coming up on our t.v. all eyes are on sochi with the twenty second winter olympic games on under way top athletes from around the world compete for gold silver and bronze and wrap up of the winners and losers straight ahead and the u.s. drone program has a new chilling target the obama administration is building a case for a drone strike on an american with alleged ties to al qaeda but there's a catch more on this story coming up and he's best known as a hollywood action film star but steven seagal has many more traits and accolades listed on his resume straight ahead an exclusive look at his political future and the religion that helps shape his world.

it's monday february tenth five pm in washington d.c. i'm meghan lopez and you are watching our team america well i don't know about you but i was glued to my television all weekend watching the world's top athletes competing in sochi at the winter olympic games the massive opening ceremony showcased twenty eight hundred athletes from eighty eight countries who are competing in ninety eight events and then the competition kicked into gear let's take a quick look at the medal count up to this point canada leads with seven medals three golds and three silvers and a bronze the netherlands and norway take second and third place also with seven medals the united states takes fourth place followed by germany russia australia and france. today there were competitions for the men's at five hundred meter speedskating women's ice hockey women's singles and louche and a number of other sports i spoke earlier with our team correspondent paul scott reporting from sochi he gave us some of the highlights from over the weekend. well

i think i think the highlight from a russian point of view is quite easy to point to it came in the figure skating team event where russia secured gold with a winning extremely dominant display and there was the emergence of a new star as well fifteen year old yulia lipnitskaya she put into absolutely peerless performances in the ladies' shorts on the free programs and really is the new dolling of russian sports and she was helped along the way by a real a real legend a figure skating i'm talking about you have got any push and it was the biggest cheer of the weekend when he took to the ice and it's a really interesting story for you he was touch and go as to whether he was even going to make these games he had a number of injuries he's been plagued by back injuries in the injuries over the years and he's actually on the go in such a very less than twelve times in recent years but he did come back he was fighting fades and he was equally as foolish in his display in the men's free program so

between them youth and experience fifteen year old. becoming one of the youngest of a gold medal winners in any winter olympics in winter olympics history combined with the legend in the fans favor that is you have. i think that was undoubtedly the highlight for russian sports fans over the course of the weekend and i think the who pays in the in the figure skating on of course other events there's plenty more golds to follow now were there any surprising when so happened over the weekend or even today. the surprises are at a premium at the moment i would say in some respects is absolutely no surprise is sunday when it comes to the speed skating event where the netherlands the dutch are absolutely a dominant and not in two events so far they've already had a one two three gold silver and bronze in two events so they are absolutely dominance when kramer he claimed the men's five thousand meters event in the speed skating down in the arena down by the coast here in the black sea resort of sochi

and there was a silver bronze also went. the netherlands and interestingly today that continuing their dominance with another one two three this time in the five hundred meters and there were a victory for they were twins who actually secured medals so the dutch keeping it in the family that had the one of the twins gone gold and the other one won bronze no surprises i would say dutch dominance in the speedskating now norway has historically dominated the winter games are they continuing that trend this year well no i have one more medals in winter olympic history than any other country and they took the lead of the course of the weekend they were on top of the medals table and as we told right now they are still very much there will thereabouts i think pretty much in third place at the moment just behind the netherlands and canada let me tell you one interesting story of norwegian ole unappealing doll and he won the biathlon ten k. sprint event on saturday to make him the joint record holder for the most amount of

winter olympic medals in history ironically or perhaps not so surprisingly alongside another two norwegian now this evening he had the chance in the twelve and a half k pursuits event to become the single most decorated olympian winter olympian in haste but unfortunately he only needed was a top three finish in the twelve and. bronze would have done it for him it would have been his thirteenth winter olympic medal seven of them of course gold but he finished fourth he was a little a little over one second off the pace that prevented him getting that bronze medal and creating history so norway are still very much there were there about spezza i think will be mixed emotions they're saving for all day on the dollar and now paul i can hear behind you music i can feel a lot of people moving around despite the fact that it's actually pretty late there and thought so what's the atmosphere like for you as a journalist covering this yeah well we're actually by one of the many lives sites in and around the sochi region that door to door of around sochi which is

a little. further along the coast which is where the coastal cluster race with all the indoor ice events where that's taking place and of course up in the mountains across napolitano so these live sights. all around the region wait in the water in sochi by the ports i'm not sure if you can you can make it out it is just beginning to wrap up outside the atmosphere has been pretty spectacular throughout the course of the evening there's a giant screen west spectators gather to watch all the sporting events and also the medal ceremony which takes place every evening at eight fourteen pm of course that's twenty fourteen to represent the spectators are gathered together to watch the medal ceremony there's also a stage which is now closed there's nobody on its. various musical acts all throughout the evening and as i say this isn't the only one in the region so the atmosphere is pretty pretty good a pretty special in and around sochi on the region at the moment on every single evening as well i have to say there's a fireworks display not far from here on out no expense spared it's pretty spectacular now one of the things that has been obviously dominating the headlines

recently is the security situation in sochi so what is this security situation like from your perspective in the olympic village. well the organize is a cane for the security presence to be reassuring rather than overbearing there are around forty thousand police and security office who officers who are in and around the sochi region at the moment and as i say the organizers will cain that the presence wasn't intimidating it wasn't overbearing and i think it is reassuring everywhere you look you do see a small gaggle of police officers walking around it does reassure you that the area is pretty secure of course there's a lot of talk about the so-called ring of steel and the fact that they are on restive all the rest of the caucuses region is not far from here on the terrorist attacks in volgograd between christmas and new year of course but the issue of security firmly in the spotlight and i think there was sort of some upper hands in

some tension perhaps in the buildup to the opening ceremony last week before the games out slowly started but now the games have begun the sports are starting to dominate the headlines i think people in or around here are starting to on wind in relax a little bit more r.t.s. paul scott bringing us the latest from sochi as a leg games of twenty four team thank you so much stay warm where all the athletes are also weighing in on the atmosphere in sochi from hotel rooms to the security situation take a look. so five are things going to mazing it's running like clockwork and everything's just going really really well there hasn't been any problems as of as of today my parents have been a little bit worried that if i just just be careful what you do and don't really buy the uniform when you have you know when you don't need to just be a big cattle but the security is really good so it's better than we thought it would be i had a really great time here and i have nothing bad to say so far well organized and people are really friendly here and having a good time however critics are still missing warrants snuffing out the olympic

flame with comments about dangerous competition courses and the mass murder of stray dogs are to correspondent on a saucy a charter now takes a closer look at the sochi backlash. well some saatchi after leads me gain points in their opponents take a sleep on the slope the mainstream media are looking for a more widespread tumble this is during the opening ceremony something look off here yeah a glitch keeping one of the olympic rings from lighting up glitches are more than a regular occurrence in any games but pundits will tear them apart until blue in the face all played in the winter olympics in sochi russia if even a remotely reasonable assessment showing russia and nothing more than a normal light is brought up we've been receiving well we have a nice hotel our accommodations are justified but from what i hear from some of the athletes who are doing some of the training they're quite satisfied statements like this fall largely on deaf ears while negative tweets about hotel room conditions go

viral for days on end there was a fifteen year old girl who followed through the air and later ended on ice on. all right and i'm for to care about outcome for your bad was in a hotel room meanwhile america's only recent history has always gets easily forgotten there was corruption at the winter olympics in the united states several people were tried for this romley was brought in to quote to fix it which he did. with millions and millions of dollars from the u.s. government you basically want to know more these days the former presidential candidate is on the news to give his expert take along with other notable sporting event analysts time to rein in the mantle on this actor jiang russo you know him from the godfather if you really want to get into sporting event issues at this last super bowl they busted child sex ring something tells me that ranks up a bit worse on the scale than the thread count of the sheets in sochi with the

simplistic bad guy approach towards decide she games the mainstream media might as well have expected dancing bears drinking vodka at the opening ceremony there weren't any bears on bicycles drinking out of vodka bottles there were no drago didn't show up at any point from rocky. we were all shocked taken aback that the the bull crap we've been sold for forty years wasn't dancing around instead an opening reflecting russia's long history and diverse culture the legacy of sochi will be that it continues smoothly as it has in the competition part as a very successful olympic games this year money aired in the u.s. ten hours after taking place with edits made to cut the speech of the head of the i.o.c. and providing little translation context or explanation to the historic episodes presented anchors even going so far as to suggest the viewers google it there's a tremendous ignorance gap here and this is what the media both creates and panders

to as the days go by olympic athletes will show more and more impressive results stealing the show from poisonous media stories while the corporate media outlets continue to play a game of their own turning sports into politics and making news venomous but with already dwindling ratings and as more of their tricks are exposed they may be en route to becoming just white noise as they see it you're going to. york. well one of the mainstream media's biggest criticisms in the weeks and months leading up to the winter olympics has been russia as a so-called gay propaganda law and whether homosexual athletes would be in danger if they flew to sochi to compete but as the saying goes when you point a blaming finger in someone's direction there are four more pointing back at you the residents laurie harvest with more on that.

you missed it the olympics are going on in russia right now and in case you missed it the american media is rushing to use this as an opportunity to try to make the world think that we're russia has the worst anti-gay laws on the planet but that's just not true for it in fact according to the washington post the only anti-gay language in russian law is the propaganda of homosexual islam among minors is punishable by in the ministry to fine that's it if you spread a gay propaganda to kids you get a fine in the us however we have a lot more anti-gay legal action eight us states and many cities and counties have anti-gay provisions in them or as yale university once called them in

a paper no promo homo provision you top to have is the advocacy of homosexuality arizona prohibits the portrayal of homosexuality as a positive alternative lifestyle alabama and texas actually mandate that fact education classes emphasize that homosexuality is not a lifestyle acceptable to the general public and those states also mandate that kids be taught that homosexual conduct is a criminal offense even though that would just be flat out unconstitutional so remember that as you read articles in the new york times about how russia is going to throw gay olympic athletes and trainers in jail for being gay it's just wrong when you watch chevy's ads that feature same sex weddings over shots of america. to protest russia's anti-gay laws it's a load of crap when you read eighteen t's statement that russia's law is harmful to

l. g.b.t. individuals and families and the birth of diety it's a bunch of his talk with the wind chill viney yogurt says they oppose russia's anti-gay law ask them how they feel about america when you hear dry university tell you that they are against russia's laws and support efforts to improve quality tell them to go back to school when you hear president obama making a statement on russia suppose that anti-gay stance that says the u.s. does not abide by discrimination in any big tell him to review his own country's law the bottom line is no matter how you feel about gay rights the notion that russia has the worst anti-gay laws ever is just plain wrong tonight to talk about that by following me on twitter at the rest of it. while immigration reform has dominated national debate for the past year and yet

despite the protests and all the promises little has actually happened in the realm of reform well it turns out that one change was quietly approved by the obama administration recently this measure would ease restrictions for asylum seekers who might have ties to terrorist groups the notice was put out by the department of homeland security as well as the state department last week announcing the changes people who provided limited military support to terrorist groups will no longer be automatically barred from becoming an american citizen this would get people like morteza a saudi a chance to finally get his green card over a decade after he initially submitted for it now as a teenager a saudi handed out flyers for a sect of the mujahideen that oppose the government of ayatollah ruhollah khomeini in iran in the early one nine hundred eighty s. that group was taken off the terror watch list back in two thousand. twelth now a saudi was never an active member or a contributor to that group and he has been living in legal limbo in virginia for years as

a result of this section of the immigration law so some lawmakers have become vocal supporters of this change to the law in a press statement senator patrick leahy said quote the existing interpretation was so broad as to be unworkable it resulted in deserving refugees and asylum is being barred from the united states for actions so tangential and minimal that no rational person would consider them supporters of terrorist activities but not everyone agrees with the obama administration's recent move senator jeff sessions released an opposing statement saying that it is deeply alarming that the obama administration would move unilaterally to relax admissions standards for asylum seekers and potentially numerous other applicants for admission who have possible connections to insurgents or terrorist groups we need to tighten security standards for asylum not relax them even further so this move a. more inclusive immigration standards comes after the president recently promised more robust and executive actions during his state of the union address that

happened just last month lawmakers of course have been promising immigration reform all this year however with midterm elections right around the corner this recent change could be the only immigration reform americans actually see for quite some time. while the u.s. is loosening its immigration standards switzerland is tightening its laws voters narrowly passed a referendum over the weekend that would limit the number of foreigners allowed to live and work in switzerland this is a stark change from the open door policy the country has promoted in the past along with its european counterparts motors fear that foreigners are taking their jobs and causing a spike in the cost of housing or to correspondent lucy catherine off looks at the economic implications of this decision for switzerland as well as for the european union. what's real and voted to shut the door to european union workers setting up a showdown with brussels as well as a potential exit from the single european markets now the so-called stop mass

immigration initiative was the brainchild of the right wing swiss people's party which wants strict quotas on foreigners first which will into essentially abandon its free movement of people treaty with the e.u. and supporters the we've talked to say that they're worried immigration is driving the lens that is under running local workers and the burden of which services holders had argued that immigration caps would in fact cripple economic growth and experts do say that this was in column e. is. not despite your labor especially when it comes to folks with skills to work in fields like health care to you with there's a big need for skilled workers but despite the very real economic concerns despite the fact that we're there is just three percent many voters ralton at least swayed by the arguments which you and simply cannot take in any more people now in order to understand why you really do have to look at the numbers about a quarter of the country's eight million residents aren't swiss there's been

a huge uptick in immigration in fact about eighty thousand new immigrants came to switzerland last year alone the vote will likely mean severe repercussions with brussels you have to remember that switzerland isn't a member of the e.u. but it has signed on to a lot of the blocs policies in order to gain access to the european markets for switzerland sells more than half of everything that it produces and with five hundred million customers there's a lot of money at stake here historic vote that is likely to have a significant impact on the swiss economy as well as on relations with the country's european neighbors reporting in burn for r.t. and lucy catherine of. well despite mounting international criticism against the american drone program it appears as though the u.s. has picked its next target and this one is an american citizen dissociative press has confirmed with four u.s. officials that the u.s. is now targeting an unnamed american who is believed to be an al qaeda facilitator and who is actively planning attacks on american citizens overseas officials are

now in the process of building a case against the man to prove that a drone strike against him is legal constitutional and necessary the justice department will then present the president with a formal review and the president will have a final say now this newest information comes less than a year after president obama promised americans more strict drone regulations and a national defense speech for the record i do not believe it would be constitutional for the government to target and kill any u.s. citizen with a drone or with a shotgun without due process but when a u.s. citizen goes abroad to wage war against america and is actively plotting to kill u.s. citizens and when neither the united states nor our partners are in a position to capture him before he carries out a plot. his citizenship should no more serve as a shield than a sniper shooting down an innocent probe should be protected from

a swat team members of congress have expressed criticism against america's use of the drone program even with the new policies that have been put in place now those include a house of representatives intelligence committee chairman mike rogers the president's may twenty thirteen policy changes for the u.s. targeted strikes are an utter and complete failure and they leave americans lives at risk the a.p. has agreed to withhold the name of the country that the man isn't as a matter of national security this suspect would not be the first american that has been killed by a drone strike he wouldn't even be the second to dates there have been four americans killed by drone strikes but muslim cleric anwar although locky was killed in yemen in two thousand and eleven along with some near khan all along he's sixteen year old son of durham on was killed in another strike two weeks later and then in pakistan judith ken on mohammad was killed in another attack a lockie it was the only reported u.s. targeted killing of an american the others were considered collateral damage

meanwhile a new article by glenn greenwald and jeremy scahill details the national security agency's role in drone attacks now according to the article the primary method used to locate targets is a computer analysis of metadata and cell phone tracking technology often times that data is inaccurate so in other words instead of using an informant who is on the ground watching the suspects movements the drone targets the area where the suspect cell phone is located and sometimes that phone is in the hands of a friend or in the hands of a family member rather than the suspect himself the information comes from a former drone operator who worked for the joint special operations command as well as for the n.s.a. it was bolstered by an edward snowden document as well as that document detailed the geolocation technique that is used by the n.s.a. . so just when you thought the n.s.a. only controls people's lives it looks like it plays

a role in some people's deaths as well. meanwhile an unlikely unlikely ally is working to broker increased cooperation between the u.s. and russia steven seagal is known around the world for kicking butt and taking names in his action packed movie is like under siege by now he is putting down the toy guns and picking up politics as his next action packed adventure r.t.s. was well reports one of my missions in this life is to try to bring us together as real brothers last spring six members of congress went to russia to learn more about the brothers accused of the boston marathon bombings they brought along action star steven seagal a friend of russian president vladimir putin to serve as a diplomatic liaison but as an american was trying to do the best i could. think of for what i believe in and what i believe is that russia is an extremely important ally and the cold war is over and we meaning america should

really have an open mind and open heart in terms of trying to create closer and closer better diplomatic relations with russia these are. vietnam these seven degree black belt is best known for his roles in action films like above the law and under siege. from under siege. beyond taking down the bad guys on the big screen he does it in life as a reserve deputy sheriff it's all captured in his reality t.v. series steven seagal lawman now in its third season seagal is taking his police work to arizona he's partnered with the infamous sheriff joe arpaio as the top law enforcement officer in maricopa county arpaio has been criticized overdue. conditions and alleged racial profiling we you know hunt the bad guys down and we

arrest them and you know over here they're always trying to make these innuendoes the jar pile was a racist and a racially profiles and he hates mexicans and it's hilarious because ninety nine percent of guys on my team are mexican and most of the people we arrest are not mexican we don't care if you're chinese japanese filipino german dutch we don't care if you break the law and we kids who we are it's to when he's not putting up a fight he's finding his seagal tells us how buddhism shapes his world view what's important is to look into the nature of your mind and find out how we as human beings can help each other how we as human beings can be. more thoughtful. really practice all truisms be more compassionate and try to make the world a better place there have been rumors of seagal running for governor of arizona we

asked him to set the record straight on his political ambitions lot of people who asked me to do it and it may be an arrogant thing to say but i think if i do run or did run i would have a real good shot at winning the problem is. at this point in time i i don't think i qualify because i've only been in new zone for four years and i think you need a five year residency so there's a lot of little things going on but we may run for governor another time so he is not ruling out that governorship for the future for now we'll have to wait and see if his diplomatic efforts pay off in scottsdale arizona liz wall r t. all right well do you remember that crime fighting dog named mcgruff who was frequently featured in public service announcements that were targeted at children well maybe this will jog your memory now what are you going to say if someone asked you to try drugs. you keep messing around great mom are you.

and i wouldn't mind if. i don't think you. are it well it turns out that this long loving bloodhound has minimal to no good or at least the actor who plays him anyway well mcgruff takes a bite out of crimes like a legal drugs actor john were alice apparently does not morales has been sentenced to sixteen years in prison after pleading guilty today to possessing drugs and ammunition police found get this one thousand marijuana plants in his house along with twenty seven weapons including of corn a blond church and nine thousand rounds of ammunition so it looks like mcgruff missed out on catching a criminal that was right under his nose the whole time and that's going to do it for now for more on the stories we covered go to youtube dot com slash r t america or check out our web site r t dot com slash usa and don't forget to follow me on

twitter at meghan underscore lopez i want to know what you want us to cover so make sure to let me know but for now i'll see you right back here at eight pm eastern. it was a problem very hard to take up. arms against. a plug hat never had sex with her hair cut. the first. place. like. one of.

the. world's. science technology innovation hall the list of elements from around russia we've got the future covered. is a. hello and welcome to cross talk we're all things are considered on peter lavelle the european union likes to think of itself as one of the brighter and fairer parts of the world for european commission report on corruption the first of a.