only on been passed and only. the plastic. the replace the if you. did you know the price is the only industry specifically mentioning the constitution. that's because a free and open press is critical to our democracy correct call for us. to make you know i'm sorry and on this show we reveal the picture of what's actually going on we go beyond identifying the truth rational debate and real discussion critical issues facing america are you ready to join the movement then welcome to the big city. but i'm sorry to washington d.c. and here's what's coming up tonight on the big picture british comedian actor and

recovering drug addict russell brand says that america's extremely stupid drug laws played a role in the overdose death of philip seymour some time to end our nation's failed war on drugs or remove the stigma from drug addiction with more americans don't have to die that and more and it's big picture rubble and many americans think their career on wall street puts you to a path of lifetime success but is working in finance all it's cracked up to be last sample a former wall street trader in tonight's conversations with great minds. you need to know this we don't need any more corporate shills in our nation's courtrooms there's already too many of them an airport published by the alliance for justice looks at the professional diversity of president obama's judicial nominations during his time in office. it finds it nearly eighty five percent of

the presidential the president's judicial nominees have been either corporate attorneys or prosecutors at some point their careers so the report highlights the fact that seventy one percent of president obama's district court nominees have worked primarily with corporate and business clients while seventy three percent of the president's circuit court nominees have worked in the corporate world citing the report and the corporate takeover of america's judicial bench as senator elizabeth warren called on president obama yesterday to nominate fewer judges who work for corporate interests and more judges who have public interest backgrounds at an event sponsored by the alliance for justice warren said that power is becoming more and more concentrated on one side well financed corporate interests line up to fight for their own privileges and resist any change that would limit corporate excess she added that it's unsurprising that the president and a majority of the senate gravitated to nominating corporate lawyers so that most

conservative senators would could not object to we have an opportunity to fight for something that balances the playing field in the other direction of the two hundred eighty one obama judicial nominees that the alliance for justice report looked at only ten have worked as lawyers for public interest organizations and only ten out of those two hundred eighty one have experience in labor and employment disputes so is the time to get corporate shills off the bench and start filling our nation's courts with judges who truly care about the best interests of the american people let's rubble. joining me for tonight's big picture rubble our kevin martin project twenty one black leadership network nicole williams democratic strategist and jury and patrick freedom policy analyst with freedom works and thank you all for joining us today to see all again and you heard my intro i see two problems here one being that these this absolutely real. most republican filibuster which just got busted up

a month or so ago when harry reid called the kind of half nuclear option was preventing the president from putting anybody on the corner waiting and waiting and well as i get my ticket to ride through i two points and then you go for number one that you know he he really had to get people past the point that was with warren was made it was so they had to satisfy the republicans because they could filibuster and number two that this is a so this is what happens when you've got citizens united this is what happens when you get the best the best. lawmakers money can buy and they give you the best judges money can but wait a minute why weren't democrats crying when they were doing it in two thousand and six two thousand. to the filibuster judicial nominees nothing nothing like women in a way nothing like this bill wait a minute they would have once you started it like i was like this is like being on a plane rust or injure civilians what it's like being on the playground and playing tag you're it and then when somebody told you you know no no no no no no harry reid and harry reid did this because harry reid knows that in his city nothing goes

anyway he at me he's a really little if he gets out there he's still soft spoken and talks about the american people then he pulls this a.p. democracy crap ok when you have so grasping the rule of law the rules of the senate the rules to sit in and now they're going to change them and now things are already changed you know now the senate flips back like there's predicted been twenty forty then the democrats need to also know we have to get back to constitutional no doubt that he didn't win the data may not know what democrats are not he could still have a kill list when the middle democracy is this playing victim stuff is that i let you know it's time i was not about the big bad or i'm only doing i'm only speaking the truth and call you know. the two things i put on the table where you know there were a can the can the can the president actually start appointing people who don't have to don't require a republican stamp of approval which means we get better judges and number two isn't this you mean like democrat but the point. like shockey should we do it do it

do it never going to have historically been the party the people who. have already of the rich come to crack down every american knows every night mazes not just yes people and i don't have any argument well first of all i applaud senator warren for calling the number of to show nominees that have come through the senate that are i think it is imperative to have a balance you know yes you know you want to you want to have a balance and that that's what i think that he's trying to advocate there and so would you say president obama lied when he said there will be no corporals the lobby is well you know the people who would not appoint him face is that he would he would i said he is always what is always what he thinks and so he like you waking corporate would like to know that they had what you say there was no. doubt that health care in patrick what you know literally you know i've got a few range of thoughts on this you know i find myself actually i never thought i'd say this impartial agreement with the point some of the points of senator warren is

actually making but i'm not sure that this is so much a partisan issue i think this is a washington versus the people issue i think for too long you've seen both democrats and republicans collude against the american people and put big money corporate interests in positions of power in the judicial branch and the bureaucracy and all across the government so i do think that needs and i take reservation at the support of elizabeth warren statement that says we need more public welfare interest i think we need people that are actually interested i think we need people that are actually interested in defending the contours of here's a judicial here's a graphic the just to your point kevin that you want to read about this is filibusters over the last fifty years it's behind you tube and you know red is you know filibusters by republicans blue is filibusters by democrats but much more a little bit of bread and tell us though is that there's also a growth in the size of government over this crap there are more positions that requires nomination and it certainly does it certainly does. if you look at the

size of government growth over this time period very shy and i've been here since there are more people to decide over being put into positions of power but here's the thing you want your judges to have a wide breadth of experiences they're going to see places from all different backgrounds from all different subject area and you want your judges to have a variety of experiences with all the different subject areas that they are going to be i don't read anything wrong with ok well really mine is back to citizens united citizens united is really born in. cities instantly it's a money situation that's why you know why more attorneys go into the private and back to that money situation former florida republican governor turned democratic gubernatorial channel challenger charlie crist was on my radio show yesterday that's a pretty strong thing to say about the current florida republican governor rick scott take it take a listen i have a record as having been governor before an attorney general before that secretary of education before that rick scott has now a record as governor for the past three and a half years but he's got a record before that and his record before that as the c.e.o. of columbia h.c.a.

health care company was that that company under his leadership had to pay the highest fine for fraud in the history of the united states of america at the time one point seven billion dollars in a fine it's like jamie dimon territory it's get in there and you know as a friend said to me the other day listen if you're just in the top ten of fraudsters or fraudulent companies in america you know that's hard to get there. so here we are the guy who was convicted of the largest crime and this is a crime and this wasn't this wasn't you know a penalty that he paid the largest crime in the history of america at least in terms of what he's a republican governor how a lot of money a lot of money is the time to get this is this is a symptom of citizens united isn't the time to get money out of politics i wholeheartedly agree tom i think it's nothing wrong for us to go to a public. campaign finance but we can't do that because the supreme court

discovered that in the first amendment the founders wrote in the first amendment that the first federal protection money you know you know what you know what's funny to me once you have that you use that you don't need anyone and everyone calls the place the foia everything of all races because what about corporate who put corporations the corporations are beholden to their shareholders who are about to make my union to be who do they buy because you have got it i was told you would have bought pollack you had to get infected cells and i really i blurted out that. it's about money to such an important point for many many states in the country in the numbers are actually shrinking because of paycheck protection laws unions can forcibly removed from their members and use it like this without disclosing it i mean the bacteria can make a person all i want you guys have done a marvelous job i congratulate you of trying to change the subject away from the fact that charlie crist was one of the biggest criminals in america and like so

many military. members you think you missed you thank you very much the only truly person i didn't want to be described in the military was one of them that's going to let. out about a twenty jet engines. and still have us drive to filibustering does not win and i'm not about to tell you absolutely nothing new to the filibuster everybody and in christ don't practice in his administration we're going to. issue of money and politics. what are we going to do about this and what would you propose to i'm saying amend the constitution to say sorry the first amendment does not cover money well i think we when you look at some of the things that are happening in the freedoms that suzanne united has allowed to happen if you look at it i see it as we're looking at government versus the people this is no longer sort of a part of the money is the well not necessarily when we just have this entire discussion about corporations controlling government and corporate interest

controlling government so if i think i was here by the wayside you get corporate how do you get big money out of government what solution you have other than amending the constitution i don't have i'm not sure i mean it's a touchy issue i think that. you know this is. like i said i think when you have a solution to get money out of government it's the solution to get money out of the current crop of politicians out of washington although i do that when they can but when they can compromise like your way the real the real way you fix it turns to is that is that you get rid of the interest of time you get rid of the interest for money to be in the politics you've simplify the tax code you simplify the rate of them who are going to break down that it is always sure the ratios that are lighting for these regulations you actually pay our dues monsanto is lobbying beyond united so it's not always that washington is the only place where you come down with two thousand your pocket after six you didn't leave the ball to have new show less somebody would not say exactly what it was full but more of what i was coming up at.

the pay buz you don't know if you don't pay the car you know response to. every woman in my life that i cared about their gold mine and then. i came to skin well. i was national champion in track and field and also i was able to go and qualify for the olympic games. you know nine hundred eighty eight i started to experiment with other drugs i had lost all the financial means that i. was really on the street.

black market can't. get to the great wall street. i'm at. this site. i think corporation kind of can. do i'm the bank and all that all about money and i'm a bass like that for a politician right the body and restless. bankers coming up. here just to plug. that.

bags but i'd think picture rather with me kevin martin nicole williams patrick hedger let's get back to it the january job numbers came out today not good stuff one hundred thirteen thousand new jobs it's better than the you know seven eight nine hundred thousand a month that we were losing at the end of the bush administration but still it's only one hundred thirteen thousand and even worse i was at the senate on thursday when this vote happened by one vote the republicans prevailed in their filibuster

of extending long term unemployment benefits so another one point six million people have been told by the republican party that they can just take a leap you know they can be almost like it's whatever ok some but. yeah once again you know we have a group of individuals who are no longer going to be able to be productive members of isis id but being able to purchase food for their family or be able to have money for transportation to get to work thanks to our wonderful united states congress it's not that i'm any reason that they're in this situation the primary reason is that we have too many regulations to higher taxes that are choking off the job market here and there's been done numerous studies are present on long term unemployment benefits are keeping people in this cycle and they're preventing people from actually getting out into the workforce leigh's name one regulation you would do away with all i would do with what i would do away with the that you can demonstrate has caused us to lose jobs well there's the actually the that we one regulation i worked on is the utility back regulation which actually forces

a number. if you tell any companies to comply with standards that are impossible that increases employment how does that increase if you already have a lot of us were out of their chair and i'm going to tell me somebody has to design that scrub or somebody has to and somebody has to pay them for it or they'll shut down the whole plant that's that's right and i and all and all of that is increasing but but if the company can't pay for it to lay people off that doesn't increase. let's let's let's hear what is one hand we have this administration tell us they didn't tell us in five years they were rounding a corner we've had stimulus son of stimulus we've had some of recovery we've had shovel ready jobs and i you said we would that will not happen. in an n n a no one will know and we have over forty some jobs nervously in two thousand and old harry reid's bill yes they are without even bring up to the senate so we've been hearing from the president oh well we gave the we're getting one hundred thousand jobs this month but to even keep up with what they sampled stimulus sort of stimulus shovel ready jobs we would have to be getting three hundred jobs a month ok ninety two million people out of our labor participation will the lowest

since the court administrator on one in six american men between twenty five and fifty four right now does not work in this is that this is even worse for the african-american community absolutely and in the democratic party's platform from one nine hundred forty four to one thousand nine hundred eighty eight they said we should when in times of economic crisis the government should be the employer of last resort it's how we got out of the great depression but you really should do it again to remember when government is the largest and we're going to change global helping were spent hundreds of millions or hundreds of billions of dollars in the stimulus plan and all we saw was an exit from the labor force that's continued into their money fourteen republicans were off or worse and thousand government but when when. james calabro tell us the haida recession is governmental spending bill will pull the nation out of recession you know we have a jobless recovery why do we have a job to get there were no able to save the lives shovel ready jobs that americans recovered you got us all which stopped us from losing. games where because the republicans block everything but they haven't come back. for the two years things

tried to do why did we have massive job growth and first democrats controlled for a little less than a year until i got sworn in and what i did will have mass was good big job growth we. are a big party why did we have massive government job their first year but we didn't have we haven't lost six hundred seventy thousand government jobs phyllis so what does it mean to your question is incoherent why have a go at my job then president obama took the private sector is doing fine but the government is growing wider and you watched this growing i was president obama i'm not surprised i'm not seeing that i'm seeing the but rather that the fact of the matter is that regulations are strangling off the economy to name another regulation we. so some of the marginal taxes imposed by the affordable care act are going to remove two point five million people from the labor force over the next decade that's not helping job recovery actually they're not exactly what the it's exactly what i said earlier they are not losing jobs they are going to be trained this knee in two different types no jobs has never been within the law president's

braiding around way don't wait wait wait a second you are some planing about the fact that because people are no longer tied to their employer that they don't have to stay in dead end jobs or work fifty and sixty hour weeks that people will be able to go home and spend some time with their kids that people will be able to retire early because they don't have the you know not all businesses this is what mitt romney was calling for he said people shouldn't be tied to their health insurance. that is not revenue that is what about it if you look at all the people going for pot filled out of pocket it would leave the record now you know oh really because you've got four million five million six more you get ten point eight million unemployed people out there who will step in and take a job at somebody else but you know johnson is going to take a did not want to maybe that's a label for this is the circular logic that's a whole completely different issue this is two point six million people who have decided to improve their lives it's the let's not at all the know what is and there is a barrier to earning extra wages by working hard that there is a deny mission of return by working after admitting that this is exactly what it

was so did i just read it earlier that's exactly what happens this is a this is a distortion an economic distortion labor force that is an exhilarating this is not a good thing the president is parading around the country right now saying work should pay and this law is basically working against that saying you work is not going to pay you should not be you should not be chained to a job that you hate and you shouldn't and you know half of all the kids in america come home to an empty don't deserve it is the republicans are constantly useless yap of all the kids that are going to hollywood i don't know a lot of houses really are that lets people say ok i'm going to get off at three and be home for my kids and you all are saying oh isn't this terrible two point six million people are not going to make any that is not working till five they should have the freedom to work till. five in order to provide their child a better life pay for their home is ok you're saying it is and they don't mean it is better to do a job at all a job it is not if you're only keeping the job to get help ensure that is. your problem is not an incentive surprise you actor comedian sometime bad boy so that

america's extremely stupid drug laws help kill actor philip seymour hoffman he wrote this piece for the for the guardian he himself brand is a recovering drug addict he said now we are aware that our drug laws aren't working and that alternatives are yielding positive results why are we not acting tradition prejudice extreme stupidity the answer is all three changes hard apathy is easy tradition is the narcotic of our rulers he went on to ask would often have died if this disease were not so imagine stigma if we were invited to believe that people who suffer from addiction deserve to suffer would have zero deed of drugs are regulated controlled or professionally administered isn't stewart brand right isn't it time to start treating drug addiction and public health problem rather than a criminal probe i think there is something to be said i mean if you look at the. situation he was in rehab twice before this situation and so clearly he recognized personally that he had some type of you know disease and with fighting constantly on a consistent basis trying to deal with this and so i think that on some level you know

he's korat you know this is a mental health it's not a switzerland in the united kingdom they said we will treat heroin addiction with her and they then doctors can prescribe heroin and people typically after a few years just. stop using it and you know just spontaneously stop they just reach a point their life or to say no but they're able to go to work they're able to conduct their lives and they don't overdose and they saw and when they and when both countries put these programs into place they saw an immediate drop in hiv aids hepatitis c. and overdoses personal responsibility and all this. believe me i'm a. person he put the needle in his own no one no one forced him to. is on every input that drug is on the same is true ok the same is true of alcoholics and that's what i've seen and smoke marijuana but you don't make a personal choice at some point in america i'm sick and tired of people telling me

what person it's a program that needs to be done something this something that you would have to go to war on drugs it's killing more people. you know i think that we do need to kind of take a step back and re-evaluate some of the laws we do have in this country but at the i still agree with kevin at the end of the day society didn't put the needle in his arm government and put the needle in his arm philip seymour hoffman with an enormous arm and it's a tragedy and i think it's a little bit too soon to be turning the tragedy which is a tragedy for his family and friends and for a lot of his fans myself included into something to make a political point it's not a political point i'm saying there are two countries where they have demonstrated that if you turn this from a criminal problem into a public health problem and you had doctors deal with it rather than cops fewer people die people like philip seymour hoffman you know the main side effect of heroin addiction is addiction it's not you know the main side effect of alcohol addiction is not the addiction it's not your liver and people crash cars i mean this is this arguably is a less destructive drug that alcohol but we would have to we would have to overhaul

our whole mental mental i agree i mean look look look at look at. the gym class that does it even though his son was alone drove he had a mental issue there were no beads available ok no i don't reckon closed a whole bunch of those things when. all we did was said ok it's time for the states to take why is everything we people on the lip government federal government federal the federal government saying you know we don't have much out of this i'm not saying get them into it i'm saying get them out of it it's the war on drugs they're trying to you know they're coming into our homes or coming into our but it's not about it's all about. them as well as it has finding out cabin. kevin martin call williams patrick ledger thank you all for thank you greats.

today athletes and dignitaries from around the world gathered at the fist fish lympics am in sochi russia for the opening ceremonies of the twenty fourteen olympic games attendees were treated to a two and a half hour performance that highlighted some of the most important moments in russian history including napoleon's eighteen twelve defeat outside moscow in the construction of st petersburg lies our peter the great with the formalities over sports fans can now look forward to watching some of the world's most talented athletes compete for olympic school we are in america should be thrilled with the prospects for team usa snowboarder shaun white who goes by the nickname the flying tomato will try to become the first american ever to win a gold medal in three straight winter olympics meanwhile the u.s. men's hockey team will try to improve on silver medal show in four years are showing four years ago in vancouver and win the gold for the first time since the one thousand nine hundred miracle on ice and figure skater gracie gold will try to make up for a poor showing in the two thousand and ten olympics by team u.s.a.'s women's skating team those games marked the first time since one thousand nine hundred four

that the american skating team failed to get a skater on the medal podium whether you're watching because you've gotten the usa or because you want to watch some of the best athletes in the world is going to be a heck of a show and keep an eye out for the norwegian curling team they've got quite a lot. coming up the life of an investment banker has been the subject of many classic hollywood movies including martin scorsese's osbourne nominated wolf of wall street but is working in finance everything it's cracked up to be sample former derivatives trader and i had conversations with great minds.

we welcome eric nate and martin to be terrific hosts on the r t network. it's going to give you a different perspective give you one stock never i'll give you the information you make the decision. about how breaking this the revolution of the mind it's a revolution of ideas and consciousness in the sense to the extreme right approach to things would be described as angry i think in a strong. under single. you don't know if you don't panic or. responds to really. everyone in my life that

i cared about their goal. and then. i came to skin. i was national champion in track and field and also was able to go and qualify for the olympic games. you know nine hundred eighty eight i started to experiment with drugs i had lost all the financial means that i. was really on the street. black market. great. interest.

for many americans success. means money and money means success seems to be. super the case on wall street that's why even after the biggest financial crisis since the great depression a job at a top notch investment bank still holds a lure for many of young americans many young americans starting the professional life that is working on wall street really worth it for tonight's conversations with great minds i'm joined by someone who lived the life of wall street millionaire and left it all behind sam polk spent most of his twenty's living and working as a trader for a high power wall street investment firm actually a series of them but at thirty he decided to leave the world of finance for good since then he's become a successful nonprofit entrepreneur.