us city, baltimore, the victims were over mexico and central america. they were working on the front of scott key bridge when it was struck by congress ship on tuesday leading to its collapse. divers, have retrieved 2 bodies. the academy award winning actor. newest ghost at junior has died at the age of 87. he overcame racism and discrimination to make his mark on stage film antennas. reynolds looked back at his life. stuff i bought. i bought some who was gloss, a juniors, most unforgettable role was as a terrifyingly intense drill instructor. opposite richard year in 1982, 10 officer and a gentleman. he thought of them wings. the only one you're going to leave here with me on these gossip became the 1st black man to win an oscar for best supporting actor for that role. one of many barriers the broken, his life. you go running off on the hills, you know what's gonna happen to me. i just the st. bottom one full. gossett won an

emmy award for playing and then slave demand called fiddler in the stereotype. breaking 1977 television mini series roots more than 100000000 viewers tuned in making it one of the most watched tv shows of all time. what sort of getting for diverse concepts. other film rules included a menacing gangster in the deep and heavily made up alien stranded on an uninhabited planet with a human adversary in enemy mine. but despite his talent and towards major roles often did not come gosset's way and outcome. he blamed partly on races, typecasting in hollywood gossip fell into depression and drug use for a time. after recovery, he threw himself into work for los angeles based charities, and started in anti racism foundation. the gossip was born in new york city and had

a successful broadway stage career before turning to movies. he appeared in dozens of tv shows, including hbo was the watchman. he said his favorite role was as a gyptian president armoires, the dot in the 1983 t, the minix series of the same name in his memoirs, lewis goss, a junior ro. sometimes i believe that the reason i have been able to do such exemplary work on the screen is because this is the only place i can be free. and that's it for me. and the clock can find funny, more of the website out 0 dot com. one is coming up right off the upfront the pod came in to be used as the oil see suffered casualties. we have not suffered

states. pilots is thank goodness we did have injuries from a missile strike on a guest house thought providing on to who that you say know double standard to all of us. any anyone in particular? i said, all facing realities government seems here to whittle down democracy. it's because it's troubling for you. it's very, very painful here. the story on talk to how does era as the united states is under fire for its continued support of israel, brutal war on gaza. and while it becomes further invest in a costly warren, you frame many are asking, how is this affecting washington's global spans? is the us overstretched and click the signal, the end of us middle polarity, will ask renown political scientists, john mearsheimer ended up front special, the nearest time with thank you so much for joining us on upfront. my pleasure to be here. it's been nearly 20 years since you co authored your seminal piece of titled

the israel lobby, dealing with the lobby's undue influence on united states foreign policy. have there been any major policy shifts or any other changes or developments since you wrote the piece? well, i think there's 2 things have changed. one is i think that we help to open up this course about the lobby before we wrote the article and then the book a not many people talk about the lobby, explicitly lobbies, influence on us foreign policy. and i think in terms of the discourse of we had a significant influence in terms of actual policy. i think we've had little influence at all. i think that the lobby remains as powerful as ever, and american foreign policy towards israel and towards the greater

middle east remains gratefully influenced by the lobby. i mean, one could argue you're being too hard on yourself, but you're selling yourself a little bit short to the extent that there is at least resistance now. and that resistance does matter. i mean, there's a campaign against the lobby group, a pack, the american israel public affairs committee, and how they influence us politics. specifically, the targeting and progressive democrats, according to one paul, 62 percent of respondents who voted for president biden in 2020, agreed that quote, the us should stop weapons shipments to israel until israel discontinues. it's a tax on the people of guys and now present, abide, and certainly continues to provide military aid and financial support to is where there's no doubt about that. but there's at least the perception of a risk that biden is taken now that wouldn't have been there 20 years ago. is that safe to say? well, i think there's no question that the attitudes towards is real and towards israel's

policies. regarding the palestinians has shifted in the body politic, especially among young people, and especially among democrats. and there's no question that causes problems for president bite. but the fact is that the lobby still remains exceedingly successful at influencing the policy at the elite level lobbies influence in congress and the lobbies influence on the white house remains as powerful as ever. so what you find here is something of a disjuncture between public opinion on one hand and the lobby's ability to influence policy on the other hand. and how that plays out over time remains to be seen. it could be the case that bike is defeated in the fall, in large part because he is supported israel down the line up to now

and that he continues to support is real down the line and that comes back to bite him. that may be the case, and if that does happen, then attitudes towards israel and towards the lobby and towards the is really american relationship, i think will change even more and maybe policy will change. but that has not happened. so for fair enough, the something memo organized by the us state department staffers, which was leaked back in november or early november, a warren that the us is failure to criticize is really war crimes quote, contributes to regional public perceptions that the united states is a biased and this honest actor, which at best does not advance and at worst harms us interest world wide, is been us, has continued support for israel, affecting it's global standing. and there's no question about it. the united states

is effectively complicit in the genocide. that's widely regarded. our ability, you know, to influence people around the world has diminished significantly as a result of this. all of this makes a joke out of the concept of a rules based order, which we preach about all the time. so this is a disaster for the united states, but i would point out to you that despite the fact that to disaster the united states continues to support is real down the line. now the rejoinder to that, at least the most reasonable rejoinder to that would be that this is absolutely a matter of national security. that is really, is not just the recipient of us large, yes, for philanthropic reasons or humanitarian reasons, but that is a strategic interest in the middle east that goes beyond the money. but it is, it's actually directly tied to us. national security interest is supporting israel . vital to maintaining us national security. i think your comments have it dead

wrong. israel is a strategic albatross around their neck. it's a liability. we gain hardly any benefits from our relationship with is real, any strategic benefits, and there are significant liabilities as we're seeing now. furthermore, it is a powerful moral or ethical dimension to this. and the idea that being joined at the hip with is real is in their moral or ethical interest is not a serious arguments. as i said to you before, the united states is complicit in a genocide. this is certainly not in their interest. so the idea that you know, we're supporting is real unconditionally, because it's in our strategic and moral interest is not a serious argument. but the moral side was more saying, if we cast aside the more argument against supporting israel, of uh, is this still a, a strategic interest that trumps that instance?

some people would argue whether it's, whether it's being wary of your, on whether it's proxy wars that there might be some vital military reason for being there. and being so staunchly tied to it. but you say there's no, there's no credible argument there. i don't buy that argument for one second. and stephen, i lay out the case against that argument in both the article end of the book. and by the way, with regard to a ran, i believe we would have much better relations with a ran today. we're not to the lobby in our chapter on a ran in the lobby book. we make it quite clear, it ran, tried to improve relations with the united states on a number of occasions of the eighty's and ninety's and the lobby moved in and killed their efforts to accommodate the or randy ends in any way. and furthermore, if you look at the jcp away, which is the nuclear agreement between basically the united states and

a ram that i think affectively shut down the rainy in nuclear program in the short term. uh, it was israel in the lobby. they put enormous pressure on the united states to put an end to that agreement, which i don't think was an error interest. so help me understand why we end up in this place if there is no legitimate moral argument here to your point. and if there is no legitimate strategic interest and it's certainly a financial burden, we're talking 3 or $4000000000.00 a year. and we're talking about in post october 7th, an attempt to get even more tens of billions of dollars to israel. it's certainly a financial burden. why does the united states continue to double down in this way in the sixty's? we say it's hawk missile sales. perhaps, you know, we might say that it's a, it's, it's an attempt to leverage a geo political standing in order to access oil more. but now in 2024. what good reason does the nicest have to do this? they're not doing it blindly. they're, there must be a reason. what is it as well,

let me just point out that the united states just doesn't give israel lots of weapons and lots of money and supported diplomatically it does it unconditionally. there is no relationship between any 2 countries in world history. and it looks like this relationship, the united states again, supports israel, no matter what it does. this is truly remarkable. we don't treat is real like a normal country and help it because it's to our benefit strategically. that's the argument you're basically making. this is a strategic asset for the united states as a normal country, and we take advantage of it. that's not what's going on here. so the why, what is the organizing principle behind this special relationship? and it's a fascinating argument you're making, but why then, why is us doing it? because of the lobby. the united states has

a political system that is set up in ways that allow interest groups to have great influence. just think of the national rifle association. when you look at poles in terms of how americans think about gun control, what you see is that there are lots of americans who are interested in some serious gun control, but it's almost impossible to get any meaningful gun control because of the national rifle association. the national rifle association is the interest group that wields enormous power when it comes to legislation involving gun control. well, the is real hobby, is one of the most powerful lobbies, if not the most powerful lobby in the united states. and the lobby goes to a nor misplace to make sure that american foreign policy supports is real unconditionally and it is wildly successful. truly impressive, how good the lobby is. getting a u. s. foreign policy makers to support israel,

hook, line, and sinker. you have any optimism that it's, you know, is the invincibility of apax that are, of invincibility breaking down. and i think that's a little too strong. i think it's a road in somewhat of what the future looks like for sure. it's hard to say. let me make 2 points there. first of all, the lobby now has to operate out of the open, and it has to engage what i call smash male politics. before we wrote the article in the book, the lobby could operate behind closed doors and for any interest group, the ideal situation is to operate behind closed doors and not out in the open. but when you're out in the open, like the lobby is now when you're engaged in smash mouth politics, it's going to cause you all sorts of problems that's pointing out. ready one, please, number 2 that israel's behavior has gotten more outrages over time and

a good manifestation at this point is what's happening in regards to today. and the situation is not going to get any better with the passage of time. it's widely recognized. it is real, is that apartheid state. and furthermore, it is engaging in a genocidal campaign at this point in time. well, that tells you that the lobby has really got a difficult job confronting it. it has to work over time these days to defend is real and it will have to work harder and harder with the passage of time. because more and more people are aware of what's going on in the middle. at least they see what is real is doing, but i would never underestimate the ability of the lobby to adjust to the circumstances and, and prevail. a more that may not happen, but you don't want to underestimate the lobby. that's my basic point. understood, that's what a warranty paint a bit in october of last year, president biden had asked congress to authorize $61000000000.00 and ukrainian

assistance. in addition to another 14000000000 for israel, which for now still remains stalled in the us house of representatives of the us department of defense. in early february, we stated that without us funding ukraine's defense will likely collapse, given that the funding is now stalled. what do you believe the impact would be for ukraine and for us policy or? well, i believe the ukraine was going to lose this war to russia, whether they got that 60 plus $1000000000.00 or not. the fact is that the ukrainians need weaponry. and furthermore, they need manpower because they're badly out numbered in terms of troop levels. well, we can't do anything to help the troop levels. and in terms of weaponry, we don't have the weaponry to get them. when you listen to people talk about the 60 plus $1000000000.00, you would think that this is going to allow us as soon as this aid is provided,

to take all these weapons off the shelf and ship them to ukraine. and that's going to go a long way towards redressing the in balance and weaponry over there. but that's not true. we can't, we can't give them the weapons they need in large enough numbers, because we don't have those weapons. and that we includes the europeans as well as the united states, so we can give them dollar bills or yours, but that's not going to do much good. so we can't. number one, we dress the weaponry in balance. and number 2, we can not re dress demand power imbalance. oh, so there's money, largely and effective to the point that it's, it's a little legitimate argument not sending any. no, it's worse than that. what it does is it encourages the ukrainians to continue fighting, which means they'll lose more territory and more ukrainians will die. when, if we cut off the aid and what you can go its own way and become a neutral country, ukraine could cut a deal now and get

a better deal today. then it will get tomorrow if we give it the to continue finding a little bit like i won't call it appeasement, but thing to effectively yield a significant portions of your land because you can't when uh, when there's an entire global community that could offer support, feels like a tough decision to me and you get an on site with mohammed ali. you go to rounds with them and it's quite clear that he has the ability to kill you. what are you going to do? quit after 2 rounds or continue to fight and allow me to kill you. well, if i, if i'm wearing gloves and he's not, i've been yelling so somebody, hey, is there a rest of it? i can put some gloves on the guy. i feel like rushes fighting with our gloves and no, it was watching. well, in the international system there is no higher authority that can rescue you when you get into trouble. ukrainians are in big trouble, and there is no referee, no god, no higher authority, no, whatever up there that can rescue. and my point to you is that with the ukrainian

should do now is they should cut all security ties, cut all security, ties with the west, right, and declare neutrality and work with the russians to make it clear that they are a neutral states and have no interest in joining nato, and then the united states should cut off all way to ukraine, and the ukrainian should rely on economic aid from europe in its place. oh, the russian president dmitri made video of who's now deputy chairman of russian security council was recently asked at what point russia should stop its invasion. and he stated, it probably shouldn't be keyed if not now. then after sometime, maybe in some other phase of the development of this conflict of president putting himself also stated that russian troops would push further into ukraine after a rush of success and taking over the town of of the of car. do you think pollutants goal is to take over all of ukraine and especially even capable of doing

this? and i think that despite the conventional wisdom of the west, he is not determined and never has been determined to conquer all of ukraine. and indeed, he would be foolish to do that. and furthermore, despite the conventional wisdom in the west, there has never been any evidence that he is interested in conquering other countries in eastern europe as well. the idea that he's trying to recreate the russian empire or create a great, a russia is not a serious argument. but what's your argument isn't that he's trying to take over the rest of europe, but maybe just the rest of ukraine? no, i don't believe that there's no evidence to support that. he'd be a full to try to conquer all of ukraine because the western half of the country is filled with ethnic ukrainians, who would resist russian occupation mightily. he'd have a serious insurgency on his hands, and that's the last thing you need. and as i said the before,

they would be foolish and extreme to try to do that. but let's move on because there's a, there's another thing i want to ask you about. in december of 2023 us defense secretary lloyd austin stated rushes, military is badly weekend. and last year the head of the defense intelligence agency said that it would take somewhere between 5 and 10 years for russian to rebuild the capabilities of its armed forces. some argue that ukrainian resistance with western support was, in fact important to prevent further aggression from russia. what are you making it? i think it's just dead wrong. i think the russian military today is much more formidable, that it was then, it was when the war 1st started. armies at the start of a war, rarely look like armies midway through a war or at the end of a war. and by almost all accounts in the ukrainian media, this is in the ukrainian media media. the russian army has gotten much better with the passage of time. they mobilized lots of troops. they've trained them up,

the equipment is much better. and most importantly, the tactics and strategy are smarter, which is what you would expect in any army the fights of protracted works. it gets better in most cases, which the past with the passage of time. i think the concern was the wiping out of ground troops and that to replenish those troops, it would take 5 to 10 years. but i hear what you're saying loud and clear, which is that those numbers are inflated and that, and that they're, they've replenish troops and much more quickly and efficiently than that. i think that's exactly right. the numbers of casualties for inflate. ready and furthermore . ready who has mobilized a huge number of troops. they've trained them up, and they now have a quite effective military fair enough. you recently stated that the u. s. as in trouble in regards to the middle east and ukraine on ukraine. you said a quote, we were committed to beating the russians in ukraine. we were committed to wrecking the russian economy and knocking the russians out of the ranks of the great powers

we sailed. this is a devastating defeat for the west. you said i'm from here. stand point is this, the end of american unit polarity, you know, una blurred, in my opinion, ended in 2017 with the rise of china. and the fact that who brought the russians back from the dead between the period of 2000 when he took over in 2017 due to polar moment lasted from roughly december 1991. when the soviet union collapse, until about 2017, we were the only great power on the planet. and it was the ideal strategic situation to be in. but the world that we live in today is not uniform. it's multi power is china, there's russia and there's the united states. and let me push back on that just a little bit because the us still remains the largest economy in the world, according to g, d, p, and g d, p per capita. in 2023. and in 2024,

the us was still ranked as the most powerful military in the world, with the world's largest defense budget, in excess of oblique $750000000000.00. there we have military base in well over 70 countries. right now. can i have a partners really threaten the unipolar strength of the united states? well, i was going out to you that you're absolutely correct that we are the most powerful state on the planet. but the argument i'm making to you is there are 2 other great powers on the planet, and although they are not as powerful as we are, they still qualify is great powers. but the fact is that china is a pure competitor, and china is bent on dominating asia, and the united states has been on preventing china from dominated nation. so we have an intense security competition now taking place between china and the united states in east asia. so in that sense, china is a threat to the united states with regard to the russians, as you will know,

who in ukraine, we are effectively involved in a war against russia. so we have these 2 of the great powers in the system, russia and china. and in both cases, we are competing with them at the security level and very serious ways. with regard to russia, one could make an argument that were more with russia in the past when countries have attempted to challenge or break 3 of us orthodoxy, they faced the wrath of the u. s. government. some countries today are still enduring. a ferocious array of sanctions, other than the passing victims of resumed change operations that were supported by the united states or other western governments. does the us do have the same ability to threaten nations that go against them or have things changed? so i think things have changed somewhat. i think that to other countries like a ran, for example, in north korea, which we're in a much low layer position during the unit polar moment,

can now cosy up to the chinese and the russians who are willing to cozy up to them . and this just goes to tell you the weaker countries in the system can find allies who will help to protect them from the united states and its pension for regime change. so before we go, let me ask you one more question. so if i accept your argument that us uno polarity is over, what comes next? are we going to see a genuinely multi polar kind of political environment here? or are we going to see a situation where china eventually takes the us as plays and imposes the new kind of imperialism to were in a genuinely multi polar system. and there is no evidence that it's going to end any time soon. one can make an argument for demographic reasons, moving forward, we will eventually go back to a unipolar world. and the reason i say that is it's quite clear that the chinese

and the russians, but especially the chinese have wicked demographic problems. and their populations are going to shrink in significant ways over time. the united states has a bit of a demographic problem itself. but we have one great advantage that they don't have . and that is that we're an immigrant culture. so we can import all sorts of people to redressed the demographic problems that we have. and i think an argument could be made that you know, 50 years from now as the united states may be back to you in a polarity, in large part because of the demographic reasons. because you understand the 2 principal building blocks of military power or wealth. and demography, you have to be rich and you have to have lots of people in china and russia are in a very precarious situation over the long term because they have declining populations. john, this time i want to thank you for your time. thank you so much. for joining us on our part with your insights,

my pleasure. thanks for having me on the show. i enjoyed it. all right, everyone that is our show apart. we'll be back in the, the injustice for me is the driving force of why i do this to show people what it's like to live in places where injustice isn't something you read in. the news is something that happens to every single day, whether it's a war or natural disaster, whether it's political corruption, making sure that they understand. and this simple language is absolutely crucial. the cities already 50 percent evacuated, most of those people actually left in the early days of the world. i couldn't do this job without the best time remained best produces the best spaces. and those of

the people the i rely on in order to be able to get that message out to the world in 2018. john this led 40 days of civic action against the on the union government . i'm president socket. can scrape on power. i'm going to labor to swear and documentary photos, he's non violent campaign to bring down a corrupt regime, tarnishing outcome with good, a democratic revolution. i am not alone on the news velvet revolution. on the latest news as equinox, people have been coming here all day to pay tribute to those who lost their lives. vladimir putin has called the attack of bloody and barbaric app with detailed coverage. so many people are out tonight to celebrate perhaps a change for the sending of these people from around the world. joe biden says the

federal government is committed to rebuilding it. there's no indication of when that process might even begin the israel at times residential areas across guns raise a night defying un security council resolution calling for an immediate cease fire the on the clock. this is out. is there a life from the also coming up? reports of the us is about to send bombs and fight a just as rough as part of a multi $1000000000.00 arms package. palestinians, most of the land a and the lead as a legal is rarely supplements and occupies.