Today in the aftermath of newtown, the National RifleAssociation Offering a same school plan. The only think that stops a guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun. Our conversation with nra point man assa hutchinson. Senator Joe Lieberman on the culture of violence. Then the gops civil war. Not the outcome that i wanted, but that was the will of the house. Republican versus republican on the fiscal cliff with congressman sooeven up lawsuit ter rhett and mcmulvaney. Weighing in all of it is our political panel. Usa todays washington bury rechief sussan page and ron duffy. Im candy crowley. Nine days after the mass shooting deaths in newtown, the president of the National Rifle association joined the gun debate. I call on Congress Today to act immediately to appropriate whatever is necessary to put Armed Police Officers in every Single School in this nation. In a similar vein, lawmakers in a growing number of states including oklahoma, missouri, south dakota, virginia and oregon will consider laws allowing teachers and School Administrators to carry firearms at school. The nra is moving ahead to have their National ModelSchool Shield in place to schools that want it. To talk about the dangers and backlash is the Program Director assa hutchinson. Thank you for joining us. One of the thing that struck me is there was no mention of any gun control in favor or in opposition, so i wanted to get you on the record. Will the nra oppose any attempt to put new gun laws in place . Well, thats a separate debate. My responsibility is School Safety, and i think thats where the debate should center. Weve got to act in a very urgent fashion to protect the children. My responsibility is to convene a Highlevel Panel of experts to develop a Model Program for schools and new tools to use to protect our children. One of those options should be armed guards who are trained, but that should be an option for the schools. One of the tools that they can utilize, but thats the debate. It shouldnt be on new legislation as much as it should be on what to do to protect our children in School Safety. Thats my focus. Debate, as you know, has a way of shaping itself, and you are working for the nra. So im trying to find out if theres anything in terms of gun contr control. We know whats out there, sir. Theres people that want to reinstate the ban on certain kinds of semiautomatic assault weapons. We know that people want to try and ban some of those ammo clips that can shoot as amamany as 10 and up of bullets in a short time. We know that there are those that want to close the loophole so if you buy a gun from a private owner, you have to go through a background check. Are any of these acceptable to the nra . Well, imt nm not going spea that issue. Dont you sfeek for the nra. You dont work for the nra and they dont pay you . Im an independent consultant for the nra designed to focus on School Safety. That is my mission. Now, what i will say in terms of further gun control legislation is that that is the wrong part of the debate. I think the focus should be on School Safety. You can have bans on assault weapons or whatever weapons you wish, and its not going to protect from a violent person. Its going to take someone who has security in the school. Timothy mcveigh used fertilizer as his weapon. So lets not focus on the weapon as much as our response capability and safety of the children. Thats simply my responsibility, and thats what im going to do and were going to take the best experts in across the country to give these options to the schools. Without speaking for the nra, do you personally think that there is any place for further restrictions on guns, particularly these high capacity guns . Thats a debate that will take place. What im saying is its not the solution. I want to look for solutions for safety in schools, and thats not the solution. Thats the wrong debate to have if you want to talk about protecting our children. We have onethird of our schools right now of the 23,000 schools that have armed guards. Should the other twothirds have armed guards . I certainly think its an option that they should consider. Its not a novel approach, but its a safety approach. Theres other things that should be done. What i am going to be doing is looking at those options for the schools. You can understand this that people listen to the nras response to focus on School Safety and people saying, wait a second. To put more guns into the schools seems like exactly the wrong answer, that more guns is the wrong answer. Certainly. That is a concern thats expressed. Again, you go back, though, through history. President clinton started the cops program where you have resource officers who are armed in the schools as a result of that. There is partial funding, but its very limited and cut back and insufficient, obviously. Its going to take over 2 billion if you put a federal funded program for an armed person at every school. I think theres voluntary programs to look at if you have trained people, and we want to set up a model training for this. It should be an option that the local school board finally makes the decision. I can understand skepticism, but i think that School Safety is the debate. I think it is terrific that the nra is willing to fund experts and st. Louolutions free of cos the schools to hopefully create a voluntary program. Its more than skepticism. I want to read you two reactions to what the nra had to say. The first from mayor Michael Bloomberg who said they, meaning the nra, offered a paranoid vision of a more dangerous and violent america where everyone is armed and no place is same. The nra ass lobbyists blamed everyone but nems for the crisis of gun violence. This is the new senator and he tweeted out walking out of another funeral and handed the nra transcript, the most revolting, tonedeaf statement ive seen. Can i get your reaction to that reaction . Well, live by my own statements, and i hope they look at those as well. They want to focus the debate on new laws and new prohibitions, and im saying thats the wrong debate. Thats their solution. I believe a better solution is School Safety initiatives, one of those options being an armed presence we have in onethird of the schools. P if you have an option of sending a child to a school with an armed presence who are trained that can protect the children or a school that doesnt have that option, right now the polls show in america most people would select the more secure school, the one that invests in security. So lets help these schools, and lets dont have a false debate thats not going to increase safety in the long term for the most precious commodity in our society. I think that the debate certain can be a holistic one, but to take guns out of the debate seems naive at this point, listening to the public debate. You know, yes, it has to do with school security, but it has to do with guns and Mental Health and any number of things. It seems to many people that this sole approach by the nra does not take reality into consideration, that is, that some high capacity magazines and big guns are killing our children and killing people the on the streets. Candy, youre right in the context there should be a broad debate. Actually, the Mental Health issues is a central part of it. I think the comprehensiveness of our databases and the information we have in regard to that is an important part of it. Obviously, the violence in video games has been raised. There can be all of that debate. Its very appropriate. Some of those issues can enhance safety. I have one singular focus, and its something that shouldnt be neglected. Thats where i think the debate in america has been confused, is that were going to come out with mandatory laws that every school has to have a teacher with a gun. I dont think teachers go to get their education to do that. They want thats why you need to have separate resource officers and armed guards to have that protection. Let me ask you one final question, and that is, where does this end . Lets say, fine, people want to put armed professionals inside schools to protect children. There was a Movie Theater shot up in aurora and a Shopping Mall shot up in tucson. Where does it end . Can you arm every place that a gunman might go . Put expolice officers, whatever . It seems neverending. Youre right. Its a problem we have in our society, and you know, Movie Theaters are making those decisions. Many of them have retired police officers, offduty police officers, malls have the same thing. So should we say were not goingtothe sagoing to have the same type of protection going to school . Certainly theres some schools and theres going to be some parts of society that say we dont want to do that investment. Well take the risk. But lets look simply at the schools right now, what our focus is , and i think this initiative for enhanced safety is the right direction. Is that the kind of country that you want for krur children and your grandchildren, just armed people outside any number of Public Institutions . Well, what i wouldnt want would be someone carrying a terribly large weapon outside of a school, but i think when you have a trained officer for example, whats more sensitive than our airplanes . People resisted having weapons on airplanes, but i oversaw the federal air marshals. Its a deterrent. No one sees that weapon, but theyre protected on that airplane. It is a huge, positive impact on safety. Schools are a sensitive environment as well, but you can provide safety and security with armed, Trained Personnel without putting fear in anyone. Asa hutchinson heading up the nra School Safety program. Tha for your time this morning, sir. Thank you, candy. Theres not much where the president and the nra see eye to eye but violence and the media may be one. Up next is senator Joe Lieberman. Its lots of things. All waking up. Connecting to the global phenomenon we call the internet of everything. Its going to be amazing. And exciting. And maybe, most remarkably, not that far away. 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[ male announcer ] stop the uhoh fast with kaopectate. Let me talk first about the nra and its safe school program. How does that strike you as the first statement coming out of the nra . I have found the statements by the nra over the last couple of days to be disheartening because the statements seem to not reflect any understanding about the slaughter of children that happened in newtown, connecticut, just a little more than a week ago. It was a kind of hunker down. They could have made the same statement dish they did make the same statement after earlier acts of mass violence. You know, no one is saying heres what bothered me. The nra spokes people have been willing to deal with every possible cause of gun violence except guns. Theyre right that theres a problem for a society, how do you spot a child or a person who is troubled before they become a killer . Whats the influence of violence in our entertainment culture on people . Its obviously also true that the easy availability of guns including military style saum weapons and say everything is on the table. What this does mean is that the kind of new regulation of guns that president obama and Vice President biden and a lot people like to see enacted early next year wont happen easily. Its a battle. The president and Vice President are ready to lead the fight. Its going to take the American People getting organized, agitated, and talking to their members of congress. Do you think the nra still has the clout it once did . They have several times been able to rally their folks on capitol hill to vote against extension of the gun ban, things like that. Well see. I think this situation is different than the other acts of mass violence, columbine, aurora and virginia tech, because here those 20 beautiful innocent children, slaughtered and hit multiple times with bullets from that assault weapon. So we see, but i tell you this. The strength of the nra is more than half of the adults in america have guns, own guns and have them in their homes. We have to convince them that none of the proposals will take their guns away. The proposals will make it harder, hopefully impossible for people to buy assault weapons and cause the loopholes to make sure the people who are in in his term bad guys dont have the opportunity to buy guns. The number of households that own a gun has gone down a bit, but there are a lot of guns out there. I want to read you actually on another part of this argument, and that is about the culture and about these video games. We now at least believe that this shooter, in fact, did like some of these violent video games. This comes from the General Council of the Entertainment Consumers Association who said we agree with the Supreme Courts decisions and the volumes of Scientific Research which all clearly state that there is no causal link between media violence and real life violence. Do you agree with that . I dont agree with that, and i dont know what Supreme Court decision that person is thinking of. It was a free speech case. I mean, obviously, theres a free speech question, but ive spent a lot of time on this. Most of the research that ive seen done shows that involvement, particularly intense involvement with violence in the entertainment culture makes people more aggressive. Obviously, everybody who plays violent video games doesnt become a killer, but there are theres a vulnerable part of our population out there that is affected by it. I would say to the entertainment culture like to the nra, take your blinders off, take your earplugs out. 20 kids just got slaughtered, and we have to come to the table not defensively and aacknowledge these are not just other peoples kids. They could be our kids and grandkids next time. I think the entertainment culture has to accept some responsibility. You know, in almost every one of these cases of mass shootings, its the same pattern. A young man troubled, reclusive, almost always involved in some kind of violent Entertainment Media gets guns and then kills a lot of people. We have to stop it. Theres a lot here i wanted to ask you about, and i want to move on to senator chuck hagel, a man you know. We are led to believe he may be the person president obama wants to lead the Defense Department when secretary panetta leaves. You may know that a number of jewish organizations and folks on capitol hill have objected already to the idea of hagel saying he has had a number of antiisraeli votes, that he has said things they perceive as antiisraeli. Has chuck hagel in your opinion disqualified himself because these various stances from becoming secretary of defense . I served with chuck hagel and worked with him on some things. I like and respect him. I wouldnt say that his votes disqualify him. If i were in the senate on the Armed Services committee and he was nominated, i would have some really serious questions to ask him. Not just about israel, but to me, the most significant Foreign Policy challenge for president obama and our country and the world in the next year or two is iran and its Nuclear Weapons program. Chuck hagel has had some very outlying votes on that. Hes been he wants to establish communication. Hes been consistently i think in that sense anybody who tries to communicate with iran has run into a brick wall, and chuck hagel has consistently been against economic sanctions to try to change the behavior of the islamic regime, the radical regime in tehran, which is the only way to do it short of war. So, in fact, as i look at chuck hagels positions on iran, they seem to me to be quite different than president obama. Now, president obama obviously has earned the right to naum night whoever he wants. I think this is a very tough confirmation process. I dont know how it would end, but there are reasonable questions to ask and that chuck hagel has to answer. Finally in our last minute i need you to solve the fiscal cliff problem. Specifically we all know that the speaker left. He couldnt get his caucus to join him on his backup plan, and he said hey, mr. President and senator reid the majority leader in the senate, its up to you to fix this. What is senator reids next move should Mitch Mcconnell get into this . How does this play out . Candy, in the aftermath of House Republicans rejectin