submit. to. the be . an earthquake a tsunami and a nuclear disaster that printed news to unfold how could this crisis have been prevented plus could be could there be a new nuclear plant closer to home. and bad boys bad boys it seems the cops seem to go both ways these days from talk about what happens when the cops become the criminals. and so you're turning around the war in afghanistan. we are and which way here's another question for you why is the united states even there. so you want to get off the streets or. i'm

sure some of them do it and life after afghanistan and iraq we're going to take a look at a ballot that more better veteran seems to be fighting homelessness. it's thursday march fifteenth seven pm here in washington d.c. i'm lucy coughing up and you're watching our team. now we begin with our continuing coverage of the crisis in japan officials there say that another fire has broken out at the fukushima nuclear complex and the tokyo electric power company which operates that plant so that there are efforts underway at the moment to put out the latest blaze we don't know if it's out yet but we will continue to monitor these developments for you but for now let's take a closer look at this company tokyo electric we're joined by investigative journalist greg palast who is with us from new york city to explain the connection between that company and the obama administration greg thank you so much for being

here now just a few months ago president obama had asked congress for four billion dollars that's four billion with a b in loan guarantees for two new nuclear reactors in the gulf coast and guess who is set to operate b. is tokyo electric power so what should our viewers know about this company that we're not going to hear on c.n.n. . well first of all c.n.n. didn't tell you that the us government is offering four billion dollars to this company to come here tokyo electric these are the guys who you know are burning up their own citizens they are not a reliable company they are joined and partnered with u.s. companies who have such a bad reputation that they invited tokyo electric in because they would train the u.s. workers on how to build and operate a nuclear plant on the grounds that you know the japanese really know how to do their stuff so they're going to own twenty percent of all subsidized one hundred

percent covered by the us taxpayer we're totally on the hook and us rate payers are on the hook and tokyo electric is going to bring their methods here which are pretty frightening you know for example. you loath that they did not properly evacuate the area they waited late they didn't evacuate in a wide enough area they did not have iodine pills out for people live near the plant those things should've been handed out from the day the plant operated people should have them in their medicine cabinets if they are within twenty kilometers of a plant we do that a lot of plants in the u.s. tokyo electric is not to be trusted nor their nor their partner which they called westinghouse but westinghouse is now just a brand name for rum toshiba and even. if greg just we don't come across as looking like we're hitting on japan or something there is a correction go the other way to talk a little bit about how general electric has been contributing to the crisis and in japan at the moment. well in fact one of the reasons we invited tokyo electric to

the us is that our own operators have such a terrible record one of them being general electric we had three engineers who worked on the very plants the design of the very plants that are exploding now who said that the plants those reactors were missed designed to those are designed by g.e. won by to sheeba. all those designs are faulty we know that in addition the two of us plants were designed and the emergency diesel generators designed in the us one designed in japan by the sheba again all everyone of the back of diesel generators which would have saved those plants from melting down every single one all thirteen generators. failed to work and i don't think they failed to work the evidence is not that they were destroyed by the earthquake or by the tsunami they just didn't work the crankshaft could not hold up and frankly a lot of people here in the us knew those crankshafts couldn't hold up now but if

people look at the bridge their hair if you look at the bigger picture here right i mean we know that the nuclear industry has its flaws we certainly know that the oil industry has the flaws are going to be revisiting that topic tomorrow when we talk about the chevron ecuador case which i know you've covered at length by this why does it does that well industry to the nuclear industry to give large corporations have any role and why we haven't seen a concrete fall of development of alternative energy uses and in this country and i tell her no i don't mean you have a reserve. yeah when i say not the alternative to nuclear as well is obviously solar power wind power in fifth in fact that south texas plan which is what tokyo electric and houston power are going to build together the power from back is going to cost about twice as much as the power from the same companies wind farms are going to paid for by wireless subsidy the. wired effectively know well

and the new. well there going all nukes because oil and nuclear power have tremendous huge lobbies whereas the wind power lobby is pretty teeny weenie in the solar lobby is almost nonexistent but these guys have a lot of money they have our money they've been you know dipping into the u.s. treasury pockets for a very long time and plus we insure them both the oil companies have a seventy five million dollar liability cap which is what b.p.'s legal liability was and the nuclear industry is a seventy five million dollar life so if we get a fukushima daiichi situation in the south coast of texas you know tokyo electric houston power they're only on the hook for seventy five million dollars and you know this is going to be seven and a half billion dollars in damage to begin with just the plants themselves of course of the damage the population will probably be about seventy five billion dollars pleasantly hope that we never see that fortunately we are out of time greg palast

investigative journalist joining us from new york now today marks the international day against police brutality and it and that's of course hardly on the radar screen of the politicians or the mainstream press for that matter now we do often hear about police injustice and all those other countries not america and very little attention is focused on the growing problem right here in the united states now there are names that do stand out in mind right in king ahmed e.l.o. and more recently oscar grant but countless nameless americans have also suffered injustice at the hands of the police so is this blatant abuse of power is this a blatant abuse of power or does it all fall under the montreaux of to protect and to serve now the resident thought that show host laurie harf and us took that question to the streets of the big apple let's take a look. march fifteenth at the international day against police brutality is it ever ok for the police to use force this week let's talk about that have you ever had personal

experience as well. sure and you feel like that they were just using force out of line yes i mean your view on the floor where we were would be pushing for there's no reason for pointing. to happen see you were there you are from and we're not we don't have no purple cord the point you were in userspace a force do you think policeman have so much power some of them yeah especially when you have family members that are higher in rank they think they can get away with whatever they want to do and they need higher rank policeman burial or stupid stuff to do to people that's what happened to me so you tell a victim to an imbalance of power with a policeman oh definitely paperwork or paper thrown off the force i just of people view them as the enemy do you think. i guess sometimes with. the authority thing you know people don't like to be told what to do is it that they are trump with the power or is it that they are just frustrated with basing criminals all day long

there we go again you know just like a murderer. that's what they want to do. you know what you want to do and where you're from they have too much power have you ever had problems with police i know problems but it's just in my. mind. this is why. would you think it has anything to do with the fact that you're a white man that looks pretty trustworthy and just you know from a profile point of view that's why you're not scared of him probably has something to do with it as someone with police experience what is it that pushes a police man over the edge i case it might have been frustrated and not wanting to be there. but no one wants to be at their job and doesn't allow them to use force. on the whole would they like it where that proudly and why they have to prove to

themselves to the public out there that it is a protective. suits any way israel you know whether or not you think it's ok for the police to ever use force the line between coarse and brutality can be pretty clear and it's never ok to cross. now from the streets of the big our culture around the united states countless cases of police brutality have been reported earlier spoke with george challenge on our survive and thrive t.v. and he explains why he believes the mainstream news outlets are not reporting on the important issue of police brutality. news agencies have a relationship with law enforcement in which they rely upon them for news and for that inside information they are willing to not profile the police in a negative manner at least that's what i see in the local news they actually i'm

not really sure why the national news agencies don't report the truth more when it comes to police brutality or police abuse i'm really questioning them i guess is heartfelt by adam medication or an advertisement like you have suppressing is about cops beating up innocent people but you know george said that could be you know in general corporations would support you know firefighters and police officers and if you come out with stories that are maybe negative awfully saucers maybe that won't appeal to some corporations that you know the news agencies in america rely upon you know fortune five hundred companies for advertising so that could be it the church i have to say to play devil's advocate i mean this is america we live in a democracy we have rights kyra protected by the constitution and justice can't be systematic in america because we have laws to protect against that is not the case i believe you and you know that's why we have the second amendment and that's why our primary responsibility for personal safety and security falls on the individual

now if i go around to citizens and businesses and i say hey i'm going to protect you you know they're going to put me in jail for extortion but cities have municipalities can go around saying we're going to put a law that we're going to put a group of individuals to protect you and that's called law enforcement we have no choice regarding the police officers that are out there in the way they handle themselves so if you believe that this is in fact happening here you've documented these cases of police brutality and yet we have laws are supposed to protect us against this is the whole concept of the usa congress the ally. well you know we're seeing the decline in america as the decline in the empire of america and with that decline you're going to see a meltdown in city municipalities and you're going to see a stressing of the police force these police officers are not getting the overtime they used to get i know bankruptcy attorneys that are seeing more police officers

in their offices so they're bringing the stress to the streets and the response to that stress is you know people are blatantly they're coming to the conclusion that hey these police officers there are there they're in times of need but it seems that there's there's more and more hatred developing on kind of a low level with the average middle class american with these police officers that are randomly giving people four hundred five hundred dollar tickets for crossing over a white line i mean come on guys well i mean state budgets are broke they've got to get the money somewhere you know that it's it's it's crazy but it's actually true and i say if you if you asked and one hundred average americans you know what do you think is going on going on with all these tickets these police officer writing go to tell you straight they'll say well you know they got their budgets are melting down they've got to they got to do fundraising well that shouldn't stand in america you're right shouldn't be denied you should be penalize

financially because some city can't pay its bill that's just wrong well don't forget all of our lovely lovely tax dollars are going to build roads and fix up the country over in afghanistan which we'll be talking about later on the shell but you know to get back to this please because of the issue people often talk about the great principles that the country was founded on and i'm not talking about the constitution i'm talking about the entire country original history so if you look at this including native americans black slavery all of these sort of negative marks in our in our past can't you make the argument that oppression in america is just as much a part of our culture our roots. well oppression will always exist even a free country like america you know we're a republic founded upon the constitution and the thing is. tyrion any will will go unchecked unless the american people stand up against it so you know we're seeing this in maria california where a woman is standing up she's getting signatures and she say you know what no more

red light cameras and she's getting signatures and she's trying to abolish that they have all of them in arizona but even i personally got a four hundred ninety one dollar ticket for going across a white line so tired any and authoritative abuse by the police will only exist in till we stand up to them so i encourage americans i courage your listeners to speak up because here's what's happening we're having an economic decline like no other and as we go from a first world country to a second world country i've been to a third of the third world police abuse and misconduct is rampant in a third world society well that's what's happening right now we're going to see more police abuse more police authoritarianism as a c. colony deteriorates and i venture really for see police officers maybe getting gauging in illegal activity possibly when their salaries get cut to nothing and

some dire predictions from georgetown injure founder of survive and thrive t.v. . our top man in afghanistan was back on capitol hill this morning where he spends the day assuring lawmakers that the war effort is going just fine general david petraeus told a senate panel that the u.s. forces have slowed the taliban's momentum in much of the country but he warns that the progress could be reversed and our chief correspondent christine for us alison at that senate hearing and filed this report. it was meant to be an honest and open conversation about the state of the war in afghanistan and who better to report and general david to trace. self the past eight months have seen important but hard fought progress in afghanistan a report card of sorts for those serving on the senate armed services committee like senator joseph lieberman of connecticut nobody's under any illusions sure that this is turning around the question that seems to have many answers is in which direction it's turning here's one sign we're there for

a reason we're making progress we have made a great deal of progress in afghanistan since the last hearing of this committee on the subject just over a half a year ago while the security progress achieved over the past year is significant it is also fragile and reversible this line fragile and reversible uttered so many times in the last few days it may almost be worthy of a drinking game as progress remains fragile and reversible but in the same hearing room just last week a bit of a different tune was sung we have enjoyed. casual defeats in operational successes against the taliban however the taliban does remain resilient and will be able to threaten u.s. and international growth in afghanistan through twenty eleven also at the hearing and intelligence assessment about the future from national intelligence director james clapper i think. the concern. has is.

after that and the ability of the afghan government to. their responsibility for government over the last few weeks there has been additional hardship in the mission and an increase in anger after nine afghan children were killed in a nato led attack here's secretary gates last week like to begin by joining general petraeus and offering my personal apology. for the accidental killing of bath nine afghan boys by coalition forces and here's president karzai talking about incidents like this and civilian casualties as a whole they want it stopped. they want to go to give their will to stop president karzai said he actually wanted foreign troops out of afghanistan so not only are they losing the u.s. supported president of afghanistan now new evidence that the war is losing support from the general public as well this washington post a.b.c.

news poll just out shows sixty four percent of americans do not think the war has been worth fighting and a much larger number seventy three percent thinks the u.s. government should withdraw troops this summer as a originally planned michael prysner veteran and member of the antiwar answer coalition agrees resistance in afghanistan is a popular uprising of afghans from all walks of life from all backgrounds in every corner of afghanistan who rightfully see the occupation of their country as an empire trying to gain a foothold in the region that's of strategic importance for resources and for dominating the region back in the hearing some signs that transition in kabul could be in the works it is afghan police who are the face of security on the streets it is the afghan army a bit further out that has security responsibilities in every given night in that city so what's the purpose of these hearings well what set inside these walls is

meant to give lawmakers inside a progress report so they know how to best vote for the future of what happens in afghanistan but what could become increasingly difficult for them the mixed messages and what they're hearing from general petraeus continues to differ immensely from what they hear from reporters inside and outside of afghanistan in washington i'm christine present on our team. all right well we may be seeing next messages from u.s. officials but it seems that the american people are speaking loud and clear and they want out of it's ganna stand in the there's new numbers out today that show that u.s. support for the longest war in our history is now the lowest ever in fact almost two thirds of americans say that the afghan effort is not worth the fight we're here to make us help us make sense of all this is just the america he is the founder of veterans for rethinking afghanistan and r.t.e. blogger jake thank you so much for being here so you know aside from convincing lawmakers that everything's ok and hey give us more money in afghanistan part of

the job ahead of petraeus is to really convince the american people that we should remain here at a time when they don't want to why are we still in afghanistan basically we're in still in afghanistan because president obama doesn't know how to control the pentagon. we should have paid attention from what president bush had this enormous leadership staff between presidents had had wolfowitz had cheney had rumsfeld had these washington national security elite he couldn't control the pentagon would be going into to the iraq war president obama with very little if no foreign policy credentials has almost no control over the pentagon and as a result the pentagon gets to dictate the political policy and they also get to dictate the operational policy that's why we're still there about it who do you blame deeply and gave people a betrayer who do you blame in the an administration that's actually overstepping on what should be in terms of foreign policy operations the first thing that has to be set forth is a political objective after politics there's an operational and there's

a tactical breakdown in terms of directing our efforts so the top of the class the the the you have to blame the the politics you have to look at with the supreme court sanction this you have to look at whether the congress vote given the money the appropriations for it and you have to say with the president's specifying a political goal and basically all three of the political branches have been manipulated by the pentagon in my opinion but i think. it seems like u.s. politics is so often driven by fear right now that we say that hey if we pull out of afghanistan the terrorists are going to take over and then everything is going to go to hell and so politicians seem to case about because nobody wants to look like they're weak on national security and defense you know lawmakers case for that and the president has to look at that as well how do you get out of this mentality i mean of course things may be difficult if you pour out but at some point you have to look at the way the cost and the benefits of being there and right now it doesn't look like a batting up in our favor that's right you know it's not adding up in our favor and one of the reasons that we still keep we keep staying put is basically because the

the american population has been sort of the who have been hoodwinked in terms of how much afghanistan costs how much it costs not only socially but economically and in terms of our international clout it's because basically the american population cares they really care about what happens the troops they really don't want to be involved in service of occupations and this sort of thing but they've been misled by between the media between. the pentagon's p.r. task force and in many ways i think also if you look at general petraeus general petraeus has a has a national security network that's in afghanistan that's about one hundred people that's worked for him simultaneously to develop policy and grow up obama has none rock obama does not even have the equivalent of general petraeus as in terms of looking at the overall strategy and what not so basically we have a president who i think in many ways is is for in terms of foreign policy is is i'm going to say that if you can competent i think it doesn't you know i don't think he

has the skills to control the pentagon to set the political objectives and to justice forward because he's been strong armed by the pentagon so obama unqualified to be in the white house when it comes to foreign policy yeah right well you know you brought up the fact that the fact that american people of course do support the troops and you brought up the fact that this war is costing us a lot but it does look like when it when we focus on the treatment of the troops once they return home from these wars their money is not. going there so when are we going to start investing in america and not in afghanistan i don't think that's going to happen i think that basically what we're going to see in the next year or two has we're going to see a. basically a strategic arms arrangement in which the u.s. is going to have permanent troops in afghanistan and i think it's because strategically if you look at the policy wonks here in washington they're concerned about the long term oil revenues that could come from the caucus states or can come from the black syrian different areas like that i think that's that's the general

apparatus we're going to see what was interesting analysis that was the afghanistan . and general petraeus says that the united states is making progress in afghanistan veterans here at home aren't having as much luck archies ramon go in to investigate the homeless crisis the homeless veterans crisis that's plaguing america. i joined the army to fight for my country make a better life for myself there were no jobs where i live so far as to be around forever i joined the army to prove myself worthy of becoming a united states citizen the reason is army doctors are really sought after so my choices are going to be right over sweet words the promise of a life full of action but step up on the career ladder or even the dream of u.s. citizenship this is the pitch of the army but every critters being completely honest about what awaits service members in the battle. or

what they can really expect when they come off it and so they treat them with all these promises of a better life i don't think people end up going inferring a life away in iraq and afghanistan and then coming home to a situation described of almost massive unemployment and substance michael prysner is an iraq war veteran he recognizes that war can destroy both body and mind of a soldier something seldom mentioned as the media has tired of showing america's wars and americans are becoming more disconnected to their troops in battle and losing sight of the consequences of the growing number not just of veterans but of homeless veterans you know that when i had a job i got laid off and that was it i've lost my wife paul kendrick is lost when he tries to remember what it was that finally landed him on the street the army veteran proudly thought in the first iraq war and now theo's like he and many other vets are being trampled on i've tried to go to be. and they said was on take time

like two or three years for your five years in a school. you start thinking about the matter and said ok calm. these days veterans are ending up homeless sooner than ever so you want to get off the streets. station on the ability four years ago mary and robert lee hunter was serving his country in iraq today he is hooked on drugs and living under a bridge. i'm going to punch problems issues was with the view we need to hang on to a big. no mitchell gump. as of monday when he said he gets by with some food and extra clothing from the nonprofit group national veterans foundation their outreach efforts fill the gap where government agencies like the v.a. have failed before you only see like one every. every three or

four months and now every time we go out we are must see somebody from from iraq or afghanistan or from the first gulf war some people join the armed services in hopes of having financial stability once they're done with their duty unfortunately some of them end up here on the streets now here in los angeles there are more than forty thousand people without a home on a daily basis many of those are better ends and that problem is just expected to get even worse as more and more service members return from the war to an economic situation with very few job prospects if you join the military for a paycheck you do it the wrong kind of the wrong place for the cordoba a marine served four tours in iraq as he helps homeless vets cordoba admits that while some recruiters are concerned about the future of the young men and women joining the armed forces others simply see them as numbers well there's

a cliche saying in the military every soldier says my recruiter lied to me it's something that we all know you know the reality is you're less likely to find a job when you get out of the military despite promises they are more marketable on the job market the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff admiral mike mullen recently expressed concern over the creation of a generation of homeless vets a practical and moral burden for the u.s. for decades to come despite the warning some conservative lawmakers like michele bachmann have proposed cutting funding for veterans that is something that proud american vets don't like to hear. remember in good faith to. the world. america is nothing. in los angeles but i'm on the leno party and it has a pro now for more on the story from coverage please go to r.t. dot com.