in today's show. it is tuesday, october 8, 5:00 p.m. in washington, d.c. we begin with the supreme court, which is beginning its new term with a case that could further open the door to unlimited money in american elections. the cases mccutchen versus the federal elections commission, with mccutchen arguing that limits on how much an individual can spend in total donating to political campaigns every two years is a restriction on their first amendment rights to free speech. currently it is regulated how much money can be directly handed over to political candidates. every two years you can only give at most $2600 to anyone political candidate. you can only give that most $32,400 to anyone national party committee. limits also exist on aggregate contributions, limiting an individual from donating more than 48,006 hundred dollars to the totality of candidates here she supports and $74,600 to the totality of party committees here she supports. that means the federal elections commission regulates what an individual can spend every two years, intervening directly to elections, to 100 23,002 hundred dollars. that is the important number. -- $123,200. that is the important number. the -- mccutchen, a frequent republican party donor, argues he should be able to spend as much money as he likes, donating to as many candidates as he likes during an election season. mccutchen is not challenging the base limit he can give to one candidate. but the limit he can give to all candidates in all national committees of $123,200. however, the conservative supreme court justices see more and more skeptical of any the mitts on money in elections. they could rule far more broadly and strike down the $2600 individual limit. that is because senate minority leader mitch mcconnell's lawyer is also making oral arguments in front of the supreme court today and wants to strike down all limits on all campaign contributions. as we saw in 2010, the high court has not backed away from taking a narrow court case and issuing a much broader ruling with significant changes to current electoral law. how might all the shakeout, and what are the political imprecations of this case? earlier i was joined by liz kennedy and 2012 green party candidate dr. joel stein. i asked liz, where does this fit in with the series of election law cases we have recently heard by the supreme court? in what direction might the court be leaning? >> this is a very important issue for folks to understand. it is also somewhat complicated, or can be. the important thing to remember is the supreme court has never struck down a federal contribution mandate. the establishment of our current campaign-finance jurisprudence, the foundational case was where the court decided that spending limits put too much of a burden on core political speech and therefore spending limits, actual caps on how much anyone can spend in the election of their own money on their own independent speech, they said that could not be cap. it was the decision in citizens united, saying that where justice kennedy found independent spending was not corrupting. which is something we can come back to. however, they have never passed -- casting doubt on the importance of contribution limits guarding the financial relationships between big donors and their actual checks directly to candidates or their campaign committees or the political parties. they understand that these kinds of financial relationships are far more open to real corruption concerns. moreover, it is not the direct political speech, actually just associational speech or when you contribute to somebody else's speech or give him an awesome money so they can then funds around speech, that is less of a core political speech question and therefore the government has more power to regulate within that sphere. >> the interesting thing here, with citizens united it struck down the limits on, you cannot directly hand money to a candidate but you can spend unlimited amounts of money on behalf of that candidate with tbs and radio ads and so forth. -- tv ads and radio ads and so forth. would it matter at this point if you strike an individual limits you can directly hand down money? >> it absolutely does. justice kagan made a very strong point, saying that if the court is now thinking independent expenditures can be corrupting, they should recognize that the government ought to have power to put in place commonsense rules to protect our politics and our government from being captured by private economic power. that is what we are talking about here. that is what the court always recognized. even when they cut down on the ability to have those particular rules, regulating in this sphere is important because otherwise what you see is a throwback to the robber baron you're a or even the watergate era. watergate was premised on campaign contributions, quid pro quo political favors. the milk industry, it is in the record, gave money in order to get a price favor on milk subsidies. this is the kind of bad democracy we do not want to go back to that exists too often elsewhere. too much big money elsewhere. but we need to maintain the kind of protection we currently have. >> i want to bring up these two charts. they show a breakdown in the individuals who met contribution limits. the first is contributions to individual candidates. the second is contributions to party committees. in both cases, the individuals primarily donated to the republican party. dr. stein, i want to bring you in. you have run for elections in this post-citizens united world. you ran for president last year. how difficult is it for parties and candidates who are -- to compete now, let alone if this mccutchen case blows the doors off all contribution limits? >> i think from the point of view of independent politics this makes it only much harder. it goes from the frying pan into the fire. but that said, it is very difficult right now. it has been extremely difficult for a long time. the key here is not so much what is happening to candidates. it is what is happening to the american people. as alternative candidates are muzzled and silenced and kept out of the media, caps off the ballot, basically blocked by this big money system and its many manifestations, it is not just the candidates but voters who are losing. what we are left with are two parties that are just different around the edges. people are extremely angry -- angry is not the word for it. not only with the supreme court and congress and this dismantling of the protections of our campaign system that was put in place after watergate, as liz alluded to. people want those protections kept in place. they want them improve. they are very happy with -- very unhappy with everything from the stalemate on the budget, the shutdown, the threatened debt to buckle with a default on the debt. look at the transpacific partnership, which is being ran to the partner -- congress right now. these are the kinds of policies we get because money in politics has basically won the day. the foxes are not just running the chicken coup, they are devouring the chickens at the same time. the american people are paying the price. one other two in poverty, 39 million students in debt. we saw the studies recently out of i believe stanford -- berkeley, actually, showing 95% of all economic increases, all income benefits since the disaster 2007 have gone to the one percent. let me say that again. 95% of all benefits have gone to the one percent. if you look at the economy as a whole, the top one percent command 50% of the wealth and resources. the bottom 50% have access to one percent. what is wrong with this picture? money and the economic and political elite are ruling the day. the american people are not being full, --f fooled, and that is helpful. we need to exert pressure. that is how we are going to get out of this mess. >> i want to get your opinion on this. the american people's -- view money in politics. we saw the occupied movement. we saw growing distrust in politicians. yet the supreme court appears to be going in the opposite direction. we have citizens united, and now the possibilities in this mccutchen case. how do you explain this disconnect? >> well, i think they are logically responding to their masters. by they i mean particularly congress, the white house, and who makes the appointments to the supreme court. the supreme court responds to them and to public pressure. we have seen the supreme court turnaround. we saw it in brown versus order of education where the supreme court reversed itself after supporting segregation for decades. the supreme court suddenly began to support integration. i think what we're seeing in the supreme court and in our elected officials is basically a reflection of the power of intensely concentrated economic and political power in the hands of the one percent. which is why we have got to fight this every way possible. i think it is important for people to weigh in with the supreme court, their congressmen and women, and with the president. of that this is unacceptable. we cannot dismantle these protections. in the same way it is unacceptable to be holding the budget and the full faith and credit of the united states of america hostage here in what is basically an extortion game being played by the top one percent. >> i want to bring liz back in. the disconnection, how the supreme court seems to be ruling? >> that is a very good point. i really want to respond to dr. stein and thank her for raising so many important points. we do see a in 10 americans saying that large campaign contributions -- 8 in 10 americans saying that large campaign contributions are blocking progress on issues that are important. addressing economic equality, addressing climate change, cutting health care costs. the real issue is the way in which money in elections plays out in policy. six in 10 americans think elected representatives are more responsive to big donors than the public or the public interest. that is not a healthy democracy. the supreme court, the supreme court's role is to interpret the constitution and to determine what makes -- make sure constitutional rights are protected. the first amendment is a pillar of our structure, of who we are as a people. yet it is currently actually being, beyond its real true meaning is what we would say about the current interpretation. what they are not understanding is the first amendment rights of the people being drowned out of the system. >> that was liz kennedy, and also dr. jill stein. she stuck around to discuss the next topic, the government shutdown, which is now in week two and is not any closer to reopening or finding a way to raise the debt limit in the next nine days. this morning president obama called speaker of the house john boehner two, according to mr. weiner, remind him he will not negotiate over the debt limit. the president had this to say -- >> the american people do not get to demand a ransom for doing their jobs. you do not clear bank and say i will not pay my mortgage this month unless you throw in a new car and an xbox. if you are in negotiations around buying a house, you don't get to say, let's talk about the price i am going to pay and if you do not give me the price i will burn down your house. >> cnn has proposed a few different scenarios friending the shutdown debate. >> a steel cage death match. number three is a joke, but admittedly it is the most desired outcome. i would pay to watch that. >> i spoke earlier with dr. jill stein from the green party, who last year ran for president obama's job. i asked dr. stein what her take is on what is going on in capitol hill right now. >> this is like the run up to the fiscal cliff. which created this incredible crisis and sense of doom and gloom so that when congress and the president settled that crisis by making the bush tax cuts permanent and getting rid of the estate tax, doing a whole lot of favors to the one percent , it did not look so bad because it looked like at least we did not go over that cliff. this is, one cannot help but sing -- suspect that is what is going on right now. this is the creation of a crisis atmosphere. wall street and the one percent, corporate sponsors, all of them, they are not going to allow the meltdown of the international economy and the stock market and all the rest, the financial infrastructure of the economy and their profit. it is highly unlikely they would allow that to take place in the same way they would not allow the initial bailouts in 2007. there was a big movement to stop them. wall street kicked in with a lobbying effort that had never been seen before and stopped that. the odds are they will not allow that fiscal disaster to happen. but there is a smokescreen in which to create, fundamentally, the grand bargain that the president has been talking about for at least the last four years whereby he cuts a deal in which social security and medicare get taken down essentially and he looks like a hero because he a furtive this desperate fiscal meltdown with the budget default. >> you are touching on something that is not getting as much attention in this debate. that is austerity. at this point it is all but guaranteed any deal to reopen the government will include austerity. the democrats of already caved on this issue. why have both parties signed onto this economic agenda that is proven to be pretty harmful to working people in europe, and on a state level across the country? >> it is horrific. the academic basis for it, a paper out of harvard, this paper that justified drastic measures to shrink the budget deficit, that was proven to be wrong. it was a fallacious study shown by a graduate student at the university of massachusetts in amherst that looked at the numbers and found they are -- there were major errors in the program that was captivating this. even that one study on which they were basing these drastic, to county and all over the world, it was proven wrong. they are in lockstep, committed to this dismantling of the remnants of the new deal and the great society and all that. this is part of what happens, what justice louis brandeis referred to when he talked about, we have a choice between a democracy or fast concentrations -- vast concentrations of wealth. what i referred to before, the top one percent having 50% of wealth in the nation, it is like you have 100 people in the room and 100 loaves of bread. one person has 50 loaves of bread and the 50 most malnourished people in the room all to share one loaf of bread. that is what the economy looks like today in the united states, and it is only getting worse. the consequences of that very unfair economy is tremendous power of the economic elite, which is in bed with the media elite -- political elite. they silence alternative voices. why? when the american people hear those alternative voices, it is their own voices they are hearing and they will support them. we have seen that before. this is a completely logical system in which greed and avarice are running wild, running rampant over our economy and our political system. it is altogether reflected in the supreme court and with the changes around citizens united as well. it is really important for us to come together across many issues and stand up for people, peace, and the planet. >> i hear what you are. we're fresh out of time. dr. joel stein, the 2012 green party presidential candidate. thank you so much. now time for the story of an aircraft purchased by the air force in 2007. 16 have been built and five more will be built by 2014, but they will not be flying missions in war theaters around the world. instead they will reside in a desert in tucson. thanks to the sequester, the military has no use for the planes anymore. almost every single one is said to be stored in tucson. even the five new planes scheduled to be built by next year will go right to the desert straight off the assembly line. there is a chance some of these planes may find other uses like putting a forest fires, but for now they will sit in the desert next to 4400 other unused aircraft from all branches of our military, totaling more than $35 billion. the latest example of waste in our defense budget. joining me now talk more about it is michael shank, director of foreign policy at xcml. the ironic thing is this is happening just as there is a guy like about too much waste in our government. -- discussion about too much spending and too much waste. further workers are back on the job. why is the pentagon immune from all these talks about too much spending and waste? >> for some reason we continue to about the pentagon and department of homeland security, the two agencies that have not been audited -- the pentagon will not be audited until 2017. they claim to care about waste, fraud, abuse. not a great example. on the show i talked about them being destroyed and afghanistan. the planes in arizona own -- join $34 billion of the crib and not being used. almost akin to what the house republicans cut in food stamps. the argument about small government, cleaning up waste, fraud, and abuse. that is ubiquitous throughout. industry is largely responsible. the defense industry has been lobbying since 2000 and -- 2008, half of which the top five companies are spending. >> it has become a jobs program. a lot of pressure to build these planes came from congress, members who are in ohio. knowing these pains and maintaining them equals jobs for the districts -- planes and maintaining them equal jobs for the districts. is the military-industrial complex perpetuated because it has become such a jobs program? >> pentagon claims five percent of gdp is defense spending. it is actually 10%. a problem with the jobs argument, it is not a great return on investment. one dollar spent on defense versus infrastructure, energy, education -- much higher returns. they got lobbied by lockheed to make sure that the plane that we do not need, along with the drone and tank, are built even though the pentagon says we do not want them. >> like if you put people to work building a bridge. put people to work building bombs -- they explode. i mentioned in the intro that these planes might be used by other agencies fighting forest fires, things like that. we recently heard about the increasing use of military technology, military vehicles by police departments. is that concerning in itself? >> certainly. dhs gives terrorism grants to municipalities. they are buying the drowns. essentially order equipment we do not want anymore we pass on to the cities. a small town in upstate new york, last week, the voted -- they voted to accept a mine assisted ambush protected vehicle. they do not really needed in watertown, a town of 120,000. we are dumping equipment. industries are happy with that. they're going to get new equipment. >> thanks so much. the senate passed a conference of immigration reform plan, but it has gone nowhere in the house read today -- the house. today immigration reformers want to make sure their cause, the 11 million undocumented workers in america, has not been forgotten. that is why today they rallied on the national mall. an hour ago, multiple lawmakers were arrested at that rally. >> we are officially in week two of the government shutdown. lawmakers just a little bit away from here on capitol hill are still arguing to get even a temporary spending bill passed. this is coming at a time when we are still very close to a default as a result of the debt limit. we are supposed to reach that in just a few days. in terms of the national mall, every museum here is closed. however, that does not mean the mall is completely out of commission. behind me is an immigration rally where thousands of people are supposed to be gathering today to tell congress that in the middle of this budget battle and in the middle of this debt crisis there is still an overarching issue that needs to be discussed. that is immigration reform for the 11 million undocumented people that are currently living in this country. >> this country is supposed to be about democracy. we have 11 million people of no rights. my rights are no different than their rights. when their rights are under attack, so are mine. >> today's being called a national day of dignity and respect for immigration reform. 100 50 cities are expected to see some type of rally or protest going on. what you see behind me is the physical manifestation of that. i had a chance to speak to a number of people here at the rally, and they told me why this protest is different from all the other protest, all the other rallies we have seen in the past. >> we have been waiting for immigration reform for a long time and nothing happened. the government always had some other priorities. i think this time the 11 million people receive the opportunity to be legal in this country and the opportunity to become citizens like everybody else. >> people are hoping this is the last one. we are tired of this. that is why we try to do it one more time. >> they expected tens of thousands to show up at the rally today. only a fraction did, but a thousand people. but some members of congress did stop by, including congresswoman nancy pelosi and tc mayor vincent gray. >> we strongly support immigration reform and try to demonstrate that by our actions in the city. by refusing to enforce and implement what we call secure communities. >> is important. my parents are immigrants, that is something i understand personally. we have a broken immigration system for years. we have a lot of people here, and now we have to resolve the issue to make sure that we keep families together but also take an appreciation for the fact that a lot of them work really hard, as ashley my part of the country. >> we are a couple blocks away from capitol hill, and thousands are gathered to say that now is the time for comprehensive immigration reform. not time to talk about it, it is time to do it. but it is up to members in congress to decide how to go forward with immigration reform. in washington, megan lopez, rt. >> in japan, the government is asking the rest the world for help containing the nuclear crisis at fukushima. this comes two and a half years after an earthquake and tsunami triggered the crisis. tom harman interviewed japan's former prime minister, who had this to say about nuclear power and japan. >> i think it is better to reduce japan -- dependency on a nuclear power. and eventually, gradually we need to get rid of nuclear power. >> for more on how former prime minister -- the former prime minister arrived on those conclusions, turn in tonight -- tuna in tonight to "the big picture" with tom hartman. that does it for now. for more on the stories, go to youtube.com/rtamerica. you can follow me on twitter. see you right i curate :00 p.m. -- right back here at 8:00 p.m.. captioned by the national captioning institute --www.ncicap.org-- hello and welcome t "newsline." i'm catherine in tokyo. south korea says the north korea nuclear reactor has resumed. the head of south korea national intelligence service made the confirmation news at the national assembly co

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