drone warfare, today we look at the stunning new book, "the assassination complex" written by jeremy scahill and the staff at the intercept. >> on this issue, when obama has been the drone president and his me, iis sort of, trust know it i'm doing. but time and again, we see incidents where large number's of civilians are being killed and there seems to be no public accounting. amy: today jeremy scahill and glenn greenwald for the hour on the government's secret drone warfare program, the death of font -- father daniel berrigan, and more. all that and more, coming up. welcome to democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman. honduran authorities have arrested four men in connection with the murder of environmentalist berta caceres. caceres was gunned down in her hometown of la esperanza last month. for a decade, she led the struggle against the agua zarca dam, planned along a river sacred to her people, the lenca. last year she won the prestigious goldman environmental prize. she had faced repeated threats. the honduran president hailed the arrests. >> the authorities have captured four suspects in the death of our fellow citizen berta cacer es. we said this was a hit on the honduran state. and i repeat it again, taking the life of berta caceres is a hit on the honduran state. amy: the suspects have been identified as sergio rodriguez orellana, a manager for social and environmental issues for desa douglas geovanny bustillo , who had worked for a security firm hired by the dam project. the other two are reportedly an army major and retired captain. berta caceres' family has called for an independent investigation, saying they have been excluded from the honduran government's probe. in a statement, the family said -- "because we have been denied our right under honduran law to participate in the investigative process from the beginning, we have no way of knowing if these arrests are the product of an exhaustive and diligent investigation, nor do we know if they include those who ordered the assassination. the news of the alleged participation of active and retired members of the military linked to desa in the assassination should be investigated further and indicates involvement by state agents which is enough reason for the immediate suspension of and a definitive end to the agua zarca hydroelectric project." indiana voters head to the polls today in a primary contest that is seen as pivotal for republican frontrunner donald trump's path to the nomination. texas senator ted cruz has sought to derail trump's lead. campaigning in marion, indiana alongside governor mike pence, , cruz confronted a trump supporter. >> america is a better country without you. >> let me point out, i'm treating you respectfully the entire time. a question that everyone here should ask -- >> are you canadian? are you canadian? amy: ohio governor john kasich had backed off campaigning in indiana under a deal with cruz aimed at blocking trump's nomination. meanwhile polls show hillary , clinton and bernie sanders in a close race in indiana. campaigning in kentucky monday, clinton said she would put her husband, former president bill clinton, to work on her jobs plan. >> i told my husband he has to come out of retirement and be in charge of this because, you know, he is more ideas than anyone i know. we have to put people back to work and make it happen. amy: in detroit, michigan, all but three of the cities 97 public school shut down after monday teachers called out sick to protest funding shortfalls. the teachers learned over the weekend the district is set to run out of money on june 30, meaning the teachers may not be paid. more than half of detroit's schools are closed again today as the protests continue. ivy bailey, interim president of the detroit federation of teachers said in a statement -- "there's a basic agreement in america: when you put in a day's work, you'll receive a day's pay. detroit public schools is breaking that deal." in iraq, a car bomb exploded in the iraqi capital baghdad on monday, killing at least 18 shiite pilgrims and wounding 45 people. the attack came a day after two car bombs in the southern city of samawah killed at least 31 peop. isis claimed responsibility for both attacks. the white house has called for congress to take urgent action on puerto rico's debt crisis as the island defaulted on the bulk of its $422 million debt payment. white house press secretary josh earnest spoke monday. >> the situation gets worse i the day. and some days, in some situations, and some basis situation gets notably worse. and it only makes a bailout more likely, which is why we continue to press hard for republicans and commerce to stop dragging their feet and to address a situation that is having a negative impact on more than 3 million americans who live in puerto rico. amy: monday's default represents only a fraction of puerto rico's $70 billion debt. puerto rican governor alejandro garcia padilla echoed calls for congressional action. >> we are going to end up in the hands of judges, both from here and outside. federal and local judges. from puerto rico and from other parts of the united states. recently we had a federal judge but upon the choice of giving $115 million to puerto rico or to walmart most of he opted for walmart. we are at the mercy of that type of decision. congress needs to act. amy: the thawing ties between cuba and the united states have reached a new commercial milestone. a carnival cruise ship sailed into port in havana after departing miami, becoming the first u.s. cruise ship to reach cuba in half a century. about 700 people were on board, many of them cuban americans returning for the first time in decades. the united states has signed a new agreement with the west african nation of senegal to allow easier deployment of u.s. troops there. the deal appears to be the first of its kind in the sub-saharan region amidst an ongoing u.s. military expansion in africa. a somali refugee has set herself on fire on the pacific island of nauru, where australia sends asylum seekers who try to reach its shores by boat. it's the second time within a week a refugee has self-immolated on the island. on wednesday, a 23-year-old iranian man, omid masoumali, set himself on fire to protest conditions and australian immigration policies. his wife said he went two hours without medical care. he died on the 21-year-old friday. somali refugee, identified only as hodan, is undergoing treatment. the israeli military has ordered a palestinian journalist to be held for four months without charge or trial. omar nazzal is a leading member of the palestinian journalists' union. israeli authorities have claimed he is a member of the popular front for the liberation of palestine, which israel deems a terrorist group. but his attorney says he is being targeted for his activism. the colorado supreme court has blocked cities from imposing local bans on the oil and gas drilling process known as fracking. the court struck down a five-year fracking moratorium passed by the city of fort collins, saying it was trumped by state authority to promote industry. greenpeace has called for a halt in secret u.s.-european union negotiations over the massive ttip trade deal. greenpeace made the call after leaking documents it says show how the u.s. is pressuring european countries to loosen environmental and consumer protections. greenpeace's stefan krug spoke out. that if theite sure ttp in its present form would become reality, which would resu in a sere downshi the therds in eure, on environmental side but also the consumer side, it is quite clear that the dish different philosophy of protecting environment and the consumers, so i guess it is a good moment to try and put some transparency into really start a public debate about this. amy: an abortion provider has filed a federal civil rights complaint saying the hospital where she works forbade her from speaking out in support of abortion rights. diane horvath-cosper accused officials with the medstar washington hospital center of imposing a "gag order" against her pro-choice advocacy. following an attack by an anti-choice extremist on a colorado springs planned parenthood, the hospital's medical director told dr. horvath-cosper he "not want to put a kmart blue-light special on the fact that we provide abortions at medstar." the justice department says south dakota has violated federal law by unnecessarily holding thousands of people in restrictive group homes unnecessarily. an investigation found people with disabilities, mental illness or diabetes are warehoused in nursing homes or long-term care facilities, even though many are capable of living at home. an animal rights activist has been sentenced to two years in prison on accusations of freeing mink from fur farms and vandalizing property linked to the fur and meat industries. joseph buddenberg had been charged under the animal enterprise terrorism act, a 2006 law that elevates crimes like vandalism to terrorist offenses if they threaten industry profits. in other animal rights news, the elephants of the ringling brothers barnum and bailey circus, which is based here in sarasota, florida, have performed their last show. the circus announced last year it would end its elephant acts amid mounting public concern over animal mistreatment. the elephants are headed to a refuge here in florida, where the company that runs the circus is based. humane society ceo wayne pacelle told npr the decision to end the ringling brothers elephant acts was "almost like the berlin wall -- like the fall of the berlin wall within the animal welfare." and the photographer and activist bob fitch has died at the age of 76. fitch was known for his iconic photos of the civil rights and farmworkers movements. he served as a staff photographer for dr. martin luther king, jr.'s, southern christian leadership conference and later followed cesar chavez and the united farm workers union. his photograph of cesar chavez became a postage stamp, but fitch was disappointed the u.s. postal service removed the original background of the red-and-black ufw flag and replaced it with an image of a field. fitch also captured photographs of the catholic worker founder dorothy day, joan baez and an iconic image of legendary pacifist, poet and priest daniel , berrigan flashing the peace sign while in handcuffs. father dan berrigan died saturday. fitch died friday in watsonville, florida after a , battle with parkinson's disease. and those are some of the headlines. this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman. we are on the road in sarasota, florida. we are headed to atlanta, georgia, tonight. but today we're spending the hour with the intercept's jeremy scahill and glenn greenwald, looking at the stunning new book , "the assassination complex." jeremy, i want to ask about the death of father dan berrigan who died saturday at the age of 94. along with his late brother phil , he played in his terminal role in inspiring the antiwar and anti-draft movement during the late 1960's as well as the movement against nuclear weapons. jeremy, you were a dear friend of dan and phil berrigan. can you talk about the significance of the life of dan berrigan and just tell us who he was and what he meant to you. i actuallyould say may not be here if it was not for dan berrigan. both of my parents are nurses. my dad grew up on the southside of chicago, and he was going to be a seminarian and his parents were irish immigrants, very catholic family. he was the only boy in the family. it seem like he was going to have to be a priest. he went and studied the obligee. in the mid-1960's, thereas the ergence of what s known the uned stateas a catlic left. pele like rothy day, the foundeof the cholic woer movent, thom merton, brliant trpist mk who was onof the ely intelctual ices agast the w in vinam. d then tse two relriest, fatheraniel beigan and fath philip rrigan. dan berranad given talk at my dawent to andt eply affted my fher and basicay left he and mod to ne york tthe cathic worke hoe on theower ea side of manhtan. forever aered whot family code t sort of mol at we we taught childre i grew up knowi of the catonsvie ninephilip a then brigan and seven of their friends, going into the draft board in catonsville, maryland, may 18 and tang hundrs draft fil that we being ed to drafprimaril africaamericanin the area to the war in vietnam. black americans were deployed disproportionally to vietnam along with the poor. phil berrigan have been a civil rights priest, and had participated in the freedom rides in the south. an berrigan was already fairly famous literary figure. he had won a major poetry prize for his first book of poetry. and for these two priests in their full religious garb, to of d this kd of a ptest and then burthese draft fileswith memadeapalm co a reveerated aund the world and energid a movemt of young tholics d people of ith toecome ve, very litical out the w in vietna it alsinspired series actions similar toatonsvil in camden, in the walkie, around the country where people saying they were motivated by the religious faith going into draft boards and burning draft cards are pouring blood on draft cards. so i grew up in a household where daniel berrigan and dorothy day and phil berrigan and the late great day dillinger , one of the chicago 8 in the conspiracy trial stemming from the democratic national convention in chicago in 1968, and -- i did not meet dan berrigan because of that. i was in school at the university of wisconsin. i would say i was enrolled in school, i would not necessarily say i participated in school. i was doing work with people who are homeless. i decided i did not want to be at the university in no more and i hitchhiked to washington, d.c., in the summer of 1950 -- 1995. i had no idea the entire peace movement was defending on the see that some of the commemorate the 50th anniversary of the --bings of her oshima hiroshima and nagasaki. i remember seeing all of these people i had been told about during my childhood were the real heroes of our society and whose books lined my father's bookshelves in our small apartment that we lived in as little kids. came.e day dan berrigan he was outside of the pentagon, just standing like anyone else. to me, it would be like saying lebron james, for some kids today were it would be like, oh, my god, it is father daniel berrigan. i went up and introduced myself to him. we were standing around and liz mcalister, of course is an amazing activist and just an incredible, wonderful person who also was phil berrigan's partner and one of dan berrigan's closest people ever to him, i think she realized i was a little bit swe struck and she said, kid, would you mind escorting father berrigan to go and use the bathroom? and this is pre-9/11, so i'm like, wow, i get to walk dan berrigan to a bathroom and i did not know it, but it was pre-9/11, we could actually go into the pentagon. i walked into the pentagon with danieln -- father dr berrigan. in, as uniform members of the military were walking out, they greeted dan berrigan as though he was a cousin they see from time to time at family reunions because he is been so much time protesting there. we go into the pentagon and we're in the bathroom. you know, using the facilities. dan says to me as we are standing there, you know, in the 1940's when roosevelt authorized the building of this place, there was talk of it being converted to a hospital when the war was over. and then he sort of pauses and says, you know, and away they kept their word. it is the largest insane asylum in the world. and that started my relationship with dan and phil berrigan and i ended up living with phil berrigan painting houses for the better part of a year and a half. really, it was like having an alternative education. i always say my list is my university on social media democracy now! i would say the commendation of hearing you, amy, for the first time on the radio and discovering missile world of pacifica and community media and then having daily conversations with people like phil berrigan and liz mcalister and daniel berrigan really shaped who i wanted to be. i put a picture up on twitter, amy, of you sitting with dan berrigan when my book "dirty wars" came out and i was just saying that, you know, without these two, meaning you and daniel berrigan, i would not be who i am today and not be about what i am about today. i don't think we were shocked by the death of dan. he was am is 95 years old. he was in very frail physical condition. but this man was just a moral giant. the closest thing we have in our society to a profit. last night i was watching one of the networks, the only real was on chris hayes show on msnbc and chris hayes played a clip of chris wallace, who is now of course the fox news sunday host and son of the thendary "60 minutes" wallace. he said, used to be famous, but nobody pays much attention to what you do these days. the year earlier, dan and his colleagues had gone into this nuclear plant at the general electric factory in pennsylvania and hammered on warheads, starting the movement of became global. dan's response to chris wallace was classic dan berrigan and sort of stunning in its simple brilliance. he said, welcome to you know, we don't view our conscience as being tethered to the other end of a television cord. -- itthought it was just was such a commentary on the dingbat factory in washington versus someone whose entire life was about not just saying something like so many of these pundits do, but standing there. i always loved what dan berrigan wrote about dorothy day when she died. he said that dorothy day lived as though the truth were actually true. so, too, to dan. amy: jeremy, i thank you for introducing me to the berrigans. phil berrigan, before he died, and dan berrigan. and it was really coming full circle when my colleague and co-author dennis moynahan and i went up to fordham to visit dan a few years ago, to be able to bring him your latest book "dirty wars." i what to go -- we also brought in one other thing, ice cream. his favorite food, ice cream. >> can i say one thing about that that nominee people know? dan berrigan loved ice cam and s fridge waslways stcked wi ice cre. she ved ice eam so mh, it ught the attention of ben & rry' the vermontce cream nufactur. ey conibute to lot of progresse causes dan beigannd the bck panthe bobbyeal and chelle shocd and pia a an spik lee all peared ia ben & jerry's ad and i think dance was like mocha chocolate fudge and use holding it up as though it is the euchari. counion in church. dan was given by ben & jerry's a lifetime supply of the ice cream. so any event the catholic worker would have that dan was involved with, he would make sure a massive crate of ben & jerry's was delivered. he always had it in his freezer. if you would walk into an ice cream shop somewhere and they had ben & jerry's, he would tell them he was dan berrigan and he has a right to as much ice cream and ice cream for his friends. i also think it was allowed to be transferred to some of his family members. niece, arigan, his dear friend of mine, she and i once went into -- we were outside of a trial going on for some anti-nuclear activists and went into a ben & jerry's shop and she said, look at the poster of dan on the wall and said, that is my uncle and i demand my free ice cream. they actually said, you are dan berrigan's niece? what do you want? amy: and that a flavor named after him. >> yes, razberrigan. he loved life and he loved ice cream. when we look at the clips of dan berrigan that are now increasingly circulating around online, and encourage young people to look at them, but we often do not hear about these sort of incredible giants of our time, you know, dan berrigan along with pope francis, the most famous jesuit in modern history and certainly the jesuit who's had the most impact around the world in terms of confronting war and confronting the church is complicity in making war, but you don't necessarily know -- dan berrigan was a hilarious person. he was warm and funny. and he loved to gather among friends and have a little whiskey and occasionally he would smoke a cigarette out the window of his apartment. his home was just lined with posters and art from all of these people who dan had walked the earth alongside in his struggles. even his bathroom was wall-to-wall with photos of images a protests and resistance. i will never forget the feeling that people who had the honor of being around dan would get just by hearing his infectious laugh. both he and phil were capable of laughing to the point of tears. and to see these guys who were such militant confront her's of the u.s. empire also enjoying just the existence on the planet and the people around them is really what i will never forget. amy: i want to end with an excerpt of daniel berrigan interviewed on "today" that in 1981. again, this was him being interviewed by chris wallace. >> back in the vietnam days and the berrigan brothers were big, you attracted tens of thousands of people. now you do not attract the same attention. is that hard for you? >> no, i don't think we ever felt our conscience was tied to the other end of a tv cord. i think we tried for a number of years to do what was right because it was right. amy: that was father dan berrigan on "today" show in 1981. his funeral will be held on friday in new york city at 10:00 a.m. at the church of st. francis xavier on west 16th street in new york. the wake will be held thursday night. you can visit democracynow.org for our full coverage of the life and death of dan berrigan. when we come back, the intercept's jeremy scahill and glenn greenwald on the assassination complex -- on "the assassination complex: inside the government's secret drone warfare program." ♪ [music break] amy: "me and julio down by the schoolyard" by paul simon. the line about a radical priest is, yes, a reference to father dan berrigan. this is democracy now! democracynow.org., the war and peace report. i am amy goodman. we are on the road in sarasota, florida. i will be speaking in atlanta, georgia tonight. here in sarasota, we're less than an hour from tampa, which houses the united states special operations command. it is the epicenter of planning for the global targeted killing program and other covert military action. we turn now to look at president obama and drones. on saturday night, comedy central larry whitmore criticized obama's reliance on drone warfare. during his remarks at the white house correspondents association dinner. he compared obama's foreign policy to that of reigning nba mvp stephen curry. >> it looks like you're really enjoying your last euro be presidency. i saw you hanging out with nba players like steph curry, golden state warriors. that was cool. it kind of makes sense because both of you like raining down bombs on people from long distances, right? what? in my wrg? amy: larry wilmore's comments come as the obama administration prepares to release for the first time the number of people it believes it has killed in drone strikes in countries that lie outside of conventional war zones. speaking last month in chicago, president obama addressed the issue of civilian deaths in drone strikes. >> there is no doubt some innocent people have been killed by drone strikes. it is not true that it has been the sort of willy-nilly, let's bomb a village. that is not how folks have operated. and what i can say with great certainty is that the rate of civilian casualties in any drone operation are far lower than the rate of civilian casualties that occurred in conventional war. amy: a new book being published today paints a very different picture of the u.s. drone program. it's titled, "the assassination complex: inside the government's secret drone warfare program." it's written by jeremy scahill and the staff of the intercept based on leaked government documents provided by a whistleblower. the documents undermine government claims that drone strikes have been precise. part of the book looks at a program called operation haymaker in northeastern afghanistan. during one five-month period, nearly 90% of the people killed in airstrikes were not the intended targets. the book is based on articles published by the intercept last year. it also includes new contributions from nsa whistleblower edward snowden and the intercept's pulitzer prize-winning journalist glenn greenwald. snowden's introduction to the book has just been published on the intercept's website. joining us now, still with us jeremy scahill and glenn , greenwald is joining us from brazil. they founded the intercept with laura poitras. jeremy, layout the scope of the assassination complex, especially now as president obama is about to reveal at least with the government is are the numbert of people killed in drone strikes. programthe covert drone for the majority of its lifespan have been shrouded in secrecy and it was sort of a kind of macabre joke in washington because the entire world could see that the u.s. was raining bombs down on people across the globe and in an increasing number of countries in the early stages of the obama presidency by the u.s. would never confirm it had conducted a drone strike. instead, use the president obama making jokes at the white house correspondents association dinner about how he was going to conduct a drone strike against the jonas brothers if they came near his daughters and everybody laughs in washington about it. he then answered a question on google plus hang out, but never gave a substantive policy speech on the use of drones really until 2013. and with the obama administration, what they're doing right now is basically trying to rebrand and engage a historical revisionism about what is when to be one of the most deadly legacies of the obama era. and that is that somehow they came up with a cleaner way of waging war. i would say the most significant aspect of what president obama has done regarding drones and regarding the so-called targeted killings program around the codifiedthat obama has assassination as a central official component of american foreign-policy. and he has implement policies that are republican probably would not have been able to implement, certainly not with the support that obama has received from so many self identified liberals. it will be interesting to see if a republican wins how many of the msnbc pundits and other , whether liberals positions will be on these very same policies. but the fact is, the white house -- we understand the white house is going to be releasing statistics that some indicate are going to say upwards of 60 people have been killed in drone strikes outside of iraq and afghanistan. which is a horrifying piece of propaganda, if that is true. the reason the obama administration and the president can say to them eric of people, well, we have only killed a small number of people is because our documents in the book show this because they have embraced a system of counting the dead which almost always will result in zero civilians killed because anyone who was killed in a drone strike under this administration is labeled as an enemy killed in action ,ekia, until or unless posthumously proven to have not been a militant, terrorist, what have you. program isnation authorized to run under what amounts to a parallel legal system or judicial system the president and his advisers serve as a judge, jury, and executioner of people across the globe. and so the documents we obtained will give lie to proclamations saneromehow this is a form of warfare when it comes to impacting civilians. the final thing a was say, what you really see come through is the military's own assessment, the fact that we were publishing this book of the drone program is that the u. is grang self fulfilli prophecs rather thantoppingerrorismhrough itdrone prrams, ha bn encouring tousm and oviding urist orgizations justs the gutanamo prin -- he talked all the time about how terrible it was to treat somebody like a terrorist and punish them with imprisonment in guantanamo with indefinite detention without so much as giving them the right to have a trial. and not only has he continued the system of indefinite detention and he intended to continue this even if you're able to close guantanamo, his plan was simply to shift it to american soil, the us and much more than that. he has institutionalized the program were now we don't only just imprison people without any charges or due process, we don't just eavesdrop on them, which was one of his big critiques of the bush administration suffers giving them due process or trial, we now target them for execution, for a death penalty. for a long time a staple of democratic analogy has been the death penalty is wrong, even with a full trial and appeals and to process and lawyers and all of the constitutional rights that are 40 to criminal defendants and you president obama has embraced the policy that says he can literally go around the world, target people for death anywhere in the world that he wants, including places where we are not at war, including even american citizens, and simply eradicate their lives based on his order. not in a war zone, people who are not engaged in combat at the time they are killed -- they're killed in cars, in their houses, while they are working, driving with their children, at funerals, rescuing people -- wherever it is they may be found, they can simply be killed. the most extraordinary aspect about it is that democratic partisans who were cheering his critiques in 2006 and 2007 and pretending to oppose this approach because it was a republican who did it, switched completely on a dime. and the minute that president obama embraced these policies, they as public opinion polls show, completely switched how they think about all of these policies and started supporting them. what this has meant is these policies have shifted from being just a right-wing extremist republican framework into one that is fully bipartisan. therefore, will be institutionalized and has been strengthened for years, if not decades, to come and the way that george bush and dick cheney could only have dreamed of. amy: i want to turn to a clip from "national bird" a new documentary that premiered at the tribeca film festival last month. this is lisa ling, former drone systems technical sergeant. >> this is global. this is getting information anywhere at any time, shooting people from anywhere at anytime. and it is not just one person sitting there with a little remote control, a little joystick, moving around a plane that is halfway around the world. that is not all there is. it is like borders don't matter anymore. and there is a huge system that spans the globe that can just suck up in was amounts of your life. your personal data. i mean, this could grow to get so out of control. and we are not the only ones that have this is one to be commonplace, if it is not already. it is a secret program. what that means is, i can't just go shouting off the hill tops telling the public what it is. what i can tell you is that to me, one person who worked within this massive saying, it is frightening. amy: drone whistleblower lisa ling in the documentary "national bird." go another whistleblower, edward snowden, who wrote the forward for the assassination complex. snowden writes -- these disclosures about the obama administration's killing program reveals there is a part of the american character that is deeply concerned with the unrestrained, unchecked exercise of power. and there is no greater or clearer manifestation of unchecked power than assuming for oneself the authority to execute an individual outside of a battlefield con and without the involvement of any sort of judicial process." that is edward snowden. jeremy scahill, take it from there. >> one of the things that ed snowden also addresses -- by the way, this is a very substantive essay that ed snowden wrote that is both personal and political in nature. he writes about how there's a difference between whistleblowing and leaking. and he talks about the difference between the authorized leaks in washington and the sharing of classified information with mistresses as eus did and people like chelsea manning and daniel ellsberg and others. snowden says there is an active political resistance when you are engaged in that kind of whistleblowing. of course, what now has become obvious, the obama administration is engaged in a war -- not against leakers, but against whistleblowers. there was -- the cia was live tweeting their version of what happened in the compound in osama bin the night laden was killed. the central intelligence agency in theically a seive immediate aftermath of that operation. but more, the political people in the white house, the people who were closest to president obama were delivered lee feeding journalists and media completely false narrative that what took place in that raid. none of them were held accountable for even viewed as having done something wrong by releasing all of the information that turned out to be false that they did about a firefight happening, about bin laden putting one of his wives in front of him. johnt everything that brennan and his buddy said in the immediate aftermath because they were rushing to plant the flag of victory turned out to be propaganda or just wrong. when you have people of courage who provide documents, classified documents of the nature that edward snowden did to win greenwald and laura poitras, the source for assassination complex book did in providing these documents to us, these are people motivated by conscience who understand that their lives will never be the same as a result of what they have done. they're not people like sandy berger who can go in and stuff classified documents down his pants and then walk away from it. they're not david the tray us who gets a slap on the hand -- raeus who get a slap on the hand. amy: we're going to go to break and come back to this discussion. we are talking to jeremy scahill , the intercept cofounder with glenn greenwald, who is also with us from rio de janeiro, brazil. the book is, "the assassination complex: inside the government's secret drone warfare program." it is out today. stay with us. ♪ [music break] amy: attribute to the trickster here on this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman. we are on the road in sarasota, florida. in new york, jeremy scahill is with us and in rio de janeiro, brazil, glenn greenwald. the new book by the intercept led by jeremy scahill, this book titled, "the assassination ," you talk about -- you say the beginning of the book, jeremy, that drones are a tool, not a policy. the policy is assassination. talk about the documents that you got that back this up and how exactly you got them. >> first of all, what i mean by that is the united states throughout history has always engaged in assassination. but as a result, the global scandals of this involving the cia with the overthrow -- beginning with the overthrow the democratically elected government of what amal a, the everthrow of salvador allend in the political assassinations taking place in the 1960's with jfk, bobby kennedy, martin luther king, malcolm x, all of this sort of sport congressional actions and their committees formed to investigate this. they sickly, the short version of the history is thomas president gerald ford issued an executive order that said the united states would not conduct assassinations and use the term "political assassinations." people go, u.s. has a ban on assassination. every president since ford, including obama, has upheld that executive order that says the u.s. does not engage in assassinations. jimmy carter edited to take out the word "political" and add "contractors and other people working for the u.s. government." the u.s. government has issue ofy avoided the assassination because if it were to do so, it would call the question on one of the centerpieces of american doctrine around the world that we can kill whomever we want, wherever we want, whenever we want the cause. because we are america. and if congress had to say, define what is assassination was, which attempt to do that have been clobbered by the permanent establishment, then you would have to look at things like reagan's bombing of in an , thept to kill gadhafi bombing said bill clinton did in the early stages of his presidency there were aimed at killing saddam hussein but kilby the iraqiut killed painter. you have to look at the obama administration's targeting of anwar al-awlaki, who was not charged with a crime. he and another young american were executed by drone strikes authorized and ordered by the president of the united states. if you're going to say that is not in assassination, then we live on a different planet. so the documents we have obtained sort of showed the banality of the immoral notion that we can kill people anywhere around the world without consequence and kill our way to victory. amy: jery, i wan tturn to democrat presideial caidate foer secrery of state llary clton lastear regarding a question about the use of drone warfare. >> what would you say to the loving parents about to 202 children who have been killed by drones in pakistan in a program which you escalated as secretary of state? >> well, i would argue with the premise because, clearly, the efforts that were made by t united states in cooperation with our allies in afghanistan and certainly with the afghan government to prevent the threat that was in pakistan from crossing the border to make killing afghans, killing americans, brits and others, was aimed at targets that had been identified and were considered to be threats. the numbers about potential civilian casualties, i take with a somewhat big grain of salt because there has been other studies which have proven there are not to have been the number of civilian casualties. last october on "meet the press" chuck todd asked bernie sanders about his position on drones. >> what does counterterrorism look like in a sanders a administration? drones, special forces? >> that and more. >> you're ok with the drones? >> the drone is a weapon. when it works badly, it is terrible and counterproductive. when you blowup of facility or a building which kills women and children, you know what backup not only -- it is terrible. >> for your comfortable of using drones. you think you have isolated in a plan terrorist? so that continues? >> look, we all know there are people as of this moment plotting against the united states. we have to be vigorous and protecting our country, no question about it. any code that is bernie sanders, before that hillary clinton. jeremy scahill, please comment. >> first of all, hillary clinton is one of the sort of legendary democratic hawks in modern u.s. history. she is what i like to call a cruise missile liberal. they believe in launching missiles to solve problems and show they are tough across the globe. hillary clinton as secretary of state really oversaw what amounted to a paramilitaries asian of some of the -- paramilitaries a of some of the states divisions and what the main employer of the private contractors that were working on behalf of the us government and was one of the key people in the ward destruction that we -- in creating the ward destruction where nothing in libya because of her embrace of regime change. but hillary clinton on these issues is sort of an easy target because she is so open about her militaristic tendencies. but bernie sanders, in a way, on been given a sort of pass these issues. recently at a democratic town hall meeting, bernie sanders was asked directly about whether or not he supports the kill list, the actual term "kill list" was used in an interview with him. and he said the way that obama is currently implementing it, he supports. bernie sanders goes after hillary clinton all the time for being a regime change candidate, and he is right, and blasting her for her alliance with people like henry kissinger. but let's be clear, bernie sanders in the 1990's was a supporter and signed on to legislation that was authored by donald rumsfeld, william vittoria'sd these neocons that created the disaster the iraq invasion with demagogic support. bernie sanders signed on to the key documents that the legislation that was created as a result of the project for a new american century demanding that bill clinton make regime change in iraq the law the land. bernie sanders and voted for that bill, which again, was largely authored by donald rumsfeld and the neocons. bernie sanders been supported the most brutal regime of economic sanctions in world history that killed hundreds of thousands of iraqis. he supported the bombings in iraq under president clinton, under the guise of the so-called no-fly zone, the longest sustained bombing campaign since vietnam. bernie sanders was about regime change. bernie sanders signed on to neocon-legislation that made the iraqi invasion possible by codifying into u.s. law that saddam hussein's regime must be overthrown. so when bernie sanders wants to hammer away at hillary clinton on this, go ahead. you're 100% right. she is deaf valley the politics of empire right there. -- she is definitely the politics of empire right there. with the policies center supported in the 1990's were the precursor to the disaster of the war in iraq that he hammers on all the time without ever of knowledge and his own role in supporting the legislation that laid the groundwork for it. amy: glenn greenwald, i will give you the last word on this. you also have been writing about these candidates. >> it is kind of amazing there is nobody with a more adept skill at being able to just selectively concentrate on some things while it pouring unpleasant things than the democratic partisan. jeremy is right that bernie sanders has been given a pass, but that is because democrats have largely chosen to ignore foreign policy as part of the democratic primary because they simply don't care. they only pretend to oppose wars when there's a republican in office and doing so can lead to partisan gain. hillary goes around the world vowing to get even closer to to take a relationship with israel to the next level, refuses to talk about palestinians like they are human. she is responsible for one of the worst disasters of the last five or six years, which is the nato intervention in libya. obvious the, suppts present oba's beicose policieand was tescalatehem. sh critizes him r not beg aggrsive enoh and ye democrs just othe pretd nonef that est and ty don't careow man peopl outsidthe bords of th unitedtates arkilled b democric presint and s bernieas done pass on tt anas stop d ask abthe thin jeremy scribed cause mocrats colctively have cided tognore alof the heous thin the demrats do outside the borrs of th u.s. bause payg attentn to th reflets so poly on llary anthey jusignore ings tha refct poorlon her. amy: and dald trum today, key prima could dermine ether he getods to bthe repuicanandidatefor presidenin india? sense,i mean, in some washington, d.c., not the u.s., but washington, d.c., is getting the exact election they deserve. these are the two most unpopular presidential candidates ever to run i think in 30 years. they have the highest unfavorable ratings of any nominees and decades. the only thing they're able to do to one another is try and be as toxic and nasty and destructive as possible because everyone has already decided more or less that they are so unlikable. so it will be the opposite of an inspiring election. it is going to be two extreme popular people trying to destroy the other on both a personal level backed by huge amounts of money and serving more or less he same interests. i thin the establiment leers in whingtonhose tha suppor the have goen the act electiothey desve. and for slick, americans are going to have to suffer along with them. amy: we have to leave it there and i want to thank you both for being with us, glenn greenwald and jeremy scahill, author with the staff of the intercept of, "the assassination complex: inside the government's secret drone warfare program." is out today. that does it for our broadcast. i will be speaking tonight in i will be speaking tonight in atlanta man: well, can you see anything? second man: yes, wonderful things.