now i could give you due to my question more. on the news tonight president trump meets with middle eastern leaders today at the u.n. as a rainy and president rouhani response to threats against his nation and the russian military strikes terrorist positions in syria taking out a reported eight hundred fifty enemy combatants and category four hurricane maria strikes puerto rico with over one hundred mile an hour per hour winds leaving the entire island without electricity i'm ed schultz reporting tonight from washington d.c. you're watching r t america. good

evening friends we start tonight at the u.n. general assembly and the ripple effect of the trump speech president trump kept a busy schedule meeting with leaders from the middle east and africa meanwhile iran's president rouhani spoke to the gathered assembly today directly responding to threats to withdraw from the iranian nuclear deal hanum. i declare before you that the islamic republic of iran will not be the first country to violate the agreement but it will respond decisively and resolutely to its violation by any part of it it will be a great pity if this agreement were to be destroyed by rogue newcomers to the world of politics the world will have lost a great opportunity but such unfortunate behavior will never repeat iran's course of progress and it basement. president trump's harsh language on north korea on tuesday has been met with both purchases and praise u.n.

ambassador nikki haley said the president had to speak up and called kim jong un a paranoid leader responding to criticism from former obama officials the president took to twitter and blamed hillary clinton for allowing north korea to obtain nuclear weapons while she was secretary of state for more on this we go to see rob good to tonight is a policy specialist at the institute for china america studies great to have you with us tonight what do you make of mr rouhani he's returned fire so to speak to the trump speech it was the most aggressive i think we've ever heard in iran it's the most aggressive you've heard iran and also also at the same time it came across to the international community as a very reasonable response usually we have here indian leaders and think back to mahmoud i mean the need. and the things that used to come out from his mouth now we oftentimes hear that many of the similar things coming out of the mouth for an american president measure the damage of the trauma speech now keep in mind that

his supporters loved it they thought it was long overdue they think the u.n. has not had course had too many resolutions and never been a. organization of action so to speak so his supporters loved it whereas the damage the damage definitely is with regard to north korea it is the foremost international issue i feel off the day in terms of the real potential for in nuclear exchange which is if avian not just of north korea of the super pos but also off humanity and on that front i think of a multiple areas where i think if in the speech. i guess when you when you look at what washington is doing they seem to be just following along with trump right now there isn't much resistance to things that he's saying about north korea is that because we can visually see. see that they are launching missiles what you make of it that they're they're they're trying mr trump is working off of basic consensus

in u.s. policy reserve in north korea but that policy also had flexibility and mr trump had actually endowed missed some degree of flexibility in that policy but he has spoken from both sides of his mouth on this he's spoken in a conciliatory tone and a hawkish tone and one just doesn't know if if you're a north korean leader which was what to take out of it what can china do at this point these are strong sanctions from the united nations unanimous from the security council what more can china do you know at this point of time china really does not want situation to drift any further towards war but frankly at this point of time they might even be thinking of opening a conversation with the u.s. in terms of what sort of contingencies might happen in place of a walk and who goes and safeguards nukes what happens to the refugees what happens to political arrangements post war at but i mean to get to that point you are talking of a lot of human lives lost and i don't think china wants to go to the go in that

direction at all ok so what would be the steps that china and the united states would take if the united states has look we're going to hit north korea i mean these would be fast high level talks and the aftermath of this is really almost. too hard to imagine we don't know what the aftermath would be do we. read nobody wants to contemplate that and do any sort of real scenario planning on that basis but what can be planned for is if the if it does come down to a full blown war we know north korea is going to be the regime is going to be eliminated and the contingencies that will crop up after that the kim jong il regime is reduced god knows how many lives are lost in the process did the president wake up the world when he said totally destroy oh absolutely i think he told he definitely. he disturbed the world he's disturbed north korea and think and on other terms also you know he he ran down the iran nuclear deal what fate is one

to place in from the north korean side in negotiation if it if the next subsequent president comes and bernanke's on it he mr trump also did not create any separation between mr kim and and the north korean countrymen under which he did in the case of iran and so i mean this all falls with the north korean troops of how the us is always going to come and try to destroy us and what is the purpose in having a conversation in the us rather than let's just start from some position of strength or at least to terence to rob good to thank you for your time tonight. the president has gathered all the attention at the united nations in the last twenty four hours with his straight talk about north korea aside from taking issue with the president's vernacular lawmakers have produced a little critique of the poor diplomatic effort with north korea it's almost as if the congress has given up and is just waiting for the first strike on kim jong un

gone are the days of ted kennedy robert byrd and paul well stone emphatically making the case give peaceful negotiations a chance the superpowers in the region china and russia have called for a diplomatic solution congress isn't attempting this there are silent. on the issue is deafening are we going to war with north korea and why is the united states congress seeming to be sitting in the stands just waiting for the mushroom cloud is that why they were elected not to speak up let's go to our panel tonight ned ryan is the c.e.o. of american majority and also holland cook media consultant joins us tonight gentlemen thanks for your time but let's start with you ned there is. a situation here where there are no dissenting voices ok it seems like the president has the green light in not to overstate this but i see

a lot of parallels with this in the run up to iraq there were very few if any dissenting voices i mean we're talking about thermal nuclear war a possibility of something the globe has never seen and yet there's seems to be no debate what do your thing what do you think about that. i think my response back to you i would be i think we've tried the diplomatic approach the sanction approach for the last twenty three years and i would say i think the north korea situation is the failure of the last three administrations republican and democrat that have brought us to this point and so i would actually argue i don't believe the president wants to see war he wants to see this solved through either very forceful sanctions i think that there are a lot of things that we can do to china and have those conversations with china say listen our interests have to become your interest we do not want an existential threat of somebody with nuclear weapons that can drop them on american cities you have to accommodate us on this issue and i think we can actually put a lot of leverage on china because of that the other thing too i think china does

have steps to bring north korea to heel and at work you look at where the supply comes from the oil supply over ninety percent of the oil supply for north korea comes from china china gets serious about saying we don't want to see this happen anymore they cut off the oil supply i think we could then have a very serious conversation about how north korea moves forward how and cook your thought so no dissenting voices and almost a stamp of approval on the airwaves across america everything was supposed to end it for trump the billy bush tape all of those fold on the campaign trail and like that bunny in the battery commercial the guy keeps ticking a lot of these members of congress are up for reelection and i think they're sniff from the prevailing wind to see you lou to line up behind they have nothing to gain by saying too much too soon what does happen to the democrats or you go ahead ed your thoughts on that no i would say i mean i thought what yesterday was it was

necessary i think donald trump laid out a very clear eyed realistic view of foreign policy in the world as it stands right now there are bad actors on the international stage he was calling for the rest of the world to unite against them and i think he's put all options on the table sanctions and all of the other economic thing. and all the other diplomacy does not work unless there is actual real force and threat of force behind it and i think that's why donald trump has not been mensing his words that he will take any means necessary to defend the american people you cannot have real diplomacy unless there is a real threat of force but what about the other extreme and it was a big deal when nixon went to china a lot of people held their breath to see what would happen what if donald trump stood up at the u.n. the other day and said looked right into the camera and said kim jong un meet me in geneva have we exhausted diplomacy what about that ned i mean the president does not use his speech at the u.n.

to you know win friends and influence people he went there with a hammer or any threw it on the table. i mean it was and i think the whole point of this regime in north korea has been to have the nuclear program to have these capabilities this is why they have existed i think it's going to be very hard to dissuade them to let those go and that you're going to have to say you're either going to have to let them go or you're going to continue to be an existential threat to us you have to let the nuclear weapons go if they will not let them go i'm not really sure what the conversation would entail gentlemen let me go down this road as an american citizen i don't want to see any americans die in a confrontation exactly because china didn't do something i don't want to put i would not want to put the fate of the american people in the hands of another country and i think that either got a fish or cut bait and i think that the president missed an opportunity at the u.n. by not calling out kim jong un you know it's like

a question more who can argue with that. so it was totally on brand you know this rocket man thing is pure trump from the guy who gave us a lie crooked hillary a little marco i'm surprised he didn't call him rocket boy but how do all these tweets and some of the off prompter lines at the u.n. translate into other languages that are spoken in other cultures we don't know the pied graph of world leaders how many have laughed him off as a buffoon and how many are taking him literally. in a word. and it was not a mistake that steve nugent was on was there in the front row very prominent during trump speech because again i don't think we would be leaving this in the hands of china if we decide that we are going to say if china will not take a strong stance against north korea we will not we will we will not have any more trade with them there will be no more real estate deals we will have

a very strong conversation with china about that moving forward it is in our hands to have that conversation with china today and. it our interest to be china's interest so i agree with you nobody wants a kinetic war on the korean peninsula i do think there are still some conversations to be had with china to get them to pressure north korea to say you have to stop this or will not in well ned ryan holland could gentlemen great to have you with us tonight i just get the feeling that the congress has bought a ticket to this and they're willing to watch and not do anything thanks so much. russia has killed nearly a thousand militants during recent airstrikes in syria let's go to manila chant she's got that story tonight this is a big impact is that it is big news ad of course everyone right now is watching what's happening in new york at the u.n. g.a. the president's words no doubt important but the the america's chief diplomat rex tillerson is also in new york where he had quietly had

a sideline meeting with russia's foreign minister sergei lavrov some of the issues on the table we're not hearing so much about these days that syria where as you mentioned eight hundred fifty militants were killed in an airstrike by the russian air force near the adlib province take a listen to what secretary tillerson had to say about this meeting and future u.s. russia cooperation in syria we've established many points of contact with the russians at various levels. that we've been dealing with a few differences over our embassies and. we've got that stabilized now but i think importantly we know what the really big issues are and we continue to find there is the mutual interest cooperation in syria who are both focused on defeating isis in syria stabilizing the country so the civil war does not rewrite and moving to the geneva for geneva talks to u.n. security council resolution two to four so we have many common objectives sometimes

we have different tactics of how to achieve those in serbia we have different interests but a lot of very serious. fork on the way in syria now although the trumpet ministration has outlined its goals of destroying isis top officials have often contradicted each other in the means of reaching that goal now this is an opening for other strategic powers in the region to play a larger role in the syrian conflict that is on one hand defeating isis and on the other it's that six year civil war and just today turkish president rachel tayyip erdogan said that he is ready to send more turkish soldiers into syria to help bring an end to the civil war turkey already has troops on the ground in syria fighting the islamic state and kurdish rebels in the north whom the u.s. is arming and are one is set to meet with president trump tomorrow at the u.n. g.a. and his schedule for a dinner with vladimir putin next week so ed just like you said this news of eight

hundred fifty jihadist being killed seems to be eluding a lot of the other media outlets these are guys from terror groups like the al nusra front who the u.s. was fighting during the obama era but we're hearing almost nothing about it in western media a lot of inroads were made in recent days in that war in syria it's a strong to a close isis is nearly depleted the civil war seems to be coming to an end with bashar al assad regaining control of his country and now the major players in the region all jockeying for a slice of influence in potentially a post-war syria and another thing we don't hear from administrators here in the united states is assad has to go right where united any united states is realized ok that's a bridge happening that separates too far and if you dissect the sound bite with tillerson there this is the most cooperation the united states has ever had with russia and syria and turkey right now is certainly teaming up with russia on

defeating isis and as well as bringing stability back to the region ok thanks manila. the devil. toll from yesterday's earthquake in mexico city stands at well over two hundred individuals the earthquake registered a seven point one magnitude and it is the deadliest in the country of mexico in the last thirty two years although the epicenter struck seventy five miles south east of mexico city over forty four buildings have so far been completely destroyed today it was revealed twenty one schoolchildren and four teachers were among the victims at a mexico city school journalists and brokenness says the death toll from the collapsed buildings is expected to rise in the coming days and so our thoughts were about how many good folks are going to be rescued or not and what we found out later was that more people at the harrisons collapsed at leeds and then were rescued and of course the big story here is one that sorry was noted earlier practice at the school children it's going to probably the least. amount of care

stare and folks are really wondering if the building codes have definitely been approved here and for its much much more than one hundred five but obviously apparently not enough president trump offered condolences to mexico and pledged to support the country in recovery efforts hurricane maria board down on early recorder rico today the category four hurricane hit puerto rico with one hundred fifteen mile per hour winds leaving the entire island without power this afternoon for more on the latest we turn live now to our to correspondent in miami marina. the entire island of three and a half million people is one hundred percent without power as you mentioned beginning this afternoon according to fema this occurred just hours after maria ripped through puerto rico video capture the deadly hurricane ripping roofs off

structures shattering windows and tearing doors off hinges in the capital of san juan palm trees were stripped in streets flooded as the storm passed through this is the first category four storm to hit the island since one thousand nine hundred thirty two puerto rico's governor ricardo receive says the island has been devastated and will need to be rebuilt from scratch he has requested that president trump declare the u.s. territory a disaster zone which would make federal funding and assistance available to individuals and local governments maria murray is a rival comes just two weeks after hurricane irma pummeled puerto rico reportedly leaving behind up to one billion dollars in damages these back to back natural disasters come at a time when the u.s. territory is already struggling puerto rico's infrastructure has gone neglected for years as the as the government of the island grapples to deal with that seventy four billion dollars debt to bondholders and additional fifty billion dollars

pension funds obligations unemployment in puerto rico is around ten percent double the national average the island's utility provider filed for bankruptcy in july after years of under-investment that yielded a system it itself called degraded and unsafe these hurricanes are hammering an economy that can't take much more there are more storms to come for sure in miami thanks so much they know you the person is confirmed dead in last week's nursing home scandal in hollywood florida all of the victims of feared to have died of heat related injuries enraged in the age from seventy one to ninety nine years old a criminal investigation into the deaths is. is ongoing a new study from the abol era health shows dire consequences for health care in america if the gram cassidy bill is passed republicans struggle to get the votes in the senate former president obama came to the defense of the

administration's signature legislation today for the first time more than ninety percent of americans know the security of health insurance. paying more for insurance or being denied insurance because of a preexisting condition or because you are a woman that's not a thing anymore we got rid of it. and people are alive today because of it and that's progress and all of this being done without any demonstrably economic or actuarial or plain common sense rationale. it's it frustrates and it's certainly frustrate to have to mobilize every couple of months to keep. our leaders from inflicting real human suffering on our constituents for more on the future of health care in this bill we go to john nichols washington correspondent for the nation and also the author of the new book horsemen of the trump a lot what is that horse the trunk pocalypse well bob phillips a field guide to the

most dangerous people in america i love the title it's got to be an interesting book just out today john great to have you with us tonight thanks so much it's great to be with you ed let me show you the numbers the study estimates that the federal funding is going to be cut by two hundred fifteen billion dollars by two thousand and twenty six we're talking about you know four trillion dollars over a twenty year period this is the grandest savings that the republicans are coming up with and also they're saying that the bill would reduce funding for thirty four states. is this a good deal. really are they going to get the votes your thoughts first off it's a horrible deal the interesting thing about our friends in the senate republican caucus at least at the leadership level is that every time they get beat on a bad bill they come up with one that's actually worse and this one even is worse

it's more sweeping than the previous proposal and poses a real threat not just the affordable care act but to medicaid and at the end of the day that's going to be a real challenge for it there are republican governors across the united states who are saying to republican senators don't vote for this thing and there clearly is a ramping up of pressure on a group of potential swing republican senators so it's possible that this thing gets beat even if it does get through the senate of course then there's a reconciliation with the house which would be very messy so i don't think we're at the point of of the repeal and replace but something president obama said there was a big deal this notion that people have to mobilize every couple months because here comes another bad bill that is i think becoming frustrating not just to barack obama but to a lot of americans senators on the republican side we're out and about work in the cables today and work in the media and what i noticed that all of the interviews is

that in their talking points they're not mentioning the insurance industry you know they they talk about cuts they talk about individual they they play washington against local control but the bottom line here is is that they are not openly openly stating that you know preexisting conditions you don't have anything to worry about getting dropped from your insurance you don't have anything to worry about now this is the new law if this goes into effect this is what america's going to be dealing with again is this a big hoodwink are they telling the truth. i don't think that those who who are at the frontlines of advancing this bill are telling the truth i also think that many people who are supporting it are not even fully aware of what's in it i think it's come together with extremely limited examination i think it's being advanced as a last ditch effort to pass something by republicans in the senate who frankly are

frustrated by the fact that they've been so unsuccessful on this issue but it is a terrible way to do legislation even if you support a more conservative approach a more free market approach to just throw a bill like this in trying to get in you know before the end of the of the the timeline here if you will it's terrible politics it's what frustrates americans as regards washington and frankly it will do harm if it comes to be the law of the land because people will lose their care no doubt john nichols always great to have you with us. thank you ed washington d.c. is notorious for revolving door politics artie's of tosh's suites takes a look at one recent example. as you may recall former president barack obama campaigned on hope and change while he promised to fight for the poor many on the right argue his policy including the affordable care act actually tax the poor

policy aside the former president went from the white house to wall street in less than a year he was reportedly in a four hundred thousand dollars per speech to massive financial firms that's about what the president's salary adds up to in an entire year reports surfaced this week that obama delivered a speech to northern trust corporation and the carlyle group both for around four hundred thousand dollars a speech he's also planning to attend a three day conference by cantor fitzgerald next week breaking and other four hundred thousand dollars a move his fellow democrats might not agree with. what obama is doing now by speaking to a company like the carlyle group the private equity giant is aligning himself with corporate power at a time when democrats may want to be turning away from. but he's not the only one rags to riches former president bill clinton and twenty sixteen presidential democratic nominee hillary clinton have reportedly earned a combined one hundred fifty three million dollars in paid speeches since two

thousand and one well that breaks down to seven hundred twenty nine speeches averaging more than two hundred thousand dollars for each address seven point seven million at least thirty nine speeches were to big banks including goldman sachs after receiving much criticism for her involvement with big banks especially by senator bernie sanders and during the campaign oddly enough clinton wrote she regretted the move in her book stroller a fellow at the open markets and said to compared clinton to her former boss colin obama's moved quote crappy saying that even clinton's book is hurting the democratic party far less compared to obama's speeches ryan cooper a national correspondent for the week sums it up in his two step plan when asked how to make that much force speech one become president or two do not enforce laws against securities or mortgage fraud but some argue the former president is using his money to help others including the work's been done through his foundation in

washington r.t. and a final note tonight we're pleased to tell you again that or to you america is now carried in can be viewed on direct t.v. channel three two one that's direct t.v. channel three twenty one thanks for watching tonight i'm a reporter from washington. your watching our team america special report. that's. basically everything that you think you know about civil society broken down. there's always going to be somebody else one step ahead of it. we should not be. we don't be. people that think like this on are but. this is an incredibly sad situation. what politicians do.

they put themselves on the line. they get accepted or rejected. so when you want to be president. some want to be rich. but you want to be prosperous like the four three of them all can't be good. i'm interested in the waters of. the should. all the world. and all the news companies merely players but what kind of part is r t america play party america offers more artsy america first. in many ways the news landscape is just like the real movie big names good actors bad actors and in the.