We look for answers at the seats of power. Washington where they dont want our camera around but theres so much moneyh here goo life is good. Once people come to washington d. C. They never leave. From the fox news headquarters in new york york, john stossel. We stop with this because americans are so fat it is governments job to help us eat better. Ab changing all hold have this is not easy the first lady says to change behaviorov government has to do its p part is Michelle Obama wantse to inspire us to exercise ofpi the white house lawn, that is great but that usually means force but simply the size of the cup could be used. Might mayor is upset about big cups of soda heth wants this size made it illegal. It is the biggest step to curb obesity. Please. I could fill two of these or2 i could go to the supermarket to buy one of. These. How does this curb obesity . He is also proud he has forced every chain restaurant to clearly postlear there were more than a few skeptics but most arel recognized as national models. Sadly that is true now b they all have to post p calorie counts even though they dont work. A study from york universitys tracked customers at wendys , a kentucky fried f chicken, and mcdonalds and found half of them noticed and some said influenced their ordering but when researchers checked reseats they ordered more. The author of the food police study that. It doesnt changeoi behavior and also what you do is Ask Companies toss undertake a cause that has no benefit to the consumer. A sign of a governmentt willing to step into your food choices even though it will notou work. Wh what type of government is that . Intrusive. In my state the legislator most willing to post those signs is the majoritys. Eight more. He assault of restaurants in f the state of new york. No evidence it is harmful. Some show among some segments increased the chances of death. So because you dont haven so i cant have sold . C in mecca comes from statistics. Called the cheeseburgermar denmark is a first country in the world to impose the fat tax some people say consumers should pay moreheal they love what denmark did. The decided to implement the fat tax basically go tod the supermarket to buy a food above a certain level of fat they charge you extra do we feel good . Absolutely. It passed overwhelmingly but d they would switch to the cheaper food or go across3 the border. Repealed the fat tax so far they have not mentioned that i think theyd make a big mistake. Eighth tried it theyea tried youre dumb idea and they said that was a bad idea. A i believe they said great idea also attacks on candy. C caddie define fastfood a solid or the big mac you can bet the lobbyist will determine what a fast food is. And other similar problem is candy the bureaucrats decided this hershey bar is but this is not because it contains flower. Fl store clerks dont know what t to charge. Flour, sugar, eggs. Kurtis sir one an award of the food network. Arent you poisoning are people . To make everybody fat. 3 without a little fat and sugar what would life be . We ask her to make a healthy version. No sugar, no salt, and very little fact it is bakedal just to show you the difference without the good stuff. S, the egg whites are good. It is not like the a guilt. Lets do a taste test reg taste test. Almost everybody like to it doesnt taste like anything. D. I wanted to like the held the doughnut. Not as what i am making looking for. Oo is good for it is a baked doughnuts. It is good that peoplees have choices. We would like to give you the option g to make better choices. Ay y john how you say you give us more choice . Th you give us last. Let me just say i and trying to be of the stuff that is not a good for the consumer. John you are a vote pooley. I have been called worse. John what business is it ofyo it is freedom. E but with the Health Care Cost if we are not into a Healthy Lifestyle the government would be blamed for not doing the rightnme thing. R john government is responsible because we have a socialized Health Care System . Wa you can take away my freedom . What i am trying to do is h help you have a better life. John you are like cancer cos spreading bad things that cost a lot of money and does not do good. I am a good cancer giving good health the advice for the best Public Health cover country. John of good cancer . Myth number six debt obamacare is good for business. Democrats say it is. Good for Small Business. Good for they are why we committed us to this cause. John white house says business will not suffer under health reform. John all good, obamacare . You cant be wealthy unless you are healthy. You remember the congressman support of obamacare. Remember the republican plan, dont get sick. If you do get sick, die quickly. John i was surpris he used to be a businessman and help create a tech company. John you are unusual having created wealth,un i. D. T. I would think you would s the burden of all these rules. One rle has had amatic impact on job creating or Small Business. John its the pile of rules. Here is obamacare and this is just the start. Many pages say the secretary shall produce me regulation. Put togetr i would say a pile of rules. John what about the tax on medical devices. A puchblg of democrats object to this. Obamacare makes a steep tax on pacemakers, digital thermometers. It can be a profit business but its one that saves lives. New tax means they will save fewer lives association now Many Senate Democrats want that part of obamacare killed. Dt we want more medical devices . When you pass a law that costs something you have to come up with the money for it. John obamacare forces more Business Owners to pay more for Workers Health care Lauren Goodrich runs restaurants in maine and New Hampshire and hires lots of kits kids and offers health insurance. You got 20 subway shops. How many employees . I have 180. So the point is to get your employees better healthcare. I think its noble cause but i cant provide every single employee. In a low margin Retail Restaurant business, this entitle devastating. John he says his profit margi is smaller becau he had to pay specialists to try to exain the rules. Accountants and Insurance Agents and lawyers t filling out how will i comply were the bill and the still cant give meet answer. John obamacare says he must buy expensive insurance or pay a fine. He either will slash his plot of. I can hear people saying so what, h has 20 stores, make less profit. You could say that. You would have to have a profit to be able to expand your business. I wont hiring more people. I have customers come in with the exact change for their lunch in their hand. They are very cost conscious. Who are these businesses on the margin. The basis of that were going to deny 15 Million People coverage . John its nice to give people coverage but it does impose costs. He says the costs will force him to cut full time workers. Ill have to cut many people down to part time. And people the law was meant to help. Maybe him or her will be hurt. Theyll have to work two jobs to make ends meet which is sad john the extra burden, you are always adding burdens. Who is we . John you democratic congressmen especially. I visited communist countries. I know what it looks like to be in a place where there really is a burden, i dont see our country being that way. John and were not, yet, but we should learn from history and stop putting more burden on guys like him you need me. I employ your teenagers. Some run off to make their own business because of my training. John coming up, the new celebrity cause, stopping fracking. Please dont track my mototott the boys used double miles om their capital one venture card to fly home for the big family reunion. You must be garths father . Hello. Mother. Mother travelings easy with the venture card because you can fly any airline anytime. Two words. Double miles this guy c act. Wanna py dodge rock . Oh, you guys and with double miles you can actuay use, you never miss the fun. And with double miles you can actuay use, beard growingontest and go win whats in your wallet . Win a quarter million tweeters is beare tweeting. And 900 milln dollars are changing hands online. Thats whyp built a new kind of server. One thats 80 smaller. Uses 89 less energy. And costs 77 less. Its called hp moonshot. And its giving the internet the room it needs to grow. This is gonna be big. Hp moonshot. Its time to build a better enterprise. Together. Like carpools. Polly wants to know if we can pick her up. Yeah, we can make room. Yeah. [ male announcer ]. Office space. Yes, were loving ts communal seating. Its great. [ male announcer ] the best thing to share . A data plan. At t mobile share for business. One bucket of data for everyone on the plan, unlimited talk and text on smart phones. Now, everyones in the spirit of sharing. Hey, can i borrow your boat this weekend . No. [ male announcer ] share more. Save more. At t mobile share for business. Oh myth number five, our Drinking Water is in danr because Oil Companies frack. What is that . Controversy is over chemicals being injected into the eart to break up rock and release natal gas. John it means shoving chemica into the ground to frack the rock to release oil and gas. This has been done for 60 years. But they learned h to dll sideways, america has much more nd cheaper natural gas. This means famils pay less to heat their homes. Soon america may be selfsufficient in energy. Also, if you are worried about global warming, burning natural gas releases less Greenhouse Gas than oil or coal. Flack go feels wrong. It feels like you are pumping stuff into mother earth. Jn a liberal european environmentalist points out that europe promised to cut Greenhouse Gas emissions but didnt cut them. We managed tout half what you accidentally happened to do when you stumbled on fracking. John so it brings fuel cheape, maybe better for the world. Why are these people so mad . They worry about Energy Companies shoving these dangeroushemicals into the ground. This is seen sfraen a documentary called gas lane. The documentary gas land. They gave it director an emmy and matt damon features greedy Energy Companies destroying the promised land. If it happens to one of us, it could happen to us all of us. John yoko ono started artists against fracking. And so is the left wing media. Itomes up by the millions of gallons and protests grow a lot of people are getting sick. John you would think assistant the antifrking movie includes this frightening scene. Oh, jesus christ. John so much gas in his water he could light it. What you are seeing is real. John an influential environmental group, river eople. All the people from the company, says this isnt our problem. Thisas there in the first place, but ty are lying. John he and the gas land movie says this is much more likely to happen after fracking but when state and environmental officials investigated they concluded fracking had nothing to do with it. It was just gashat is naturally in the grod. That happened. There are many places in america where no tcking is done, but water still catches fire. This is a lake in alaska. This man lives in new york whe fracking is banned, yet. And if fracking doesnt cause these problems. Why the headlines about ruined wells. Film maker checked out pollution claimed made by them have you done independent testi . We did way back two years ago. John he was oddly vague about the results. I cant remember what that shows. John he says the well water was dirty a dark. When they checked, it wasnt. It changes from day to day. John they demanded that pennsylvania environmental officials tested the water and epa did andoncluded the water was fine and reported that good news them. Listen to his reaction. Im sick and tired of this. What happened. We tested your waternd at this point in time we found no contaminants in it. John even epa director says. In no cases we determined that the fracking process have causedhemicals to end groundwater. There is risk. The protestors say instead of track america should just use less energy and investn alternatives. Renewable energy would be that, wind, solar, geothermal. There is more eney in algae in any other source. John , no, renewable eney doesnt provide the world with the power we feed. If you got your way there would be no progress. Oil, natural gas, fuel is dirty but otherwise we would be living in the dark ages. I hear the zealtry coming from the other side. I see statistics that are uncomfortable for you and the people who are in favor of this. John onis side in my state protestors persuaded to stop all trackingn new york. That makes me uncomfortable because the world needs energy. Energy is limited. Life is cruel and life is short. Energy matters. We take it for granted. We really shouldnt. [ male announcer ] staying warm and dry has never been our priority. Catering to the nveniently lated has never been our priority. Our priority is, was and always will be serving you, the american people. We get to see everyone in america almost every day. And weve noticed that youre sending and receiving more packages than ever. So we wanted to give you a more reliable way to ship them. With improved Priority Mail flat rate. Dont just take our word for it now well prove it every step of the way with tracking up to eleven scans, specified delivery dates, and free insurance up to 50 all for the same low rate. Well never stop delivering for every person inhis country. [ woman ] we are the United States postal service. [ man ] we are the United States postal svice. [ woman 2 ] ware the United States postal service. [ male announcer ] we are the United States postal service. And our priority is you. Go to usps. Com® and try it today. John number myth number 4, were safer because of lawsuits against reckless companies and dangerou products. That is logical but what f you want to buy one of these plastic gas cans. Largest manufacturer has closed up shop. John that was in oklahoma. Nothing has made me prouder to see the way this the team finished this job. John after 50 years, 15 people lost their jobs. These people were my family. My plan is to go home and lay down and cry. John companies disappear all the time. Markets change. New products emerge but this company made something that is high demand. What happed . This happened. Some people use the gas cans positive to pour gasoline on fire. Some were burned and some were killed. Its terrible but is it the gas cans fault . Oh, my god. People with the cans. The lawyers have digned ystems that are good fr lawyers and bad for our community. Jn the lawyers. If you or a loved one. John if you get hurt its easy to find lawyers eager to take your case for a percentage. Dont wait, call me today. John a lawr didnt sue them bute defends his cleagues that did. The flame arrester would prevent t explosions because of the background of flames. A flame arrester. Is inserted in the spout and myrevent fire from crawling up into the can. It might. They are testing them in plastic gas cans and so far the test show it might make the cans more dangerous because they clog and static ectricity can start a fire. That is probably why no plastic gas can includes flame arresters. Its up to the jury to listen to the experts and hear about the research. Johohn but the jurors isnt scientists and the see a pour victim and theant to help. Its very dangerous. If they can make the product safer, why dont they. Because it would cost more and clog. It could cause more danger. Its debate, but once you lawyer parasites step in, the debate is over because you cost so much. I dont think that is the case. If a company decides toake a product and put it out on the market they are required to do what is reasonable. John juries are called upon to decide what is reasonable but the legal system that stacked against companies that mak a product that can burn people. The warnings are not distinguished at all. Lawyers often win money saying tre shuck more warning. A simple ladder today includes 30 warnings. Have you ever looked at Birth Control label . I have not. John this is what the lawsuits, do both sides of the page, there is so many warnings, none of us read them. We are less safe. That is up to a jury. People are going warn labels in general. When they were first sued it fought back and won. It cost us 2. 5 million to win. Joh even whether you win you lose. Its the lawyers that are winning and everybody else loses. John more lawsuits poured in. The year before we filed for bankruptcy we had 25 cases in the last nine months. You can sue until they are broke and tired and cant provide jobs and take care of communities and be an entrepreneur. John even if their cans were dangerous, they dont take into account of not having a product. During Hurricane Sandy stores ran out of containers for gasoline. We cant keep them in the stores. Manufacturers are having keeping up. John they didnt know they no longer exist. Customers were desperate for cans. I looked all over brooklyn. This is first time i found a five gallon gas can. People are saying you have a bucket you get gasoline from a gas station. One man walked into a gas station will you go ago five gallon igloo cooler. They were puttinggas in milk jugs. To make the argument because of lawsuits resulted in the Company Going out of business, resulted in their being n cans available, resulted people not getting gas cans is ridiculous argument. John but we lose products because of fear of lawsuits. That is why america has no aids vaccine and no lyme disease vaccine. Someone like me to bring something to the marketed cause it could cause harm, im happy about that. John we pay foris happines not just in products we lose but americans pay 1,000 per year for lawsuits. In oklahoma, they let 117 workers go. This is wrong. If they can take this and destroy it, they can take just about anything. John they can, but there is something that no one seems to be able to take away. You have to fund them. Tiny hardly used post john another myth, government can run the post office like a business. Hey buy commercials lie businesses do but real businesses cant lose billions every year. 16 billion last year. Post office loses money even though. They dont pay sales taxes, they dont pay parking tickets or property taxes. Here a reason, check out this Little Post Office i massachusetts. This is one of hundreds that on average bring this less than 700 a month. I dont blame her, but a real business would close a store that cant cover even her salary let alone other costs. Never mind. They say post offices must serve all of america. There is another post office down a mile down the road. John in fact there are five others within a few miles. Why do they so many so close to each other. Even the locals see the excess. They should go down to a couple. John close these post offices. We are working on it. John what do you mean . A business just does. We are expected to operate like a business but congress hasnt offered the opportunity to do this. John on the website since ben franklin the post office h changed with america. But you dont change. You are a government monopoly, you barely change. 200,000 less employees than we had. Big government media would say things like that . They are hell bent on seeing the u. S. Postal service die. John so the managers wait for workers to quit or retire. Attrition is kinder, is that why you do it . We have Union Contracts and in no layoff provisions. John how can you run a business that way . That is how the cookie crumbles. John that is your tax money. Private Delivery Services continue to thrive while the postal service. Fed ex and ups make billions because they innovate and cut costs. Postal officials like mickey try to do that, try to close money losers like these. John why werent they closed long ago . Political pressure. John congress can do any major change, save billions by adjusting benefit payments . Not a chance. So the politiciansrent dumb, what are they thinking . They are thinking about reelection. John they are supposed to be responsible. Are we so dumb we lose taxpayers money . If the post office could charge anyway they wanted not necessarily. John cant they run it like a business . They have to beg you for permission every time they wanted to do something . The post office provides something extremely valuable and that is universal service. That costs something. John universal Service Every american must get mail service whether you live in the suburbs or deep in the alaska. They haul mayor by mule to the bottom of the grand canyon. It is in the constitution. John but it isnt. They have the power to establish post offices. It doesnt have to and it doesnt have to deliver mail to all of america. They arent living there by force. If you go back to history, it was private carriers that pick up the mail and took it the last mile or people picked it up. What we have today is an invention of congress. John who says there needs to be universal service . I could get email . There are countries poorer than the United States including the congo and universal mail service for everybody. Private sector, they go out of business if they lose money. Your government, i have to pay forever . I dont represented john stossel in congress. Overwhelming people dont want them closed. John theyre shortsighted and they want free stuff for themselves. Arent youed to be the grownup, in this case you cant have it all . Dont feel a moral compulsion to shut down post offices when they dont want them shut down. Public disagree with you. John they. Most people dont want their post office closed. N this one. Its good for convenience. No, i dt understand why they are still open but ts one has to be. John next, what you dont know about trains and mass transit. This thing is like the boys used double miles from their capital one venture card to fly home for the big family reunion. You mt be garths father . Hello. Mother. Mother traveling is easy with the venture card because you can fly any airline anytime. Two words. Double miles this guy can act. Wanna play dodge rock . Oh, you guys and witdouble miles you can actuay use, you never miss the fun. Beard growing contest and go win whats in your wallet . Win a quarter million tweeters is beare tweeting. And 900 Million Dollars are changing hands online. Thats why hp built a new kind of server. One thats 80 smaller. Uses 89 less energy. And costs 77 less. Its called hp moonshot. And its giving the internet the room it needso grow. This is gonna be big. Hp moonshot. Its time to build better enterprise. Together. John now, mitd number 2, we need government to invest in infrastructure. That does make sense. We do need ways of getting places faster anduding infrastructure does create jobs. Lets get moving. John politician want to spend more on trains. The 220 mileanhour train. Ohn cool, but this is only a promise. Train line the politician approve starts and ends in the boondocks where economist adrian moore lives. I live in tihachpi. And high speed rail comes right through my town. This is boondoggle of boondoggles. Dennis lipton helped get the train project funded. Lots of peopl live in california. They are starting it in the middle of state. We envision cnecting los angeles, san francisco, san diego. John that will cost 100 billion. You are expecting private investors. Have any come forward . Not at this time but there is everyeason to believe they will. The private money was a joke because private money will invest in something they can make a profit. John so why does it happen. Because its visionary. Its very visionary. Trains will revolutionize our infrastructure. John trains are romantic. He likes amtk train. Amtrak trains are packed. John actually here is what it looked like when we taped. On average, the amtrak trains fill just a third o their seats, but if we dont invest in trains what is the mass transit alternative . New buses. This is now the Fastest Growing mass transit in america. Why . Because its cheaper. John buses dont get the big subsidies but they are much cheaper than trains. Ill take that. Amtrak is too expensive. I dont have 200. John more typically an amtrak from new york to d. C. Costs about 150 and bus ticket is 20. Its cap. John also todays buses are pleasan they have wifi and most for a bus can go where the people go. Trains run in straight lines, bu people move every which way. Only cs and buses can change routes. John they are making money and doing a better job . And growing because they are more flexible. John which raises the question why should taxpayers lose more money on trains. People cite new yor subways. You would lose money, they transport lots of us. What would happen in new york if we waited for pri investors to build the subway, it would have neverappened. John makes sense, if you ask people who built the subways. I think it was the government. I think it was president eisenhower. Union workers. John actually. 1878 before the brooklyn bridge. The original subways in new york were all private. Carried tens of millions of passengers. John after 50 years they tried to raise the fares to a dime. They didnt like that mayor took advantage of that and government will take it over and we wont raise the fare. John but, of course, the governmendid. And now the fare is 2. 50 and government built subway constrtion takes longer. This subway was supposed to be done in 1938. Then they said 1980. Now, they say 2018. Its taken so long that the subway cars built for it now wont be used because they dont fit the track. We no longer lead the ultra violet lightso kil polio germs. The modern equipment, but why, they had money on the line. I want to recognize up front a number of officials, elected officials. Politicians hav different incentives like sucng up to other politicians and government workers have time to and ound. Despite the delay and despite the billions lost, government wants more trains. Its rail, rail, rail and rail. John up next, do you like these beautiful homes. You should. You probably helped pay for you probably helped pay for [ male annncer ] these days, a Small Business can save by sharing. Like carpools. Polly wants to know if we can pick her up. Yeah, we can make room. Yeah. [ male announcer ]. Office space. Yes, were loving this communal seating. Its great. [ male announcer ] the best thi to share . A data plan. At t mobile share for business. One bucket of data for everyone on the plan, unlimited talk and text on smart phones. Now, everyones inhe spirit of sharing. Hey, can i borrow your boat this weekend . No. [ male announcer ] share more. Save more. At t mobile share for business. At t mobile share for business. Ery day were working to and to keep our commitments. And weve made a big commitment to america. Bp supports nearly 250,000 jobs here. Through all of our energy operations, we invest more in the u. S. Than any other place in the world. In fact,eve invted over 55 billion here in the last five years making bp americas Largest Energy investor. Our commitment has never been stronger. John finally our number one myth, people go to washington to serve my fellow americans, they call it public service, but that is not what i notice in how they live. I am first entering the home you have this. John washingtons Real Estate Market is hot. There is lots of expensive homes her beautiful gourmet kitchen. All glass walls. This home is a steal at 2. 8 million. John 2. 8 million is a steal. Our Real Estate Market has been recession proof. John why is that . We have the lowest unemployment rates in the country. John because government keeps growing so much so most of richest counties in america surround washington, d. C. The rest of the america had a housing recession. Everybody else, housing prices went down, not in washington. He is says d. C. Is special bause the people that control the government and get to tax you live there. They like it there. Government contractors. There is reason they go there and stay there. John consider where they work. Architecture is grand. Many Office Buildings resemble palaces. Its like versailles before the french revolution. They spent their lives in verilles and didnt know much what went went on outside that world. John congressman alan grayson lost his seat but r ran again and won. He says if it is royalty in america. Its not congress, its the lobbyists and who made it that way . John by passing all these laws. If you have a Big Government there is more government to fight over. There is that argument, but will the real well think is not in washington, d. C. John its on wall street, he says. There is a lot of money there, but there is a big difference. In the private sector if you can find a way to cut costs you are a her if you can find a way to cut costs in bureaucracy you are goat. They measure success by the size of their budget. Big budgets give special interests reason to invest in d. C. And invest they have. Unions say teachers are under pay but their union looks rich. This is their headquarters. Were told its worth hundred Million Dollars. The atrium is called an environmental oasis. They didnt want u to take pictures of it. Take a picture of it . They to me to wait outside and officials waited to see if we can videotaped. We read about the beautiful lobby and i would like to show it to the viewers. Its like they are sucking money from the rest of the country and building palaces. Have you been to any mall in america in the past 20 years. Isnt it more grand . No. I would have to disagree. John backs outside i was passesed from one official to te next. Find out more what is going on zbljts. Im going to have to check. John he went back inside for a while. Finally a ruling came down. No. John the reason . Were not opening the building up. John tried another beautiful building. Headquarters of the afl c. Murals made of marble, glass and gold. John john stossel, i want to take pictures of the lobby. I had plenty of time tohink about the 12,000 active lobbsts working in washington. They are smart to be here. Because washington controls so much but this union doesnt want you to see what theyve got. Ive been notified by our Legal Department that were not because the state of the mural. John the estate wouldnt allow it. Oh, well. The bottom line is that washington, once a sleepy par time home for politicians now resembles versailles. They work in buildings that look like palaces and after wo they go home to castles. The property is on five acres. Beautiful shower and his and her closets. It helps understand why people spend millions to win jobs here and then. Once people come to d. C. They never leave. John that is our show. Im john stossel. Lou in. Lou good evening, everybody. Thank you for joining us. You are looking at just some of the estimated 1300 victims of what Syrian Rebels claim or chemical weapon attacks by president assad forces. The United Nations has taken up the issue with no word of any response as yet. The u. S. State deparent contradicted themselves today on whether syria has chemical weapons. General jack kne is here to assess the situation. Also tonight the nasdaq halting trading for more than three hours today. It still remains silent on