security

Ahmed Ghailani, the Guantanamo prisoner accused of taking part in the 1998 bombings of the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania goes to the courts in NY this week but is being denied a fair trial as federal prosecutors recently rejected appealing a ruling by a trial judge that prohibits a key witness from testifying. Meanwhile Dick Cheney is back to warn us against new nuclear terrorist attacks, that presumably only an expanded state security and defense apparatus can save us from. If the the FBI raids on peace activists last month are any indication, we're already well on our way. But what does America think of government powers under Obama? We'll look at a new poll from USA Today. GRITtv contributor Vince Warren of the Center for Constitutional Rights is here. 'Medal of Honor' is a video game out this week set in modern day, war-torn Afghanistan. The controversy? As a player you can choose to play on the opposing force - essentially as the Taliban. This has led to the game being banned at US Army base stores. To discuss this and more, we're joined by two video gamer experts, Kieron Gillen, director of Rock Paper Shotgun and Lucas Siegel, site editor of Newsarama and a Veteran of Operation Iraqi Freedom. And our community video comes from Jane Regan of Haiti Grassroots Watch has been spending time in the devastated country, documenting the ongoing struggle of Haitians still reeling from January's earthquake. All that and Laura's F Word looks to the socialist government of Hungary to see what we can learn in the face of BP's catastrophic oil spill.

The war in Afghanistan seems to be a constant rigmarole of democratization, stabilization, and Al-Qaeda claims. Which is it? Contributing editor to The Nation, Christian Parenti joins us in studio to share his take that the United States response to Afghanistan is a political instance of an iatrogenic disease: an endless cycle of creating more problems with supposed “cures.” Distributed by Tubemogul.

Continuing with our Oscar theme, we bring you the second part of our conversation with whistleblower, anti-war activist, and documentary film subject Daniel Ellsberg. Since the 1960s, Ellsberg has been fighting to stop war and bring government secrets into the open, and he knows firsthand how much power citizens can wield against the government. Ellsberg is headed to the Oscars himself with the crew of the film, and he sat down with Laura to talk about his experience releasing the Pentagon Papers to the press, what's changed from the 60s and Vietnam -- and what hasn't.

When he took office, Barack Obama promised to close the prison at Guantanamo within the year. This week, the anniversary of that promise brought a fresh round of protests at the capitol rotunda, since Guantanamo is still open. To mark another year of its existence, we thought we'd share some voices from those who've been inside. Thanks to the ACLU for this video.