United States State Department . Also, the republicans say they are simplifying the tax code. Really . Well show you some countries where taxes are as easy as 1, 2, 3. Global lessons on taxes. We will give the American People a big, beautiful christmas present. And muslims and mexicans. Trump has repeatedly demeaned both groups, but now other americans are feeling uncomfortable. Conservative Foreign Policy scholar, max boothe tells us, why he feels he doesnt belong any more. Donald trump is making me feel like a foreigner for the first time in my life. But first, heres my take. Watching the republican tax plan race through congress, one is reminded of a big apparent difference between Donald Trumps program and other populist movements in the western world. In america, trump is leading something that is best described as pluto accuratic populism. A mixture of traditional populist causes with extreme libertarian ones. Congress own think tanks, the joint committee on taxation and Congressional Budget Office calculate that in ten years people making between 50,000 and 75,000 a year around the Median Income in america would effectively pay a whopping 4 billion more in taxes. While people making 1 million or more would pay 5. 8 billion less, according to an analysis of the senate bill before its lastminute changes. And that doesnt take into account the massive cuts in services, health care and other benefits that would likely result. Martin wolf, the sober and factbased chief economics commentator for the Financial Times concludes, this is a determined effort to shift resources from the bottom, middle and even upper middle of the u. S. Income distribution toward the very top. Combined with big increases in economic insecurity for the great majority. Wolfe says the real puzzle is why this is a politically successful strategy. The Republican Party is pursuing an economic agenda afor the. 1 , but needs to win the votes of the majority. Berkeley political scientist, paul pearson, argues that trump entered office with a set of ideas and no real organization. Thus his administration was ripe for takeover by the most ardent, organized party, the libertarian wing. Nurtured and built up, this group of conservatives decided to ally with the Trump Administration to enact its longstanding agenda. So is it that the Republican Party is cleverly and successfully hoodwinking its supporters, promising them populism and then enacting pluto accuratic capitalism . Many argued republicans have been able to work this by tangling social issues in front of workingclass voters who fall for the bait and lose sight of the fact they are voting against their own interests. But what if people are not being fooled . What if people are actually motivated far more deeply by issues surrounding religion, race and culture than they are by economics . Theres increasing evidence that trumps base support, because it feels a deep, emotional, cultural and class affinity for him. And while the tax bill is being analyzed by economists, trump picks fights with black athletes, retweets misleading anti Muslim Videos and promises never to yield on immigration. Perhaps he knows his base better than we do. In fact, trumps populism might not be as unique as its made out to be. Polling from europe suggests the core issues motivating people to support brexit or the far right parties in france and germany and even the populist parties of Eastern Europe are cultural and social. The most important revolution in economics in the last generation has been the rise of the behavioral scientists trained in psychology who are finding that people systematically make decisions that are against their own interests. This might be the tip of the iceberg in understanding human motivation. The real story might be that people see their own interests in much more emotional and tribal way than scholars understand. What if in the eyes of a large group of americans, these other issues are the ones for which they will stand up, protest, support politicians, vote and even pay an economic price . What if, for many people in america, and around the world, these are their true interests . For more, go to cnn. Com fareed and read my Washington Post column this week. And lets get started. Mome from Michael Flynns guilty plea to big question marks at the state department, lots to talk about this morning on gps, well get right to it. David stanger National Security correspondent for New York Times. And a columnist at time and julia yoffe, staff writer at the lan tibatlantic. David, where do we stand now . If you looked in february, the white house said basically, we had no contact with the russians. Where are we now . Well, fareed, since february, weve discovered at least nine members of the Trump Transition Team, or their the campaign who did have contact with the russians. We found probably more than 30 contacts. So the initial story has sort of fallen apart. The early story about michael flynn, the former director of the Defense Intelligence agency, who then moved into the inner circle of the Trump Campaign and became National Security adviser for 25 days, his contacts are particularly fascinating. We were told initially that his conversations with ambassador kislyak, the Russian Ambassador at the time to the United States, amounted to holiday greetings. That seemed improbable, since they took place the day of and the day after president obama put sanctions on russia for the election meddling. We now know from the guilty plea that, in fact, they discussed the sanctions and the suggestion seems to be though we dont know the details of that discussion yet, that what he was doing was essentially saying, hold on. Dont retaliate. Well take care of this once we come into office. Now, the question is, why would he lie about this . And why would you actually make promises to a Foreign Government before you are in office . The right answer would have been, we hear your concerns, mr. Ambassador, and were happy to take it up with you at 12 30 p. M. On january 20th, but we cant until that time. And so now the question is, who else knows, and as we reported in the times today, my colleagues reported that, in fact, there were many others who were consulted about these interactions with ambassador kislyak. And as you said, you know, why does everybody keep lying about this if its all very harmless. Julia, again, big picture. Remind us, why is it that the Trump Administration seems to have been trying to be nice to the russians . Isnt that sort of the question is, all these moves seem to be moves to tell the russians, you know, hold off, were going to try and relax sanctions on you, were going to try and have a different relationship with you. And presumably, at least, many people have said, this is all because trump was in some way being assisted by the russians. We dont have any proof yet on that first piece of the story. Thats right. I think that is the however, you know, 100 million question, 64,000 question. That is the question. And there is still a lot we dont know. We know why the russians were reaching out to the Trump Campaign repeatedly and in many different ways, which is also very classic, right . You have lots of different kind of efforts going out, lots of tentacles reaching toward the Trump Campaign. Which is totally understandable. Because you had trump talking about how he wanted to respect russia and get along with russia, how he thought putin was a great and strong leader. That he wanted to pull the u. S. Back off the world stage, which is great for russia, because russia wants to expand its presence on the world stage. So the more of a vacuum the u. S. Creates for it in places like the middle east, the better. So its its understandable why the russians were reaching out. The question we dont know the answer to yet is why the Trump Campaign seems so eager to or the Trump Transition Team seems so eager to reach back out. What were the russians offering to them . And, you know, other things we have no explanation for yet is why jared kushner, for example, was asking the Russian Ambassador to set up a secret secure channel from the Russian Embassy in washington to moscow. And it was the Russian Ambassador that said no. Our equipment is a little too sensitive. What is your reaction to the flynn business . First of all, we know one reason why the Trump Administration the Trump Campaign, was so interested in trying to work with the russians. Thats because Paul Manafort was actually on the payroll of the oligarchs close to the kremlin. Leaving that aside, i think jared is in real trouble here. At the time these conversations were happening between flynn and the Russian Ambassador, jared was in charge of Foreign Policy for the Trump Administration. For the trump team. He was the one that was approving every meeting that trump would or would not have with a head of state. He was the one that was determining Foreign Policy direction. So it begs credulity he would not have been aware of what he was discussing with kislyak. And if flynn was saying, hey, were going to make sure these sanctions come off, i think jared was absolutely a part of that. Theres no way were not going to find that out. Now, i dont think thats collusion. For me, you know, collusion implies that trump and putin were actually in some way working together to try to swing the election an illegitimate way. I dont see that. But i do see breath taking, staggering incompetencies. I think jared had no idea what he was doing was potentially problematic for awhat an administration would look like and there were no adults around them in the room. The carter pages, the papadopouloss. The people advising donald trump were the d list, because nobody thought they had a chance. So as a consequence, a whole bunch of things that would have raised the antennas of richard haass, who would say, wait a second, this just isnt done, those people werent around trump. And then you see his lying about it. The coverup is whats going to get them in an enormous amount of trouble. Weve got to take a break. Stay right here. We will be back to talk about everything else. Secretary tillerson, north korea, everything we can fit in. Hi. 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People arent buying these books online, but they are buying them to protect their secrets . . hi bill. If that is your real name. Its william actually. Hmph affordable, fast fedex ground. Gives skin the moisture it needs and keeps it there longer with lockin Moisture Technology skin is petal smooth after all, a cleansers just a cleanser unless its olay. And we are back with david sanger, ian bremer and julia yoffe. We could talk about flynn forever, but lets get to real substance, by which i mean, north korea, Foreign Policy substance. Tell me what the significance of this missile test was . Because what i i looked at it, and it seemed like an old soviet ss18. And its not entirely clear that the rocket was able to reenter. You know, these things often burn out in reentry. So given all that, and given that the soviet the ss18 is what is it, 35, 40 years old. Thats right. Why is this a big deal . Well, the first thing, fareed, is we didnt really see this big almost ss18 coming. The pace of the north Korean Missile capability has been so rapid over the past year, that it raises the question, why didnt we see more of this, why wasnt there more warning . But also, are they getting help or are they doing this entirely indigenously. Presumably has to be from the russians, right . Nobody else could do this. Certainly, the design of the engine that we saw there appeared to be a russian design. Came initially from a ukrainian factory that was active when the soviet union was still around. Hasnt made those in a long time. There are a lot of questions about how the North Koreans got that engine. So the rocket itself went off in a relatively successful test. There are a lot of questions about whether or not the warhead burned up on reentry. That wouldnt be strange. Because the United States had a lot of warheads burn up on reentry when we were first getting into this business in the 1950s. But what it does tell you, fareed, is theyll figure this out. You know, we often say, this isnt rocket science. This is rocket science. But its wellknown rocket science. So i think that theyll get there. The bigger significance, though, i think is this, fareed. There are nu their Nuclear Capability and ability to reach the United States is just about there. So this game is pretty much over. And that really changes and limits the choices the president has, including whether or not he wants to try to shoot one of these down, if its approaching american territory, whether he wants to go do a preemptive strike, or whether, as i suspect, well just end up living with it. Julia, at a time like this where you have this huge crisis, it seems an odd thing to have a changeover at state to sideline or fire rex tillerson, and in any case, tillerson doesnt seem to be able to function. And he doesnt have a point man for east asia or point woman for east asia. He seems intent on getting the state department, driving out the most senior, most experienced diplomats, who will take decades to replace to get people up to snuff. If we ever get another chance to restaff these positions. But i think also, its a weird time to keep knocking the iran nuclear agreement. Because if youre north korea, and you see that, okay, one country decided to put a halt on its Nuclear Capabilities or developing their Nuclear Capabilities, to what end . To constantly have that agreement undermined, rattled. You look atlibya and moammar gadhafi, gave up his nukes and was essentially lynched. If im north korea, im not going to come to the table. Im not going to agree to give up anything. Because i have no guarantees, because this administration is completely untrustworthy. Tillerson at state. Do you think hes out . What happens next . I think he will be out. I think perhaps he would have been out already, if it wasnt for the flynn revelations. But after that occurred, be i think trump wanted to in a fit, say no, no, you guys are fake news. Clearly, he doesnt have a functional relationship. Not only with President Trump himself, but at this point even secretary of defense mattis, even National Security adviser master have been calling for his ouster. I think on the north korea issue, the fact is, we cant take trump seriously or literally at this point. He said that the North Koreans would be stopped before they had the opportunity to develop a Ballistic Missile that could hit the continental United States. They now have one that clearly could hit washington, d. C. Not credible. And thats okay. He used to say that the mexicans were going to pay for a wall. Said it every day. He doesnt say that any more. I think we should take comfort in the fact that he says stuff, but the reality is that there are now engaged diplomacy between the chinese that are relatively highlevel in the North Koreans. The south koreaens are looking for a freeze for test, freeze for exercise with the United States. And i think which would be a complete reversal of trumps rhetoric, as you say, which was unyielding, denukization of north korea or nothing. If there is any president we have seen in modern times that can do a 180 on National Security, its President Trump. And he may not have much of a choice if the chinese, south koreans and North Koreans are. And end up right where he started. David sanger, we have 30 seconds. And i just want to ask you about the move of the u. S. Embassy to jerusalem. For now what we have is splitting the difference, hes