it's. coming up on r t in the hot seat u.s. intel leaders are called before congress to answer questions about n.s.a. surveillance worldwide threats and reforming the fires a court will have all the details on that just ahead down the keystone pipeline gets a green light the u.s. state department says the pipeline would not have a significant effect on climate change or the environment but is that really the case will dig further into this pipe battle coming up and cloaked in secrecy and san francisco google's mysterious barge still has people asking questions while city officials are pushing for its removal from the bay more on that later in the show.

it's tuesday february fourth four pm in washington d.c. i'm lynn neary david and you're watching r.t. america we begin today with two different hearings that took place in congress this morning the house intelligence committee heard testimony from director of national intelligence james clapper on his annual worldwide threat report this follows a senate hearing on the same topic that took place last week also on the hill the house judiciary committee examined recommendations to reform the foreign intelligence surveillance act artie's sam sachs is on capitol hill and has more. the house intelligence committee took on the issue of worldwide threats to u.s. national security and a hearing today and there was quite a long list of threats covered cluny al qaeda militants in syria iran's nuclear capabilities and even threats of china shooting down space satellites but with the director of national intelligence james clapper on hand to testify it was the

so-called threat of edward snowden's n.s.a. disclosures that stole the show and led to some hair raising comments by members of congress its chairman mike rogers that has repeatedly made claims without evidence that snowden is secretly working with the russians but at today's hearing the witnesses on hand refused to confirm that accusation do you believe that. there's any indication that the n.s.a. contractor who is now in moscow might be under the influence of russian intelligence services chairman i don't have any information to that effect excuse me later in the hearing congresswoman jan schakowsky asked for evidence of a snowed in russia connection she was told that was best discussed in a classified hearing also during the hearing chairman rogers suggested that journalists who are handling the snowden documents are breaking the law though he was unable to get the director of the f.b.i. james komi to agree with that assertion so if i'm a newspaper reporter for fill in the blank and i sell stolen material is that legal

because i'm a newspaper reporter right if you're a newspaper reporter and you're hocking stolen jewelry it's still a crime and if i'm a hocking stolen classified material that i'm not legally in possession of for personal gain and profit is that not a crime. i think that's a harder question because it involves a news gathering function could have first amendment implications that's something that probably we'd better answer by the department of justice the issue of targeted drone killings came up as well with representative adam schiff calling for an annual report detailing all drone strike deaths the director of the cia john brennan called it a worthwhile recommendation but back to the n.s.a. today's hearing comes a few weeks after president obama laid out a series of n.s.a. reforms including changing section two fifteen of the patriot act which underpins the n.s.a.'s domestic phone spying program and nearby in the house judiciary committee another hearing was underway that specifically honed in on these issues

it was here that david medina of the privacy and civil liberties oversight board explained how this sort of surveillance restricts american civil liberties examine the privacy and civil liberties consequences of the program and found them serious because the program contains highly sensitive information that citizens are may be chilled and their socio rights in engaging with reporters or religious groups or political set organizations knowing that the government is collecting information about them and finally we also learn from the hearing that members of congress are having their own phone data swept up in the n.s.a.'s domestic phone spying program as well but that came hardly as a surprise since we know that virtually all americans phone data is collected by the n.s.a. according to the snowden documents. that's the latest coming from capitol hill. are two. and american tech firms have released their most detailed data yet about the

u.s. government's information requests made under the foreign surveillance intelligence act the controversial law that has governed the national security agency's most secret surveillance programs the tech companies that have released that information include google facebook yahoo microsoft and linked in take a look at this for the six month period between january and june of two thousand and thirteen google yahoo facebook and microsoft all report they received between zero and nine hundred ninety nine pfizer requests for content like e-mail messages photos address books and calendar entries google says those requests involve between nine thousand and nearly ten thousand users or accounts but yahoo was actually much worse with three times more yahoo user accounts affected by the content requests impacted over five thousand facebook user accounts and over fifteen thousand microsoft servers the government only allows the companies to disclose data and broad ranges of one thousand or as linked in chose to do combine

all of their national security requests and report in ranges of two hundred fifty the social networking company reports receiving between zero and two hundred forty nine national security related requests affecting that same number of user accounts the new data disclosures are the result of a legal battle over transparency between tech giants and the justice department and it's all a result of the revelations brought to light by former government contractor edward snowden last summer snowden leaked documents to the press were dealing the role of tech companies in secret u.s. surveillance programs tech companies were specifically vulnerable and light of disclosures regarding a u.s. intelligence system called prism showing the government's access to users' e-mails videos and online chats regardless of the deal reached with the justice department privacy advocates and civil liberties watchdogs say it doesn't go far enough while google and linked in are already calling for more transparency. and in other news

related to form of government contractor edward snowden we're just learning that snowden and scuse me sweden and iceland pirate party representatives have jointly nominated snowden and chelsea manning for a twenty fourteen nobel peace prize and a letter published by representatives of both countries it says quote we are nominating manning and snowden together because the courage of manning and inspired snowden and both of them have inspired thousands of people all over the world to speak truth to power and demand transparency and accountability in their own societies chelsea manning formerly known as bradley was sentenced to thirty five years in a prison last year after leaking hundreds of thousands of documents to the whistle blowing web site wiki leaks. and the state department has finished a highly anticipated review of the controversial keystone x.l. pipeline the five point four billion dollar oil pipeline has been

a thorn in president obama's side with supporters encouraging his approval for the sake of job creation and foes saying it will produce more greenhouse gases the report says the pipeline wouldn't have a significant impact on climate change but as artie's liz wahl finds out it's not exactly that cut and dry. there's. a state department report that outlines the environmental impact of the keystone x.l. pipeline is fueling anger among activists the report backs up the findings that this this pipeline fails says climate test it will have a huge climate impact some scientists have referred to it as game over on climate change the pipeline would funnel oil over a thousand miles from canada's tar sands through the american heartland to the gulf coast this is the long awaited state department report that assesses how the pipeline would impact the environment it states quote climate changes are

anticipated to occur regardless of any potential effects from the proposed project it finds that the pipeline would not have a significant impact on greenhouse emissions because the oil would be transported anyway by rail according to the report moving oil by train is just as harmful to the environment but environmentalists are now questioning the motives of the study while we look at the report we have to kind of look at it with this kind of you know has new oil industry so when for instance report that the conclusions or the recommendations that are in the report don't really matter environmental organizations like friends of the earth believe the report is riddled with conflicts of interests we do some freedom of information act. the cost to the state department as well as did some checking on the internet and we found that in fact they actually have relationships with at least five organizations including the american petroleum institute who are advocating for the construction of the

keystone x.l. pipeline the pipeline is a political k'naan drum for president obama who has pledged to make progress on climate change he said this about the keystone pipeline last summer our national interest will be served only if this project does not significantly exacerbate the problem of carbon pollution well the obama administration has vowed to put climate change at the top of the agenda of protesters here say he can turn those words into action by blocking the keystone x.l. pipeline president obama has a decision to make does he want to be a climate champion or what does he want to be remembered as the pipeline president we know what the implications of moving so much fossil fuel from one part of the continent to another would have for not only global climate change and carbon dioxide emissions but really for the future heating of the planet but with energy

independence high on the agenda and labor union saying there's jobs on the line there are strong political pressure especially from republicans to get moving on the pipeline it's unclear how much the state department report will sway the administration's decision in washington liz wall r.t. . and the russian government says that syria should complete the shipment of its chemical weapons out of the country by march first which is weeks behind schedule this comes just a week after reports surfaced that syria had given up only a fraction of its stockpile secretary of state john kerry admitted this week that the u.s. policy in syria was failing him last night in an interview with lou dobbs one former lieutenant colonel agreed with kerry's assessment and added his own take or multiple takes on what the u.s. should be doing take a look. now it's no secret to any outside observer that we don't even have a syria policy of syria doesn't give out the chemical weapons it's time for

airstrikes at the end of the day it's not a bad thing to have our enemies in syria kill each other. i would think that that is a notably well attractive strategic option and now for more on what's happening in the war torn country let's go to our marina port in iowa. kerry's comments reportedly came during an off the record closed door meeting on the sidelines of the munich security conference now according to the two senators in attendance john mccain and lindsey graham they said that the u.s. secretary of state admitted to them that he no longer believes the obama administration's approach to the crisis in syria is working and they say he talked about supporting a plan to arm the moderate opposition in syria according to the two senators they say that that plan would be aimed at blocking al qaeda affiliates in syria from carrying out terrorist attacks on america now kerry spokesperson denies that he raised the issue of supplying weapons to the syrian opposition no according to the

two senators that are mentioned mr kerry also said during the meeting that he believes bashar al assad's government is failing to uphold its promise to give up chemical weapons according to the schedule that's been outlined you know however russia's deputy foreign minister recently said that syria is proceeding according to plan and even this month the assad government plans on removing a large shipment of chemical substances and that process is set to be complete by march first while there have been some delays moscow says western officials are overblowing the situation russia says the reality is that when a stockpile of chemical weapons are being transported it's not always easy to immediately get proper security for the entire operation now in the past few weeks u.s. statements regarding syria including the ones that i just spoke about have indicated that america is still beating somewhat of

a war drum last week we heard america's director of national intelligence james clapper warned that damascus may be producing biological weapons he also said that syria's influx of extremists have turned the war in a war torn country into a terrorist training hob and subsequently that's a threat to u.s. . national security so here we have three years after the civil war in syria started it appears as though the u.s. is back to square one with no coherent progress being made on the crisis in syria and still some experts would say look potential military strike or to arm the opposition. now is artie's marina port. and we are just three days away from the start of the twenty fourteen olympic games taking place in sochi russia of course our team will have full coverage on this take a look. i

. and now for a closer look at russian president vladimir putin's visit and the preparations for the games here as artie's martin andrews. president putin arrived earlier today ahead of the olympics are really starting on friday in the at the wonderful stated that is complete and it's behind us we actually have a her hustle was taking place at the moment but it was the president putin's first stop when he met the delegates of the i.o.c. one hundred twenty six committee that opened the session today his bus stop was to the salt cheap national park what was that were the same facts a whole group of of leopard's person left with as they're known through

rehabilitation center was a put a few years ago didn't suffer actually went inside one of the cages to pets the cubs of course the wildlife just important subjects for the presidency important to the people of salt she summit so that she chose a leopard to become one of the mascots of the winter olympics here in salt she regarding the actual delegates they had a great feast and banquet in a peaceful soviets architectural building they enjoyed live music from russian traditional musicians and also listened to some western music in the form of we have the champions of course the famous hit by queen regarding the people who are here six thousand athletes they're making their way to song sheet over the next week and how they're artsy better with the men of the olympic mountain village i spent long as you're about he spoke about the security issues and how people including businesses i just feel about the atmosphere here in sochi take

a look is that you did not just among hispanics and a good many of the athletes have been seeing that back home liesl very negative media coverage of all the sochi olympics some are even afraid to come here but when they arrived they started wondering what all the bad press was involved and really very impressed by what's going on here that they see this much less hassle and this conference is pressure when it comes to security checks compared to previous games given because as i said that opens on friday people are still fighting for a ticket for the opening ceremony. various celebrities arrive here in such a there are helicopters around us as we speak princess diana arrives earlier today and also r.t. spoke to the famous tennis star maria sharapova about the excitement surrounding the winter olympics twenty forty. three students and i'm very impressed by what i've seen here in sochi i haven't been here for a year and when i arrived yesterday i was amazed when i finally saw all the stadiums and then use i really hope that everyone will enjoy the olympic games here

in sochi had friends some of them are volunteers they flew over from canada they were fortunate enough to see over her repetition as they call it in russian on sunday including some fireworks tonight at eleven o'clock the fish stadium that seats forty thousand people that will also be in full swing the rehearsals on friday the olympic ceremony is said to bring three billion spectators from around the world but the subject on many people's lips is that of gay rights and earlier on in the week i went to such only gay couple to speak to the owner and some of the party revelers regarding how gay life really is in russia and how the new anti-gay bill readdy affects them take a look. thousands of athletes and visitors are expected to arrive this week and three billion people are also estimated to watch the winter olympics this month for some however the games aren't about sporting progress they're about gay rights and the controversy surrounding last year's legislation that restricts children being given information about nontraditional relationships a similar law to the u.k.

section twenty eight that was in forced for two decades from the late eighty's we had to the city's only beach front gate venue my ak or lighthouse in english for a cup that's been in the city for more than thirty years it seems as such she and it's beginning subculture is far more liberal than people think traditionally one of the more tolerant russian cities when during the soviet era russians from all over the country could holiday here. club owner and his partner a man have been a couple for over thirteen years and settled that they don't agree with the law they remain mostly unaffected by it and while christmas is big they describe the west's response as heavy handed and an overreaction. book of course i think it really bad it negatively affects gay russian people because society blames them for spoiling the olympics for an important opinions are still divided on sexuality in russia and this club does give something of an insight into the reality of gay life

here the one time in the club and i'm meeting people. it's like any other gay bar that i've ever been to be on the activists abroad have spoken loudly in great numbers but the reality is that the issue is more complicated than it seems while some in the l.g.b. to community say the ball is broken i think it your way to the baby and violence and the situation has to be changed and they gave up and russia can take it even somewhat lower it well people do not roam the streets handed hand in sochi behind closed doors such clubs people can be openly affectionate and one thing is for sure whether you have conservative or liberal views this month is going to be a celebration of sport to remember martin andrews he sochi. and still ahead here on our team google's mysterious barge is no longer welcome in

san francisco officials want the barge removed from the bay area after complaints were made about its construction more on that after the break. i. think. well it seems google is coming under fire and this time it has nothing to do with

the n.s.a.'s government requests the tech giant is now being targeted by california authorities for not having the proper permits necessary to construct a barge in its current location it's a four story structure that's now docked at the pier at treasure island in san francisco bay the barge rose to fame last year at as google's floating mystery of course all of this begs the question what is this mysterious structure and where is it going to discuss this a little bit more i'm joined by our teaser among the lindo so ramon let's go back to the beginning apparently this vessel was originally spotted by a scene that reporter last year i think last october what was this four story structure originally thought to be yeah that's right amir the first news reports did start coming out back in october of two thousand and thirteen but at that point this massive construction project had irving going on for more than a year now so you know it started to you know up looking at lease agreements

talking to people there on treasure island and eventually connected the dots linking the project to google but even when that report came out google stayed pretty quiet about what their intentions were and did google ever reveal what they intended to use the structure for. well once this story started to pick up a little bit more steam they were forced to say something and investigative reports there in the bay area indicated that google intends to use this as a high and display for some of their new projects him and products but. right now there hasn't been any construction since last summer so google remains very big about what they intend to do with it only saying that they hope that it become some sort of interactive technology center where people can learn about the technology they're working on it's very peculiar i mean is there any reason to be suspicious that google had some secret intentions that we don't know about well

this is reportedly part of google x. which is secretive research unit of the tech giant so the coast guard and the park service have boarded the barge but when asked. about what's on there they're staying quiet saying that they can't reveal what's on there so this has really led to more mystery and more speculation theories abound about what's going on up there some people the reason people think that it's a data centers because google got a patent for that a few years ago some people think that it might be a floating island that google's going to be using to avoid taxes or just to keep their servers away from the prying government eyes so still a lot of speculation and google continues to get a lot of publicity because they have kept it pretty mysterious and we also have to remember that they're building a similar barge on the east coast over in portland maine people do love speculating its fine will google never did officially finish the project and now that's come to

a halt because the san francisco bay conservation and development commission has asked the company to move it do we have any idea where it could move to you know what what's the future of this mysterious structure. well mayor i contacted the development commission and who earlier today is still waiting to get a response to that however yesterday state regulators did say that construction has to be stopped because that there are no proper permits to build there however they did indicate that. if the project does move to another part of san francisco bay that they may be able to continue the project if they get the proper permits now the current lease at the location they're out now runs through the end of the summer but documents obtained by the san francisco chronicle show that google had proposed this moving barge that would be going all around san francisco bay and up and down the west coast they intended to get it going in late twenty thirteen

obviously they passed that deadline so the earliest we might find out what this truly is might be later this year so flower money they sometimes a full report from you from inside the mysterious structure when it does finally open r.t. correspondent ramon glenda will be an eye on it. and it seems like a pill sized camera maybe gaining some rare insight into your colon very soon the food and drug administration has just approved the use of the pill cam colon for people who are not able to complete a standard colonoscopy the pill size camera which is about one point two five inches long takes photos of the patient's g.i. tract over the course of ten hours after the patients wallows the tiny camera they put on a special device around their waist and then that device helps transmit the photos of the intestines to a computer where a physician can then determine any abnormalities however there are some risks involved including the device getting stuck inside the body choking on it when

trying to ingest it or possible skin irritation but with colon cancer as the third leading cause of cancer related deaths in the u.s. this might be an easy pill to swallow. and boom bust is coming up next here on r t aaron eight joins us for a quick preview erin what can we look forward to today hey there marit thank you big news here on broom bus today we're going international that's right so for all of those watching from outside the new. privy at hello etc etc we're very happy to be here with you and we hope you tune in to boom bust coming up on today's show white collar crime experts are joins me live from our new york studio to discuss all things fraud from the world of finance plus ed harrison and i talk to trade agreement specifically not a big deal it's all coming up so stay tuned they're impressed with those languages thank you very much thanks amir and that does it for now for more on the stories we

covered go to youtube dot com forward slash r t america check out our website r t dot com for its last usa follow me on twitter adam you're a david and stay tuned boom bust is next. welcome to the year of the horse sense of the b.b.c. news subtitles as we enter the chinese new year which is of course is called the year of the horse alas i believe the b.b.c. forty and sub reveals a lot more about the true state of the british and global economies that which is not allowed to be said publicly by the likes of the beloved b. if you think about the elites and government think tank and business have been forcing public assets and their populations to turn tricks per bankers using the pip slap of death until the finances plug those national assets and run too many loads of debt and then abandon the trickle saying of a nation screaming for more debt credit all the way of the blue factory.

i got a quote for you. it's pretty tough to. say where it's about story. that's just described like but smear about john stead of working for the people most tissues the mainstream media were pretty much on the right lines didn't. come home because. they did rather well. we welcome their innate and abby martin to be sure precocious on the r. t. network. it's going to give you a different perspective give me one stock tip oh never i'll give you the information you make the decision don't worry about how breaking the sub works it's a revolution of the mind it's revolution ideas and consciousness and frustrated with the system extremely new approach which would be described as angry i think

i'm a strong enough under single. there i marinate this is boom bust and these are the stories that we're tracking for you today. coming up a white collar crime expert sam antara joins me live on today's show to discuss financial fraud in all of its forms then debt ceiling drama is that the treasury secretary says we must do something about it but we're asking the question why are we in this position in the first place find out just ahead and finally in today's big deal ed harris and i discussed free trade friend or foe it's all coming up and it all starts right now.