Rachel, thank you very much. And this president ial election, as with all president ial elections in which an incumbent is on the ballot comes down to one basic question do you want another four years of the person in the oval office right now . Do you want four more years of donald trump . Last night the president made his reelection case to america, but it was hard to see what case he was actually making. He denounced a lot of things and attacked a lot of people, but we didnt hear a lot about what the president would do with another four years. That might be because the president himself doesnt seem so sure. Heres the picture in the New York Times following a recent interview with donald trump. How would he be different in a second term . Wi really not much at all. I think hed be similar, which is exactly what his supporters e want and his opponents fear. Beyond more of the same, he is strained to see what his second term agenda would be. One thing is clear, more of the same, though, is not what america wants. 73 of voters in a recent Morning Consult poll said the l nation was on the wrong track. And a number that size cannot be ignored. Mb trump has faced three crises that have up ended his argument, a pandemic that killed more than 180,000 americans, an economic p slowdown as a result of that pandemic and the growing civil m unrest as more and more black men and black women in america are shot by police. Those crises have also reshaped the race for joe biden, and sh were going to have more on that in a moment. But let us not lose sight of the president s struggle here. The president has almost put the pandemic behind him. Several speakers at the Republican Convention talked about the coronavirus in the past tense. Despite the virus still killing a thousand americans a day. As trump accepted his partys nomination, a crowd of 1,500 gathered on the south lawn at the white house, roughly 1,500. Masks were not required and social distancing was not enforced. Is those images came hours before it was announced that four people at the rnc in charlotte tested positive for covid19. And tonight the president held a Campaign Rally in New Hampshire. About a thousand supporters attended the event and some in the crowd booed when they were told that masks were required. Plenty in the crowd apparently ignored that requirement. Others wore their masks around their chins. And you guessed it. There was no social distancing. The president is still willing to make his case on the economy, but just last week another one i Million People filed for unemployment claims. The Unemployment Rate sits right now at 10. 2 . And heres how the times peter baker describes the president sc handling of race in america. In responding to the debate over racial justice, he has sought confrontation over calm, blaming street violence on what he calls radical democrats and presenting himself as a defender of the police. Trump says his second term would be similar to all of that. That is the case he wants to make. Meanwhile, joe biden and Kamala Harris are taking a different approach to that crisis. Biden called for a National Mask mandate. Last week he said he would shut down the country if scientists recommended doing so to fight the virus. Biden says he will only hold in Person Campaign events if they are safe. Biden plans on holding in person events after labor day in battleground states. He specifically cited am pennsylvania, arizona, wisconsin and minnesota, but he said the events had to be consistent with the state rules about how many people can be assembled. And joe biden and Kamala Harris have chosen a different path on confronting this systemic racism in this nation. In his rnc speech, donald trump did not mention jacob blake, the 29yearold black man who was shot in the back seven times at close range by police in wisconsin. Biden and harris have not only condemned that shooting, they have spoken with jacob blakes family. Here is what jacob blakes father said about that conversation. I have talked to joe biden and Kamala Harris for an hour an the phone. They were so comforting that you almost forgot how the situation was really playing out. They relieved some they made jacobs mother stop being nervous for like 40, 50 minutes. And shes so nervous and so fo worried. And i dont think people understand the worry of a mother. Thats her baby. The Police Shooting of jacob blake was an important focus today on the march on washington. T thousands of protesters in d. C. Called for criminal justice restructuring and racial c equality. Kamala harris made a video appearance at the event. The road ahead, it is not going to be easy. But if we Work Together to challenge every instinct our nation has to return to the status quo and combine the wisdom of longtime warriors for justice with the Creative Energy of the Young Leaders today, we have an opportunity to make history right here and right now. Ri 67 days before the election, the difference between the two parties is stark. There are two radically different approaches being offered to handle the major crises facing america. The question is what does america want, more of the same, or is it time for a change . Leading off our discussion tonight are Yamiche Alcindor and zalina maxwell from sirius xm radio. The author of the great book the end of white politics how to heal our liberal divide. Both are msnbc political analysts. O. Or ladies, its greal really great to have you. Great to see you. I want to start off with that Morning Consult poll, that large number of people that said the country is going in the wrong direction. The question is do those people think that the president is thet person to put us back on the right track or that a change in the presidency is whats going c to be necessary . En well, its not surprising that 73 of americans are not happy with the Current Situation because by and large unless you are a republican going to a trump event you cannot live your life as you were living it before, frankly. You cant go outside. U you cant hug your friends. You have to stay socially distant. You have to wear a mask. Our lives have been upended. So what i think that poll i demonstrates is that people have noticed that some of the incompetent leadership by this president has directly paused some of these consequences, not just the fact that the virus exists at all. But we can see that other countries are able to better handle it and people are frankly looking for leadership that right now appears to be a vacuum left open by donald trump because he just will not listen to the scientists. Lets talk about what we have been seeing across the country specifically in the last few days over what happened to jacob blake. J it seems like the Trump Campaign is counting on that sort of strike, that sort of racial unrest so they can make this message that america is on fire and theyre the only ones that can put it out. Well, that was the exact message that President Trump was sending in that hour and ten minute speech on the lawn, the south lawn where of course thousands of people, hundreds of people gathered shoulder to shoulder with no social distancing and no masks and no testing. What the president was trying to do was sell the idea of fear, el this idea that what you see on your tv with a burning cars and looting, thats separate and patient from the peaceful protests that were largely seeing all over the country, that thats going to come to a l neighborhood near you. Especially white suburban women that this is going to be a scary time if joe biden is elected. As much as we talk about black o lives matter, as much as we see boycotting from athletes and the largest protests movements, polling shows that the chaos is possibly hurting the black lives Matter Movement. So Kellyanne Conway came out and said yesterday the chaos and violence helps us. She said that makes the distinction clear between President Trump and joe biden. And when you look at a poll like Marquette Law School did in wisconsin specifically, the support for black lives Matter Movement dropped among independents. It went from 47 in july to or, rather, in june to lower than that in august. There is evidence that the voters that those people are starting to look at the black lives Matter Movement and starting to equate them with tht out of control rioters that is separate from the movement. There are millions of people that tune m in to fox news ever night and hear that drum being beaten over and over again. 4 it reminds me of a lot of what we saw when we were covering this campaign in 2016. Donald trump was followed by ig strife and unrest. A lot of these rallies when you walk outside there would be clashes between trump voters ank protesters. He was inside calling for his supporters to punch protesters,d do whatever they needed to do. So he was painting this picture that america was wild and out of control, even though it was onl wild and out of control in the small pockets where he was at any given time. He was creating these these divisive moments. It seems like what were seeing right now is the president doing the same with the scenes coming out of a place like kenosha, wisconsin. Im just wondering when you talk to trump voters why do they think that the solution to what trump is doing is more trump . Well, i dont think that they see him as a cause of the unrest because he is telling them and e fox news is backing him up on this with the footage and the narrative that they are spinnin is that, you know, the reason this is happening is because democratled cities are not, you know, taking control of out of control black people. I mean, frankly, thats what hes saying. An and i think that, you know, we as american citizens and as in folks and allies to equality and justice under the law, which is what were talking about in this movement or a Movement Activists are talking about in this movement, i think that, you in know, they are very clear in their message and they are not the ones committing these acts of violence in the streets. Theyre peacefully protesting because the police have nc committed an act of violence in the streets. And until there is accountability for that, these protests are going to continue whether donald trump likes it or not. And frankly he may be able to spin it in his favor. But the problem is that if hes trying to convince suburban white women that he is the one that can him and his families safe then why on the other hand is he telling them to send their children back to School Without following the proper scientific procedures . So he is talking out of both sides of his mouth. And it may work with some voters. But frankly i think covid is something that voters cannot forget, wherever they stand on the black lives Matter Movement, they understand the pandemic is the immediate need that needs to be taken care of serious. I want to talk about joe biden very briefly here and i want to read this quote from the atlantic talking about how biden should immediately go to wisconsin, immediately go to kenosha. He should meet the blake family and give them support and comfort. He should also meet the Small Business owners who doubt that democrats care about the wreckage of their dreams. Then on the burnd out streets, from the heart, without a script, biden should speak to the city and the country. He should speak for justice and for safety, for reform and against riots, for the crying ty need to bring the country together. I guess why arent we seeing joe biden do Something Like that tonight or tomorrow . Thats a really good question. And i think its a question that the Joe Biden Campaign will likely be reckoning with. Joe biden has said that if he is president he would go to president. And we have seen joe biden deliver these eloquent remarks where they look very president ial. So it might be something that we see in the future. I go back to that idea that the polling in wisconsin specifically shows that among independents, democrats and republicans, approval for black lives matter went down from june to august. Thats a bad thing and a bad sign for joe biden in a t. Political battleground state. There are people in that community, despite how they l might feel about the overall racial equality, theyre looking at these protests and they do feel like at times theyre out of hand. Thats really people who are looting and not part of that protest. But joe biden can maybe go to those people and say, look, here is what people are feeling. Bi and also here are the businesses we understand we see. President trump is going to continue to marshall his messag saying these people are out of control. He is going to continue to con plate them and use it to his benefit. So it is an interesting idea that joe biden might be wanting to go there based on the fact i seems as though wisconsin and likely americans in other cities are really fearful of what these protests can turn into. Ly thanks for just this moment. Lets also bring in doctor ja so into the conversation. From the Harvard Global institute. I want to talk about social distancing and mask wearing andg the rhetoric the white house the president and the convention used about the pandemic, using it in past tense. The other day i was at a trump i event in pennsylvania outside oa the event where a number of p supporters had gathered. There was no social distancing. There were very few masks. Rs a lot of people were saying that masks were just a way for them to control you. It is unclear who that them is. Shannon is reporting tonight that in New Hampshire there were boos when there was it was announced there would be a maske requirement, that many people flouted that. A lot of the masks were being worn around the chin. He what does it do to have the white house hold these events to speak about the pandemic in past tense . What does it do for our National Safety when it comes to this virus . Thank you so much for having me on. We are not anywhere near done with this pandemic. Ot i think we have more days ahead of us than we have behind us. And what National Leadership requires at this moment is Clear Communication with the American People, not just of the road ahead but what we must do to protect people during the weeks and months ahead of us. Obviously were not getting that out of the white house. And any large gatherings can be dangerous. But large gatherings with no rg social distancing and no mask wearing is a recipe for e disaster. Im worried about whats going to happen in the days and weeks ahead. It is not just the mask wearing or the social distancing. It is the political pressure at the cdc, at the fda. The fda with the Plasma Treatment and now the cdc by saying that you dont need to get a test or the requirements to get a test or that you show symptoms, not that you have been in close contact with somebody and you might be asymptomatic. That destroys our ability to contact trace, if we had it in the first place. No. This week has been terrible for our kind of National Scientific infrastructure. Under republican and democratic president s, we have always had a tradition of letting the scientists at the fda, letting the scientists at the cdc speak directly to the American People and share the facts. Now not only have we muzzled them, now we see a real sort of bastardization of that science, a real kind of suppression of that science with all sorts of recommendations about somehow how we dont need testing. Not a single medical group agrees with that. Thats why you saw such strong pushback with the American Academy of pediatrics, others all saying weve got to go back to this science. Political statements cannot get us through this pandemic. And lets talk about the president s own personal safety and the risks that he it seems to be more willing to take. We not only saw what happened last night and the fact that people not everybody on the lawn was tested. They said everybody that was close to the president was checked. But the Washington Post reports this on secret Service Agent testing positive. When President Trump gave a speech to a group of sheriffs ii tampa, his decision to travel forced a large contingent of secret Service Agents to head to a state that was battling one of the worst coronavirus surges in the nation. Even before air force one touched down on july 31st, the fallout was apparent. Five secret Service Agents already on the ground had to bee replaced after one tested positive for the coronavirus ann the others working in proximity were presumed to be infected, ru according to people familiar with the situation. Yeah. You know, these men and women obviously are providing a Critical Service to our country, protecting our political leaders like the president. And i have sort of two reflections. First of all, you should not be putting these people in harms way anymore than is absolutely necessary. And i dont know why the president has at many times gone to the hot zones of america to give speeches in context where there isnt social distancing and isnt mask wearing. The second point thats really critical here is we keep hearin