Transcripts For ALJAZAM Consider This 20140823

We dont telegraph our purchase. Could the cooperation with the Bashar Alassad regime be on the table. Times you have to cooperate with and share information with bad guys. Hamas says it has executed spice for israel. Russian convoys have crossed the border into ukraine. Waited long enough. It was time to move. The pentagon says there will be consequences. Kyiv calls it a direct invasion. A fingertip analysis to combat its food shortages. The healthy autistic like behavior. We hoped it might be treatable even after diagnosis. We begin, with questions about how officials describe apocalyptic, beyond anything we have ever seen. The are beheading of james foley by Islamic State militants constituted a jihaddist Type Movement dependence the United States. We have made clear time and time again, we are going to come after you if you come against americans. We are not going to be restricted by borders. While direct action in syria was possible, no decisions have been made and the president currently on vacation in Marthas Vineyard has not given further beyond iraq. Or that sympathizers could be radicalized 50 groups online propaganda have worried u. S. And european governments for months. On friday the fbi and the department of Homeland Security sent a bulletin to Law Enforcement officers around the country urging them to be vigilant for threats against the i. S. While there were no known threats its clear that officials are taking i. S. Very seriously. Join us from the pentagon rear admiral john kirby, good to have you with us. Thank you. Hearing the chilling words from your boss, defense secretary chuck hagel, highway the white house says i. S. Is holding three other americans, that after this horrible beheading of james foley, this is all scaring people in a way we probably havent been scared since 9 11 but what are we going to do about it . There is uncertainty about what the strategy is. Well, i dont think the purpose is certainly not to scare people. Thats not the intent. And i dont think that you know americans need to be feared in that regard. But this is seriously, this is a serious threat i. S. I. L. Poses not just to iraq but the to the region. They have aspirations to attack western targets and we do have a strategy. The strategy is on multiple levels here. We certainly have a military component to it but there is a political component to it and there is a diplomatic component to it and were frankly taking a regional approach here. The military piece is only a small piece and the military piece is not going to solve all the problem. The real threat that i. S. I. L. Governance. It is defeating the ideology. And once it defeats ideology of the region they will cease to be the threat they are. The assad regime has done nothing but approach the fear of the people. When you speak of Good Governance isnt this a region that really has never seen Good Governance . Well, this is a region that has certainly struggled with Good Governance, there is no question about that but that doesnt mean that we shouldnt pursue that as a goal. And were gratified about what we see in iraq with the naming of a new Prime Minister and efforts to form a unity government. We think thats really the long term answer here. To the i. S. I. L. Threat inside iraq. Were helping and wire were going to help were going to help from a military perspective, when and where we need to, thats not going to change, but ultimately it is not going to be a military solution. Chuck hagel said i. S. Is a threat like weve never seen before. There was very little urgency in the way the white house was dealing with i. S. Or our diplomats, secretary kerry and our soldiers secretary hagel ahead of where the white house is . No, theres no difference in views here. I think everyone shares the same sense of urgency and the say sense of purpose. And the vaim realit same realistic approach to what i. S. I. L. Poses. They are not like any terrorist network weve seen in the past, i think thats what shail secretary hagel was referring to. They have military prowess, they are interested in grabbing ground and holding it and possessing infrastructures to continue to resource themselves and that makes them different. That makes them unique. And everybody i think has the same sense here of how to move forward. To your point, general martin dempsey, on thursday, the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff addressed the elephant in the room which is what you brought up, the fact that i. S. Controls all sorts of land and military bases in iraq. Can they be addressed without defeating that part of the organization which exists inside syria . The answer is no about. Security Council Advisor ben rhodes said that the white house agrees with general dempsey, that i. S. May have to be attacked in syria and we should not be restricted by borders. Are we going to see a large increase in the mission . We dont telegraph our purchase here in the pentagon. But everybody is of the same mind. We recognize the sanctuary they have in syria and the threat they pose to the entire region. But what general dempsey also said is addressing the threat they pose in syria cant just be solved bying military means. There has to be an international approach. Rhodes added that the president hasnt been presented with options to ramp up the u. S. Response. How soon do you think that will happen . We are not on a specific timetable with respect to that, antonio. We in the pentagon are keenly focused on this challenge. We are Planning Organization that shouldnt surprise you, we are always thinking about options and thinking about alternatives. And when we need to present options and alternatives, up the chain of command, we certainly will do that. Well how about helping the people in the region that have been our allies . We of course have rejected cooperation with Bashar Alassad in syria. The administration though has been slow to help Syrian Rebels the more moderate ones. The iraqi forces are getting there too slowly, complaints have been made. We are already conducting some of those efforts and i would take issue with the complaints that critics have been making. As far as the kurdish resupplying mission, the Iraqi Government has been resupplying kurdish organization, we have been helping in organizing that effort. Including albania who just recently offered to pitch in and help here have jumped in to help with that effort and we are looking at perhaps doing it directly through the u. S. Military. Secretary hagel set up a task force to look at this, no decisions have been made but were looking at that. You talked about syria and the moderate opposition, the United States has continued to support a moderate opposition in syria. We have submitted a budget of 500 million to equip a moderate opposition. About Good Governance, assad and his regime is a big part of the problem here. They have created the conditions that has allowed i. S. I. L. To exist and flourish in syria. Last question, the white house finally said on friday that the attack on james foley was a an a terrorist attack on the United States. At this point should we see this fight against i. S. As an action of selfdefense for the United States . Weve already in many ways considered this inside iraq as an act of self defense. The president gave us the authority to conduct air strikes in iraq to protect u. S. Personnel and facilities to so that, we have also taken efforts to help humanitarian disasters but we are already striking at i. S. I. L. Inside iraq in the effort to protect u. S. Personnel and facilities. Rear admiral john kirby, as always its a pleasure to have you with us. Thank you, antonio gm to be with you. We are joined by neda bakos, a former Central Intelligence agency analyst, working on the relationship between iraq, al qaeda and 9 11. The chief targeting officer, ever you have criticized the criticism against i. S. I. S, the president earlier this year sarcastically referred to the group as Junior Varsity terrorists. Why has it taken so long for the u. S. To see i. S. As the significant threat it seems to say it is now . Well, i. S. Is actually a metamorphosis of zarqawis organization. , a secondary organization compared to al qaeda central. So i think in some ways that sort of myth was holding for quite some time within the administration. Now we have seen that i. S go ahead. No, go ahead that i. S. Is a very serious threat. You posed a question on twitter this week, what if due oa deal assad stopped slaughtering his own people . Warning sau assad that if he exposed himself to attack from the United States, the white house has rejected out of hand cooperating with assad to defeat i. S. Your reaction. You know i wouldnt be advocating partnering with assad to go after i. S. Mainly because he is part of the problem. Hes created a vacuum that has allowed i. S. I. S. To grow to the strength they are today by largely ignoring them and allowing them to take over some of the territory while he focused on the moderate rebel gripes so i think that it would be dilutional to think that we could delusional to think that we could actually trust him. We have created a leverage to deal with him, i. S. I. S. Is taking over territory much anticipated. It is estimated they actually hold territory thats possibly the size of the u. K. So if we are to go in and actually take action against i. S. I. S. I think it behooves us to at least start engaging with assad, in addition to the sanctions, and allowing us to go in and take care of the problem while negotiating with him a ceasefire, it is in everyones best interest to end the civil war at this point. Now a man who was formerly ambassador to the region ryan corroboratinger, has advocated shifting the emphasis away from assad, the u. S. Has to consider as bad as assad is, there is something worse. Isnt there a danger and theres a history of it of blowback when we end up helping these butcher dictators . Yes. I mean and iraq is actually an example of that. We can learn from the lessons of the invasion of 2003. Were now discussing the r rebaathification of the area, to expect a legitimate presence in the area. They are the long term i dont think is in thens best interest to let assad remain in power. If we do go into syria with bombing runs we become pretty much a defact to cooperator of assad, we become the enemy of his enemy. That puts us on the same side as hezbollah, assad and iran, which a weird place for the u. S. To be in. Were almost becoming part of the proxy war at this point. But nowp now were seeing demonstrations of the supporters of the assad regime, saying they are not getting enough help from i. S. I. S. For the assad regime, there is actually populace report, and they dont feel their own government is actually doing enough. I think theres an opportunity here that we need to explore diplomatly. Within syria, another former ambassador robert ford resigned, he says that we cant help out assad because of his horrible behavior, his cooperation with al qaeda, and his position all along was to help the moderate rebels in syria. We just heard rear admiral john kirby say, the efforts are ongoing. Is this too little too late, and assad falls, isnt there a danger that syria becomes a bigger vacuum that ends up getting filled by i. S. And not the moderates . Right. I think we cant have enough of a coalition, they are up against a monumental effort at this point. So leaving the vacuum there, if assad is actually owfte ousted out of power. Really appreciate you joining us to give us your perspective. Thanks. Thank you. And now for some more stories from around the world. We girn in ferguson, missouri where the protests finally seem to be calming down. The National Guard started leaving ferguson, friday, after the shooting of Michael Brown two weeks ago. With only a few isolated arrests over the past couple of days, police are hopeful that gatherings over the weekend will be peaceful. But police are worried that browns funeral on monday will reignite the violence. Nicholas maduro, has suggested fingerprinting, and preventing people from buying too much of a single item or diverting supplies to the black market. Translator the establishment of the biometric system will be similar to how fingerprints were captured for the system of election. We end in washington, d. C, where the Washington Post has taken a stand over the name of washingtons nfl team. The post will no longer use the name redskins, except when it is essential for clarity or effect, we will no longer use the slur ourselves. The Editorial Board has long urged the company to stop using the term. Does not apply to sports coverage. The post hopes that Dan Schneider will take action. And thats some of whats happening around the world. Coming up, nato claims Russian Artillery is in ukraine and supporting russian separatists. Has russias invasion of ukraine begun . And later, hamas publicly executes people they claim are. Israeli and our social media producer, Hermela Aregawi is here, whats trending . While youre watching let us know what you think, join the conversation on twitter ajconsiderthis and on our facebook and google plus pages. The crisis in ukraine against tid intensified on friday. Ukrainian officials accused russia of staging a direct invasion after more than 200 trucks carrying what are supposed to be relief supplies for separatist held areas entered ukraine without permission. The ukrainianian military said no more than 35 trucks had been checked for military contraband. Adding that russia should remove the convoy from ukraine if they dont they will face the consequences from our partners in the international community. In new york im joined by nina krucheva. Author of the lost khrushchev. Nina, good to have you with us. Thank you. As ive said, russia has moved military trucks into ukraine. All along the crisis without providing any proof of their allegation. So again, the russians denying that theyre doing this. Why would Vladimir Putin do something as blatant az moving Russian Artillery into ukraine. We didnt know it was moved this time or some other time that he was accused of doing this. Because all this military equipment has been it has been documented theyve been moving back and forth. So its probably may not necessarily be this time around and probably not associated with a convoy. Because i do believe that the white trucks are going to be the white trucks and exactly what putin says they are intended for humanitarian aid because this is also his pr campaign. He is helping the ukrainians, those who are now in humanitarian distress. While poroshenko the ukrainian president is actually supplying the humanitarian disaster. Thats how the he would say the west is out to get us. That is what he always says, but the only way he can do it is, were helping the people in distress. While the military equipment may go has already gone into ukraine some other way outside the international view. But assuming youre right, this is still an effect, they moved the trucks into luhansk, which the ukrainians had pretty much taken over the city. Arent they pretty much preventing the ukrainians from having any more gains because the danger is that youre going to hurt a humanitarian convoy. Well, they have. And i actually think that thats why the convoy was stuck on the russian border for some time. Because ukrainian was really blocking it ukraine was really blocking it. Despite the fact that ukraine was claiming there were other problems, it lets the convoy, humanitarian, even if it is truly a humanitarian convoy, into luhansk, there would have to be a ceasefire, the rebels would have time to regroup. What putin did is he waited for a week there and then he said fine if you cannot provide ceasefire and i cannot help them some other way im going to move it in and i will force you to stop and therefore the rebels would regroup. But then have the ukrainians in fact just played right into putins hands because putin again narrative when it comes to the humanitarian convoy is that poroshenko, the president of ukraine, has stalled and that this is humanitarian aid that is desperately needed and so why didnt the ukrainians figure out a way of letting this in so putin couldnt get a pr side to this . They all were trained by the same school so he knows exactly how putin is going to play that game. And so ukraine probably should have addressed the convoy story right from the beginning, inspected it immediately, let it in, because poroshenko also played his own paracampaign as you remember after putin sent his trucks, poroshenko sent his trucks because he would look really really bad to the public, if hes such a great peace keeper, poroshenko isnt helping his own people in luhansk, even though they are against him. So it was really a game. I think putin is greater because he was also kgb trained, poroshenko is trying to balance a lot of other issues so he is not as quick as providing counterbalance. But somehow in the middle of all this whats getting lost is a country has sent trucks into another country without authorization and according to nato they have got artillery there, here is something ukraine president Petro Poroshenko said on friday. We will do our best that this does not lead to more serious consequences. But owne yatsenyuk yuck said, not russian separatists. How dangerous has the rhetoric been getting . But the stakes have been up for how long we have been talking about it. So it is and i dont think its actually its lost. Its not lost that russia actually went into sovereign country. It hasnt been lost. Another thing that yatsenyuk yuck said, yes, russia already invaded ukraine and it it in crimea. It did it in march. Russians wanted crimea. He thought probably with donetske and luhansk, and other places in ukrainian that would be the same story. Because frankly crimea is actually a drain on russian resources if it doesnt have other east ukraine support. But it didnt work out this way. And moreover 60 of russians do not want any invasion. I have to say putin is very sensible to this kind of Public Opinion. He may manipulate it, however, he listens to it very carefully. Although he has not invaded so far. His trucks were sitting there for a week but officially he continues to say im a humanitarianist, and i think deep in his heart he really wants donetske and luhansk can be free out of separatists, so can he maneuver it more politically so earnings poroshenko wouldnt be important militarily. On tuesday poroshenko and putin will meet. Nina its always good to see you thanks. Thank you. At least 17 palestinians were killed by mass fighters friday after they were condemned to death by a socalled revolutionary resistance court for collaborating with israel. Meanwhile israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said, hamas would pay a dear price, hamas rockets wounded five other israelis. Israeli strikes on gaza killed at least four palestinians and wounded 40 more. For discussion on this im joined by robert grenier, robert good to see you. Israel was able to target and kill at least three of hamass top military leaders on thursday. Given the kind of precautions these men usually take, would it have been possible for israel to get at them without inside help . Forget they completely controlled the entire cell phone system in gaza so they can use that for geolocation for intercept of communication for communication themselves with potential agents, they have drones that just blanket the area. And as the Campaign Goes on, its only natural as people are trying to move, shoot and communicate as the military says, that the opportunities for some sort of a slipup just magnify over time. That said, the israelis have been very, very clever throughout the palestinian territories both in west bank and gaza in maintaining a very Effective Network of informants. So in this particular case whether it was largely technical through human informants or some combination of the two we certainly dont know. I understand theres tremendous anger in gaza against collaborators who may be helping israelis bomb because so many people have died, doans hamas understand that doesnt hamas understand that these public extra judicial killings are going to be viewed as barbaric and hamas is seen by much of the west as a terror group of . Lets not forget that all politics is local and i suspect hamas is primary primarily concerned with maintaining control in the gaza strip. Their Foreign Ministers are concerned with Public Opinion overseas but thats not the primary concern now. Lawyer to assist them and they have the rights to appeal. But these alleged collaborators who were shot on friday were tried convicted and sentenced by what hamas calls a revolutionary resistance court and they said it was to create deterrence. Now a former deputy head of israels National Counci Israels National Security council says that hamas is in a panic. Do you agree that this is a sign of weakness not strength . Yes, i think you would have to agree with that. Clearly, they want to try to impose discipline and they want discipline. I dont think it was an accident that these executions were largely carried out immediately after friday prayers, where you had the largest congregation of people to view it and take et cetera. This is clearly an indication that hamas is concerned both with its ability to impose discipline on the people and to be seen by others to be capable of imposing that discipline. Right, and obviously trying to deter scare as you set people off from collaborating where as you said people off from collaborating with israel. Target them . We can only guess at the way politics is working out within the gaza strip right now. Im sure there are some people who are very concerned about hamas leadership who feel that the people have suffered enough. All they want is for the violence to stop. And there may be an increased motivation for some of those people to work against the hamas leadership. You know again, the number of motivations that may be at work here are limited only by the number of people involved. So i suspect that the internal politics to include within hamas itself are very, very complicated right now as the pressure on them increases. Talking about the number of people involved hamas insists that the number of palestinian collaborators is minuscule, they say that many are either arrested by Security Forces or they actually turn themselves in. Does that seem credible to you . You know i think weve seen before in individual cases ever palestinian collaborators, who are uncovered, there are difficulties they have with their families, even if they feel that they are personally justified in what theyre doing there is always a certain sense of shame. So the emotion of an intelligence source a collaborator if you will are very, very complicated things and can lead people to do things that seem to an outsider to be completely irrational. Certainly a scary situation all around. Robert grenier good to have you, thanks. Lets check in with hermella. Accounts in implement of ferguson officer dairch wills have raised over 250,000 and some eyebrows. Go fund me has removed several nasty racist comments by the original donors but says that doesnt go far enough, says it should be taken down altogether because it violates go fund me policies, it an horgs all policies the Financial Coalition exploitation of a crime. Adding that much like facebook and twitter, go fund me is an open Technology Platform that allows for the exchange of ideas and opinions within the bounds of our terms of service. Let us know what you think. Does go fund me have a responsibility beyond removing the hateful comments . Tweet us ajconsiderthis. And now, an update on a story we reported on earlier this month. The u. S. Copyright office has settled a battle between wikimedia. A photo that the monkey took, fresh guidance saying the office wont copyright it looks like wikimedia wins this one and the photograph will remain in the public domain. Its bad for monkey, he cant sell his own picture. Thanks hermella. Youre welcome. Straight ahead, a new study raises hopes that autism can one day be treatable. A Major Company says workers should be taking naps. Thats in our data dive. The u. S. Open is about to begin, on the stream, the usda pulls 770 inspectors from poultry processing plants. Join us on the stream to find out what that means for your food safety. The stream on Al Jazeera America Al Jazeera America presents edge of eighteen this envelope is my life right now ahh. This is nerve racking at the crossroads of now and the future. Im ready to get out man. Im ready to get out of high school you find kids making adult decisions im gonna do whatever needs to be done. Affecting the rest of their lives oh my god. I have to get packing this is it. We gave 15 kids cameras. I would like to introduce myself im more than, just the kid with the tall hair. Yeah. Im different they took us inside their hopes ya boy is breaking off and becoming a millionaire. And disappointments. You cant just get over something, that sort of scarred you so much their dreams. If you dont go to college you gone be stuck here. I dont wanna be stuck here. And realities. I feel so utterly alone take a real look at education and the issues facing our children today. Friday. My homie got shot five times just because youre pregnant dont mean your lifes ended. I dont even want to be gay anymore. Just please take this curse off of me. Are you ready . I dont know if its gonna work out Al Jazeera America presents Academy Award winner alex gibneys edge of eighteen im passionate< and i need you guys to understand it im so proud of you. Oh my god i feel like theres no way out you need to get your life together. Cause you 18 now. Edge of eighteen only on Al Jazeera America the reason why some children develop autism while most dont has long eluded researchers. But Research Suggests that autism could be created by too many synapses. A childs brain develops synapses as a phenomenal rate as a Child Experiences the world. Usually concession excess synapses are trimmed. Joining to discuss this, dr. Wang, good to have you back with us. The study compared brains of people who had autism and who didnt. How do all these excess synapses create autism . The number of synapses really peaks in childhood and is supposed to go down as children become older. In autism they do not go down in number as quickly and as far as they should. That leads in abnormalities, in the connection of brains, they are not talking to each other the way they should. As laymen, it includes the sensitivity to noise, perhaps social difficulties, even seizures. Could this synaptic pruning or the lack of the pruning be another symptom of autism or could it be the cause of autism . We dont think of it as a symptom of autism but its sort of the mechanism. Its the why of these symptoms being present. The cause, on the other hand, is some combination of genetic risk factors and environmental risk factors and then those things interacting together. And somehow those genetic and environmental factors together result in the pruning going awry. The pruning not happening like its supposed to. And could that explain why autism symptoms normally dont get noticed or dont start appearing until at least a child is about a year and a half . Yeah, i think thats absolutely right. Because early on in life, at six months old, at 12 months and one and a half years old everybody is supposed to have a lot of those synapses and this Research Shows that at that early point in life the number of synapses is still normal and abnormalities dont come up and thats when the symptoms start appearing too. There are so many different types of autism. Could this be a commonality among all of them . That is a huge question. In this particular research as you said, they looked at you know a dozen or so brains. Thats only a dozen. Its wonderful that the families of those children were as generous as they were in donating the brains of their departed loved ones. We need to understand this more broadly. We need more brain donation so we can see how common this is. If its only a few people with autism who are like this or whether this characterizes the big population. Probably its not everybody, the question is what fraction of autism is like this . And different types of autism could they be happening because different synapses in differently parts of the brain are affected . Yeah, absolutely. There could be regional differences in the brain. It could also be that some people have a problem with inadequate pruning as they found in this research. Maybe other people have the opposite problem, there is excessive pruning, we dont know that the pruning is inadequate in everybody. The study found that mice that had a disease thats closely associated with autism, they were able to fix the synapse pruning problem by using a medication that eliminated most of the autism like behaviors that the mice exhibited. What about those drugs . Where do we stand on what could happen with humans . That is an incredible exciting piece of this same research. They studied the human brains and they studied the mice that had a genetic mutation for tubular sclerosis, many of them not all of them have autism. Many of them do have autism. There is actually a study going right now not against rapo micin, the drug in this study but a closely related drug, a study going on right now on these patients with tube tuberous sclerosis. Patients have trouble with tumors appearing in some other places in their body and this drug helps those turm tumors go away. We are hopeful that well see some benefits here, and then the question is going to be, is it relevant only to the patience with tuber oust sclerosis or with other types of autism too. Dr. Paul wong, good to see you. Appreciate your time. My pleasure, thank you. The preparation are underway but one thing is missing, an american man with a legitimate chance of winning. In one part of the country, the government is recommending todays data dive sleeps on the job. The u. S. National sleep foundation found that japanese workser sleep just six hours and 23 minutes. We average only nine minutes more. Thats a half hour less than people in canada, mexico, germany and u. K, the other countries surveyed. Its gotten so bad in japan that employers are encouraging workers to take a nap during the workday and japans Work Ministry encourages all people to take a half hour nap during the afternoon. Some businesses are providing a place to nap. An added problem is that only about half workers everywhere report gettin getting a good nis sleep. That could be because workers arent getting enough exposure to Natural Light during the day. Researchers from the university of illinois found that employees with workplaces with windows get 173 more exposure to Natural Light than those without windows. That extra sunlight pays off with an average of 46 minutes more of sleep every night for those workers. And a better overall quality of sleep. Workers with windows also reported a better quality of life, better metabolism and more physical activity. Its most important to be exposed to Natural Light early in the day and the closer you are to windows the more positive you will be. The positive effects of windows vanish once youre about 20 to 25 feet from windows. Light is crucial to synchronizing your internal biological rhythms. The worlds tonight on tech know. I cannot imagine being trapped in ruble like this. A miraculous new invention. This if finder. Its a victim detection radar. That could save your life. As long as your heart is beating, we can detect you. Tech know. Every saturday, go where science meets humanity. This is some of the best driving ive ever done. Even though i cant see tech know. Were here in the vortex. Tonight, 7 30 eastern. Only on Al Jazeera America. The final major tennis tournament of the year gets underway on monday here in new york city. It is the u. S. Open and american men will be underdogs. I mean real underdogs. No american male has won the u. S. Open since 2003. Andy rotdick. Joining us to discuss the state of american tennis and the upcoming u. S. Open is patrick ruby who is a sports columnist. Men. What is going on. In 1994, there were 24 in the top 50, today there is one, and two of them barely, where did the american men go . Surface and style. American players they grow up playing on hard courts. The ball moves faster. What does that mean . That means that they learn to have a big serve, maybe a big forehand. They play aggressively and try omove in. But the thing is, you know, the way the game has evolved in the last ten, 20 years, whether its the racquet technology or other surfaces, you actually have a bigger advantage if you grow up playing on clay courts, like we see in europe and other countries. Slower and more tactical. One of the key things that american players have to get better at. I think the usta is taking steps to teach younger players to play on clay, trying to build more clay courts but thats going to be a while to bear fruit if its even going to. Some surveys show tennis coming in seventh, and tennis is second after soccer, but that argument sounds a little hole hollow to me, restriction a little hol rings a Little Hollow because thats probably been the case all along. You could make the case, well, american tennis doesnt draw tall best athletes in the country. It probably 97 has. But i think that maybe whats more important is that tennis has become more popular overseas and more popular around the world, particularly in europe and i think maybe the talent pool in the United States has stayed a little flat or declined a little bit. But in the talent pool everywhere else has elevated tremendously. Its not just that american tennis players have gotten worse, its possible that the world has caught up and surpassed the United States. To play high level as a kid cam theres less money as a pro, fewer scholarships in college, we only have a fraction of the pro tournaments they have in europe and far fewer than 30 years ago. So is tennis on the decline . Im not sure if its declined. Relative to the glory days of mcen row row and the 70s and 80s, relative to ten years ago, where we had the golden year ever agassi, and sampras and currier. It is an expensive sport to be good at, as a kid, to get the right kind of coaching, to get elite coaching and to travel and to play in these junior tournaments. Its also, look, america is a very large geographic country. Its spread out, its hard to get to those coaches, to those tournaments, even if you have time. To be fair, the women are better, serena is 32, venus is older, if the two williams sisters stop playing tennis even the women arent going to look that good. The williams sisters, im glad you brought them up. The biggest explanation what has happened to elite american tennis, weve been unlucky in the United States. The williams sisters are once in a lifetime talent. Sampras or andy roddick, grand slam winners dont come around very often. In some ways, all of us in america might have been spoiled by a lot of good luck. No matter what your National Development system is, no matter what youre doing as a country to produce champions, champions happen. Roger federer happened in switzerland. Rafael nadal, australia and other countries have a long proud tradition of tennis theyve done worse than the u. S. Arguably, given at one point they were very dominant, too. The u. S. Tennis association, get a lot of money, 200 million from u. S. Open, questions how usta spends its money. I wonder if the usta is not doing enough, which is that american tennis may be declining where it counts at the professional levels, but also, in that popular culture. Its just you dont see tennis outs there. Were not paying attention to tennis on television and other places that other sports get. Well i think with the usta for one, that New York Times story today, in terms of cronyism and sort of where the money is spent, you know i dont know how much there is to that. But every dollar obviously that is not going to Youth Development in some way is a dollar thats not going to find that flex agassi, that next sampras. Its really hard to say, the best they can do is what you hint at which is to particularize the sport, get racquets in a lot of kids hands. If theyre going to turn into the next great player, its probably going to come within, its probable because theyve got some kind of singular ability. Or the places where the williams sisters, one parent can make all tennis. I dont know systemically and structurally if theres much beyond that if they can make it easier to get to academies, i know theyre trying to build more academies and more training centers, that may help as well. But to get to that top five, that top ten, you need special players that emerge and maybe theres nothing you can do as a country or Tennis Association to make that happen. It needs happen organically, at peoples homes and not as academies. But the usta is certainly trying hard. They have all swords ever programs to bring new children into the tennis world. Patrick, thanks. Thank you for having me. A former u. S. 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