i remember when we interviewed michael in berlin, when he was suing donald rumsfeld, the defense secretary george w. bush. stay with us. ♪♪ [music break] ♪♪ [music break] amy: this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman. that in 2006, attorneys with the centers for constitutional rights went to berlin, germany to file a war crimes lawsuit in germany against then-outgoing defense secretary donald rumsfeld and other high-ranking u.s. officials, for their role in the torture of prisoners in iraq and guantanamo. we spoke with then ccr president michael ratner from berlin. michael: what we did was file a 220 page complaint against 14 high-level u.s. officials, rumsfeld being the lead one. general sanchez being in there. and a number of the lawyers who wrote some of the so-called torture memos, particularly lawyers. the procedure is you file the complaint with the prosecutor and the prosecutor then decides whether or to have an investigation. we did file a similar case in 2004. the prosecutor and 2004 dismissed the case. he dismissed it for legal reasons o

undermined powell within the bush administration was vice president cheney and secretary of defense donald rumsfeldpresident george w. bush surrounded himself with his father's friends, but he did not have the intellect to deal with his father'sriends. those neoconservatives were always undermining everything powell was trying to do, to include condoleezza rice. he was treating her like a daughter and she should have been supporting him, but she didn't. that is what politically forced owl to leave the administration. go ahead. . monte: you did mention this when talking about colin powell shattering, trailblazing, if you will, for the african-american community. do you think the former secretary of state was aware of all the doors he was opening for african-americans, because back then, nobody really talked about him being a trail blazer, because it just happened. nowadays, things are different. >> he had to realize. butere's the tng about col powell and all professional soldiers -- they do their job. as he was leading what would come behind him, he was too busy doing his job with dignity to make a

you know, you know, i'm referring to the deceased or criminal donald rumsfeld and with the same it's become a slightly more emotional because of the skin color. but what he did was hoping to basically serve the empire to elias ministry wage was and in the k. so for co little pound, of course, he has a pre history to iraq, which is very mom. he was one of the younger officers who come right up, the main line massacre which made her became a huge scandal in the u. s. history. so that's what he is a celebrate pharaoh and give them a going to send off because they support all this stuff and have been for ages. now the media and the global media in the west is a central player and all the wars that have been taking place in the 21st century the lies about iraq were told by the new york tribes. what federal in the b, b. c. under pressure from blair, director general the bbc or didn't tow the line will basically forced out, etc, etc. so these walls have effectively cemented guerrero of the state media in particular like the bbc of cnn and our western terminals. tony tony blinkin biden's, a

you know, you know, i'm referring to the deceased war criminal, donald rumsfeld and with the same it's become a slightly more emotional because of a skin color. but what he did was will fail to basically serve the empire to elias ministry wage was. and in the case of a, he was one of the younger officers who come up the main line massacre, which later became a huge scoundrel in the u. s. history. so that's what he is a barrow and give them a going to send off because they support all this stuff and have been for ages. now the media, the global media in the west is a central player in all the wars that have been taking place in the 21st century. the lies about iraq were told by the new york times were better in the b, b. c. under pressure from blair, director general the bbc or didn't tow the line were basically forced out, etc, etc. so these walls have affected me, cemented the role of the state media in particular like the bbc of cnn and other western terminals. tony tony blinking biden's a man in the state to bob and said he was a great man. i think what i'm getting out is because yo

house fellows in the nixon administration who later served as special assistant to counselor donald rumsfeld. he's the chief editorial assistant to former president nixon on research and writing of his memoirs during the presidency years in san clemente. and he has the distinction of having seven interviewed the former president for 38 hours on tape in 1983 in those materials reside in the peabody archive. our distinguished speaker this evening is john roy price the road scholar and harvard educated attorney who migrated from 1968 rockefeller campaign to that of nixon. he promptly joined the new nixon administration in 199 working with daniel patrick moynihan and later working with domestic adviser john ehrlichman a special system to the president for urban affairs. he ultimately became head of government relations for chase manhattan bank and present ceo of the federal bank of pittsburgh. a special note jonas joined this evening by his daughter alexandria so welcome to both of you. john's new book "the last liberal republican" an insider's perspective on nixon's surprising social policy" re

. >> yes, as donald rumsfeld said, weakness is provocative.nistan, we enforced in their minds the notion that the u.s. first of all is just feeble. but also incompetent. leave morgue than what -- 83 billion dollars worth of equipment and 400 americans maybe more. leaving our afghan allies there. leaving and not doing very much about our british and other nato allies. china looks at that, says that, well, the united states is finished. >> gordon chang we have frozen our defense budget. and communist china are goingful bore ahead with nuclear missiles and conventional weaponry. with a navy, with submarines. and pushing on all fronts looks like xi is doing a imitation of mao. and opposing his will on every day life, the people there, this is a very, very risky period for the reasons you said we have a president in my view, incapable of being command every in chief and u.s. know that. >> thank you, mark. mark: we'll be right back. age is just a number. and mine's unlisted. try boost® high protein with 20 grams of protein for muscle health. versus

he later developed a rivalry with donald rumsfeld during the w. bush years. talk to me about his leadership style and how it evolved and affected decades of u.s. military strategy. look, they say the sign of a great person is to be able to evolve and change over time and he certainly did that. >> yeah, i believe he did. in fact, he was very good as a staff officer certainly in the pentagon, but he also could lead. and he led large organizations such as the fifth core when i met him in germany in the 1980s. and then forces command, which is the largest army command that the army has. it's in charge of all army forces in the continental united states. he had that, a more directive type of leadership. and then as national security adviser for president reagan, that was more of a soft power because that was an adviser, coming up with plans and advising then president reagan. and then as secretary of state, a whole different kind of leadership is needed. one is certainly as an adviser to president bush on foreign policy but also being a representative throughout t

eight or nine months of the bush admistration, well lost fight after fight when dick cheney and donald rumsfeld and others who were called the neoconservatives were really running the administration. there was a good bet that powell was not going to last until the end of the year. but then september 11 happened, powell decided to stay, but he is still very isolated. they basically saw him as a milk carton. they put him in the refrigerator and when they needed him, they would bring him on the shelf. they brought him off the shelf in 2003 to talk at the u.n. because there was no one else in thedministration who could give the attention -- get the attention and respect and colin powell gave that talk which was from a to z false. he was the only one in the administration and a year and half later, he is gone. he is complicated because in many ways, he did not fit in with the republican party. he did not leave until earl this year. but he increasingly, anyone who is a moderate, black moderate, simply had no place in the republican party. he endorses obama. he endorses biden. he endorses hillary clin

>> you know, to paraphrase donald rumsfeld, you go into court with the laws you have and the sentencingges people got for trespass, obstructing congress, and so on, those are the penalties they come with and if people want to change that, yes, then go to congress and make those more severe penalties. but it's not the justice department is being more lenient than they should be. that's just the penalties that come for those crimes. >> elliot williams, thank you very much. >>> coming upon up, vice president kamala harris's office on clean-up duty once again. why she is now making amends to israel. 'hook audrey sent. ♪ oh my land and sea, that's mine ♪ ♪ and pardon when i shine ♪ ♪ hands to the sky, all mine ♪ ♪ woah, woah no ceiling woah ♪ ♪ woah good feeling woah woah ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ up to one million dollars. that's how much university of phoenix is committing to create 400 scholarships this month alone. because we believe everybody deserves a chance. see what scholarships you may qualify for at phoenix.edu ♪ ♪ dignity. it demands that we can still do the simple things. so it demands life-chang

in one of those that really struck me in reading the book you have many of these memos from donald rumsfeldsfeld who was the defense secretary at the time of 9/11. and two years into the war, like 24 years into the war he's complaining in these memos, internal, i have no visibility into the bad guys are. which is remarkable to think about that you don't really know who the enemy is. so let me put that to you. who was of the enemy in the war in afghanistan? al-qaeda, the taliban, isis k? who were to court rumsfeld the bad guys that america was fighting? >> right. it sounds like a simple question but we don't know who the bad guys were. we couldn't distinguish them. as i said before at first it was clear al-qaeda was in any. those the bad guys but by the time rumsfeld wrote that memo al-qaeda was gone in afghanistan but we were still fighting people. we were fighting people that we couldn't always understand what their motivations were, what group or network there were a part of it. we had this term the taliban but the taliban covered in the number of insurgent groups can sometimes they were

and so there was a falling out with dick cheney and donald rumsfeld who argued forcefully for the war, and had believed in the wmd analysis which proved to be wrong, tragically. that said, i think his largest legacy is in human rights and minority rights, and in the argument that he made against the indignities of the trump era, the indignities of social media, the excesses of social media. just that he believed so strongly in what he did, in supporting historically black colleges and in establishing the colin powell institute at ccnmi, his ama mater in helping immigrants such as his jamaican family in the bronx and for everything he suffered in the jim crow south as an infantry man, and when he was first courting his life and had to drive from the bronx to alabama and back and get through that terrible time in the 50s. and kwo -- go through everything he did as a black man in the segregated south and in the segregated military, really de facto segregated military. all he did for the military and education with america's promise, that, i think, is the larger legacy. >> and pete, andre

donald rumsfeld, a black belt in bureaucratic in fighting every time powell would leave the country onon, this he would meet back in washington. then comes this u.n. appearance where this cia and it's really a mind blowing story, they took intelligence from an iraqi defector code name curve ball who they never spoke to they ree lied on german intelligence to inspect this guy and they put all of what curve ball told them into powell's presentation to the u.n. so he felt totally betrayed and within a couple of years went public about where it happened. and it was clearly the low moment of his entire career and something he regretted for the rest of his life. >> and, john heilemann, the -- his final -- what turns out to be the final couple of years, there he was at the democratic convention look being completely help nly and not the slightest hint of what he was struggling with, cancer and parkinson's. >> yeah. i mean what jonathan said is right. he was enormously composed and i think in a lot of ways, you know, that kind of regal baring that he kind, he was not a man that would have show

of those that really struck me in reading the book, you have many of these kind of memos from donald rumsfeldte don rumsfeld who was the defense secretary at the time of 9/11. two years into the war, two full years into the war he's complaining in these memos, internal, i have no visibility into who the bad guys are, which is remarkable to think about, that you don't really know who the enemy is. so let me put that to you, who was the enemy? al qaeda, isisk. who were the bad guys that america was fighting? >> it sounds like a simple question, but we don't know who the bad guys were. we couldn't distinguish them. as i said before, at first it was clear al qaeda was the enemy, those were the bad guys, but by the time rumsfeld wrote that memo, al qaeda was gone in afghanistan, but we were still sfieting people, right? we were fighting people that we couldn't always understand what their motivations were, what group or network they were a part of. we had this term the taliban. but the taliban covered any number of insurgent groups. sometimes they were criminal networks or smugglers or people who

ideological neoconservative — unlike the vice president dick cheney or the defence secretary donald rumsfeldon's iraq strategy. john negroponte was us ambassador to the uninted nations, at the time (sot one of his great accomplishments at the united nations was he succeeded in getting resolution 1441 was set “p in getting resolution 1441 was set up this intensified inspection regime of iraq and i think open and open and mine and others would be that those inspections would be allowed to go on long enough to demonstrate whether or not iraq clearly had met two weapons of mass destruction but people in washington were in such a hurry to go to war they never allow that process to play itself out entirely. i think that was one of the great tactical errors of the bush 43 administration. as well as his polticial and military career, colin powell's achievement for becoming the first black secretary of state, has been remembered today. in the early 2000s jack straw was colin powell's counterpart as foreign secretary in the uk. it's to ronald reagan scrape credit that he was spotted when he was a midd

secretary wilkie worked under bill gates and donald rumsfeld in the bush administration.on, secretary of defense harold brown. you don't see that caliber in this administration this white house. >> inflation will come back down eventually, spending will over the cost of living in the long-term. stuart: thanks very much indeed. i want to bring in stephen more. i lived through the stagflation of the 1970s. it was not very pleasant, and ugly time for america in general. will we repeat the stagflation of the 70s? >> i lived through the 70s, i was a teenager, everything was more expensive whether was groceries or gasoline. i think the comparison between what is happening now and what happened in the 70s that worries me as an economist is there's an energy crisis going on in the world and it hit europe first, a natural gas shortage, oil shortage, they are moving towards coal as their primary source of energy because green energy doesn't work. no politician should pay attention to that. green energy is niche market energy, not going to power $22 million academy with windmills an

brings in dick cheney vice president and people said we'll have a lot of experience around him, donald rumsfeldthink cheney and rumsfeld were tight and i think times the secretary of state looked as an outsider but i harkened back to in the 2016 race, when colin powell's name emerges on the hillary clinton e-mails and he feels as though he's being used in some of the stuff he had written back then is being used for hillary clinton's benefit, and he indicates that he thinks hillary clinton basically is a friend of his, but is lying through there. he also thought that donald trump, the 45th president, was ill-equipped to be president. he thought he was not somebody he could get behind was a big critic of bush of trump the 45th president, and he hadn't voted for republicans since he was bush 43. ainsley: he was republican and he changed to an independent. will: ainsley you brought up covid. look this day will be a day for many things for remembering the man, the leader that was lost. it's also a day to understand the implication on everyday americans, and the reports are he died from complications

the bush administration projected prospects for a negotiated settlement with the taliban and donald rumsfeld said an arrangement where omar could live in dignity would not be acceptable. further attempts were rejected by the bush administration in 2002. secretary, do you believe this was the right decision seeing where we are today? mr. armitage: i don't know about hindsight, congresswoman, but we did give the taliban an opportunity. second, we did not during the aforementioned bond process, consider the taliban, because they were through. it was over. that's why we did not even try to have a negotiated settlement. from about 2005 on, it was quite quite clear that the taliban themselves had come to the conclusion that we did not, that our legs were not long enough for the journey that we would be on. >> i was having my bat mitzvah in 2002, but after 20 years of fighting, we ended up with a stronger taliban and a worse deal than what we could have had in 2002. we have gone over many other moments like this. lastly, early on in our engagement in afghanistan, it became clear that there were hig