Saigon. Years after the vietnam war, a wave of terror and murder journalists. Quick tell your father to stop what he is doing or he will pay the consequences. No one was ever charged. Somebody knows. Is shadowy group. Amy during the 1980s, five vietnamese american reporters were murdered in the United States. Despite lengthy fbi probes, none of the victims killers were ever brought to justice. Could a stunning new documentary lead authorities to reopen the cases . We will speak to journalists a. C. Thompson and rick rowley. All that and more, coming up. Welcome to democracy now , democracynow. Org, the war and peace report. Im amy goodman. The fourth republican president ial debate took place in milwaukee, wisconsin last night with a smaller field of candidates on stage. Ate out of the 14 candidates took part in the main event after low poll numbers forced governor Chris Christie and Mike Huckabee to the socalled undercard debate. The first question of the night aresed on protesters who outside the venue to many 15 an hour minimum wage. Donald trump, ben carson and marco rubio all rejected a minimum wage increase. Trump said wages are already too high. Taxes too high, wages too high, were not going to be able to compete against the world. I hate to say it, but we have to leave it the way it is. People have to go out. They have to work really hard and get into the upper stratum. Amy his remarks came as fast food workers walked off the job in hundreds of cities across the country the manning a 15 an hour minimum wage and union rights. Here in new york, restaurant server Gabrielle Hatcher said the movement has broad support. This is support for a lot of different things. I know black lives matter was here. I think some people are wondering why theyre here, but Racial Justice and Economic Justice are two sides of the sa coin. When women have been color when women of color have been turned down. They are one and the same. There is no room for growth right now. I think that needs to change. Amy new York Governor Andrew Cuomo has announced he will increase the minimum wage for state workers to 15 an hour, making new york the first day to do so. Workers who serve food at the capitol also took part in the strike, joined by vermont senator in democratic president ial candidate Bernie Sanders who echoed their call for a 15 an hour minimum wage. Hillary clinton has called raising the minimum wage to 12 an hour. Israeli Prime MinisterBenjamin Netanyahu has wrapped up a visit to washington. A day after meeting president obama at the white house, netanyahu met with lawmakers and addressed the democratic think tank center for american progress. His appearance comes as leaked emails reported by the intercept show cap censoring its own writers on the topic of israel. Netanyahu has reportedly requested a record 5 billion in annual u. S. Military aid, an increase over the 3 billion a year the u. S. Already provides. Ahead of netanyahus visit, israeli moved to greenlight the expansion of israeli settlements in the west bank with 2200 new housing units. The move recalled a similar act i netanyahu just before a visit to israel by joe biden in 2010. The settlements are considered illegal under international law. But president obama reportedly did not raise the issue during his meeting with netanyahu monday. Addressing the Jewish Federation of north america tuesday, netanyahu praised the meeting with obama, saying, israel has no better friend than america. I had a very good meeting with president obama and i his commitmentte to bolster security. At a time when the middle east is becoming more dangerous than ever. And i also want to say that we are sharing so many things, the United States has given indispensable help to israel, that israel is returning that assistance almost on a daily basis in intelligence and in many other things. Amy two Young Palestinian cousins have been arrested and accused of stabbing and wounding an Israeli Security guard in east jerusalem. The guard shot and wounded the younger boy who was in separate 12. Incidents tuesday, Israeli Forces killed two other palestinians accused of attempting knife attacks around jerusalem. Meanwhile, the Palestinian MaanNews Agency ReportsIsraeli Forces used live fire during a raid on the qalandiya refugee camp near the occupied west bank city of ramallah, wounding 13 palestinians. President obama is expected to sign a sweeping military spending bill, even though it restricts prison transfers from guantanamo. The National Defense authorization act passed by the Senate Tuesday extends a ban on moving guantanamo prisoners to the United States, and sets new restrictions on transfers to other countries, including libya, syria, yemen, and somalia. White house spokesperson josh earnest said obama will likely sign the measure. Our view of those specific andisions have not changed, what the president does believe, though, is there are a number of provisions in the nda that are important to running and protecting the country. So that is why i would expect president ould see the signed the ndaa whenever it comes to his desk. That does not reflect a change in our position or the intensity of our position about the need to close the prison at president signed the ndaa whenever it comes to his desk. That does not reflect a change in our position or the intensity of our position about the need to close the prison at Guantanamo Bay and the need for congress to cooperate with us in doing so. Amy this with the obama ministry is expected to unveil its plan to close guantanamo. An American Contractor detained by Houthi Rebels in yemen has died. The state department confirmed the death of john hamen tuesday but did not say how he had died. , in a defeat for austerity in portugal, an alliance of leftwing parties has topped the toppled the centerright government just weeks after it came to power. Lawmakers from the socialist, communist, and left bloc parties joined together to vote down the governments austerity program, for to meet forcing the portuguese government to resign. The socialist party leader is now expected to become Prime Minister. The German Airline lufthansa has cancelled about a third of its flights after a german court rejected a bid to stop a strike of cabin crew workers. The strike began friday over pay and retirement provisions. About 100,000 flights were canceled. The university of missouri has named its first interim vice chancellor for inclusion, diversity, and equity after protests over racism on campus forced two top officials to resign. President tim wolfe and columbia campus chancellor bowen loftin both announced they would step down after students of color on the Football Team joined the mounting protests. After the resignations, graduate students rallied tuesday, vowing to keep up the fight for Racial Justice on campus. Meanwhile, an assistant Communications Professor has apologized and resigned her courtesy appointment at the university of Missouri Journalism School after a viral video showed her calling for some muscle to help remove a journalist from at a protest. Quick can i talk to you . You need to get out. No, i dont. You need to get out. I actually dont. Who wants delicate this reporter out of here . I need some muscle. Amy melissa click apologized for the incident, saying, i regret the language and strategies i used. And those are some of the headlines. This is democracy now , democracynow. Org, the war and peace report. Im amy goodman. The fourth republican president ial debate was held in milwaukee last night with a smaller field gracing the stage. Eight out of the 14 candidates took part in the main event after low poll numbers forced new jersey governor Chris Christie and former arkansas governor Mike Huckabee to the undercard. Donald trump and ben carson remained centerstage as the top front runners, despite ongoing controversy over statements by both and new questions over whether carson has embellished his life story. Part of the main action tuesday came not at the podiums but right outside. Hundreds of people staged a protest as part of a nationwide fight for 15 day of action demanding higher pay and union , rights for fastfood and other lowwage workers. Asked about the protests by debate moderator neil cavuto of fox business, the three top candidates donald trump, ben carson, and marco rubio all said they oppose a higher minimum wage. Trump said he thinks wages are already too high. Mr. Trump, as a leading president ial candidate on this stage and one whose tax plan exams couples making up to 50,000 a year from paying any federal income taxes at all, are you sympathetic to the protesters cause since a 15 weight works out to about 31,000 he year . I cant be, neil. The reason i cant be is that we are country that is being beaten on every front economically, militarily. There is nothing that we do now to win. We dont win anymore. Our taxes are too high. I have come up with a tax plan that many many people like very much. It is going to be a tremendous plan. I think it will make our country and our economy very dynamic. But taxes too high, wages too high, were not going to be able to compete against the world. I hate to say it, but we have to leave it the way it is. People have to go out. They have to work really hard and have to get into that upper cannot do this if we are going to give people the rest of the world. We just cant do it. So do not raise the minimum wage . I would not raise the minimum. After carson . People need to be educated on the minimum wage. Every time we raise the minimum wage, the number of jobless people increases. This is particularly a problem in the black community. Of black teenagers have a job who are looking for one. Highhats because of those wages. If you lower those wages, that comes down. Senator rubio . If i thought it was the best way to help people increase their pay, i would be for it, but it isnt. In the 21st century, it is a disaster. Youre going to make people more expensive than the machine and that means all of this automation thats replacing jobs and people right now is only going to be accelerated. Amy in the biggest gaffe of the night, texas senator ted cruz stumbled and fell short when trying to name the five federal agencies that he would cut to fulfill his vow to reduce the size of government. The error recalled the infamous oops moment of a fellow texan, thengovernor rick perry, during the 2012 campaign. Five major agencies that i would eliminate, the irs, the department of commerce, the department of energy, the department of commerce and hud. In a 25 specific programs, that is on our website at tedc ruz. Org. It is easy for everyone to say cut spending, but much harder and riskier to put out chapter and verse specifically the programs you would cut to stop bankrupting our kids and grandkids. Amy on government spending, senators marco rubio and rand paul sparred over the nations military budget. Either Child Tax Credit increase and im proud of it. The profamily tax plan i have will strengthen the most Important Institution in the country, the family. Theres a point i would like to make here about the tax credits. We have to decide what is conservative and wt isnt conservative. Is it fiscally conservative to have a 1 trillion expenditure yet go where not talking about giving people back their tax money. He is talking about giving people money they did not pay. It is a welfare transfer payment. So heres what we have. Is it conservative to have a 1 trillion interest repayments, a new Welfare Program that is a refundable tax credit . Add that to marcos plan for 1 trillion in new military spending, and you get something that looks, to me, not very conservative. I know rand is a committed isolationist. Im not. I believe the world is a stronger a better place in the United States is the Strongest Military power in the world. Amy rand paul later criticized fellow candidates for backing a nofly zone in syria, which he said could spark a military confrontation with russia. As Carly Fiorina pushed back, donald trump drew boos from the crowd when he complained about fiorina interrupting. You can be strong without being involved in every civil war around the world. How would you respond . Ronald reagan was strong walked away. He quit talking. Can i finish my time . Why did she keep interrupting everybody . Yeah, i would like to finish my response. This is an incredibly important question. And the question goes to be, who do we want to be our commanderinchief . D1 a commanderinchief who says something that we never did throughout the entire cold war, to discontinue having conversations with the russians . Amy donald trump and jeb bush also sparred over russias military campaign in syria will stop trump said he welcomed it. In,s if putin wants to go and i got to know him very well because we were both on 60 minutes and we did very well that night, but you know that. If putin wants to go and knocked the hell out of isis, im all for it when i do percent and i cant understand how anybody would be against it. They blew up when a minute. They blew up a russian airplane. He could not be in love with these people. He is going in and we can go in and everybody should go in. As far as ukraine is concerned, we have a group of people and a group of countries, including germany, tremendous economic behemoth. Why are we always doing the work . Protecting ukraine and working, but we have countries that are surrounding ukraine that arent doing anything. They say, keep going, keep going, you dummies, keep going and we have to get smart. We cant continue to be the policeman of the world. We are 19 trillion will stop we have a country that is going to help. We have an infrastructure that is falling apart. Our roads, our bridges, our schools, our airports, and we have to start investing money in our country. Wrong on this. He is absolutely wrong. Were not going to be the worlds policeman, but we sure as heck at her be the world leader. Theres a huge difference. The ideaeading, it is a good idea for putin to be in syria . Let isis take out assad and putin will take out isis . That is a board game. That is not how the real world works. We have to lead, we have to be involved. We should have a no fly zone in syria. They are barrel bombing the innocents in that country. If youre are a christian, increasingly in lebanon or iraq or syria come youre going to be beheaded. And if youre a moderate islamist, youre not going to be able to survive, either. We have to play a role in this to be able to bring the rest of the world to this issue before it is too late. Fourthr more on the republican president ial debate that took place in milwaukee, we are joined by we will begin with jamil smith, Senior Editor at the new republic. He is also the host of intersection, a podcast about race, gender, and identity. His most recent piece at the new republic is headlined, the black bogeyman cometh. Before we talk about that, lets talk about what was happening inside and outside the hall. Yes, they sparred on a number of issues. The smaller candidate pool now, the front runners. But what they agreed on is do not increase the minimum wage. You wrote about this. I found it interesting the first debate question was spurred by activists outside the building. Ive never seen that before. I strongly doubt the minimum wage would have come up in the context that it had had the protesters not been voicing their concerns. Obviously, the answers were expected. The republican platform is steadily against raising the minimum wage. President obama has come out for raising it to 10. 10 an hour, estly, 15 is a goal obviously, 15 is a goal. Amy in achieved in many cities. And other localities. I think ben carsons was most troubling. His own personal narrative is really all he has to sell. He doesnt have any political experience to speak up, so he goes back to his personal narrative which is based in a myth of coming up, pulling yourself up by your bootstraps and moving forward. Into, you know, prominence. Basically, what people what ben said, africanamerican teenager unemployment is somewhere over 80 . He said only 19. 8 percent of teens have jobs. The bureau of labor statistics states 25. 6 is the unpleasant rate for teenagers for male black teens ages 16 to 19. I have no idea where he got that number. It really served as faulty argument about the minimum wage, depressing black employment. Actually, history shows if you increase the minimum wage, youre going to not only put more money in the pockets of poor africanamerican families per capita, africanamericans to make up a little bit more of people below poverty, but i think what you have is ben carson trying to say, hey, i made it, you can make it, to. And this is how you take it, by taking lowpaying jobs are not paying jobs like i did and somehow magically ending up in the top echelon of america. It is a fantasy more than it is policy. Amy i want to stick with ben carson for a minute. You have written extensively about him. At the debate, dr. Ben carson was questioned about recent news reports questioning the accuracy of his biographical record. Dr. Carson, to you, he recently railed against the double standard in the media that seems obsessed with inconsistencies and potential exaggerations in your life story, but look the other way when it came to then senator barack obamas. Still as a candidate whose brand has always been trust, are you worried your campaign, which youve always said is bigger than you, is now being hurt by ou . Cooks first of all, thank you for not asking me what i said in the 10th grade. I appreciate