Transcripts For WHYY PBS NewsHour 20140626 : vimarsana.com

This is the most productive fishery in out world. All these fish are disappearing. Woodruff those are just some of the stories were covering on tonights pbs newshour. Major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by moving our economy for 160 years. Bnsf, the engine that connects us. Bae systems inspired work. And the william and flora hewlett foundation, helping people build immeasurably better lives. And with the ongoing support of these institutions. And. This program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. And by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. Thank you. Ifill the u. S and britain made fresh diplomatic efforts today to address the growing turmoil in iraq. Secretary of state john kerry urged leading arab states to form a united front against the Islamist Insurgency in both iraq and syria. And in baghdad, British Foreign secretary William Hague met with shiite Prime Minister Nouri Al Maliki and pressed him to bring sunnis and kurds into a new government. We believe the urgent priority must be to form an inclusive government following on from the recent elections that can command the support of all iraqis and work to stop terrorists and their terrible crimes. Ifill and on syria, president obama asked congress for 500 Million Dollars to train and arm westernbacked rebels fighting the assad regime. Theyve been losing ground to islamist factions, and the white house has been under pressure to do more. Woodruff thousands of ukrainians rushed to cross into russia today, a day before a weekold ceasefire expires. They were the latest in an exodus of civilians trying to escape fighting. Meanwhile, in paris, secretary of state john kerry warned russia to move quickly on restoring peace in ukraine. He spoke as european leaders prepare to consider new sanctions on moscow. We are in full agreement that it is critical for russia to show in the next hours, literally, that they are moving to help disarm the separatists, to encourage them to disarm, to call on them to lay down their weapons and to begin to become part of a legitimate political process. Woodruff later, a state Department Spokeswoman said kerry was not suggesting any specific timeline on possible sanctions. Ifill investigators have a new theory on what happened to Malaysia Airlines flight 370. They said today the plane flew on autopilot for hours before crashing in the indian ocean, off australia. And, they said, that suggests the crew was incapacitated by a loss of oxygen. Now, theyre shifting the search southwest, to a priority zone within a new area that covers about 23thousand square miles. Australian deputy Prime Minister warren truss. We expect that the underwater search element will commence in august and take about 12 months to complete. In addition, the search effort will include equipment provided by malaysia which includes vessels fitted with search equipment including towed Sonar Systems which will be used to search the sea floor. Fill the search area has been covered from the air and on the surface. The effort will now move deep under water. Woodruff new york citys ban on big sodas is dead. The states highest court refused today to reinstate the restriction. It had barred restaurants, movie theaters and other businesses from selling sugary drinks larger than 16 ounces. The court ruled the City Health Board had overstepped its authority. The ban originated under former mayor michael bloomberg. Ifill in economic news, Consumer Spending rose just two tenths of a percent in may, suggesting growth may not be as strong as hoped in the second quarter. And wall street had a subpar day, the Dow Jones Industrial average lost 21 points to close at 16,846; the nasdaq fell a fraction, to close at 4,379; and the s p 500 dropped two points, finishing at 1,957. Woodruff former senator howard baker, who famously posed the central question for president nixon during watergate, died today at his home in tennessee. Hed suffered a stroke last weekend. The moderate republican captured the spotlight at the 1973 watergate hearings, as he repeatedly asked, what did the president know, and when did he know it . Here, he questions thenattorney general john mitchell. Is there such an aura of magnificence about the presidency . Is there such an awesome responsibility for a multitude of problems and undertakings of this nation that the presidency in some instances must be spared the detail, must be spared the difficulty of situations which in ordinary circumstances might be considered by some at least to be frank, open declarations of criminal events . Is the presidency to be protected in that way . Is the splendor of the isolation so great that the president must be protected . And if so, in what cases . Woodruff baker spent 18 years in the senate and served both as majority and minority leader at various times. Later, he became chief of staff to president reagan in the waning years of his administration. Most recently, baker served as the American Ambassador to japan. Howard baker was 88 years old. Ifill still to come on the newshour. The Supreme Court delivers a blow to the president s power to make appointments. And it struck down a limit to sidewalk abortion protests. Then, what the crisis in iraq means for oil prices. The decline of one of the worlds most vibrant freshwater ecosystems. More grim details about troubles at v. A. Hospitals. Team u. S. A. Down but not out in the race for thworld cup. Plus, a profile of this years Pulitzer Prize winner in poetry. Woodruff the u. S Supreme Court handed down a pair of unanimous decisions today in two highprofile cases. In one, the court reined in the appointment powers of the president. The justices ruled that president obamas temporary appointments to the National Labor Relations Board in 2012 were illegal because congress was not in recess. The justices also struck down a 35 foot buffer zone prohibiting protests outside abortion clinics in massachusetts finding the limit violated the First Amendment rights of demonstrators. Marcia coyle of the National Law Journal was at the court this morning, and she joins us now. So lets take this case involving president ial powers first. The case was brought by a canning company, and as we said, it had to do with the presient making appointments to the National Labor Relations Board. Thats right. And did he that pursuant to his power under the recess appointments clause in the constitution. Judy, its surprising that in more than 200 years, the Supreme Court has never looked at the scope or meaning of the recess appointments clause. They had really no prior decisions to rely on in this case, but they had three questions they had to answer because of a Lower Court Ruling that really was in favor of the Washington State Bottling Company that was fighting a ruling by the nlrb that it had engaged in unfair labor practice with its union. So the justices in even though this was a unanimous decision, judy, its important to note that it was only unanimous in the end result. That these three appointments wrin valid. The justices were splid 54 on how you reach that result. And it was a very sharp 54 split. Justice breyer wrote for really wrote the main opinion for the majority that included the courts more moderate liberal members as well as justice kennedy. And what he did was he looked at the meaning of the words in the recess clause, the recess. And also looked at the purpose of the clause, which was to ensure the smooth functioning of government when there are vacancies and gave considerable weight to historical practices of president s and the senate. Woodruff it really did come down to the definition that they could agree on of what is a recess. Right. Exactly. Woodruff what does it mean jarks is the senate doing or not doing during that period so that the president can make appointments without Senate Confirmation . Exactly. And what the majority held here was, one, the president can make appointments during any recess that is at least ten days or longer. The issue came up that or the lower court had held only between annual sessions of congress, not intercession, recesses. But the court said any recess thats at least ten days or longer. The other issue that was very important to this particular case was whether the president could make appointments to fi vacancies during breaks between ro forma sessions of pro forma sessions of congress. In this case, there were threeday breaks. And the senate said it was in session. It was not in recess. But the majority here held and actually this was unanimous that the senate determines when it is in recess and as long as its capable of being able to do business, its in session. And that was the case with these three appointments, consequently, the appointments were invalid. Woodruff and it was uman muss and the results of the justices differed in their reasoning. Some tough language from the conservative justices. Very tough. Justice scalia read a summary what would be the dissent from the bench. And he said he disagreed completely with the majoritys view half the meaning of the words recess were or when does a vacancy arise . That was another key issue in the case. The majority said that the president can fill sakencies that occur during the recess as well as preexisting vacancies. And he disagreed strongly with the interpretation of the history of practices of prior res. And he accused the majority of making up rules here and of judicial adventurism. But Justice Breyer said under the dissenting views, thousands of recess appointments would have been invalidated under that view. Woodruff its interesting. The other big decision they handed down today, also unanimous, but the reasoning differed again. This one of course had to do with massachusetts law, a ban on antiabortion activists being able to be in an area outside of abortion clinics. It actually was a 35foot buffer zone, so it wasnt just antiabortion protesters. It could be proabortion rights protesters as well. But it kept out everybody except clinic employees and people who needed to walk through that area in order to get to another destination. And here Justice Roberts wrote the opinion, which was a surprise as well, because he did not ask one question during the oral arguments in this case. But he said in his opinion that where massachusetts went wrong here was that it did not narrowly tailor what it was doing to the problem it was trying to solve. It want youd to have order on the streets. It wanted to protect Public Safety as long as womens safety, but the buffer zone burdened too much speech, and these women who blocked the challenge, who really were antiabortion activists, they were not protesters, he said. They wanted to engage in quiet counseling of these women, and the buffer zone prevented them from their two primary tools which were facetoface conversations and distributing leaflets and information. Woodruff but the liberal justices agreed with the final definition. They did. And i think here what was important was the Supreme Court was urged by antiabortion groups but did not overrule a prior 2000 precedent on buffer zones. And also, the chief justice said the law itself did not discriminate on the basis of viewpoint. It didnt favor antiabortion or proabortion over one or the other. Justice the dissenters again, Justice Scalia writing, said that it did discriminate on the basis of viewpoint and the court should have struck it down on that basis and should have thrown out that 2000 precedent. Woodruff its still unusual i guess to get two unanimous rulings on the same day. Youre the expert. Marcia, very quickly. One more day, when this term the justices can hand down. Theres a very Important Union case and the other is the challenge by the religious owners of forprofit corporations to the contraceptive requirement in the Affordable Care act. Woodruff i have a feeling were going to be right back here on monday. Marcia coyle. Thank you. My pleasure, judy. Ifill as iraq continues to fracture, there are new concerns about the security of its considerable Oil Production facilities. Only last month, the countrys crude Oil Production reached 3. 6 Million Barrels a day, the most since Saddam Hussein took over in 1979. That made iraq the seventh largest producer in the world. Fighting at iraqs Biggest Oil Refinery has raged for a week, with the Government Army battling fighters from isil the Islamic State in iraq and the levant. Both sides have claimed to have the upper hand at beiji, located about 130 miles north of baghdad, an Iraqi Military spokesman yesterday. The refinery is under the control of our valiant armed forces isil militants could not impose control over a metre, actually the fighting has been underway for seven days now and the result is 92 dead bodies of isil militants scattered in the vicinity of the refinery. The tribes in baiji provided us with precise information about locations of isil militants and about the sleeper cells, so we handled them through raids and air strikes. Ifill the clashes have stopped Oil Production at the beiji complex, which had been able to refine up to 300,000 barrels a day. Today, yet another site came under attack. Isil fighters assaulted the town of mansouriyat aljabal, home to four, currently inactive, natural gas fields. But amid the growing chaos, the price of crude exports has risen by only 2. 35 a barrel, closing just under 106 dollars today. Fuel supplies within iraq are also under strain. In the Northern City of erbil, lines for gasoline stretched more than a mile on sunday. translated the Current Situation affects the peoples life and their work. People have business to do. I had to leave my shop and queue here to supply my car with fuel. Ifill the turmoil comes just four months after iraqi Oil Production had reached its highest levels in more than 30 years. Joining us for some analysis of what this fresh upheaval in iraq means for the energy markets, is greg priddy, director of the Global Energy and Natural Resources at eurasia group, a Political Risk research and consulting firm. And, gianna bern, the president and founder of brookshire advisory and research. How nervous does this upheaval make you about what happens with oil prices and with gas prices . Well, i think the market has initially probably overestimated the impact of this a little bit in sense that most of the iraqs Oil Production is in a small area around basra. Ifill in the southern part. Which is overwhelmingly shiite population. So the militants fighting in the north would have very little local support there, and theres really nowhere for them to hide or operate. In the north, youve had the kirkuk volumes that go out to turkey to the mediterranean. Its about 230,000 barrels a day. Thats been offline since early march. So that loss has already happened. Ifill gianna bern, how much of this Oil Production is intended for internal use, domestic use in iraq, and how much of it is intended for export . Well, the vast majority of iraqs production is intended for export. You just mentioned in your just a minute earlier iraqs production has reached about 3 Million Barrels per day and its come a long way from where its production was several years ago, so the vast majority of it is a good 3. 3 Million Barrels for export. Most of which is coming out of the southern parts of the country. Ifill okay. So where is that let me stay when you for a moment. Where is that going . Its coming from the southern part and going to not to the u. S. Wheres it going . Asian markets are big importers, so china, japan, korea, your asian markets are very significant. European markets are likely to be impacted should this spread further. I think the important thing to mention right now is that where its at and where crude oil prices are at today, the market has contained this impact. So the market has absorbed all this information, all this activity, and really the market hasnt reacted the way we might have thought several years ago, which is a good thing, so but its important to note that here the activity and the fighting has not reached some critical areas. So for now, its wait and see. And the market has digested all of this information pretty nicely in fact. Crude oil prices and i think the important one to keep in mind here is the brunt, brunt prices cost about 113 per barrel today. So wti closed at about 16 per barrel for today. So brunt is much more likely to be impacted by any activity in iraq. Ifill how different is this from what we saw last time . Were going to through a lot of deja vu here watching whats happening in iraq militarily and internally. But is there any deja vu, any lessons to be learned from what we saw happen before . Well, with the previous crises in iraq, with the invasion, it went offline fo