diplomatically. >> speaking to the washington post, iranian president rouhani said he envisions a deal on iran's nuclear program within months, not years. in an interview with cnn, the iranian president distanced himself from denial of the not the holocaust espoused by his predecessor, ahmadinejad. >> any crime that happens in the history can steam entity, including the crime the nazis committed toward the hews and non-jewish people, is reprehensible as far as we're concerned. this does not mean on the other hand you can say, well, the nazis committed crimes against a certain group, therefore, they must assert the land of another group and occupy it. this, too, is an act that should be condemned, in our view. >> president rouhani has been in new york this week for the you in general assembly. the u.s. and its allies are facing what could be a major setback in efforts to influence 's civilome of syria

war. a coalition of rebel groups has openly split with the western backed foreign opposition. in a joint statement, 13 arm saidle -- rebel factions they reject the authority of the turkey-based national coalition, which is backed by countries including the u.s. and saudi arabia. the new front has dubbed itself the islamic alliance and claims to represent three quarters of the armed rebels fighting the assad regime. the alliance's lead signatory is ront, deemed a terrorist organization by the u.s. the news comes amidst reports members of the un security council have come to an agreement on a draft measure for ridding syria of chemical weapons. the u.s. and russia, along with the council's three other permanent members, have been negotiating over resolution since washington and moscow struck a pulmonary deal earlier this month. anonymous western diplomats say the core of the u.n. measure has

been reached, but russia has denied the claim. you and inspectors are now back in syria, resuming their probe of the alleged use of chemical weapons. the senate has open debate on a spending bill that would avert a government shutdown at the end of the month. the senate took up the bill wednesday after republican senator ted cruz ended his toathon quads i filibuster delay its consideration. ted cruz was backing the house republican effort to tie government funding to a repeal of obamacare. but the repeal provision had no chance of passing the senate, and democrats plan to strip it from the final version when they send it back to the house on saturday. ted cruz himself joined with all 99 of his senate colleagues on wednesday to advance the same measure he had just been 21 hours trying to stall. house republicans are expected to shift their focus on repealing obamacare to the pending vote on raising the federal debt ceiling. on wednesday, the treasury department warned the u.s. could

face a default on its debts no later than october 17 unless the borrowing limit is raised. republicans are now mulling a strategy that would condition a hike to the debt ceiling on a one-year delay of obamacare's implementation. enrollment in the new health care insurance programs greeted by obamacare begins on tuesday and the laws mandatory coverage requirement takes effect january 1. in a victory for food safety advocates, the senate's bill to avert a government shutdown will reportedly exclude a provision critics dubbed the monsanto protection act. the measure allows companies such as monsanto to continue selling and planting genetically modified seeds even if courts rule they pose health or environmental risks. it is set to expire at the end of the month after it's quite addition to an earlier spending bill signed by president obama in march. the bill galvanized the food justice movement, sparking protests and an online petition.

last week the house passed a spending bill that would extend the monsanto protection act, but senate democrats say their bill will let it expire. four senators have unveiled a measure to rein in the surveillance powers of the nsa. the bill from democratic udall,s ron wyden, mark and richard blumenthal, as well as republican senator rand paul, is the most sweeping congressional response to date since edward snowden exposed widespread nsa spying in june. at a news conference, senator wyden cited what he called a sea change in public opinion as a result of snowden's leaks. senator udall said the measures in the intelligence oversight and surveillance reform act would protect americans from unjustified intrusion into their private lives, in part by ending the ball collection of telephone records under section 215 of the u.s. patriot act. >> it includes in the ball

collections of millions of americans phone records, prohibiting the back door searches of american communication, and making the foreign intelligence or villains court more transparent and accountable. under this bill, the federal government will still be able to 's andld of terrorist spies phone records, but only were the government can demonstrate a suspected link to terrorism or espionage. and although i strongly believe some surveillance programs have made us safer, americans with no link to terrorism or espionage should not have to worry that the nsa is backing up their private information. democratic senator patrick leahy is not one of the bill's cosponsors, but has backed calls for similar reforms. the senate intelligence committee is set to propose -- address the proposed nsa reforms of the hearing today. on wednesday, the nsa chief criticize the outcry over government surveillance, saying edward snowden's leaks had sparked what he called "sensationalized hype." files showssified

the nsa spied on prominent critics of the vietnam war including dr. martin luther king, junior, mohammad ali, democratic senator frank church. the three were among over 1600 people on a watchlist whose overseas phone calls, telexes, and cables were targeted. president lyndon johnson launched the list in 1967 in a bid to see if growing antiwar beinged -- sentiment was aided from abroad. the spying continued through 1973 under president richard nixon. just seven names on the list have been revealed so far. in addition to dr. king, ali, and senator church, they include two journalists, washington post humor columnist art buchwald and new york times columnist tom wicker. the venezuelan president maduro is claiming he canceled his trip to the u.n. general assembly in new york this week due to threats on his safety. he said political opponents were

planning what he called provocations and direct threats. provocations led to the situation of violence in new york, and certainly, the international campaign was going to begin. venezuela, violence, venezuela, maduro, etc. the other provocation was integrity. affect my >> in his comments, president maduro cited the alleged involvement of otto reich and roger noriega, two former republican administration officials who back the 2002 coup that briefly ousted maduro's predecessor, hugo chavez. maduro clashed with the state department last week after he was briefly denied access to u.s. airspace on his way to china. customs and border protection agency has announced new guidelines following a spate

of deadly shootings by agents on the northern and southern borders. at least 19 people have been killed by border agents since 2010. the victims include at least six mexicans killed on the mexican territory. 16-year-old josé rodriguez was reportedly shot from behind no fewer than seven times last october for allegedly throwing rocks at an agent. the new changes include a training program: to size the defusing of threats instead of resorting to deadly force. in a statement, the american civil liberties union called the measures inadequate, saying -- a former black panther held in solitary confinement for over 40 years in louisiana has filed a bid for compassionate release

after being given just weeks to live. herman wallace and to others were placed in solitary confinement in 1972 following their conviction for murdering a prison guard. they and their supporters say they were framed for their political activism. according to his attorneys, herman wallace, now 70 one years old, has been diagnosed with terminal liver cancer and has just weeks to live. he is seeking compassionate release to spend his last days in hospice care. in sweden, the 2013) leave a towards have been announced for four recipients. paul f walker of green cross "workingonal, for tirelessly to rid the world of chemical weapons." director of the gaza-based palestinian center for human rights, congolese wege, andist denis muk

.his was agronomist hans herren awardsout annually, the are widely known as the alternative nobel prize. they will be given out in the swedish parliament in december. those are some of the headlines. this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman with juan gonzalez. >> welcome to all our listeners and viewers from around the country and around the world. 30 activists with greenpeace remain jailed in russia and face possible parsi charges one week after they were detained during a peaceful protest against arctic oil drilling. many of the greenpeace activists are appearing in a russian court today. a freelance photographer and a greenpeace spokesperson have just been ordered to be jailed for two months in september 18

greenpeace activists attempted to scare russia's first arctic offshore oil platform. a nearby russian coast guard ship with agents mask on board responded. the russians proceeded to ram theflash -- slash greenpeace inflatable boats. they detain two greenpeace activists would manage to climb onto the oil platform. >> a day later, armed russian coast guards dissented on the activist manship, arctic sunrise, using a helicopter and ropes. they reportedly lined up the majority of the 30 activists on board and held them at gunpoint on their knees on the ship's deck. officials then towed the boat and its occupants to the port where the activists were held incommunicado and questioned by investigators. on tuesday, russia's top investigative agency said it would prosecute the greenpeace

activists on parsi charges. if convicted, they could face up to 15 years in prison. on wednesday, russian president vladimir putin defended the russian coast guard's decision to apprehend the greenpeace activists. he spoke at an international conference on the arctic. >> it would be better if greenpeace representatives stood with us together in this hall and told us what they think about the problems we are discussing. they could state their complaints, demands, and concerns. no one is trying to rush them aside. we gather for meetings like the specifically to discuss such problems. it is obvious they are not pirates, but they tried to storm the platform. our security forces and border troops did not know exactly who was trying to seize the platform under the greenpeace guys. it is obvious these people violated international law by coming dangerously close to the platform. >> human rights groups have called on russian authorities to drop the parsi charges.

amnesty international russia activistsare said the legitimately exercise their right to peaceful protest. parsi charges are totally fabricated and do not have any legal basis. they're absolutely ace list. we're calling on the russian authorities to drop these charges against the greenpeace activists who use the right to peaceful protest. let me stress the activist to protest against oil drilling in the arctic did not possess any weapons. talks for more we're joined by kumi naidoo. in 2012 you participated in a similar action against oil drilling in the arctic. it is great to have you in our studios here at democracy now! explain to us what is happening right now in the arctic. activists are in court.

we know five activist, two from russia, one from canada, new zealand, and poland, are being sentenced to what is called pretrial detentions, basically, detention without trial, for two months. the charges they're being investigated are actually piracy. and the words of one of the who is russian colleague a photographer on board, said the criminal activity i am claimed for is called journalism. and that captures very well what we see. this is a disproportionate use of state authority to try to importantvery conversation that needs to be had. right now we are reaching tipping points on climate. the arctic is a refrigerator of the planet.

it is a warning sign that we have to get serious. sadly, western oil companies withexxon and others russian state-owned companies, to go and try and drill the last drops of oil in this most fragile, remote, and risky environment for such activities. >> talk about the russian .ecision to begin expiration how recent is it and what are the plans in terms of how extensive they expect it to be? >> the plan is pretty extensive. sadly, a key part of the russian government's economic strategy to harness the hydrocarbons and fossil fuels in the arctic. situation isicular important is even though there are many expirations going on by different companies in different parts of the arctic, this is the

first actual drilling that is about to start. the last or only participated in the same protest, which i was part of, they said they were about to start. our protest slow them down by about a week and then they suspended. thathis is significant is this will be the beginning of a road to disaster if the drilling actually starts. that is why we put so much emphasis. >> kumi naidoo, you, yourself, do this last year. talk about the action. i remember we were talking to you hanging off the side of the ship. what has happened in this year? >> in the course of this year, there was no charges brought against us, by the way. we were very transparent. we never hit anything. the russian coast guard ship him and took them three days to get there. once they got there, they just observed and took the view we

were peaceful. after we finished our protest after about seven days, we sailed away peacefully, no problem. this is a completely different approach. we don't understand. piracy, by the way, is a very big international problem as we stand today, to actually ring these charges against peaceful activists. to silence resistance. whoow my colleagues participate in this action. a young woman who was with us last year was the first person to actually get arrested. yesterday, the russian coast , the reading of what they did was horrific. you have a man from switzerland being yanked while hanging

several meters up. screaming, "were coming down!" their lives were put at serious risk. then they started shooting bullets into the water close to where the rigs were. this is really unnecessary intimidation. we appeared -- appeal to president putin and the russian people as a whole to understand what is at stake here is not just the world's future, but russia is very much in the firing line of climate change because of permafrost and what changes are happening, which will impact heavily on the russian people. >> what you make of the prosecutor saying they're going possible piracy charges while president putin says, obviously, they weren't pirates?

is this difference is within the government or is putin just try to put on a good face to the actions of his government? >> that is a good question to put to the russian government who are the only people that could answer it. thespeculation is that occupation of the ship by the coast guard when they came down by helicopters happened in international waters, and that action by the russian state was in fact legal in terms of international law. and it might be there pursuing the piracy charges because that gives them cover from any litigation against them for an illegal act of occupying a ship for no good reason in international waters. that is the only speculation i have heard. that is a question only the russian authorities cancer.

>> what are the u.s. plans for drilling in the arctic? they said they're going to release rules by year end. of course, shell wants to drill in the arctic. >> shell has given the world ofy eloquent sort of example why it is so incredibly difficult for us to even think that it is possible. billion oflown $5 the investors money over the last two years and one fiasco after another trying to get to the point of exploration. shall has now suspended the drilling for this year to try to get their act in order. but i think it is very misguided a president obama and the u.s. administration to allow this to happen. to grant any licenses is essentially yet another step toward accelerating us to universal climate change because

the consequences of drilling in this very fragile part of the world will be devastating. >> we're going to take a break and come back to our discussion with kumi naidoo and be joined by jeff masters from the weather underground as we continue to talk about climate change. kumi naidoo is executive director of greenpeace international. stay with us. ♪ [music break]

>> this is democracy now!,

democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman with juan gonzalez. the intergovernmental panel on climate change is set to issue friday it strongest warning yet the climate change is caused by humans and will cause more heat waves, droughts, and floods unless governments take action to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases. the ipcc releases the report every six years. it incorporates the key findings from thousands of articles published in scientific journals. -- the ipcc began meeting earlier this week in stockholm ahead of the report's release. this is the ipcc chairperson rajendra pachauri. >> they will approve the summary policymakers an acceptable report. this is happening at a time when the world is awaiting the outcome of this session with great expectation because of its obvious significance in respect of the current status of global negotiations. in the ongoing debate on actions

to deal with the challenge of climate change. is expectedreport to conclude with at least 95% certainty that human activities have caused most of earths temperature rise since 1950, and will continue to do so in the future. that is up from a confidence level of 90% in 2007, the last or the assessment came out. meanwhile, the heartland institute released a report this week by group of climate change skeptics called a nongovernmental international panel on climate change or nipcc . the 1200 page report disputes the reality of man-made climate change. talks from or greenpeace international's executive director kumi naidoo joins us and we're joined by jeff masters, director meteorology at the weather underground. on friday he'll host the weather channel's live coverage of the release of the ipcc's report. he is joining us here in the new york studio. we welcome you both to democracy

now! jeff masters, the significance of this report that is being released tomorrow. >> it is huge because willie c one of these reports every six --rs, and it lays out because we only see one of these reports every six years. it lays out the case that humans are mostly responsible for climate change. it will accelerate and there are things we can do to slow it down. >> in this report of the nongovernmental panel? >> it is what you would expect from basically lobbyists who are working for the fossil fuel industry, whose profits are threatened by the scientific findings of the ipcc. you would expect this blowback by the fossil fuel industry to dispute the science, to cast out, to play up some of the arguments against it -- which really art disputed by scientists. >> and the conclusion of the scientist, but isn't there

sovereign government involvement in the findings as well? >> the ipcc is kind of a unique hybrid because it is not just a scientific organization. all of its results have to be approved by government representatives. this week in stockholm, the scientist have presented their information and each government -- 195 in total -- have to go line by line through the report and approve it. the politicians have a say in what is in the final report. as a result, the report is conservative because everyone has to agree unanimously. >> jeff, what needs to be done? >> we have to cut down our emissions of heat capping dress gases and to prepare for the coming climate change storm. it is already here. we are ready see the impact. we better get ready. >> in terms of what has been leaked about it so far, some of

the conclusions may be a bit surprising. on the relationship between climate change and hurricanes and typhoons, what do they say they're? >> they have reduced the amount of certainty that we have already seen changes in intense hurricanes due to human causes him a of that reflects kind of date scientific work that is been happening that is not sure. there is a lot of variability and hurricanes naturally so it is hard to tell if they are changing due to a changing climate. that is one positive maybe we can take out of the report. how does colorado fit into this picture? the one thousand year flood question in india in june, something like 5700 people died in floods. >> one thing we're pretty sure of is climate change is already causing an increase in extreme rainfall events, particularly in north america. these are the top of events we saw this year in colorado and

again in asia. we have seen an increasing number of very heavy precipitation events, the kind that are most likely to cause some of the extreme floods we've seen in recent years. >> i want to bring kumi naidoo back into the conversation. you're here for the u n general assembly and president obama generalis week at the assembly. your assessment of what he did or didn't say about climate change? >> he hardly mentioned climate change. , even theabout it is cia and pentagon in 2003, even president bush which you chose , that report suggesting the coming decades, the biggest threat to security and stability would not come from conventional threats of terrorism, but from the impact of climate change. anyf any head of state,

political leader is concerned about peace, security, and stability, then they should be using the platforms at the united nations now to talk about the biggest urgency this planet has ever faced. a year already of serious impacts, particularly in the developing world. we have seen lives lost. argue, as thed secretary general argues, the genocide in darfur, was certainly intensified, exacerbated as a result of climate impact. the desert is marching from senegal to the south at a rate of one molly year. -- one mile a year.

when you see all of that happening, when heads of state are talking about all these interventions around chemical weapons, all of which are important, but the biggest threat to peace and security is coming already from climate change and it will intensify. in that sense, i was deeply disappointed that president obama did not make that connection. >> what could the u.s. be doing right now? >> they're compromising the economic future because the u.s. dues to forget about the arms race, space race, and so on. the only race that is going to matter in terms of which countries and companies will be competitive in the future is those countries and companies that get on the green race. the u.s. needs to take leadership. the world is hungry for u.s. leadership -- >> president obama was making the case for how the u.s. is exceptional. >> yes. way it isase, the

red, speaking beyond, change now, is an approach by the u.s. of do as we tell you what to do, don't do as we say -- do as we say, not as we do. we have waterboarding, guantanamo, extraordinary rendition. on respecting human rights and not violating peoples privacy without their knowledge -- people around the world are saying things like, we had so much optimism and president obama was saying, yes we can, yes we can, but with all of this nsa spying, maybe he was saying, yes we scan, yes we scan. [laughter] i wanted ask about what is happening in ecuador. at woodward dropped a plan to preserve swaths of amazon rain forest from oil drilling by having wealthy countries a them not to drill. president correa said the plan to say parts of yasuni national

park had raised only a fraction of the money sought. he said the world has failed us. this week i had a chance to interview ecuador's foreign over at the ecuador mission to the united nations t initiative.uni-it he said it failed to attract sufficient funding. world, natural resources are being exploited without a great deal of concern about the impacts of that exploitation. and we appeal to the world and we said we are willing to thatfice 50% of the income could potentially be generated, .ut the world has to contribute and we said if the international community would cover the other

50%, we were willing to ofpletely preserve the area yasuni itt and not export the oil indefinitely. but the world's response was negative. few millions of dollars, and we said if the world doesn't respond to our appeal, we are going to have to exploit this oil because we need these resources and the resulting income. appeals and done appeals and appeals and not

singing at go to our appeal, ecuador decided to exploit the oil without affecting the surface of yasuni. >> that is ecuador's foreign minister. president karen did not come to the u.n. he did not think the speeches have an impact. kumi naidoo, what about what is going to happen to the yasuni and how important it is? that was an tragedy innovative, creative way of people and nature were protected as not been responded to by the international community. it is a reflection of a skewed sense of the way we should be investing our global resources at the moment. we look at the amount of money

that is going into -- taxpayer money. a tiny fraction of that money could have actually secured this very, very fragile part of the world. people need to realize in the past when people protecting forests, it was seen ,s it's all about biodiversity protecting certain species, and if you like nature. today, people misunderstand that forests are belongs of the planet. it is fundamentally connected to the challenge of climate change. and the more we deplete our forests and at the rate we are depleting our force at the moment is ery two seconds of forest the size of the football field is disappearing. countries who have not come

up with the money i think -- >> a group of environmentalist have sent a letter pleading for not to move ahead, even if the international community failed him because indigenous people in the area are rising up saying, do not develop this, do not drill here. unesco designated the park as a world biosphere contains 100,000 species of animal, many of which are not found anywhere else in the world. >> that underscores the disconnect with regard to getting our priorities right. and also i think what you're seeing, so long as the countries historically who built economies on fossil fuels, the u.s. and most of the developed countries of the world, if they continue to be saying, we're going to continue with further fossil sands andthe tar

fracking, it makes a really difficult for organizations like greenpeace to actually lobby with developing countries to say, you're going to have to read the coal in the ground and the oil in the soil. they say, but those folks are still continuing. we are playing political poker with the future of the planet in the future of our children. all of the facts are telling us we are running out of time. there wereters, supposed to be a panel with michael bloomberg today on this issue. he certainly has sufficient funds in his own personal bank account to help ecuador to save the yasuni, so you may raise that issue when you're talking with them on the panel. i want to ask you more about the ipcc report. it won't be released until tomorrow. and it says about droughts the future prospects for the planet and specifically how it

relates to some of the issues or the conflicts we are in the world, even now, and also about the us is -- acidity in the oceans? >> drought is the number-one threat we face from climate change because it affects the two things we need to live -- food and water. the future projections of drought are rather frightening. you see large areas of the world, particularly the ones already dry, are expected to get drier, and it will greatly challenge our ability to grow food there and provide water for people. i was a little disappointed in the ipccd draft from report. it doesn't mention drought at all in the text. yours are mentioned in a single table they have showing, well, we are not really seeing changes in drought due to human causes yet, but we do think the dry air will get drier and this is going to be a problem in the future. a huge issue. it is really not addressed well and the summary. i'm sure the main body of the report, that will be released monday, we'll talk a lot about

drought. the second issue you raised, the acidity of the oceans, yeah, that we are sure we have seen an influence. there's been a 26% increase in the acidity. it will have severe impact on the marine communities and will only accelerate. 99% certainty the oceans are going to get more acidic and it is due to human causes. >> on drought, can you talk about syria? >> yeah. in syria, they're having their worst drought in over 70 years. there have been climate model studies done showing the drought in that region of the world in particular is very likely or probable due to human causes. if you run a climate model both with and without the human increase in greenhouse gases, you see a large privation in the drought conditions there in the mediterranean region. so we're pretty sure drought is a factor there. and in syria in particular,

people have migrated over one money people that have had to leave their homes because of drought. they have moved in to the cities. they don't have jobs and directly contributed to the unrest there. >> interesting analysis, kumi naidoo. >> absolutely. pointing to the big trigger for the conflict in syria as been climate impact drought. if you look at egypt and all the countries that went through the so-called arab spring -- i say so-called because i don't think the struggle for justice is a seasonal activity. the air resistance. you see and all of those countries there has been water stress as well. the fight in the future won't be over oil, but over water if we don't get it right.

people cannot drink oil. if you look at fracking in the united states, the potential danger that it has to water security because of the impact on the water table, it is really taking -- and south africa, by the way am a shell has a contract to stop fracking. extremely water stressed area. connect theed to dots. basically, what you see as a problem is a silo mentality to governance. all of these things are connected and we need the leadership we need now is leaders who can think in a total weight and understand the connections of the different global problems. >> jeff masters, what happens there arerms of

further reports that will come out in early 2014? >> that's right. this is only the first part of a four-part series. this only talks about what has actually happened to the climate and what the models project will happen. in march there will be a whole other section which is going to talk about what are some of the impacts of this? and then there will be a further report, what can we do about it? how can we reduce the impacts? this is going to take over your to play out. >> skeptics are paying a lot of attention to a part of the leaked report. the ipcc said the rate of warming between 98 and 20 tell was about half the average rate since 1951. >> they like to put in a frame something which they can use to challenge the report. i look at that sort of incidents as a speed bump on the highway of climate change. we expect natural variability to play a role here. we have various cycles in the thesphere, the sun changes,

ocean changes. we expect to see these sorts of slowdowns. we expect this excel versions as well. if you look at the 15-year period ending in 2006, the rate of warming was almost double the previous 15 years and nobody paid attention to that. >> was colorado climate change, the 1000 year flood? >> we can say that sorts of events become more common. you load the dice in favor of more extreme precipitation events. you rule double sixes more often and maybe now and again you control a 13. >> our meteorologist ever going to start flashing those words " climate change" as often as they flash "severe weather"? >> they are beholden to what the producer says. some are on board and many are not. >> if i could jump in, there's a lesson from history in the united states that is helpful. if you look at when the scientific evidence around tobacco was clear and the

contents -- and scared that tobacco is bad for you, there was still a very powerful lobby of scientists from the tobacco industry to actually contaminate [indiscernible] seeing a carbon copy of that same approach. i would say to the leaders of the fossil fuel industry, also there is another thing you need to learn from. when into tobacco litigation started in the early days, the ceos of tobacco companies were elegant and said it will never -- arrogant and said they will never take it seriously. climate litigation is starting now on the fossil fuel companies are actually being dismissive. i say to the fossil phil industry leaders, go and ask tobaccos of companies what is the largest amount of money to have because it is often in the legal department because of the scale

of settlements. one expectation is the huge amount of money that goes into lobbying is going to do everything to actually rubbish this report and try to take too many pieces of information. the american people in particular must interrogate the fact for every member of threess there is between and seven full-time lobbyists paid by the oil, coal, and gas sector. and they are actually held back the possibility of the u.s. being a global leader and that will her to. >> we will continue this commerce station. thank you, kumi naidoo and jeff masters. jeff masters will be hosting the weather channel's live coverage of the release of the ipcc's report tomorrow. when we come back, matt taibbi

is with us of "rolling stone" on "looting the pensions." stay with us. ♪ [music break]

>> this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman with juan gonzalez. we turn now to major new piece by rolling stone contribute in edit or matt taibbi called, "looting the pension funds: five years after the financial crisis, wall street is picking at the carcass of flat-broke city and state governments -- blaming public workers and making millions to 'rescue' them." >> matt taibbi joins us here in our studio. explain how the pension funds are being looted. >> the primary focus of my piece, there were a couple of things.

number one, how did these funds come to be broken the first place? i think everyone realizes that states are having fiscal crisis. one of the reasons is at least 14 states have not been making their annual required contributions to the pension fund for years and years and years. so essentially, they have been illegally borrowing from these funds, sometimes going back decades. another focus of the piece was the solution that wall street funded think tanks are coming up with now is to get higher returns by putting these funds into alternative investments like hedge funds. in a lot of cases what i'm finding is that the fees that states are paying for these new hedge funds world tentative investments are roughly equal to the cuts that are taken from workers. like in the state of rhode island, for instance, their frozen the cost of living :djustment and the frozen

roughly equals the fees they're paying to hedge funds in the estate. it is a will transfer from teachers, cops, and firemen to billionaire hedge funds. >> decades ago, pension funds used to invest conservatively, basically in bonds, because they knew this was retirement money of workers that they couldn't risk. last 20, 30 the years, they have shifted more of their money into the stock markets, to the gambling of the stock market, so when the market went down, suddenly the investment returns of these pension funds went down and they were stuck and because they were projecting continued increases on those returns. >> and among the problems here is state and municipal pension funds are actually not covered by the federal law governing pensions, so there is no prudent man ruled that requires a

certain level of reasonability or prudence in investment. hedge funds probably would not have been a typical public worry municipal investment a long time ago -- public or municipal investment a long time ago. now 10%, 20% of these funds are being put into these alternative investments. if you look on the prospectuses of a lot of these investments, they say in huge letters on the front, these are high risk investments you may lose everything. exactly the opposite of what you want to put public money to. >> talk about john arnold. >> he became a billionaire, one of the world's most successful commodity traders after the collapse of enron. he is sort of the new koch brothers figure. use on a crusade, created something called the arnold foundation, which is funding pension reform efforts in

multiple states across the country. from montana to florida to rhode .sland in rhode island, arnold donated a lot of money to a 501(c) four organization called engage rhode island. this is sort of a new formula. and the citizens united age, you have some person, a hedge fund guy like john arnold, who gives a whole bunch of money to some shadowy organization which advertises this crisis that we can't afford to pay workers anymore, so we have to do things differently. we have to make cuts and put all the money and wall street managed funds. and that is sort of his playbook. >> i want to ask about detroit. the biggest bankruptcy we know of and recent modern times for a municipality, and you have the situation of the pension funds

there under threat. but the average retiree from detroit government is receiving a pension of $19,000 a year. we're not talking about golden parachutes. yet these are the very pension funds that are now under attack. >> there is a huge corruption case that just broke open this morning. what i would say about that, pension funds are sort of the last great big unguarded piles of money in this country and there are going to be all sorts of operators trying to get their hands on that money. during the crisis era, it was wall street inks who are essentially looting them. in detroit, it was the workers themselves who were taking the money. they're giving themselves what they called 13 checks, taking advances of their own money. across the country the more typical narrative is not some worker who is making $19,000 who

is really making out in this kind of corruption, it is the hedge fund who is making 50 and $60 million in fees managing state funds. that is the much more typical -- >> you had a piece earlier about thomson reuters. earlierstory came out this year. there was a whistleblower who worked at thomson reuters. there's a key economic indicator that thomson reuters is interrupted with university of michigan that affects the fed's and some of the fed's moves. if you have early access to that data, you deftly have a trading advantage and it is subsequently , 16 oft that some firms the biggest banks and hedge funds in the world, have been getting that data up to an hour early -- >> and that means? >> they're able to trade ahead of that information. i spoke with a market research

firm who looked at the trading data and said, look, you are seeing these huge spikes in activity just before the data is officially released, which means there are whole bunch of people were gambling on inside information. this is going on all over the place. >> matt taibbi, we have to leave it there. we will have a link to piece in rolling stone that hits the stands friday called, "looting the pension funds: five years after the financial crisis, wall street is picking at the carcass of flat-broke city and state governments -- blaming public workers and making millions to 'rescue' them." [captioning made possible by democracy now!]

tavis: good evening. from los angeles, i am tavis smiley. tonight the first of two conversations with finger linda ronstadt. -- with finger linda ronstadt.

her crystal invoice is eminently crystalline voice is silenced due to parkinson's. her book is titled "simple dreams." we are glad you joined us. a conversation with linda ronstadt is coming up. ♪ ♪ >> and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. ♪hank you.

tavis: before she retired from in 2000 nine, linda ronstadt collaborated with numerous artists including dolly parton, paul simon, and so many more. she moved from libretto to the mexican songs she learned from her mother and father. she has written a wonderful memoir called "simple dreams." here is a simple reminder of her beautiful voice. desperado, why don't you come to your senses ♪ for soe been out riding

♪ng you're a hard one ♪ ♪ i know that you got your ♪asons >> still sound good? >> i remember a secondhand store. tavis: i am talking about your voice am a and you are talking about your blouse. does it still sound good to you? >> i love that song. tavis: does it still sound good to you? >> where did i get that vibe rob lowe? it sound like a billy goat. -- that by brought so -- that

vibrato? it felt like a billy goat. tavis: you were here last time. i wanted to remind you of something you said last time you were on this row graham -- this row graham, and i quoted you around the world about this. program, and i quoted you around the world about this. you said part of the problem in this country is either pollution and you'reution, right. there is so much noise we have to break through these days. >> it's depressing. everywhere you go there is a soundtrack. you cannot really hear it. we work so hard on those records andake them sound good, every single year since they invented sound recording, it gets better. wi