Transcripts For ALJAZAM Consider This 20131008

Offer private employers cover contraception. This term the court will hear cases like abortion protests and campaign finance. Ruling on those cases not expected until the spring. And u. S. Commandos arrested the man accused of being involved in the Embassy Bombing in 1998. Thats the news at this hour. Consider this is next. Is. The United States moves against alqaeda an and alshabab in two hours. Has the white house shifted its a counterterrorism strategy away from kills in favor of captures. As many uninsured americans have tried to navigate the process of signing up for obamacare those who pay for their own insurance, theyre alerted of the new rate, and it didnt pretty. Welcome to consider this. We begin with the capture of the alqaeda operative in libyas capitol and the raid in somalia. Reports officials insist these actions were both necessary and legal. We hope that this makes clear that the United States of america will never stop in its effort to hold those accountable of those who conduct acts of terror and alqaida and members of their organization that they can run but they cant hide. U. S. Operations in libya and somalia send a strong message. Well continue to try to bring people to justice in an appropriate way with hopes that ultimately these kinds of activities against everybody in the world will stop. Navy seals from seal team 6 launched the First Mission in somalia, home to the alqaedalinked alshabab group. Alshabab spokesman claimed they had been warned ahead of the seals raid. Its clear that they are planning a large scale attack before the attack in nairobi. And this man is accused of playing a key role in the 1998 bombings in tanzania and is known to be close to Osama Bin Laden years ago. The operations were conducted as you know by the authorization to use military force from 2001 which authorizes the use of force against alqaeda and forces. Alliby will be brought in soon. A former fbi counter effort part of the team in the bombings of kenya and tanzania. And don bareli, former member of the Fbi Joint Terrorism Task force, who testified before the House Foreign Affairs Committee Last week about the threat from alshabab. Great to have you both here. Thank you. Thank you. You were involved in the Embassy Bombing and investigations. What can you tell us about abu alliby and after all the work you put in to find justice for all those people who were killed. How do you feel knowing that hes in u. S. Custody tonight . Im grateful that not only was he captured, but captured alive. As good as it feels to capture someone who is guilty of a crime that long ago, but well learn more about future attacks. Its critical that we didnt do a drone strike on either of those targets because their values to us in the Intelligence Community is far greater than the value of a prosecution ever will be. Well talk about the down strikes later. Don, any significance that these raids from launched within a matter of hours. I think it sends a great message. Weve seen terrorist organizations launch simultaneous attacks against their targets, i think its great to turn the table on them and launch simultaneous attacks. Whether its by design or coincidence its hard to say. But i will say when we have these Tactical Operations a lot goes into it, and time something absolutely critical. Sometimes you look for those windows of opportunity when its safe enough for the operators to take action. When the intelligence is appropriate. Was it by design or coincidence, hard to tell. But it sends a clear edge. Absolutely. Tim, you were talking about allibys capture, and whether hell bring valuable information to the u. S. Hes being held for questioning. Who makes up the Integration Team . And what kind of techniques are being applied in this case with the high level suspect like this, given that weve walked away from some of the techniques that used to be alive. Well, think the team will be made up fbi and c. I. A. Agents that are topnotch interrogators. And it usually does not involve physical coercion at all. For someone like this, its going to be a matter of delicate balance of rapport building. Partly to put the fear of god in this guy to let him know that his life of terrorism and crime is long since over, and if he expects to see daylight again in any capacity his best cooperation. His intelligence that he holds right now is most valuable to us in the immediate hours after the capture. De appreciates greatly in the days and weeks past. When Saddam Hussein captured it was a colleague, an fbi agent named george who did all the interrogations of saddam. That a was choreographed by a couple of members of the behavior analyses at quantico who choreographed every movement and every word that george maim while in the room with saddam, and he was the only human being that saddam was allowed to interact with in any way. That my be torturous to us, but it allows us to control the conversation and direct someone like Saddam Hussein, a maniac, and someone like alliby, who is not much different, and direct them with the scope of what theyre facing and direct their operation. The plan as prosecutor here in the uniteherethe plan is te here in the United States. But he has not been read his miranda rights. Thats because they want to get information from him now. Are they confident that they wont have any trouble convicting him with the evidence that is all right out there. It should not be a problem. We have this with another individual captured in the spring of 2011. He was an a alshabab operative. He was interrogated for months. He was turned over to a Law Enforcement team, he was read his miranda rights, and he was a water shed of intelligence, and he was also convicted, and pled guilty, and i think still looking at sentencing, but potentially could look at a life sentence. Its possible to serve both masters. That is to get valuable intelligence along with preserving a viable prosecution. Thats what the government is looking to do right now. But will alliby, tim, bring us a water shed of intelligence. He spent ten years in custody. What can we get from him now . We can get a lot from him. A water shed is not necessarily things that have been built up over years. He knows how they operate. He knew how they operated back then, and even if he has been back in this game for the last several months or few years, he still has a lot of intelligence about the personnel, and the targets. And the personnel that are working on their side and where they are, and also lets talk about bengahzi. While alliby was in plain sight, bengahzi, another libyan city, despite the fact that he had a 5 million bounty on his head. And heres a quote the question is if the window is closing does that mean that were leaving the bengahzi suspects on the street there . Heres what republican congressman peter king said yesterday on fox news sunday. Why, if were able to get alliby we didnt get the operatives in bengahzi, we know where they are. Theyve been open and notorious for quite awhile. Theyve gone underground. What does it say about our priorities . This is where the law and politics merge. We cant discount the fact that the capture of alliby was significant. To me it sends a message that the cooperation between the u. S. Government and the Libyan Security authorities is getting better. Weve had a team of fbi and c. I. A. Even though the Libyan Government complained about this . They can complain but i would venture to guess there were at least some people in the inner circle of knew what was going on. They have to complain to save face with their own people. I dont think this was a completely huma unilateral oper, similar to the Osama Bin Laden raid in pakistan. What do we know about this guy who was the main planner for alshabab . Was he really the main target because that compound was used by the head of alshabab. All the sources i read said he was the target. Im not privy to classified information but by all accounts he was the target. This is the guy associated with two of the key embassyu. S. Embassy plots, the attacks in 1998. Both of whom are deceased but both Significant Players in the attack. He was involved in the 2002 attack in kenya against an israeli hotel and airliner. This guy is a big deal. Why not just take him out . There was enough firepower to take him out. Again, antonio, the value of speaking to someone like that, and getting intel from them,ness two weeks after an attack where 60plus people were killed, and similar attacks against soft targets like that are things that are very vulnerable here in america. And with the hundreds somali spores, close to a million or more, i believe we have close to threequarters of a million in america alone. Those somali diasopra are a small minority are infected by alshabab. Theyre infected by that ideology. I want to talk about their role in financing alshabab, but lets talk about the drone strikes and whether to take this guy out or not. According to u. S. Military official, it was a capture mission. If they wanted to kill this guy, there are lots of ways to do that. No drone strikes, do you think, don, the administration is stepping back from using drones . I cant say theyre stepping back. Theyre weighing their best options. If theyre operating in an area where they have reasonable chances of success in capturing the target, theyre not going to be looking at a lot of innocent civilians or casual collateral damage, theyre going to opt for the option, and thats what theyre attempting to do. Tim, alshabab even last week we had experts telling us that alshabab was supposed to be on its way out. But within a matter of weeks they succeeded with that gruesome attack on that Westgate Mall in kenya. Now they held off a Seal Team Six, are they stronger than they were given credit for . I dont know if sophistication is the proper scale to measure them on. They may have been weakened as far as territorial in sow ma i cant, theyre no longer controlling mogadishu, it doesnt mean theyre weaker. Just because they dont control the territory doesnt mean that their numbers have been decimated. Theyre still recruiting around the world and financing comes from around the world. It might be more difficult because theyre more underground now and the fact that they were able to repulse a Seal Team Six attack shows the rules of engagement between them and us. Theyre not worried about collateral damage. Theyre only worried about saving our butts. Our guys dont want to cause collateral damage, and theyre trying to capture them alive. They do attack people. Theyre poaching elephants to use the ivory for their trade. Theyre become major sellers in the region and theyre getting financing from those here. Some have been convicted in the United States for giving money to this group. And apparently they have the money to pay these fighters. Not many of them are religion fighters. Theyre getting the financing to pay theyre mercenaries or somali who is are working for them. Money is the lifeblood of any terror organization. Without money they cant survive. Eventually they wont get recruits. They cant bite the resources, weapons and provide for the training and all those things. There are lots of sources of money that come in to alshabab. We have doneas at the u. S. Government have done a lot to stem the flow of money that goes in there including sanctions against various banks, prosecuting people in the United States who have sent money to alshabab. But this is a very difficult task. Especially when you look at foreign source was money coming in from other countries, for other organizations. Potentially under the auspices of ngos that are built to be charitable organizations. But the fact of the matter once the funds get over there its very difficult to track whether they end up in the hands of needy people who need food or those who are fighting. Two months ago we were talking about alqaeda, the Arabian Peninsula and yemen and then the isla islamist extremisn kenya, they keep popping up everywhere. Don, tim, thank you for being with us tonight. Good night. Millions who buy their own insurance are shocked how much theyll be paying under obamacare. Talking to those people who just got their notices recently. And what do you think . Hermela aragawi is fielding your questions. She will bring them to us. Bring us your conversation on twitter, and google plus pages. Im here to take the fear out of finance. Every night on my show i break down the confusing financial speak and make it real. As americans navigate through obamacare. Many americans are going through sticker shock. They see the premiums theyll have to pay. To discuss this we have with us mary, a self employed Court Reporter who is dealing with choosing a new plan. She joins us from our San Francisco studio. Great to have you all with us. Tom, i want to start with you. You buy your own insurance. You say youre a supporter of president obama, and you wanted more people to be insured. Now youre looking at what is going to happen to you. Your premium currently 635 a month. The afternoon bronze premium is 1,432 for you. Thats 9,564 more every year. We checked the California Exchange, and it didnt look like we could find anything lower. You thought he would be paying less, right . Yes, in fact, i did. Or at least that i would be able to keep my current insurance. Somewhere along the whole way i believed the line i could keep my insurance and or move to the exchange that it would be up to me, and some how that promise isnt coming through. Mary, in your case you got a letter from your Insurance Company saying that you needed to find a new plan on the obama Care Exchange by january. Your premium 225 a month, but the cheapest plan on the exchange that you can find is 507. Now, what does that mean for you . You live in San Francisco. The cost of live something high. Thats a big jump. Are you going to qualify for a subsidy . No, i do not qualify for a subsidy as of now. It is very scary right now. I havent begun to check into my options. I went into sticker shock friday when i got my letter. I have to make some kind ofi have to pick a plan very soon. I really dont know a couple of months to do it. And exactly. Joanne, what do you say to people like tom and mary . A spokesman from the California Exchange said there will be winners and losers under obamacare but most people buying their own insurance wont see an increase, but youre seeing these two examples. Who is going to win or lose here. Clearly these people will have a challenge getting coverage. What kind of coverage did they have before . Is that entire increase because of the new law . Are there other trends in healthcare and is it the same exact plan, do you have different protections as a consumer. If i was paying another 10,000 out of pocket, thats a lot of money. Is this the experience of these individuals . Yes, it is. Are there other people like them . Yes, there are. Is this the experience of everybody in the country, no its not. There are also people who are subsidized, who have cheaper plans or werent able to get insurance at all and can get it now. It will be for the country to decide the balance of winners and losers. There are some expertsthis is not an universally shared view, but there are some people who think that it will be cheap center a year. That insurers going into this new exchanges, insurers by definition are conservative. They reduce risk. They may be coming in high because its a new market with a new market and its a whole new system, you might see iti wouldnt say thats a guarantee. There are some people who say that in the Insurance Industry and academics who say it may be better in a year. The healthcare costs, the rate at which they are rising has slowed down. Theyre at historic lows. That may be partially because of obamacare. Tom, i know you want more people to be insured. How much of it isare you willing to pay more knowing that in the future if you had a preexisting condition and needed to get insurance a that now you would be able to . Well, all along ive been listening to the reports that said initially they said people in my age group would be staying flat. And later on they said in california my age group that it might go up 30 . 30 is a number i could see society sees the benefit of having everyone insured. I do, too. Maybe at 30 number would have been high but okay. But not more than double. Mary, what are you going to do . Are you considering just biting the bullet and just paying the penalty . No, i dont want to do that. I have no choice but to get insurance. Im going to keep shopping around. Im going to stay with my provider right now. But it is a very scarywhat is going on with healthcare is very scary. I believe the obama plan was extremely shortsighted. I resent the fact that im having to pay 507 to subsidize someone else. Lets bring in a couple of examples, joann, one is from new york city. We can show you the notice that this person got. Its a couple with one child, and you can look at the numbers there on the screen. Currently theyre paying 359. Theyre both self employed. Their premium will jump to 911. The only advantage is that their deductible will be a few thousand dollars lower. I spoke to this person earlier today, and she said they were going to seriously consider the penalty because the gap was so many thousands of dollars that it didnt seem to make sense. In new york the rates are actually going down. So i dont know what this individual had in terms of how minimal the coverage was before. If someone had a plan that was very, very basic, that really wouldnt cover you, you what we call under insured. It wouldnt cover you if you got seriously ill. Those plans arent sold any more. I dont know about this family in new york, how skimpy their plan was, and what kind of protections they had. As a rule the new york rates are going down and quite a bit. Let me give a florida example. This is a single, selfemployed male. His current plan, 270 monthly. That jumps to 483, and he lost dental. Same deductible. Same plan. Probably not the same kind of plan. Its probably a different plan in the sense that Preventive Care is free, basic benefits, Mental Health is covered, maternity is covered. No more lifetime limits. You think in many of these cases theyll be getting more benefits rather than less. One of the arguments that people make is you get less choice and limited in some of the places you can go to get your healthcare. Those are two different issues. The provider network, whether youre an hmo or ppo and how many doctors is different than the basic benefits. In terms of benefits you have got, and what kind of benefits are required. Someone may not want those benefits. They would rather say i will take my chances and i would have a plan that doesnt cover anything and if i get sick im taking a risk. Those plans, theyre slimmed down plans that had fewer Consumer Protections wont be allowed. Its an apples to apples comparison. Some people dont want an apple. They want an orange, but in terms of how much the exchanges are working, how much is new benefits in the plans, how much is healthcare inflation. Even though it is going up more slowly than it was going up, it is still going up. And if youre getting it at a job, a lot of employers have been passing on costs. If you get your coverage at work, and your deductibles is going up, your copay is going up, your premium, thats not necessarily the law. That is what your employer is doing. Thats been a trend for many, many years now. And more with were focusing more on the selfemployed. Who are the real winners . Those people who makedepends on multiples of the poverty income. It goes into the middle class. A family of four who will be heavily subsidized. Right, right, the lower income will be morea family of four making 92,000 will get less of a subsidy than a family of four making 30,000. All right, tom . The Biggest Surprise i found out if i earned 94,000, which is four times the federal Poverty Level for a family, then i dont qualify for any benefits and i have to pay this 1470 or whatever the number was. If i earned one there are less my rate drops from 1,470 to 271, less than what i presently pay. So i believe there are a lot of people who are earning less than 94 as families that are going to qualify for these benefits, and making it lower than what i recently pay, which i think might be tilting it a little bit too far the other direction. Being able to pay that, you know, having such a cliff on that 94,000 number. If i had a job, and i thought about working a little bit more that year from 94,000 to 95,000 i would actually have to make 18,000 more before i was any better off. If i earned 96,000 i would be worse off. It was really implemented with some difficult to understand attributes. Tomorrow, mary, joanna, thank you for bringing your experiences to light. Its going to be an interesting few months, and lets hope that it does help a lot of people and get more people insured becauseand that it doesnt hurt people like you who may end up having to payyou dont have to pay too much more. We appreciate your time and sharing your stories with us. Coming up next we have more technology than ever but is it making us smarter or dumber . And former c. I. A. Agent Valerie Plame joins us with a new novel and novel idea with diplomacy with iran. [[voiceover]] from lucrative defense contracts to behindthescene lobbyists. Did egyptians ever think that aid would actually be cut . Never. [[voiceover]] fault lines explores the enduring relationship between the american and the egyptian militaries. I dont think we will suffer now. We already have airplanes, tanks. They havent changed the nature of what they provide us. Why would we want to change what we provide them . More than 70 of American Homes are wired for the internet. But does it make us smarter . Does spell check make us awful spellers . Is google give us any answer we need help or hurt . One author is convinced it is making us smarter than you think. Thats the title of his new book, how technology is making us smarter. Dr. Gary small is not so sure. Thank you both for joining us tonight. Weve got spell check, people say that spell check is making us terrible smellersspellers, i keep saying smellers instead of spellers, but spellers is what i talking about. Book sales are declining because you can possibly watch a movie anywhere you are, iphone, ipad, wherever you are on your personal computer. You focus on a couple of things. The thing that im focusing on in my book is the fact that were connected to each other a lot more. Were talking to each other a lot more and were becoming more social thinkers. People up until now focused on the idea that was great about the internet was access to all this information. But what i think is great is access to all these people. People that you can argue with. And easier to connect. Lets talk about transactive memory. Youre talking about the the old days you would have to go to a smart person to find something out, but now you can go to google. And how many smart people are going to be less if you dont have to study the stuff and learn the stuff. If i didnt know something, i would call a handful of people who i knew might be able to figure it out. Now you go to google. How many people will try to retain and obtain that kind of knowledge if they know that they can just go to the internet. Im not worried about that. When you look to peoples memo memory, whatever theyre passionate about, they can hoover it up. Thats why thing bring up stats over childrens birthdays. Were great on things were passionate about. Im not worried about people being dumber about the things that theyre passionate about. What do you say about what clive is saying, do you agree . I agree there is an upside with this technology. But the social interaction is twodimensional. It does not have the same quality of a facetoface conversation many times im involved in email conversations, and it just doesnt get to the subtleties. If you play a computer game it slows down your ability to recognize the emotional content of a facial expression. I think there is a balance here with the connectivity. The key is to know when to use the social media, and when to turn off the computer and communicate off line. There have been studies that show facebook can lead to depression. Some of the connectivity may not be that favorable. There have been studies showing the opposite. Facebook researchers are all over the place, actually. What i would say is i agree with gary that its important to step away from this stuff. If you take the force of what im saying there are new ways of thinking that we get from being connected together we still need to retain the usefully different ways we get from being off line. Go off line on the weekends. Stay away from screens. I think thats a good idea. Im less concerned about empathy than gary because a lot of differences were finding are relatively small, and some of the concerns of empathy stand in a longstanding generation of young people running amok. In my generation we were slackers. And there has always been issues with new technology. We have a social media question as we speak. Lets go to hermela for that. Collide n response to your tweet about your book, viewer joe nelson said, omg you think so . Thats so cool. I heart technologies. Lol, rosl interweb. What will all the acronyms created on the web and what does at a say for our future hemmingways and virginia wolff. This is playful interesting ways. These are like puzzles that were called a difficult, fun thing to do. Im not worried about this corroding our language. I think its playful fun uses with it. And what about something that collide points out in the book. Fortune 500 corporations are more productive and there has been increase in production thanks to technology. I dont know if there is a direct cause and direct relationship. I suspect that technology plays into it. Its clear that all this technology is super charging everything that is human. Were social animals. We love to connect. Now we can do it in six, seventh, and eighth gear. But i still think in Large Companies and in any kind of Organization Even though the Technology Skills are essential today, human contact skills are still very important. Theres a time when you have to read other people. You have to understand their motivations, the subtle at thisf interaction and theyre key to organization. What about multi tasking. Thats quite interesting. We love to do it, and we can get better at it, but there is a certain point where we make more errors. Thats clear. But a recent study a week or so ago found if you play the right kind of video game your musicky tasking skills can improve. A 70yearold can multi task as well as a 20yearold. So it can make our brain smarter if were smart in the way we use it. What about people who Call Computers distraction machines. There was an arsenal recently that called them as carnival barkers crying for your attention to go somewhere else than what youre doing because so much is available on your screen. Actually, im even dimmer on distraction than gary. I think distractions are a serious problem. I dont think people should be trying to get better at musicky tasking. We should be focusing on ways to resist the endless distractions. Its true. If you think its your computer. Its not your computer. Its si 60 million multi corporations begging you to look at their ad ads. I dont know whats not on wikipedia any more, and at one point we had people a combined 200 million a week, twice as much as it took the building of wikipedia, theyve got 200 million hours a week just playing world of war craft, gary. Clearly when you see numbers like that you got to be a little concerned. Im not saying im not concerned. There is a problem with technology addiction. Some people cannot stop playing their games. Its clear that the multi tasking can distract people. People are always coming in and complaining about their memory. Well, the big reason they have a bad memory is theyre just simply not paying attention. Now i would argue that the computer can improve your memory if you learn the right kinds of techniques from the computer. But if youre overdoing it with all the bells and whistles, and the partial continuous attention, its going to affect your memory. Thats what you say. You actually think our cognitive abilities are improved. Oh, yeah, they are. If you can fight the distraction. Gary is right about the distraction. If you dont read something attentively, its not going to stick in there. But i thinkim seeing push back on distractions. I hear these great stories. I just stopped checking my email on the weekends. I try to get away from it. I sort of compare it to crop rotating. Keep the soil fresh. During the week do youre mazing connective stuff. I wonder how many people are able to do that. The employers wont let them is the real answer. What is the best about technology for our brains . I think the best part of technology is the lack of intellectual isolation. Its the idea that you can throw an idea out there, and you can find someone who is thinking the same thing. This is incredibly rare for the average person for a long time. The average person could not do this. As i researched my book i kept encountering people saying this was the most amazing thing. There was a problem that they were trying to solve, think through, wondering about, they could find somebody to think about it online. Ill let you have the final word on what is the worst for you. With first i would agree with clive that its greet to reach out, connect with people and be creative with them. But the worst is that we stay too connected and we dont take time off line. Were not thinking indepth about problems. Instead were sharing information with our friends and hoping for a like or a thumbs up. Well have to rotate our crops, as clive said. Thank you both. Cliff, gary, great to have you with us to discuss this fascinating topic. Up next on the data dive we explore the true cost of the government shut down next. Re a d y fo r on inside story, we bring together unexpected voices closest to the story, invite hardhitting debate and desenting views and always explore issues relevant to you. In todays day at a dive of the cost of the government shutdown. Chuck hagel is calling the furloughed Defense Department workers thanks to the pay our military law. And the shutdown would cost 2. 9 billion in modern day money at 300 million weve already crossed 2 billion in economic output this time around. 800,000 federal employee versus been furloughed although theyve been promised back pay. If that happens it should make up for most of those economic losses. We think the furloughed workers account for 18 of the total federal workforce but the census website is shut down so we cant say for sure. With most of the government operating most americans have not been affected at all by the shutdown but it is having a major impact on many who arent government workers. The National Institute of health have stop accepting new patients and stop answering hotline calls with medical questions. The center for Disease Control prevention lost onethird of its staff. They stopped their Seasonal Flu Campaign and at a reduced capacity to respond if there is an outbreak. The fda is responsible for 80 of our food supply so it will have a harder time spotting and preventing foodborne illnesses. Head start has been stopped in six states. And private donors are stepping in to help. The National Archives are closed as are National Parks and monuments. Federally backed loans for rural communities, Small Business owners or families buying a home are frozen but mortgages through the fha or the va should be okay. Finally some good news. If youre getting hounded by the irs it has suspended auditing operations during the shutdown. Coming up, Valerie Plame is out with a new novel about a c. I. A. Agent. We asked her if it was based on her, and if this is any way to avoid a nuclear iran. Bring you a sneakpeak of the future, and take you behind the scenes at our evolving world. Techknow ideas, invention, life. Thats all i have an real money. Victoria azarenko on july 14, 2013, a column revealed the identify of covert c. I. A. Agent Valerie Plame effectively ending her career with the agency. Her work was focused on nuclear air proliferation, and she wrote an auto biography that turned into a movie and has since been working with the Organization Global zero. Now shes authored a new spy novel called blow back. Joining us is former c. I. A. Agent valerie blame. Great to have you with us. Thank you for having me. I want to start with serious questions. Your work at the c. I. A. Now at global zero and in the novel all have corrections to iran. The number of countries that now have Nuclear Weapons has grown since you left the c. I. A. Are you hopeful that proliferation will stop . I am hopeful. I think more and more nations are realizing that Nuclear Weapons belong in a dust pin of history. That they no, no longer provide the security that they once did, where we have the nexus of Nuclear Technology and terrorism. The proliferation will continue unless we take Strong International steps which is what global zero is supporting, enough, i think weve just been lucky so far. Therthere are revelries that iran, despite their denials, that iran is trying to achieve Nuclear Weapons, do you think theyll get to the place where iran will not develop a weapon . Im cautiously optimistic because maybe there is a window of opportunity. President rouhani has clearly shown a moderation in tone. From all of his tweets, from wishing happy Rosh Hashanah to his jewish friends, to the phone call with president obama, and then of course on october 15th there will be meeting in geneva or, high level meetings, and this is amazing that this is the first time that theyve been this level of talks since the iranian revolution. And i believe that diplomatic relations should not be reserved just for friends. I believe america is a great enough country that we can speak with our enemies as well as our friends, and we need to havebegin to have this conversation with them. I think iran definitely wants to reenter the community of natio nations. The sanctions are biting. As they say, im optimistic that maybe we have a moment here. While at the c. I. A. You monitored the top Pakistani Nuclear scientist who had been involved in helping other countries develop Nuclear Weapons. The biggest concern, Nuclear Devices falling into terrorist hands. Given everything that has happened over the past ten years what do you think the likelihood of that is . I think its still very high, actually. This is something that we need to have very Strong International Intrusive Inspections and begin to move forward, starting with United States and russia, reducing our nuclear arsenals. We cannot continue on the path that were going. But this continues to be a dire threat, and thats something that i developed my expertise in in the c. I. A. Its what i continued to do with global zero. As you pointed out i made it a central it is, the Central Point of your book. Lets talk about it. Valerie plame, Vanessa Pearson, how close is that crazy. That covert c. I. A. Agent who lives in cypress to you . I would say shes smarter than i am, younger than i am, but informed by my experiences in the c. I. A. I was always irritated with how female c. I. A. Ops officers are portrayed in popular culture. I was given the opportunity to write this book along with my coauthor, sara lov lovett, i wad a female character who was realistic but entertaining. You bring you portrayals in movie and tv shows. Were seeing more female agents including claire danes character in homeland, and the character in dark 30 a. M. Are they not an improvement . Perhaps, theyre not highly sexualized. Theyre cardboard characters. Claire danes, shes a brilliant actress and homeland is compelling tv. But notice how she doesnt have any friends. For that with the ops officers not to have very good interpersonal skills, they wouldnt go very far. Jessica did a beautiful job in zero dark 30 and she was nominated for it. However, that character really was a compilation of several officers, and there always is a team effort that goes into a successful operation, which always seems to sort of go by the way side because its much more dramatic to focus on one character. On the individual. But while youre with the c. I. A. You were a deep cover officer. How much of what you write in this novel is true to what a c. I. A. Covert operator might do . And how much is more, you know, novelistic . Well, i took out all the waiting. All the rabbit holes that you go down and come up with nothing because you cant keep a reader very long if you put that in. There is a lot of waiting for your assets, whether youre in a restaurant or in a park, and so forth. But what is very genuine is all the trade craft that is very accurate. How you communicate clandestin clandestinely with an asset. How you move in and out of a country, those sort of things and the locations are all places where i have been, worked or traveled to. So i triedand her interactions at headquarters and so forth. I tried to make that as realistic as possible. And still make it entertaining. You know, the book starts with the main character, Vanessa Pearson meeting covertly with an informant. Those kinds of meetings, the whole cloak and dagger thing, this advance world of technology with so many different ways of communicating, that still happens . Believe it or not, yes. Despite all the technology, what really matters is a Human Interaction. Im biased but human intelligence is what is going to tell you the intent. All the technology and spy satellites and everything that is available to the Intelligence Community in technology terms, all that is helpful, but it really is only with that Human Interaction that there is a certain degree of trust, and you understand what the intent is that thats where really critical intelligence comes in. Yes, Vanessa Pearson meeting her asset i in vienna. And when you wrote your auto biography, you had issues with the c. I. A. Vetting it, and not wanting to you write it. Did you have issues with this book . When you join the c. I. A. You sign a secrecy agreement, which i support. Everything that i write i have run by the c. I. A. For pre prepublication preview, with blow back. They realized it was functional. I wasnt revealing sources or methods. Unlike fair game which was quite a bit redacted, with this one there were no black marks. You were a covert agent. You had to resign because you could go no where any more with the c. I. A. You went from being this secret person who couldnt tell people what you did to becoming a household name. How hard was that massive transition for you . It was difficult. It took me honestly a couple of years to come to terms with it because i had gone from being a very private person where obviously secrecy and discretion is paramount. You dont do that job with any hope or desire of public recognition. And then literally overnight i was a very public person, and enmeshed with this very partisan scandal. That must have made it harder. It wasit was really difficult. Both my husband, joe wilson and i, went through the ringer. And it took me awhile to realize that it least if im going to be a public person i can use my voice and speak out about things which i care about passionately like global zero, for instance. Unfortunately we have to go. But i hope there has been a Silver Lining in all this for you. While you had dedicated your life to something it must have been very hard to lose that. At least everything that youve done since, your auto biography, the novel, and a series of novels, and the movie, hopefully it made up for what you went through. I look forward to finishing your book tonight. Im really enjoying it, and i look forward to the next ones in the series. The book is blow back. Thanks to valerie blame tonight. Www. Aljazeera. Com consider this, facebook and twitter google plus pages. Well see you next time