Just fantastic. Meantime, watch the interview with Vladimir Putin on bloomberg politics. Com. We say to you sayonara. Coming up, hardball with Chris Matthews. Lady and gentleman, state your engines. Lets play hardball. Good evening. Im Chris Matthews in new york. After a week with kathleen, michael, sarah, thomas, caroline, julie and brendan im back to hardball. We have an exciting show tonight starting with the brutal challenge now facing republican candidate donald trump. Also tonight, the negative stories about now breaking on former president bill clinton and on trump. Plus the fear that russia meaning Vladimir Putin is playing mischief with our president ial campaign. Also, i talk with tom hanks about his new role playing the
courageous Airline Pilot, you know the guy who landed that plane in the hudson river saving all 155 passengers aboard. Lets get started. Heres how this president ial Campaign Looks right now. Even though polls show the race getting tighter a bit, the facts staring at us and certainly the two major candidates is that Hillary Clinton has a solid lead over donald trump where it matters most, where it will decide the election. In fact, it shows her winning the election even if trump wins every one of the states viewed right now as tossups. He wins all the tossups, she still wins according to current numbers which is damning for the situation he now faces. A brand new nbc news battleground map gives clinton 272 electoral votes to trumps 174 meaning if the election were held today, again, she would win the necessary 270 votes in the Electoral College right now. States accounting for 200 electoral votes are now categorized as likely democratic. Another 72 electoral votes are counted as lean democratic. That compares to 133 electoral
votes that are likely for trump. Another 41 that lean toward trump. Anyway, 92 votes right now are seen as tossups. What all this means is that trumps at the bottom of a very Steep Mountain tonight. One route for him to climb that mountain is an historic victory in the upcoming debates, perhaps trumps great daunting hope to turn this race around. Obviously, Hillary Clinton and her team were going to try to crush that hope, to paint trump as a dangerous commander in chief. Thats what she did today in tampa with a message geared to veterans. His companies, trump companies, have fired veterans because they had to take time off to fulfill their military commitments. And when asked why he would insult a gold star family, he suggested that his sacrifices are somehow comparable to theirs. Hes talked about letting syria become a free zone for isis. Look at the map, donald. Hes talked about sending in american ground troops. Not on my watch. That is not what we are going to do. He says he has a secret plan to defeat isis. But the secret is he has no plan. The Trump Campaign of course came back at that. In a statement, jason miller, Senior Communications adviser for trump said quote, Hillary Clintons remarks today in tampa are exactly what you would expect to hear from a candidate who took off the month of august and woke up in september losing the election. Well, who exactly is losing this election right now . Michael steele, former chairman of the Republican National committee, msnbc political analyst, can, howard fineman, global editorial director for huffington post, heidi pryzbla. This numbers game, it is daunting if you look at the battleground states. Hillary already past the 270 number, at 272. Trump, if he wins every one of the tossup states across the
country starting in nevada all the way to florida, if you look at it west to down east, in florida, he has to win all of them and even if he does, hillary still wins. Bad situation right now. This is coming at a time when arguably, hes had a big lift over the past couple of weeks from Hillary Clinton getting knocked down a bit. We are seeing that in the polling averages. Its not only just in terms of these key swing states but also when you look further into the polling data, you look at the demographic groups and i cant see evidence of him really expanding his base in any of these other key demographic groups other than white males where he continues to be dominant. So in terms of the polling averages, its in terms of the demographic groups and its in all of the key battleground states. Essentially his rust belt state strategy that he sold from the beginning or that he said he would rely on from the beginning isnt working if you have michigan, states like michigan and pennsylvania going blue and then youre not making it up in some of the newer swing states
like colorado and virginia. Brand new nbc news online poll shows Clinton Holding a four point lead over trump nationwide, 41 to 37 . Thats not much. Libertarian gary johnson and Green Party Candidate jill stein are still a distant third and fourth. Meanwhile, a new kcnn poll is also out today which shows trumping pulling ahead, 45 to 43 . In this poll, johnson has less votes, 7 and stein is down to 2 . They both do much better in our own poll. Let me go to michael steele. It seems to me trump has a mountain to climb right now because if he wins all the tossup states, all the jump balls, he still loses. Hes got to win all them and then hes got to go on and win pennsylvania, wisconsin and michigan, then to win the election. Its really tough for him. Does he throw the long ball . Does he go for a hail mary . What does he do . He has to do all of it. He has to throw the long ball, got to do the short game on the ground with turnout, hes got to find new constituencies which you have seen him try to do with
africanamericans, for example. Not so much to win that constituency but to pull those numbers down a little bit as opposed to losing 80 to 20, youre losing a little bit less than that. A lot less than that. But thats the reality for him. Look, going to what heidi just said, this is no surprise. This blue wall so to speak has been here for quite some time. Four out of the last six president ial elections have landed for democrats because of the way the demographics are set up nationally. Republicans have focused on congressional races. Redistricting doesnt fix this problem. This goes to a broader view of the party, a broader view of the president ial messaging by a candidate, et cetera. This is going to be a long hail mary pass for the Trump Campaign starting right now. So the bunching of liberal voting not just minorities but liberal voting generally in the big cities hurts the democrats in terms of redistricting but it certainly helps them win the big states. Thats right. Howard, lets take a look at this. A new abc interview aired this morning, trump explained why he doesnt think Hillary Clinton, heres a personal knock, doesnt look president ial. Lets catch this action by trump. Let me ask you, you often talked about Hillary Clintons stamina. Right. You have even said she doesnt look president ial. I really do believe that. Yes. What do you mean by that . I just dont think she has a president ial look. You need a president ial look. You have to get the job done. I think if she went to mexico she would have had a total failure. We had a big success. Nch when you talk about her not looking president ial, are you talking about aesthetics here . Hey, by the way, she says things about me that are horrible. As an example, the single greatest asset i have according to those who know me are my temperament. But she came up with this madison avenue line lets talk about his temperament. The single greatest asset i have is my temperament. The Clinton Campaign responded, this is not the first time donald trump has had a problem looking at someone different from himself and actually seeing thm. This cycle voters know all too well what is not president ial. Donald trump in his narrow views and divisive rhetoric. Sometimes you and i are used to staff writing back and forth. It is so dull and boring, this back and forth, these lines. Trump, his problem seems to be he will never take back anything even when david muir feeds him a line, he has to go along with it, that she doesnt look president ial. He goes yeah, yeah, i cant take back something i might have said once even if he never said it, doesnt remember saying it. Hes all too happy to do it. Any time you think donald trump has been schooled by someone like kellyanne conway, his pretty Smart Campaign manager, to cool it on this kind of thing, he does it again. That was muted by donald trump standards but still, it was vaguely sexist, it was every uncouth type of remark in the book. But heres the thing. Donald trumps problem is twofold right now. Over the weekend, he was advertising heavily, we talk about football before, he was advertising heavily on college
football games. Whos watching that . A constituency that should already be his. In terms of the Republican Party, right now, its about threequarters of the Republican Party is either enthusiastically or reluctantly supporting donald trump. That isnt nearly enough. Hes going to detroit not in expectation of getting huge numbers of africanamerican voters. Hes going to detroit to try to get some undecided suburban voters who think hes nothing but a flat out racist. Beyond the eight mile line. Donald trump did more than anyone to take the birther attack against obama mainstream. Today one of trumps biggest supporters, you might expect, dr. Ben carson, being reasonable here, was asked about trumps birther history. Here he goes. You think its time for donald trump to acknowledge that all that birther nonsense was a mistake and to apologize, so that africanamerican voters to whom hes reaching out might be more willing to listen to his message . I think that would be a good idea. Absolutely. You know, he said that so
casually. He took away this guys original sin and said confess, brother. Confess. Its astounding how casual he was. Trumps not going to take back birtherism. Thats his stock in trade. But he should. He should. You cannot go and sit down in a room of africanamericans, i dont care what their political stripe is, and not know that that hangs over that conversation. Look, whether youre republican, conservative, democrat, liberal, if you are africanamerican, there was pride in the election of barack obama. All right . So to put him through and question his lineage and the nation in which he was born, yeah, that matters to a lot of folks. Its not going to be dispositive of general election support per se, but it taints the conversation. Thats what ben carson was getting to. Yes, he should, because it makes the conversation easier if you do. Lets go into crazy land, heidi. The crazy theory of birtherism. Now, does trump deny that his mother is his mother . Does he deny that obamas mother is his mother . I think he would probably accept that fact. In which case, he is an american citizen by most standards. He just isnt native born american, right . You get to this crazy world where hes illegally here. If you go that far, hes somehow, he should be deported, not recognized as president. The whole birtherism thing is a road to crazy land. How do you drive back on that road from crazy land . Its hard to come back from that. The people who are listening to this, though, and the core audience that actually Still Believes in some of the birtherism line is his base and they dont care for those type of details. Whos your mother . Those details. Chris, the problem is, though, to be competitive in those big states he needs like pennsylvania, to take an
example, in the collar counties around philadelphia, those crosspressured especially women professional moderate republicans and others like that, that onefourth of the Republican Party that is saying im not getting anywhere close to donald trump, the Trump Campaigns objective, Kellyanne Conways objective has to be to remove things somehow that are preventing those people. But i dont think its possible. What the poll is showing right now on the state by state basis is that its not possible. I dont thinks the possible, though, i dont think you need to take back the birtherism angle. Theres so much more you would have to take back in addition to that to appeal, it would be a good place to start. If you are appealing to white suburban women, stop saying these things like today, like he said about Hillary Clinton not looking president ial. Just stop. Speaking of Hillary Clinton, i have been saving this sugar plum for michael. The proclinton super pac priorities usa is out with a new ad attacking trump for his past statements on the issue of war
and on his statements about Nuclear Weapons which this ad puts together. Lets watch. Im really good at war. I love war in a certain way. Including with nukes, yes, including with nukes. I know more about isis than the generals do, believe me. I like war in a certain way, including nuclear, typed together, married together, those two different thoughts to make it sound like this guy is dr. Strangelove. I know. Your thoughts . Its just, we are in the land of neverneverland on crazy commercials. Should she take that one back . Should the pac say this is outrageous, calling trump a lover of nuclear war . They are no more going to take that back than donald trump will take back his birtherism comments. Here we are. This is why turnout this election is going to be hard for a lot of voters. Because of the way these campaigns are pushing the voters right now into this dark corner
that theyre just going to you know what, i dont want to play. No mas. Heres the problem for the Clinton Campaign on this type of advertising. This is only the day after labor day and they are already exploding Nuclear Weapons. This is the daisy ad already. Where do you go from here . The day after labor day. Where do you go from here . Thats the one danger i think that hillary faces here. To go from here to november with primarily, if not almost exclusively an attack program on donald trump. I dont know, maybe thats the way to win the election. They certainly seem to think so at this point. I have to go to heidi. Why is hillary when we show her in pretty damn strong position tonight, in fact, if things hang the way they are, she wins, why is she going to the Nuclear Button here . Why is she going to accuse the guy of liking nuclear war . Because its part of a broader shift, trying to shift the narrative back to her credentials, her background, her experience on National Security. You will have your Forum Tomorrow night and she wants to keep driving up his negatives. She has all these National Security advisers, gop advisers coming over to her. She wants to keep the focus on that and on donald trump in a negative way. This does it. They are not that nutty, these neocons. I dont think theyre for nuclear war. Shes accusing trump of fomenting war and of course, he will say a lot of people now advising hillary are the people who got us into iraq. As the hawks join hillary she accuses him of exactly. Another level. Another level. Its a problem on her left flank, by the way, because those hawks that are joining hillary are causing real concerns for bernies progressives. As they should. We can agree on that. Thank you so much, michael, howard and of course, heidi. Coming up, Hillary Clinton continues to face questions about why her husband should have received 7 million from a forprofit College Group for five years of well, we dont know what. Meanwhile, donald trump is now being grilled about a
campaign donation his charity made to the attorney general of floridas Political Action committee when her office was considering whether to investigate Trump University. Interesting combination there. Plus the fbis investigating what its calling a broad covert russian operation to undermine our president ial election. What is moscow up to . What are we doing to stop them . And the Academy Award winning actor t great tom hanks is coming here tonight. He stars in sully about that courageous Airline Pilot who heroically landed his plane there in the hudson river, saving all the lives of all those aboard. Finally, something new on this show. My election diary. A nightly look at where the president ial race stands as of tonight. Tonight, its dire for donald trump. Take on any road with intuitive allwheel drive. The nissan rogue, murano and pathfinder. Now get 0 apr for 72 months, plus 500 bonus cash. Join me tomorrow night at 7 00 eastern from the flight
deck of the intrepid in new york city. It will be the first Candidates Forum of the general Election Campaign featuring Hillary Clinton and donald trump live tomorrow night. Nbcs matt lauer moderates beginning at 8 00 eastern on msnbc. Well be right back. Over ceda . Super food . Is that a real thing . Its a great school, but is it the right the one for her . Is this really any better than the one you got last year . If we consolidate suppliers whats the savings there . So shod we go with the 7 horsepower . Or is a 423 enough . Good question. You ask a lot of good questions. I think we should move yointo our new fund. Ok. Re. But are you asking enough about how your wealth is managed . Wealth management, at charles schwab. Welcome back to hardball. With two months before the election, both sides are facing negative headlines t