarding spending by the department of health and human services the report shows that medicare the government health insurance system for seniors paid for nearly four hundred seventy four thousand claims for vacuum erection systems also known as vs take a look at this over a six year period early yearly claims for the devices nearly doubled from twenty point six million in two thousand and six to thirty eight point six million in two thousand and eleven government waste is an issue that's taking the forefront as lawmakers try to reach an agreement on

a one trillion dollars spending bill to talk about some of this overspending and where we could maybe be saving a little bit more money i spoke with tom schatz president of citizens against government waste i first asked him why medicare is paying more than the retail value there's no reason that they should be they knew about this disparity in one thousand nine hundred eighteen and medicare is capable of setting a special payment limit for something that is grossly excessive compared to other costs for other devices veterans department pays about half of what medicare pays for these devices and the private sector pays even less so how do we ensure a more competitive bidding process here america's has had trouble with competitive bidding for durable medical equipment which is where this falls into in terms of the category there was a change in the law a few years ago they're having trouble of course getting this off the ground this particular item is not covered but they don't need congressional authority for

competitive bidding they can just set the price and say what we're paying is far too much because clearly what everyone else is paying seems to be enough to keep those devices around but interestingly they haven't done. for the past fifteen years the question is why are they not exercising this authority they have a lot of things that they are doing they probably haven't paid attention takes a report by their own inspector general to bring this to light and it's now that it is out front hopefully they will start taking it more seriously and possibly that is not a lot of money but eighteen million dollars a year for them four and a half million for the beneficiaries but it's real money to taxpayers and the people that need these devices well the of taxpayers i think a lot of them would be surprised to learn that the vacuum erection system is a covered medical device how does the agency determine which items are medically necessary and which aren't going to judge what they consider necessary that's a separate discussion but they do provide by aggregate to medicare beneficiaries

sixty five recently not that old right but and i think of a physician says it's medically necessary that is one of the ways that medicare judges whether to provide any kind of drug or device right well a lot of people will look at the story and just last but it does you know shed light on a much bigger issue of government waste when it comes to health i mean why is there so much money being spent on this particular area when it could be perhaps you know better spent on lifesaving treatment and equipment to better serve seniors well again it's a question of what the medical necessity is of a lot of different things that some people might not need but others do need and that's a judgment that may be second guessed by congress as they say they can cover certain devices but the medical field is so large and there are so many things that people need it's constantly being reviewed sure well that's certainly a field for which there could be some cutbacks but i know you probably research many other fields that are due for some spending cuts can you talk about some other

things on your agenda absolutely the appropriations bill for this current fiscal year two thousand and fourteen is on the way to be approved in the senate was approved in the house there or here. marks or pork barrel spending in that bill even though congress claims they've eliminated these earmarks hundreds of billions possibly billions it's much better than it used to be but nonetheless there's wasteful spending everywhere duplications an overlap hundreds of billions a year in duplicative programs that congress want to eliminate so there's plenty of work for us to do and what would you propose going forward to remedy the problem so the easiest way to reduce spending is to eliminate the duplications and overlap there are more than two hundred science and math education programs yet the achievement of science and math students in the u.s. isn't any better than it was ten years ago compared to the rest of the world in fact it's probably getting worse so spending money doesn't solve the problem congress should solve the problem and then figure out how much needs to be spending to get rid of a lot of these duplicated programs all said well tom schatz president of citizens

against government waste thank you thank you and this morning the senate finance committee how the hearing about the so-called fast track authority which would allow trade deals to pass through congress with a simple yes or no vote rather than letting legislators add or take away from the deal this fast track authority would then apply to the trans-pacific partnership a pact under negotiation between the twelve countries on the pacific rim including the u.s. three of the witnesses at the hearing represented business interests and spoke favorably about the tepee and other free trade deals. ultimately free trade is best for every economy economic growth and job creation at home depend on our ability to sell american goods and services to the ninety five percent of the world's customers living outside of the u.s. only one witness raise concerns about negotiations like. what has the net effect been of twenty years of these trade deals what has happened to our jobs our

communities in north philadelphia that i grew up in cleveland and i can picture right now devastation throughout those communities nowhere near the replacement jobs for that more than seven hundred thousand jobs lost from nafta alone but one interest group that's been supportive of the tepee is hollywood and industry which has launched a full scale assault on online piracy so why is hollywood pushing for this trade deal artie's among the lindo has a story. hollywood is the land of glitz and glamour where superstars are made hollywood is also a big money industry with a major role in d.c. politics and the future of the internet they want to raise quote unquote protection for copyright. in a way that many harmes users write online as the entertainment industry pushes for tighter copyright laws on the web hollywood is hoping that the u.s. government will help fight its battles public and online outcry help beat the stop

online piracy act or sopa from passing through congress but trade agreements like the trans-pacific partnership could be a backdoor way for hollywood to get what it wants powerful hollywood interests failed to push controversial sopa legislation through congress now supporters of the free internet are worried that some of the same provisions that were in sopa are being included in the trans-pacific partnership. the. defenders of digital rights feel the trade deal could undermine free speech on the internet turning service providers into copyright cops and when that happening is. actually woke up and down because there's no consideration for whether there is a fair use so users have a right to use content and commentary that occasional etc advocates of the free web feel that media consolidation is part of the problem. there are a few gate keepers controlling. sets majority of media in this country you could

buy your way into politics he'd use money to support people as well in the present a great threat to democracy in the united states can dot com the founder of the file sharing site make upload was arrested in new zealand based on an american criminal copyright indictment when he talked to r t he claimed the indictment was based on politics you know they had to be some kind of plan and i turned it to four soap opera. because the president certainly was aware and his team in the white house was aware if they don't have anything to give at those fundraisers to those guys in hollywood who are eager to you know have more control over the internet he wouldn't probably raise that much and you know hollywood is a very important contributor to bombers come pain organizations like the electronic frontier foundation even google has spoken out against hollywood's copyright crackdown efforts as the entertainment industry fights to protect its profits the

worry remains that it could at the cost of a free internet. in los angeles remodeling the party. well the last fifteen minutes of dennis mcguire's life were filled with gasps and snorting noises according to the witnesses who watched him die mcguire was executed by the state of ohio earlier today for the rape and murder of a pregnant woman in one nine hundred eighty nine the combination of drugs used to kill him had never been tested before and led to one of the longest executions in ohio since a reinstated the death penalty more than a decade ago ohio innovated with the new form of the lethal injection because the manufacturer of the previously used drug pentobarbital has barred its use in capital punishment prison officials throughout the country are dealing with the pentobarbital shortage but different methods for lethal injection maguire's lawyers tried to argue that this untested drug combination could result in

a violation of the eighth amendment against cruel and unusual punishment but a federal judge allowed the execution to move forward with a new execution method executions using panel barbara reportedly took last time and the condemned did not gasp or cough as mcguire did. and still ahead here on our t.v. it's been one week since that chemical spill in west virginia and some people are still without water and. date on the spill right after the break. we welcome erin eight and abby martin two two a precocious on the art team network. it's going to give you a different perspective give you one star never i'll give you the information you make the decision. breaking this the revolution of the mind it's a revolution of ideas and consciousness and frustrated with the system extremely probably would be described as angry i think in a strong. or single. i've

got a quote for you. it's pretty tough to. say where it's not story. but if this guy like you would smear that guy's stead of working for the people most missions the mainstream media were pretty much on the bridegroom's vision. of a good run but it won't. but i think. everybody will be curious to know did you know the price is the only industry specifically mention in the constitution and i think that's because a free and open press is critical to our democracy correct albus. in fact the single biggest threat facing our nation today is because for the takeover of our government and across the pacific we've been hijacked why handful of

transnational corporations that will profit by destroying what our founding fathers one school class i'm tom are in on this show we reveal the big picture of what's actually going on in the world we go beyond identifying the problem. rational debate and real discussion critical issues facing america if i ever feel ready to join the movement then walk a bit. i would rather ask questions to people in positions of power instead of speaking on their behalf and that's why you can find my show larry king now right here on our

t.v. . question. and today marks one week since the toxic chemical began to leak into west virginia's water supply all some people have been cleared to return to drinking the tap water health officials are still advising the pregnant women who live in the affected areas to refrain from doing so and instead drink bottled water but for more on what's happening in west virginia let's go to our tease megan lopez. a warning to pregnant women in west virginia don't drink the water that's the latest report coming out from the west virginia department of health and human resources bureau for public health a statement released today says quote due to the limited availability of data and out of an abundance of caution you may wish to consider an alternative drinking water source for pregnant women until

a chemical is that non detectable levels in the water distribution system now today marks the one week anniversary of the day that authorities first noticed thousands of gallons of for meth the cycle hexane methanol spilling into the elk river from freedom industries but water ban has been lifted for about seventy percent of the three hundred thousand residents in the area but even if the pregnant women fall within that category they are still encouraged not to drink the water from the system because there might be trace amounts of the chemical left in it now the problem started near the elk river right here and then it connects to the ohio river which travels south to kentucky and beyond west virginia investigators insist that the levels of m. c.h.m. will be so diluted by the time that it reaches all of those states that the water will be safe but northern kentucky water district authorities and the greater cincinnati waterworks have closed their water intakes on the ohio river just as

a precaution problems continue to plague freedom industries as a company tries to clean up the chemical spill and seem of inspectors for the state department of environmental protection cited the company for fine but violations at the secondary storage facility where the chemicals were moved on friday its inspection report the d.p. said quote secondary containment within the facility was deteriorated or non-existent the plan indicates that the building itself acts as a secondary containment but a hole does exist at floor level in the building's walls the problem is so serious that freedom. might be forced to move its inventory of m.c.h. of chemical to a third a storage plant in order to avoid another catastrophe meanwhile west virginia authorities released documents from two thousand and ten saying that local residents complained of a licorice smell in the air near the elk river plant site so this might not be the first time that the plant has experienced issues containing him c.h.m.

in the storage of that there are of federal and local of us to gators have launched probes looking into the health effects criminal negligence and economic losses following the leak u.s. senator jay rockefeller asked for the center of disease control to conduct a study on the long term health effects however the c.d.c. has yet to respond right now the apartment of environmental protection does not have the authority to inspect or regulate above ground storage tanks such as the one that held the c.h.m. chemicals west virginia senate majority leader john under is set to introduce a bill that would change that today in capitol hill fashion speaker of the house john boehner made the chemical spill a political issue blaming the obama administration for not enforcing rules. we have a lot of regulations on the books and what they've been astray should i be the one who is actually doing their jobs why wasn't just point inspected since nine hundred ninety one i am entirely confident that you're in for regulations already on the

books to protect the health and safety of the american people somebody ought to be held accountable here what we try to do is look at those regulations that we think or cumbersome or over the top in that are costing our economy jobs while speaker boehner protects the regulations are already in place and lashes out against president obama according to a new report by the new republic and confirmed by the website open sources dot gov and executive from freedom industries donated fine of a thousand dollars to speaker boehner in two thousand and fourteen alone so it appears as if mr boehner is not completely independent from this story himself while politicians bigger and the cleanup continues for now west virginia residents are just trying to keep their heads above the contaminated water as they wait for the all clear in washington meghan lopez r.t. and that does it for now for more on the stories we cover go to youtube dot com

slash r t america check out our website r.t. dot com say follow me on twitter thanks for watching. i'm sick. mind. and. money and the. politicians write the laws. just to.