righteous citizens must step up and make the country work. justice is something we should all expect and stand by police to make sure justice is done, even if other police are the ones we question. thanks for watching. i m al sharpton. hardball starts right now. the return of mccarthyism. let s play hardball. good evening. i m chris matthews in san francisco. let me start with the return of mccarthyism. i speak of the behavior of senator ted cruz who accuses president obama of undermining the relationship with israel. it is cruz once again with the reckless charges of joe mccarthy in the 1950s. as he once suggested future secretary of defense chuck hagel was taking hundreds of thousands of dollars from north korea or saudi arabia he now accuses barack obama of working mischief against israel. didn t this country have enough of this stuff 60 years ago? when the reckless communist mccarthy was brought down? is senator cruz trying to mimic the bad old days or just so ignorant are of what those tactics did he s not aware of the horror of mccarthyism all over again. it makes cruz someone who doesn t care what he says as long as it rings the bell at the county fair, makes noise on the right. the place where he set his willful ambition. have you no decency? apparently not . joining me is joe klein and ed rendell, former governor of pennsylvania. senator cruz objected to a temporary f.a.a. ban on flights by u.s. airlines to israel yesterday, a ban put in place tuesday as cautionary measure after hamas rocket landed near the israeli airport. the decision also came in the wake of downed malaysian flight mh-17 last week. while some in israel and the u.s. objected to the ban because of the economic impact on israel senator cruz implied a for nefarious motive saying, the facts suggest that president obama has just used a federal regulatory agency to launch an economic boycott on israel in order to try to force our ally to comply with his foreign policy demands. here is houma rhee harf responded to the allegations yesterday. senator cruz said the flight suspension is economic blackmail and the obama administration is doing this to punish israel. that s ridiculous and offensive. the f.a.a. takes these responsibilities seriously. they make decisions based solely on the security and safety of american citizens, period. for anyone to suggest otherwise is just ridiculous. in turn senator cruz doubled down on the allegations on fox news last night. yesterday we saw the f.a.a. make an unprecedented decision to ban all air travel to the nation of israel. i have asked today the very simple question did president obama just unilaterally launch economic boycotts on the nation of israel? is this a political decision? was it driven by the white house? by the state department? if it was based on airline safety, as they said, why did they single out israel? why not ban travel to pakistan or yemen or ukraine where a commercial airliner was shot down. instead they targeted israel. they did ban travel to ukraine. flights to israel were restored this morning after the f.a.a. lifted the short ban which lasted about 36 hours altogether. let me go to joe klein on this. let me say this. i know what cruz is up to. he s shouting from are the rooftops in a reckless way. making charges. he doesn t feel the need to substantiate. tell me what you think of this guy, what he s doing. it s gotten worse over the last few hours. cruz is now saying he will hold up all state department appointments until there is an investigation that gets to the bottom of this. we need our state department people out in places like israel and the palestinian area. this is just gamesmanship. you look at the larger picture, all the noisy investigators in the republican house like darryl issa. what have are they come up with? they have been talking about benghazi for years. nothing. this is a major smoke screen. it s a major smoke screen at a time where we have to be very clear about what s going on in gaza and in that region. also in ukraine. but, there is one difference between cruz and mccarthy so far. cruz is going after big fish like obama. mccarthy ruined the lives of a lot of average americans. i suspect cruz will be ringing the bell until he gets anywhere near a presidential primary at which point he ll be dismissed quickly. you and i grew up with this as did joe. i first caught this guy s act when he went after chuck hagel whose nomination was a problem. he wasn t going to be a slam dunk. not when he was most vulnerable cruz impugned his motives by saying he was out there taking money from the north koreans. that s a classic mccarthy charge. now accusing the president of me the nefariously going after israel. for better or worse we are israel s best friend at least in this incident of fighting with hamas. it s all over on their side. all over. what s shocking is number one he s made the charges without a shred of evidence as he did against now secretary hagel. number one. number two, it s idiotic to think a temporary two or three-week boycott of u.s. planes in israel would have a major impact on the israeli economy that would force them to do anything. it doesn t make sense. 36 hours now. that s all it was. joe made a good point. it s part of the republican assault on virtually anything the president does. what s disconcerting to me is two things. one we are doing it in the midst of tough times. we used to bind together, put partisanship aside when there was difficulties like what s going on in the middle east now. number two is this unrelenting assault on whatever president obama does. you know i m not a guy who says president obama is right all the time. but they are holding him to such a standard. imagine for a second he didn t impose such a ban and a hamas rocket brought down a u.s. commercial flight into israel. the republicans would be screaming blody murder. why didn t president obama protect our citizens? look, if president obama discovered a cure for cancer today, tomorrow republicans like cruz would be saying s done nothing for heart attack victims. this is standard f.a.a. behavior. cruz comes from texas. he s been spending too much time in washington. if he were traveling back and forth to texas he would know that the f.a.a. cancels flights on the nearest suspicion of a tiny thunderstorm. they have become very, very cautious over the last decade. it s baloney. take a look at the guys in action. first of all, cruz attacking hag haguen. then mccarthy. i will point out this committee knows absolutely nothing about the personal compensation chuck hagel received in 2009, 2008, 2010. it is relevant to know if the $200,000 he deposited in his bank account came directly from saudi arabia, from north korea. i have no evidence to suggest it is or isn t. here is senator cruz s role model, senator mccarthy. he says he s not concerned about low level spies in the state department. he s saying communists are making policy at the highest levels of government. let s listen. i am speaking of the group sabotaging foreign policy. you can bias bias. meaning the little fellow who will sell his country for 30 pieces of silver. it s the men in the top level of government and the second echelon who do the planning and shaping of foreign policy. they are the dangerous men whether they get 30 pieces of silver or not. does that sound familiar? absolutely. easiest tactic in the world to throw it out there and say, well, we don t know. it is mccarthyism. no question. the american people are better than this. i think republicans are hurting themselves with all of the shenanigans, anti-obama venom. they are trying hard to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory in the november elections. let s look at a reasonable person who disagrees with the president and the f.a.a. decision but did so in a reasonable way. here s michael bloomberg offering up a defense basically. the former new york mayor offering a defense of at least a character in good will of an administration he disagrees with on this point. if you don t feel safe here i don t know where you would feel safe. i think the state department is just over reacting in typical bureaucratic fashion. political reasons for that? why would you think that? i m asking you. don t be ridiculous. it s an outrage for you to i m just asking by asking the question, you are implying our government does things for political rchblt maybe once in a while they do. it is your job to prove it. just the allegation i take as an offense. that was well done, joe, wasn t it? yes. it shows you how the process works. cruz spews poison into the media atmosphere. people like wolf have to ask the question at that point. so cruz accomplishes what he wanted. the difference between cruz and mccarthy is that cruz is brilliant. if you listen to the way he used the words when he was kind of accusing hagel of taking money from the wrong places the construction was absolutely brilliant. you couldn t pin anything on cruz other than the overwhelming charge he s raising this ridiculous nonsense. it s innuendo. yeah. but cruz is a brilliant lawyer. mccarthy was not so brilliant. i disagree with that a little bit cruz might be a brilliant lawyer and may have phrased it in legalese but to the american people he looks like a jerk, acting against the country at a time we should be coming together. i think they are making big mistake. all i can say is he s making his opponent on the right, rand paul look like pope francis. thank you, joe cline and ed rendell. coming up, marco rubio calls a fake foul. remember those tricks? accusing people who support same-sex marriage as intolerant and opponents as victims. that s a tactic for you. plus, the story in iraq no one is talking about. the persecution of christians by islamic fundamentalists who have taken over a third of the country. i m talking about isis. and a long shot senate candidacy got longer. there are charges of plagiarism against john walsh who was behind already, trying to hold the montana senate seat. finally this is what happens when you get too enthusiastic at the closing of the new york stock market. 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[ whirring ] [ train whistle blows ] she makes trains that are friends with trees. my mom works at ge. with the top speedou compare of comcast the top speed of business dsl from the internet. phone company my mom works at ge. well, there s really no comparison. why pay more for less? call today for a low price on speeds up to 150mbps. and find out more about our two-year price guarantee. comcast business. built for business. welcome back. talk about a fake foul. yesterday during a speech on family values at catholic university senator marco rubio are explained why he opposed same-sex marriage and why that doesn t mean he s seeking to discriminate against gay people. fair enough. he also seemed to go out of his way to say it s his side those supporting traditional marriage who have been victimized. let s watch. today there is growing intolerance on this issue. intolerance toward those who continue to support traditional marriage. we have seen the push to remove the ceo of mozilla because in 2008 he made a small donation to support proposition 8 in california. we have seen chick-fil-a attacked and boycotted due to the c.e.o. giving an honest answer to a question about his religious beliefs. even before this speech is over i will be attacked as a hater or bigot or someone who is anti-gay. this intolerance in the name of tolerance is hypocrisy. supporting the definition of marriage as one man and one woman is not anti-gay. it is pro traditional marriage. if support for traditional marriage is bigotry then barack obama was a bigot until just before the 2012 election. the country has been moving toward embracing same-sex marriage. everyone knows that. marco rubio and his allies may be losing it. i think they are. have they been victimized for their views? howard dean, former chairman of the democratic national committee. michael steele is a political analyst and former chair of the republican national committee. let me go to michael steele. let me ask you a couple of things to set it up. do you think the republican party will keep its platform, its plank which opposes same-sex marriage next time around? will they run on that platform of opposing same-sex marriage? i think in large measure they will, chris. it depends who the nominee of the party is. as you know for both parties, what is or is not in that platform. i would think right now given the current landscape, i don t see that plank being removed just as i don t see, for example, the pro gay marriage plank being removed from the democrats. let me go to governor dean. do you think that s a winning issue for them to come out in 201? that s almost three years from now, well into the 21st century that marco rubio seems to be playing the champion of. at that point, still coming out against it? well, first of all, it depends who the nominee is. if rob portman who made noise about running for president is the nominee and i suspect that plank will no longer be in the platform. secondly, what marco rubio is doing is a sophisticated are version of what cruz is doing. it s a flop, as you called it earlier. there is no foul here. he took a flying leap. what he s doing is something quite sophisticated. the christian community has long felt victimized. they felt like they were a minority. that people didn t treat them with with respect. that s what marco rubio is playing to here. the truth is many religions discriminate against people. they feel gay people aren t full citizens and some felt black people weren t full citizens. the mormon church changed their views in 1974 on this. you re a catholic, i was baptized catholic. it doesn t permit women to be priests. there are limitations on the roles of women in the church. that s church doctrine. it discriminates against women. the problem is marco rubio is trying to make a religious argument for the civil matter. we have equal rights under the law. he may endorse a religion that doesn t dpree with that. it doesn t mean people oppose him are intolerant. i think he s right. i will give you time after my interjecti interjection. the republicans know they can t champion traditional marriage in 2016. so they will play the victim and say, it s not about whether you are for or against gay marriage. it is whether you are intolerant toward people opposed to it. i don t think the democratic party is ever going to attack people with a different view. 42% of the country oppose it. why would any party kiss off 42%. marco rubio gave examples. i m talking about the democratic party. i m including them. there were those on the left who supported to chick-fil-a and various ceos who have a personal view on this matter. not how they run their companies. not what they say is part of their business. but what they view personally. they have been villified. one ceo lost his job. i think there is a basis for concern about how the pendulum is swinging here. i think you are off base here. marco rubio wasn t arguing for or against the subject of gay marriage. he was talking about a political position, number one. number two the moral components of that political position. that s not endorsing a position, saying it s a catholic or protestant view. he s saying there are those of us in this country who hold the traditional marriage has value and right now there is a tendency for those folks to be vilified or criticized because of it. if you taken a position this is why i signed the first civil union bill. not because i had a big jones for gay rights. equal rights under the law means every individual in america has the same rights. true. unless people who fall in love who are the same sex can t get married they can t are have federal rights. that s the argument. i have no problem with a religion who says you can t have same-sex marriage. i have a problem with any kind of format that says equal rights under the law should not be allowed. that s the argument he s make. we should go after him. go ahead, chris. why do republicans keep getting back into the sex question when it has worked against them so often. i don t understand this kind of youthful ambition. maybe i have forgotten it. but he wants to be president so bad he s willing to pick up an issue and run with it today. why doesn t he relax a little bit, this guy? he s desperate. he s down 12 points to hillary. in his dream world he thinks he s a candidate for president against hillary. nothing could be further from the truth. i think marco rubio and i have to give him credit for a very sober well thought out argument he made. he was at a catholic institution, talking about a moral principled position. it was good. i don t think there was this category call leap to jump into the presidential race. yes. is he carving out new space? absolutely. my impression was that was not the driver here. i thought he was playing for the hard cultural right, the rick santorum crowd. he used catholic u. as a base of operations. he was talking to the right wings in the country. he went to the wrong place. the republicans are silly. people under 35 won t vote for candidates who talk like this. this is why obama got 67% of the vote. i don t know about that. they haven t so far. we ll see. 16 is a long way off. certainly true. among women under 35 you are definitely correct. they are liberal on these issues. they don t buy what s called the traditional view. nobody is attacking heterosexual marriage. there is no marriage in jeopardy because it is a straight marriage. if you worry are about people being coupled together in a same sex situation that s your problem, not a real problem. i love that word coupling. anyway, up next, strong arm tactics on wall street. but not the usual kind. the sideshow is next. this is hardball, the place for politics. really. so our business can be on at&t s network for $175 dollars a month? 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[ male announcer ] ask your doctor about lyrica today. it s specific treatment for diabetic nerve pain. welcome back to hardball. time for the sideshow. the latest recipient of the congressional medal of honor doesn t know his own strength. watch what happened yesterday at the new york stock exchange when ryan pitts rang the closing bell. [ applause ] whoa! what did he do to that gavel? it was all taken in good humor. the crowd laughed and cheered for the army paratrooper awarded the presidential medal of honor. next jimmy fallon points out toronto mayor rob ford is campaigning for re-election despite his out in the open battle with drugs and alcohol. he wants to hold onto his job. look at this. he wants to get re-elected so he s out there campaigning, talking to voters, meeting the people. he went to a play ground and this is real. this is a real video. i know. but this is a real video. oh, my gosh. oh, my be careful. hold on. yeah. he really did that. there was a girl screaming oh, my god. that s his campaign manager. some politicians will do anything to get their favorability up. some have to because in a new poll one of the darkest characters in the galaxy far, far away has a better favorability rating, believe it or not than the current potential 2016 presidential candidates. in a poll from the 538 blog the favorability of star wars characters was measured. compared to national polling darth vader was viewed more favorably than hillary clinton, than mike huckabee or rand paul. the only star wars character to come in lower was jar jar binks who was still higher than congress. darth vader cut off his son s arm and blew up a planet but gets a higher rating than the candidates for 2016. this is hardball, the place for politics. called allstate quickfoto claim. it s an app. you understand that? just take photos of the damage with your phone and upload them to allstate. really? so you get a quicker estimate, quicker payment, quicker back to normal. i just did it. but maybe you can find an app that will help you explain this to your father. introducing quickfoto claim. just another way allstate is changing car insurance for good. at every ford dealership, you ll find the works! it s a complete checkup of the services your vehicle needs. so prepare your car for any road trip by taking it to an expert ford technician. because no matter your destination good maintenance helps you save at the pump. get our multi-point inspection with a synthetic blend oil change, tire rotation, brake inspection and more for $29.95 or less. get a complete vehicle checkup hey there, i m alex witt. president obama spoke at a california technical college earlier and touched on a range of issues including improving the economy, energy and job training. the president has been on a three-day fund raising trip to the west coast. a new jersey couple is dead after a tornado struck a catch ground in virginia. their son was critically hurt. dozens for waken to hospitals. local officials say the wreckage of flight 5070 was found in mali. it disappeared over western africa. severe weather may have been a factor. two more military planes carrying remains of victims from flight 17 landed earlier in the netherlands. the flight with 298 people on board was shot down last week over ukraine. most of those on board were dutch. now back to hardball. we are back. here is a story from iraq you may not have heard about. the persecution of oh christians at the hands ofs i miracle extremists. christians in iraq occupied by isis are being warned to have are a choice. convert to islam, pay a steep price or face death. that was the message playing over loud speakers at iraq s second largest city mosul. isis launched an offensive last month and seized control of sunni regions with the goal of capturing baghdad. the offensive has crested for now. christianity which came to iraq in the first century a.d. remains under constant threat. iraq was home to 1 million christians prior to the 2003 u.s.-led invasion. ever since are christians have been the target of brutal violence, facing the bombing of churches and killing of clergymen facing many to leave the community in iraq to stand around half that size. 450,000 according to church officials. they are being purged by isis. jim, i guess you know me well enough to know when i saw the story i leapt on it. it s something i didn t know about. what do you know about the actual day to day life threats, death threats that the christian community is getting in baghdad or actually anywhere in iraq from isis? the threats are mainly in the m ork sul region where isis is in control. at this point, there are very few people of christian faith in mosul. the community has been down to a handful of people. they are being quite persecuted. the stories we are getting from their families in the states. that s a huge christian, iraqi community in the states. it s horrifying. the villages under threat are north of mosul. i m pretty sure they will be safe. the purging is disturbing. it goes back to the iraq war itself. when the ethnic cleansing took place. they never paid attention to the issue at all. thanks for joining us. i went to school with an iraqi-christian. we knew there was a christian community there. what is the united states doing to prevent this or give any protection to this small christian community over there? catholic relief services is on the ground in iraq now as a matter of fact. just this week with officials from the u.s. government helping to plan relief operations. catholic relief services is responding to the needs of the christians who fled mosul, many with just the clothes on their back. those folks left. they had to cross checkpoints as they fled. when they crossed checkpoints they were stripped of possessions, money and even the rings off their fingers. we are providing them with food, basic cooking supplies and hygiene supplies. what is the attitude of arab people to arab christians? do they see them as outsiders or people who have been there for 2000 years well before there was islam as a practiced religion. christians in mosul have been there for 1500 years. they are integral members of the community. it s interesting. our staff on the ground told me this morning that the neighboring sunni, shia and other minority communities have been generously receiving christians who fled from mosul. most of the people in iraq are tolerant of their christian brothers. but isis and other extremist groups don t share that perspective. that s the problem. these groups were unleashed during the civil war period. they did not reflect that. it is a thuggish gang of criminals not unlike some of the mexican drug groups or some of the gang groups that exist in this country. this is a criminal outcast element that s adopted the language of islam as their political ideology but had nothing to do with the religion and coreligions who don t share their depravity or violence. is there anyone in the state department or white house. you do this all the time, fight for the cause. there are those who do. the leverage the united states has in a country like iraq is limited. clearly we don t want to support prime minister malaki. it s part p of the problem that unleashed the sectarian violence. we have allies we ought to be empowering to do more than they are doing. as bill notes relief assistance that s going to be required in the long run for the iraqi christian community. but the ultimate solution in iraq which is way down the road is to create a government that represents the iraqi people, all of them, in a nonsectarian state that s inclusive and tolerant and that we are a long way off from that, chris. we are trying to create a united america here at home, if you haven t noticed. this is an example of what s going on in cities like mosul. one christian resident said we had to go through an area where they set up a checkpoint. islamic state group militants asked us to get out of the car. we got out. they took our bags, money, everything on us. i don t know what will happen to us. our future is uncertain. what can people do? anything to help these people out or get fellow of americans. i think there is a lot people can do. certainly they can support the catholic relief services and other groups on the ground assisting those who have fled. they can also pay attention to the situation and encourage our government, the united states government to engage in ways that are going to bring peace to the region and help are bring the vision jim mentioned for an inclusive government to fruition. that needs to happen. we all have loyalties to the christian community of the arabian world. i feel it when i go to jerusalem. i care about those people. they have been there 2,000 years. thank you. up next, how a long shot senate candidacy just got well, longer. this is hardball, the place for politics. a, they think salmon and energy. but the energy bp produces up here creates something else as well: jobs all over america. engineering and innovation jobs. advanced safety systems & technology. shipping and manufacturing. across the united states, bp supports more than a quarter million jobs. when we set up operation in one part of the country, people in other parts go to work. that s not a coincidence. it s one more part of our commitment to america. well, here s a story for people who love newspapers and politics, as i do. name the president the new york times mentioned more often in one year than any other? the washington post did the research. i ll bet it s not the president you think. in fifth place mentioned in 6,220 the articles was gerald ford in 1976. in fourth place, jack kennedy in 1962, the second year of his presidency. in third, richard nixon in 1973 as water gate heated up. first runner up in second place, barack obama in the election year of 2012. in first place, the president you probably didn t expect jimmy carter in 1980 with 9,720 articles written about him. at the bottom of the list, rutherford b. hayes in 1877. poor him. movie night. i get 2x the points on streaming movies and takeout from restaurants with my citi thankyou card. everyone wins. you mean you win. yes i do. the citi thankyou preferred card earn two times the thankyou points with no annual fee. to apply, go to citi.com/thankyoucards. you owned your car for four you named it brad. you loved brad. and then you totaled him. you two had been through everything together. two boyfriends. three jobs. you re like nothing can replace brad! then liberty mutual calls. and you break into your happy dance. if you sign up for better car replacement, we ll pay for a car that s a model year newer with 15,000 fewer miles than your old one. see car insurance in a whole new light. liberty mutual insurance. and cialis for daily use helps you be ready anytime the moment is right. cialis is also the only daily ed tablet approved to treat symptoms of bph, like needing to go frequently. tell your doctor about all your medical conditions and medicines, and ask if your heart is healthy enough for sex. do not take cialis if you take nitrates for chest pain, as it may cause an unsafe drop in blood pressure. do not drink alcohol in excess. side effects may include headache, upset stomach, delayed backache or muscle ache. to avoid long term injury, get medical help right away for an erection lasting more than four hours. if you have any sudden decrease or loss in hearing or vision, or any allergic reactions like rash, hives, swelling of the lips, tongue or throat, or difficulty breathing or swallowing, stop taking cialis and get medical help right away. ask your doctor about cialis for daily use and a free 30-tablet trial. in politics words matter, especially when you steal them from someone else and get caught red-handed. senator john walsh, democrat are from montana, behind already in his race to keep his appointed seat has been caught red-handed. in a great piece of investigative journalism the new york times reported today that walsh s masters thesis which earned him a degree from the united states army war college in 2007 is so riddled with instances of plagiarism that it s rivalled by few examples in recent political history. at least a quarter of the thesis, key parts of the conclusion and a third of the paper was lifted from other work without proper credit. this is a look at 19 pages. every one has instances of plagiarism on it. what s more remarkable is this part of the story. when asked directly if he had plagiarized senator walsh responded, i don t believe i did, no. the college s academic handbook leaves no wiggle room for fraud. the new york times reports copying a segment of another s work word for word, then conveniently forgetting to include quotation mark bus remembering to cite the source is described as academic fraud in the handbook. according to a memo to supporters senator walsh acknowledged his citations weren t all done correctly. sean sullivan is with the washington post and joan walsh, editor at large of salon. thanks for joining us. how is the story holding up today? large sections in the paper showing it was obviously lifted from other sources. so much of the paper. absolutely. this story has the potential to be very damaging for senator walsh. you know, here is somebody who doesn t really have much of a record. he was recently appointed to the senate and really he was going to be running on the strength of his military record and the strength of his character, and this is a development that cuts against both of those things. this got a lot of attention in local papers today. it was on the front page of almost every local paper in montana. so, you know, walsh was already behind in this race, but this damaging revelation to him, you know, makes things even harder for him heading toward november. joan, what do you make of the breadth of this? this isn t one of two oversights or failure to quote. this is large bodies of material. does that sort of suggest that maybe he was a little uneven in his thinking at that time, that he did suffer from post traumatic stress syndrome, that there might have been something wrong in his stability at that point that would justify at least morally what happened? you know, chris, i had the same thought. i mean, it s so egregious, it is worse than anything we know in recent history. and it s so blatant that it does make you wonder if things were entirely all right. i m not defending it, and i also want to say, you know, senator walsh has not been well served by his staff. unfortunately, they ve come out with really shifting explanations. they came out today and they ve tried to say it was a citation problem. it s not. it s a plagiarism problem. and i also think this issue of ptsd, my heart goes out to him, i believe him. i certainly conservatives are mocking it today. i wouldn t do that. i think if he had gotten out and told the times that s what he thought happened, this story might have looked very differently from the start. it s very hard right now. it s not impossible. i don t want to say that. but it is hard right now to get the attention that maybe this deserves for a frank accounting of his struggles and also his treatment. he says he s gotten treatment and he s still on medication. that would have been a really great thing to say, i think, the day that the times approached him. well, i ve never quite understood plagiarism. i always thought there s vanity in writing. i do a lot of writing. i like to take credit for my writing because i tid it. if you didn t do it, why would you want to take credit? 1988, egregious case, joe biden was caught trying to pass off the words of a british politician as his own. ended up costing him a shot at the democratic nomination for president. last year rand paul was caught lifting chunks of wikipedia entries in his speeches and later found to have lifted sections of think tank essays in his books and opinion columns he s written. the new york times says, mr. walsh appears to have gone considerably further. back to you, sean. what evidence do we have that he really suffered from a syndrome that might have shaken his ability to make sound decisions when he was taking this course? well, right now the evidence we have is basically what he s telling us and what his campaign is telling everybody about what happened. you mentioned earlier, you know, there have been cases of plagiarism in politics before. biden, rand paul. these stories tend to fade into the background. you know, a lot of people probably don t remember that joe biden, you know, had an incident similar to this and they would probably say, oh, oh, yeah, you know, that kind of sounds familiar. but, you know, in this case, it s really potentially damaging for walsh because his military record has come up in a negative light before. republic chance have tried to attack him over it. if this was on a different issue, perhaps this might fade into the background, but because this was an issue already at the forefront of this campaign, that republicans were already attacking it, it really makes it doubly worse for him right now. let me go back to my friend and fellow political observer, joan, i think we ve been fair here. i don t think this is a partisan issue at all. i think this is the human condition, whatever gets in the water and makes people do this. people do it a lot on both size. what s this do for the outlook of the senate control issue? i never thought walsh was a strong had a great chance in a conservative state like montana, but everybody has a chance, i suppose intellectually. right. if his opponent fell apart, he d have a chance. he has not led in a single poll. this is not something the democrats were depending on. this was given to republicans while other seats were considered stronger or contested for democrats. i don t think it s going to change the story line of what s going to happen in the senate. sean, the facts are he s been caught red handed. the new york times, you ve done a great job of showing this in a graphic form. it s clear anybody with an objective mind says this guy lifted the material. is there any talk of him resi resigning over this? you know, not right now. i think it s too early to talk about that. i think right now he wants to get his, you know, footing set back to where it was a couple weeks ago in the campaign. you know, there isn t much talk about resignation, but clearly at this point, you know, he was a long shot. he s a real long shot now in the campaign to win a full term in november. well, when the hammer comes down, that will be the u.s. army, when they come down on this, that s going to be the part that really hurts. that will be objective judgment. you can bet they re going to do a good job of checking this out. thank you so much, sean sullivan, and joan walsh. an all irish cast tonight. we ll be right back. except that managing my symptoms was all i was doing. when i finally told my doctor, he said my crohn s was not under control. he said humira is for adults like me who have tried other medications but still experience the symptoms of moderate to severe crohn s disease. and that in clinical studies, the majority of patients on humira saw significant symptom relief. and many achieved remission. humira can lower your ability to fight infections, including tuberculosis. serious, sometimes fatal infections and cancers, including lymphoma, have happened; as have blood, liver, and nervous system problems, serious allergic reactions, and new or worsening heart failure. before treatment, get tested for tb. tell your doctor if you ve been to areas where certain fungal infections are common, and if you ve had tb, hepatitis b, are prone to infections, or have flu-like symptoms or sores. don t start humira if you have an infection. if you re still just managing your symptoms, ask your gastroenterologist about humira. with humira, remission is possible. wouldn t it be great if hiring plumbers, carpenters shopping online is as easy as it gets. and even piano tuners were just as simple? 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who in this country responds to the charge that chuck hagel is in the pay of north korea or saudi arabia? or whatever other goblin? it s the tactics being used here. this reckless readiness to charge someone whose policy you don t share with working with this country s enemies. this is what senator cruz did to hagel, what he s doing to the faa right now. he s accusing it of being a secret punisher of israel. there s something in cruz s manner and tactics i just don t like. he acts as if he s ready to take a shot at someone no matter how below the belt that anything goes in his manichean struggle
mcdonnell and his wife. the jury is made up of four women and eight men. the senate is expected to vote on the nomination of robert mcdonald to be the next secretary of on the next secret veteran affairs. to fix the troubled agency. later, the rnc will hold their fire harry reid rally on capitol hill and aimed at getting voters to elect republicans to the senate in the upcoming mid terms. that is going to do it. a tuesday edition of way too early. morning joe starts right now. flares have turned night into borrowed daylight in the skies over the gaza strip. today was supposed to be a cease-fire it didn t work. intense fighting prevented investigators reaching the crash site of mh-17 for the second day running. much more substantial sanctions will come into place across broad sectors of the russian economy. two americans are fighting a for their lives. the spread of a dangerous illness like ebola is no longer somebody else s progress. now three-month examination by the new york times clams that governor cuomo s office deeply compromised the panel s work. if you had watched the movie to the end, the name of the movie would have been independence. you named it interference. donald sterling lost again today. go clippers! a victorious shelly sterling emerged from the courtroom and she can now move ahead with her plans to sell the los angeles clippers. stephen a. smith addressing the fire storm he triggered with his choice of words. to say what i said was accomplish is an understatement. you hit somebody, they hit you back. don t be surprised! oh, we will get to that. that is a big debate here. good morning, everyone. it s tuesday, july 29th. welcome to morning joe. with us on set senior political editor and white house correspondent for the huffington post is sam stein, sitting next to willie. hi, willie. managing editor for the news website bobby ghosh and pulitzer prize winning editor and with the the washington post, eugene robinson. you know what i m talking about whoopi goldberg and stephen a. smith controversy. they were fighting about this yesterday because of comments made. have you been following that? i heard about it. i didn t get to see it but i look forward to it. we will lay it all out but it s definitely one of the old debates renewed in a very different way. we begin this morning in the middle east where the crisis between israeli and hamas is now in its fourth week and the hopes for a resolution appear to be dwindling. last night air strikes lit up the sky in the center of gaza city as israeli hit key hamas locations. the targets including a tv station and the home of one of the group s top leaders. the strikes came as israeli prime minister benjamin netanyahu delivered a national tv address. he warned of an extended conflict and said, quote, there is no war more just than this. israeli and hamas are trading blame for an attack that left nine palestinian children dead and dozens injured. palestinian officials say israeli air strikes hit a park as children were playing on swings. israeli, however, says militants in gaza fired the rockets which failed to reach the intended targets and that brings the death toll to more than 1,100 palestinians, according to officials there. 53 israeli soldiers have been killed, including four yesterday, as well as three civilians in israeli. joining us no from you gaza nbc news foreign correspondent ayman mohyeldin. reporter: last night was a marked difference in terms of where we are here in gaza city. it s a scene we have seen throughout other parts of gaza but yesterday the fighting arrived in gaza city and 35,000 people live here. late flares were dropped early in the evening 3:00 p.m. local time and paved the way for a series of intense shelling that targeted, among other things, the gaza port, the house of hamas leader here in gaza, and others. there are also this morning, disturbing news about the humanitarian situation here according to the spokesperson who is in charge of the gaza electrical power tank, two fuel tanks belonging to that tank were hit and caught on fire and still burning well into the hours of this afternoon. as a result of that now, they say the representatives at the power plant a humanitarian disaster is going to unfold here. 1.8 million who depend on all types of electricity for water, sanitation, and other subinfrastructure needs are now wa without power and no place to store the fuel burning for the last couple of hours. a sense to what the palestinians are waking up to this morning. the death toll continues to find. along the front lines, there is still fighting taking place. hamas militants were able to, yesterday, fire at israeli soldiers and infiltrate across the border into israeli with some of these tunnels, so it shows you that the situation here is still very tense to say the least. mika? ayman, it s willie. good to see you this morning. is there any changing pressure over the last four weeks inside among palestinians about what they should be doing here in terms of stepping back? as these civilian casualties mount, as they see women and children being carried into hospital and many of them dead and some of them wounded. have they thought twice now and said maybe we should step back from this or are they only emboldened by the ongoing attacks from israeli? reporter: here it s important to make the distinction between hamas and palestinian factions and ordinary palestinian people who are bearing the brunt of this. when you speak to ordinary palestinians they feel they are reaching a point of desperation. they feel the situation is very much out of their hands. the political factions and the military wings of these political factions still remain very defiant and emboldened and they say their backs up against the war and they have nothing to lose and living a life under siege the past seven years and for them this is now about fighting until the end and that end is a struggle for them and they want to continue the struggle to get the international community for once and for all live the siege and that is how they are portraying it and how a lot of the palestinian factions and representatives we are speaking to are saying that is what this struggle is about. ayman, thank you. on capitol hill, kirsten gillibrand and ted cruz came together and announced a resolution criticizing using civilians. the israeli press is pushing a cease-fire that the reports claim would be more beneficial to hamas. secretary kerry is standing by his actions. make no mistake, when the people of israeli are rushing to bomb shelters, when innocent israeli and palestinian teenagers are abducted and murdered, when hundreds of innocent civilians have lost their lives, i will, and we will make no apologies for our actions. in a column that you entitled kerry s gaza blunder. in part you write this. secretary of state john kerry has made a significant mistake how he is pursuing a gaza cease-fire and not surprising he has upset both the israelis and some moderate palestinians. kerry s error has been to put so much emphasis on achieving a quick halt to the bloodshed that he has solidified the role of hamas, the unpopular islamist group that leads gaza, along with the two hard line nations that and in the process he has undercut not only the israelis but the egyptians and the fatah movement that runs the palestinian authority all of which want to see an end to hamas rule in gaza. david ignatius, i see what you re saying and i m wondering how it s possible to blunder something that has been devolving for decades. the gaza mess is not john kerry s fault but it s a tragedy that has been going on as you say for so many years. i think the mistake kerry made in seeking a cease-fire quickly in this intractable conflict without thinking about a pathway for the future so that the situation in gaza wouldn t simply revert to the status quo which we see means another war and another round of misery two years, three years ahead. kerry s first effort was with egypt when he got to the middle east, he tried to use egyptian mediation to broker a cease-fire and that didn t work. so he then turned away from the egyptians who were right next to gaza who are angry at hamas, almost as angry as israeli itself is, and turn to the hamas friends in turkey and in qatar and try to use them as the mediamea meadmea mediators for the cease-fire. he then upset palestinians and moderate palestinians and others in the region who thought he was enfranchising the region who were obstacles to peace. if one thing i hope secretary kerry can do is get back on the track of finding a more stable and permanent transition to a future where hamas is not the only dominant force in gaza. we are bringing this back to you. but, bobby, jump in and take it to david. when you listen to leaders on all sides of this conflict, it doesn t sound like there is a lot of room for negotiation. first of all, i m not sure what you would hold off any call for a cease-fire for because they are not stopping and they are not pulling back. rhetoric especially on the side, i m sorry, of benjamin netanyahu seems to get tougher and tougher every day. having said that, what do you think is possible at this point? nothing until the shooting stops. until the shooting stops, nothing is possible. i think that explains kerry s sort of sense of urgency. it s not like this was his first attempt as david pointed out. he did try to work through the egyptians. that did not work. the egyptians no longer under general, no longer have the flun influence in gaza they used to. the position is now so small it might as well not exist. so it s unlikely that you re going to get a immediate if egypt is a mediator. i can see the sense in trying to work through them. obviously, there was something inarticulate in the way kerry presented his proposal, but the response from egypt has been beyond caustic and so counterproductive. this is a guy trying to solve a problem. there is a global uproar. president obama called netanyahu two days ago and called for immediate cease-fire, basically, the same thing kerry is saying. stop the shooting now. instead the israeli officials speaking many of them speaking off the record or speaking without attribution are mounting pile on top of john kerry who wants to just be ahead. it s difficult for americans to accept something is beyond their reach, betweut isn t it possible this is a conflict, america despite its great power cannot exert its influence without two parties who want to come to the table and speak to each other? if history proves this is not a conflict that american can just solve. my view is and this is a view that has evolved over the years it s just better to be involved than not involved. just saying you guys are crazy, call us when you re ready to talk seriously, both of you. you know, that s a tempting position but, in fact, that doesn t work. that tends to make things worse. i think we need to be involved. my question for david ignatius, turkey is a nato member, a major country. so why not work through turkey to try to resolve this, especially given, as bobby pointed out, the lack of influence that egypt has right now? of course, it used to under the muslim brotherhood but it certainly doesn t now. so why not go to a government like that of turkey to try to work something out with hamas? well, it s a reasonable question. obviously, one that secretary kerry thought. if turkey could create working with the u.s., a stable situation in gaza, if turkey could deliver negotiators among the gazan within hamas or any other faction that could negotiate the kind of cease-fire and longer term arrangements for gaza that would lead to stability, i would have no quarrel with it but there is no evidence that is possible. what is unfortunate here is that in april, secretary kerry recognized that in the agreement between fatah, the more moderate palestinian faction, and hamas, for fatah and the palestinian authority to take control in gaza, which they agreed to do, was the opportunity to negotiate something longer lasting. i think my biggest regret, gene, is secretary kerry turned away from that sensible longer term program that would actually get at what is wrong and went for the very short term 24-hour cease-fire which, as we have seen, is falling apart because there isn t a structure yet that can create stability. okay. we are going to get to the other crisis, foreign policy crisis, the downing of malaysia airlines flight 17 and russia now pushing back against sanctions and saying it will only embolden in a moment. i want to get to domestic politic as well. a follow-up to a story we talked about yesterday. new york governor andrew cuomo is pushing back hard against allegations his office interfered with a political ethics commission one he put in place and stems from a front page article last week in the new york times which alleges cuomo s office squashed certain subpoenas that would have looked into the governor s own dealings. the governor emphatically denies this and saying no proof. one to a media firm connected to new york s democratic party. now one of the firm s three co-chairs at the center of the times story fitzpatrick is claiming that the panel was, indeed independent. he says, quote, the bottom line is that nobody interfered with me or my co-chairs. governor cuomo quick to praise the press conference yesterday in a news conference in buffalo. when you look at the facts, this moreland commission performed exactly the function they were supposed to perform. we passed a law that happen brought historic reform to the state. it was an overwhelming success and the commissioners have not gotten the credit that they deserve. independent. they were talking to people from the second floor. of course, they were. of course they were and they were talking to people from the senate and the assembly and the good government groups. it s not independence is will never talk to anyone, it s that they exercised their independent judgment. but despite yesterday s denials, e-mails obtained by the times showed, quote, mr. fitzpatrick had privatelily expressed frustration with meddling by the governor s office and cuomo needs to understand this is an independent commission and needs to be treated as such. yesterday, the governor disputed the times characterization of the remarks. read it again. the second floor needs to understand this is an independent commission and needs to be treated as such. okay. so what he is saying, at some point in time, is larry is having a conversation with him and larry is advocating a point. that is true. follow the movie to the conclusion. and what does chairman fitzpatrick say? no. resoundingly, no. what does the chairman s actions show? no. resoundingly, no! because he rejected the request! the rejection is ioion is ipso statement of independence because he said no. and he could, and he did. if you had watched the movie to the end, the name of the movie would have been independence. you named it inference. all right. so, sam, i special to governor cuomo. most of it was off the record last night about this because he saw our very heated conversation here on the show. also, we were sort of having a hard time getting through the quote, his very defensive quote about the commission that he created. but he says while the times is making a conclusion, that doesn t necessarily say it s true and that they have gone too far in their conclusion. while it may look like you can make a connection, you actually can t. and even the members of the panel say that the commission was independent. anybody? i mean, the question, i guess, is how much influence can you exert without the panel actually responding to your influence and does that matter? cuomo is saying the panel was ultimately independent because they said no to the request but the request was still made and influencing meddling in its own right. why can t a request be made? it depends how you want to do you want the commission to be completely independent from the other parts of the government? and i think when you establish, most people when they establish an ethics commission, yeah, you don t want anybody meddling in their influences and you want them to investigate and not have any contact with the outside world. boom. but cuomo is saying there is a gray area and that they do need to talk to other elements of government and they need to talk to other officials to do their work. i think part of the problem is cuomo has he is a secretive governor the entire time and now he is speaking out, people have a tough time sort of reconciling i will say my own personal, i would like i would love for him to come on. it s one thing to do a press conference really far away. i understand. we talked about the different reasons why he doesn t really want to do a lot of interviews right now. but i m wondering if he should. you know? and it would help a lot because it seems incredibly defensive. sort of pushing back saying, don t you understand what this looks like? this is someone who has tried to control the narrative around him from day one. and i think doing an interview in this form sort of counterintuitive everything he has done as governor and it shows. this is someone who did interfere in the broadest sense of the world in the ethics commission and that is someone who likes to have a control of the environs around him. governor cuomo came into the office i m going to clean up albany and new york and said it over and over and over again and that was the whole impetus for his campaign. now if he can clean up albany unless it pertains to him is what the problem is. gene, you read through the new york times piece this morning. his office says to the times a patient staffed by the executive cannot investigate the executive. so then the new york times asked governor cuomo about that apparent contradiction there. he said i never said it couldn t investigate me. see, facts matter, even for the new york times. it appears his own office can t quite get the story straight. yeah. it s very confusing. and one wondering about, you know, that the question you were jug talking about, why is governor cuomo, why is his style so secretive and why is everything so behind closed doors? especially the workings of a commission that is supposed to clean up all of the corruption and problems in albany. you would think that at least he would be more forthcoming and sort of open about about how this is working, what he is trying to accomplish and how he is doing it, and i think that just generates more suspicion and makes people wonder what this is really about. you know, the secretiveness, i think, comes off what appears to be a reticence to be tv interviews because potentially he might not want to get involved in the presidential politics conversation. 2016 might be waiting or ready for hillary, depending on where he has been. you know what? i think he should do an interview on this. i told him that. i really do. i think that this is taking a life of its own. still ahead on morning joe, everything you wanted to know about richard nixon, not pertaining to watergate. historian douglas brinkley is here with thousands of hours of audio from the 37th president. a decisive ruling in donald sterling s bid to block the sale of the l.a. clippers but is it finally enough to stop the defiant owner? and espn stephen a. smith and his apology for his controversial comments on domestic violence which sent the ladies of the view especially whoopi goldberg into a very provocative and heated discussion. first, bill karins with a check on the forecast. bill? mika, did you see the pictures from outside of boston yesterday? a tornado? oh, my gosh. yeah. we had a tornado in connecticut two days ago and then yesterday up there outside of boston. this is very rare. this was actually near the coast. only about 10 to 15 miles north of downtown boston. there was 120-mile-per-hour winds and ef-2 tornado went right through this highly populated industrial area and fortunately no injuries. can you imagine that? look at the huge trees that came down. a picturesque picture in los angeles. you can see a tornado twisting there but it stayed harmlessly over the open fields. yesterday in new england wind damage and a lot of cleanup and trees down. storm system that produced a tornado is gone. so the lower humidity has moved it. cooler temperatures. it s going to be an absolutely gorgeous day today and you can feel it outside. probably didn t need your air-conditioning last night. many areas top out to the low 70s to the 80s for a high. this picture just out from yosemite national park. a small fire formed last night and now, all of a sudden, it s starting to spread and look at that active fire in yosemite national park. we will watch that today. again, it s a small fire now. but potential there is to grow. of course, the california drought, everyone knows how dry it is. the low humidity is not just in the northeast. appreciate it this morning. little rock, memphis, all the way through atlanta, a gorgeous day and it s like early fall throughout much of the country and that includes new york city. what a gorgeous day! lunch outside! light jacket, maybe even for some heading out the door this morning in july! you re watching morning joe. we will be right back. after nine days i let the horse run free because the desert had turned to sea but the energy bp produces up here creates something else as well: jobs all over america. engineering and innovation jobs. advanced safety systems & technology. shipping and manufacturing. across the united states, bp supports more than a quarter million jobs. when we set up operation in one part of the country, people in other parts go to work. that s not a coincidence. it s one more part of our commitment to america. the summer of this.mmer. the summer that summers from here on will be compared to. where memories will be forged into the sand. and then hung on a wall for years to come. get out there, with over 50,000 hotels at $150 dollars or less. expedia. find yours. now, that s progressive. time now to take a look at the morning papers. we will start with the l.a. times. the $2 billion sale of the los angeles clippers to former microsoft ceo steve ballmer will go through after a judge ruled against team owner donald sterling yesterday. the court sided with shelly sterling saying she had negotiated a good deal for the clippers and had the authority to take away her husband s control of the family trust. doing so after doctors determined he was mentally unfit to manage his affairs. under the ruling, donald sterling can t delay the sale from going forward as he appeals the case. poor donald sterling. only gets $2 billion. it s almost over. the washington post police in washington, d.c. are scrambling to deal with a new ruling that lifted the ban on carrying legally registered handguns in the nation s capital and comes after a federal judge ruled the district ban on firearms possession in public is unconstitutional. they are wanting to appeal to let new gun carry regulations. gene robinson, how is this playing in d.c.? not well at all. you know, i haven t seen anybody walking around, you know, strapped the last day or so. but, you know, the crazy thing is that people in the district of columbia overwhelmingly want gun control and they support gun control. they don t want people, you know, owning handguns, much less carrying them around in the street, however, congress and the courts are essentially saying, no, go ahead, shoot it out. let s go to the richard times dispatch. the fourth circuit appeals court struck down virginia s ban on same sexy marria-sex marriage. as other states are in the fourth circuit. it does not have a direct impact on gay marriage in other states the attorney general in north carolina says it means the ban will eventually be struck down. a new studied finds that a third of americans delinquent in debt and on the ground $5,200. that includes credit card bills and medical bills and child support. southern states have the largest number of people who are late on their bills. that includes alabama, florida, texas, and out west in nevada. the san francisco chronicle two men are accused of squating in a palm springs california condo they found on a website. the bothers had been living in the condo for over a month and refused to leave, despite only paying for 30 days. since the brothers had been living in the condo for more than 30 days, they are protected by california s tenant laws but that is not the only problem they are having on the web. the called air b&b squatters raised $40,000 on kick-starter for a video game that appears to have been abandoned. angry owners were redirected to another game s kick-starter play looking to raise another $25,000. what does that mean? these guys are taking advantage of every internet function out there. they are living for free and they are raising known a game that apparently doesn t exist. kind of brilliant. the california the tenant law? it serves a purpose but not that purpose. so they can t leave. i don t know what the hell is going on in california but that is histoysterical. this is a movie by the people who made pineapple express. coming up following a headline grabbing, whoopi goldberg jumps to stephen a. smith s defense. we will also explain what this has to do with baseball. oh, my! sports is next. i think that is sports. we re changing the way we do business, with startup ny. we ve created tax free zones throughout the state. and startup ny companies will be investing hundreds of millions of dollars in jobs and infrastructure. thanks to startup ny, businesses can operate tax free for 10 years. no property tax. no business tax. and no sales tax. which means more growth for your business, and more jobs. it s not just business as usual. see how new york can help your business grow, at startup.ny.gov fancy feast broths. they re irresistabowl. completely unbelievabowl. totally delectabowl. real silky smooth or creamy broths. everything she s been waiting for. carefully crafted with real seafood, real veggies, and never any by-products or fillers. wow! being a cat just got more enjoyabowl. fancy feast broths. wow served daily. when laquinta.com sends him a ready for you alert the second his room is ready, ya know what salesman alan ames becomes? i think the numbers speak for themselves. i m sold! a selling machine! ready for you alert, only at lq.com. i might have to close my eyes because i think i m going to glinflinch if i see the ball coming. does that look like a good spot? yeah, sure. ah! are you all right? oh! i could hear that one whipping by me. what an off day. yes! terrible! that is the best picture in baseball right there. clayton kershaw of the l.a. dodgers are jimmy kimmel playing a little game last night. the nfl thought it had moved on from ray rice domestic violence arrest when he was suspended for two games for his alleged striking of his then fiancee in a casino early this year. mitchell beedle making these comments after saying this. we also have to make sure that we learn as much as we can about elements of provocation. not there is real provocation but the elements of provocation. you got to make sure you address it because what we got to do is do what we can to try to prevent the situation from happening in in any way. so yesterday, stephen a. smith offered an apology. my words came across that it is somehow it is a woman s fault. this was not my intent and not what i was trying to say. yet the failure to clearly articulate something different lies squarely on my shoulders. to say what i actually said was foolish is an understatement. to say i was wrong is obvious. to apologize, to say i m sorry doesn t do the matter its problem justice, to be quite honestly but i do sincerely apologize. all of this got the ladies of the view talking leading to this passionate exchange between whoopi goldberg and her co-host. i want to say for a man hitting a woman, unless his life is in jeopardy. i m sorry. he knocked her out. he knocked her out cold. i m sorry. if you hit somebody, you cannot be sure you are not going to get hit back. you have to teach women, do not live with this idea that men have the chivalry thing still with them. don t assume that that is still in place. right. so don t be surprised if you hit a man and he hits you back! you don t hit use it. listen. you hit somebody, they hit you back. don t be surprised. wow. you know, i think it could devolve no a really bad conversation that could get incredibly bad reaction because, obviously, what stephen a. smith said got an incredibly huge, terrible reaction which led to his apology, which i will just say i think it completely outweighs exactly what he said. he was trying to to have a constructive conversation but the bottom line is, unfortunately, there is an unequivocal truth. men may not hit women in any circumstance. it is hard to have an honest conversation in saying that. but i think what whoopi said had value too. i do. i think you just don t hit a woman, period. you stop. that s a given. you think stephen smith didn t know that? i just think, you know, he got his comments underscored a to be curious and have a conversation. but if it s a steadfast rule. he shouldn t have used, in my view, the word provocation was a poor choice of words. does anybody want to try to have this conversation? maybe what he was trying to say everybody stop hitting everybody else or something else. but provocation is a provocation. but to have this conversation beyond a man should not hit a woman is impossible to have without a backlash. because there is no situation in which you can say a woman has put this man in a place where he need to strike back. no such situation exists, short of maybe the woman threatening the man s life. of course. i think if that is the basis of the conversation, then there is really not much to talk about, to be honest with you. it s not just men hitting women. i got into a fair number of scraps when i was a kid. my father and teachers always said afterwards, you don t hit anybody. you walk away. men don t hit women and women don t hit men. you don t hit anybody. you leave it there. i would say it s one thing to defend yourself if a man or woman is coming at you. if you re ray rice and you can bench press 400 pounds and you can suppress the woman and you don t need to knock her out. the big problem here is the two-game suspension for ray rice which seems so lenient compared to anybody else. you suspend him for far more games than other people were suspended for their so. all right. let s go to japan on a slightly different note. an actress with a background in martial arts breaks boxes with her head before throwing out the ceremonial pitch. what is that? wow. how about that? that s crazy! awesome. rifles ovals one of our favo first pitches of all time. this that is a rhythmic gymnast. which way do you go? i think i take the rhythmic gymnast. it s crazy. break the bricks one more time so we can render a decision here. i m going with the bricks. we haven t seen the pitch is the only thing. finish the job! i think that was it. you got to finish the job. still ahead, how iowa has turned from a small caucus state into a year-long tourist destination and mark leibovich is here with his columnist. the latest in the ups and towns of the toronto mayor rob ford. oh, no! don t do it! oh, no! we will be right back with more morning joe. fill their bowl with the meaty tastes they re looking for, with friskies grillers. tender meaty pieces and crunchy bites. in delicious chicken, beef, turkey, and garden veggie flavors. friskies grillers. and cialis for daily use helps you be ready anytime the moment is right. cialis is also the only daily ed tablet approved to treat symptoms of bph, like needing to go frequently. tell your doctor about all your medical conditions and medicines, and ask if your heart is healthy enough for sex. do not take cialis if you take nitrates for chest pain, as it may cause an unsafe drop in blood pressure. do not drink alcohol in excess. side effects may include headache, upset stomach, delayed backache or muscle ache. to avoid long term injury, get medical help right away for an erection lasting more than four hours. if you have any sudden decrease or loss in hearing or vision, or any allergic reactions like rash, hives, swelling of the lips, tongue or throat, or difficulty breathing or swallowing, stop taking cialis and get medical help right away. ask your doctor about cialis for daily use and a free 30-tablet trial. ask your doctor about cialis for daily use the ca illac summer collection is here. during the cadillac summer s best event, lease this 2014 ats for around $299 a month and make this the summer of style. 45 past the hour. joining us is chief national correspondent for the new york times leibovich. your piece in the upcoming issue takes a look at the politics of iowa and how one state turned its adorable little caucus into a year-round tourist destination and you write in part this. iowa may be a flat landlocked state with six electoral votes but it has become the premier tourist destination for political brown-nosers. if there is one thing every republican presidential candidate can agree upon, it is that branstad represents the peak of american leadership, if not the pinnacle of all human achievement. homage must be paid. we want iowa to be the envy of the whole nation he told me in the parking lot. not just because we have the first in the nation caucuses, no, of course, not. certainly natural for the governor of new jersey to check out the cows here in the middle of july. iowa is going in the right direction branstad continued and the rest of the country is going in the wrong direction. while he is milking this political little sort of first stop thing that iowa has going, mark? yes, he is. the thing that i wanted to look at was the anthropology of the early state. we have had iowa and hamp as the early primary states for a long time but in case of terry branstad the long time governor has been running the state on and off since the 80s it is a study of incredible exhulltation how wonderful of a person he is and people falling all over themselves how great terry branstad is. who are the worst defenders? well, everyone. everyone? it s one oof another. i spent a day with chris christie there last week in iowa and he chris christie, it was actually the day of the ground invasion of gaza. it was also the day, i think the day after the plane went down in ukraine. and mr. tell it like it is, tough talking new jersey governor, you were expecting he was going to weigh in on the subject but, no, no. he was very concerned, mostly about talking about how great terry branstad is and how much of a legend he is and also how inspired he has been by the governor of iowa. you point out, mark, christie, perry and jindal have all passed through iowa this year. is there any indication or any evidence that all this butt kissing helps? helps a would-be presidential candidate? does it work to go in a couple of years out and kind of make your way across the state? i think, obviously, you need to pay attention to iowa if you want to do well in iowa or new hampshire. i think what is interesting and new now it s starting two, three, years out. yeah. it used to be there was an off-season. it s like so much in american life now. you see christmas decorations on sale in the spring. you see people lobbying for the oscars the week after the academy awards ended the year before. there is really no off-season and that certainly has proven true in presidential politics also. gene? mark, is there any indication or did you see any that people in iowa are getting sick of all of this? do they really accept that chris christie is actually there for the cows? you mean he is not? i think they would get fed up with all of this stuff. i think on the contrary, i think they love it. i think from a strictly economic standpoint it s probably great for the state. a lot of national media comes through. it s fun for them. i don t think there is any major downside, although i think it s important we tell it like it is, which is that, look. i mean, this is not necessarily a natural, you know, recitation of the rhythm of american life, yet this is part of the excess that has taken hold in so many areas. but, i mean, it s not full-proof obviously, because mike huckabee won in 2008 and rick santorum run in 2012 and neither ended up as president, at least as far as i can tell. you re wrong, sam. oh. in iowa, there are actually pictures of mike huckabee and rick santorum as our president. it can cut both ways like anything. barack obama would not be president today if it weren t for iowa so you don t know what impact it will have. it is really bizarre. mark is right. why we have a system because we all go to iowa. you can write this state. let s have a rotation of states. you should. just do one for every state. can you do one for every single state capitol? you could have a handbook. mark, thank you. we will be reading your column at nytimes.com. dr. nancy snyderman will be here to explain how much risk to the u.s. with the ebola outbreak. first, toronto politics at its finest and another classic from rob ford. yes, that is rob ford. he is going to break it. news you can t use is next. let me get this straight. 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[ female announcer ] lactaid. 100% real milk. no discomfort. come on, would i lie about this? frommy family and is to love ice cream. however some of us can t enjoy it without discomfort. so we use lactaid® ice cream. it s 100% real ice cream just without the lactose. so now we all can enjoy this favorite treat. surrender to the power of accomodation grooveland booking.com booking.yeah! we re changing the way we do business, with startup ny. we ve created tax free zones throughout the state. and startup ny companies will be investing hundreds of millions of dollars in jobs and infrastructure. thanks to startup ny, businesses can operate tax free for 10 years. no property tax. no business tax. and no sales tax. which means more growth for your business, and more jobs. it s not just business as usual. see how new york can help your business grow, at startup.ny.gov . i voted for culture. .with a k. how are you? i voted for plausible deniability. i didn t kill her, david. and i voted for decisive military action. america, you cast your votes. now, go to xfinity on demand and select the people s hotlist to see this summer s top 100 shows and movies. i voted! the mayor managed to get a little bit of exercise in over the weekend. on sunday, he and his brother doug went to the opening of a dinosaur themed playground where they took the opportunity to break in the brand-new see-saw. woo! oh, okay. wee! i got you. no. look at him. gracefully. watching rob ford work a see-saw makes me fear for mrs. ford s life. that is rob ford after the two-month stint in rehab and comes out campaigning for re-election. he and his brother good ole doug get after it on the see-saw. look at the kids looking at them. does he have staph? that is the first question. is there an advance here? who is the guy saying, mayor ford, this is a brilliant picture. get on that see-saw with your brother. i think the fun continued. please stop. i think the fun continued. he tried to go up the rope climb. what the heck? what is he doing? the greatest. we are so glad he is back in our lives. i would take my children home. do the right thing. do it for us, please. mika, you ll love this one. baby ilee and pit bull puppy clyde. bouncy seat. look at clyde gets up there. isley s mom has been instagraming photos of the two together. come on. how cute is this? oh, my god! baby and puppy. oh, my goodness. i love that baby! posted last week has 2 million views. he s a pit bull, too. people say bad things about bpi bulls. they can be great. last week this photo bomb by queen elizabeth smiling at two australian hockey players sneaking in there and not to be outdone. prince harry gave a grin of the commonwealth games last night. one of the men made this his facebook profile pick and you would do the same. a little crazy there. coming up at the top of the hour, a path to victory. how democrat mitchell nunn planned to win a u.s. senate seat and how that plan could backfire. benjamin netanyahu is facing a lot of questions. new sanctions against vladimir putin and russian officials reportedly entering a third phase and we will explain what that means when andrea mitchell joins us. we will be right back with more morning joe. you owned your car for four years. you named it brad. you loved brad. and then you totaled him. you two had been through everything together. two boyfriends. three jobs. you re like nothing can replace brad! then liberty mutual calls. and you break into your happy dance. if you sign up for better car replacement, we ll pay for a car that s a model year newer with 15,000 fewer miles than your old one. see car insurance in a whole new light. liberty mutual insurance. the summer of this.mmer. the summer that summers from here on will be compared to. where memories will be forged into the sand. and then hung on a wall for years to come. get out there, with over 50,000 hotels at $150 dollars or less. expedia. find yours. weit s not justt we d be fabuilding jobs here,. it s helping our community. siemens location here has just received a major order of wind turbines. it puts a huge smile on my face. cause i m like, this is what we do. the fact that iowa is leading the way in wind energy, i m so proud, like, it s just amazing. carmax is the best with a quick written offer, right on the spot. perfect for jeannine, who prefers not to have her time wasted. .and time! thank you. your usual. she believes life s too short for inefficiencies. i now pronounce you husband and wife. no second should be squandered. which is why we make our appraisal process quick and easy, and why jeannine chooses to start here. carmax. start here. it s time to bring it out in the open. it s time to drop your pants for underwareness, a cause to support the over 65 million people who may need depend underwear. show them they re not alone and show off a pair of depend. because wearing a different kind of underwear, is no big deal. join us. support the cause and get a free sample of depend at underwareness.com flares have turned night into broad daylight in the skies over the gaza strip. today was supposed to be a cease-fire. it didn t work. an explosion on a busy street where children were playing. israeli says it was a stray hamas rocket. hamas doesn t accept that. and used the attack on the children as a reason to go on the offensive. intense fighting prevented investigators reaching the crash site of mh-17 for the second day running. much more substantial sanctions will come into place across broad sectors of the russian economy. two americans are fighting for their lives. infected with the deadly ebola virus. the spread of a dangerous illness like ebola is no longer somebody else s progress. last july, andrew cuomo pointed a special commission to tackle public corruption. now three-month examination by the new york times claims that governor cuomo s office deeply compromised the panel s work. if you had watched the movie to the end, the name of the movie would have been independence. you named it interference. we will get to that story in a moment. welcome back to morning joe. joining us now from washington, nbc chief foreign affairs correspondent and host of andrea mitchell reports andrea mitchell. senior editor at the the new republic julia yanfey. good to have you both with us. the west increasing pressure on vladimir putin. president obama and leaders of several european countries agreed to a sweeping new set of sanctions. they will target defense, energy, and financial industries in russia. moscow, however, remains defiant. the country s foreign minister downplayed the impact of the sanctions and warned they will would only make russia stronger and more independent. in another sign of stepped-up tensions, moscow is now accused of violating a 1987 nuclear missile treaty by testing cruise missiles as early as 2008. u.s. officials say president obama addressed the issue in a letter to putin, calling it a, quote, very serious matter. meanwhile, ukrainian investigators say flight 17 s black box has revealed a massive explosive decompression brought down the jet and the shrapnel destroyed the plane. u.s. forces are making their way toward the crash site after another fighting with russian rebels. kiev says they gained controlled of two towns in eastern ukraine and more battles under way. the clashes are being blamed for 50 deaths between the two sides and 800 civilians have been killed there since mid april. the newest human rights chief is calling for a full investigation who shot down flight 17, adding that it may be considered a war crime. andrea, i want to start with you here. set the scene for us, first, in terms of russia s response, at least in their words, to the sanctions. well, russia will be tough rhetorically and doesn t mean the sanctions won t hurt. i want to look at the details of these sanctions when they are finally explained to all of us later today, because up until now, they have been giving france a pass, a waiver for arm sales that were already agreed to. any time you grandfather arm sales to russia, that is a big loophole in these sanctions. in any case, it is described to me as the toughest set of sanctions yet and it s clearly getting russia s attention. the fact is that europe is pretty organized now by the president and in sync with the united states because russia has been firing live artillery across the border. there is plenty of evidence of that. plus marbling its forces along the border to move more sophisticated efforts into the milit militia. that is being more aggressive. julie, conventional wisdom the last week or so that european countries were hesitant to go along with tougher sanctions because of the impact the sanctions might have on their own economies. it looks like europe, at least for now, has moved past that? that s right. the fact of the matter is that, you know, it s a two-way street and, you know, as much as europe is dependent on russia for certain things, like energy, russia is dependent upon europe. it gets 40% of its food and medicine from europe. so it goes both ways. so if one party shuts off basically, the consensus is also the russian economy would crumble a lot faster and much more devastating fashion than the european economy would. where is this going to go? what is the strongest measure that can be taken on the part of europe to unequivocally depend what is happening. it is a big issue and i think what europe is scared of is the kind of the wildcard that is putin s behavior. he has shown time and again that he can do really unpredictable things. things that, you know, will hurt his opponent but also hurt him, but he decides it s worth the pain. so i think what europe is scared of is that russia will turn off the energy tap, which, you know, for some european countries, they get as little as 10% of their energy from russia. some eu countries get as much as 100 of their energy from russia so that would really hurt. the netherlands which is most severely affected by the tragedy of the malaysian airliner and the horrible impact on the dutch. the netherlands their pension funds are all tied up in shell and other major corporations so they are going to take a huge hit from this from whatever sanctions do take place. it s also finance. it s the banking in the uk. the brits have been tough about this but when putin was first flexing his muscles toward crimea everybody was caving in because they are integrated they are with russia economically. bobby, the other sort of level of thinking in this is a point you just brought up and that is if russia gives more sophisticated weapons to the rebels, do we do the same for the ukrainian military and start jumping in that way? if russia has gone to the point where it s shelling across the border in support of the rebels, then what how can we make sure the ukrainian military doesn t get completely pounded on this? andrea, has there been any discussion on that in d.c.? more of the risks. yeah. there is real concern about the risks because there have been principally republicans on the hill, the usual hard-line conservative arms committee folks like mccain and graham who have been saying why aren t we arming the ukrainians. oerds is the fear at the pentagon and elsewhere. once you give the sophisticated weapons to the ukraine government, you ll have the same possible tragic result that you had the separatists. they are not really ready to run these things that you re thenes situation. the best thing help with the ukrainians on the intelligence and see where the weapons are on the opposition side. the analysis is that russia has escalated so dramatically in the last couple of weeks because the kiev government was making progress against the separatists in eastern ukraine and gaining territory and that is why the fighting. the fighting was even as keir simmons was showing us yesterday, they were fighting right around the crash site. julie, there is a level of sanctions the west and the world community could do to take putin to pause and step back. up until now the sanctions have only emboldened him and allowed to say to his own people it s us against the world. i don t think it s in a certain sense, it has stopped him from doing certain things. you know, there are people in moscow who say that for a period of about four days in april, russian troops were poised to go across the border into ukraine and that it was because of sanctions that he didn t give them the order to go across the border. publicly, though, the problem with sanctions also is the more you sanction vladimir putin, the less he can actually give you what you want. because of all the image that he has portrayed in russia for the last, you know, what, 14 years he is standing up to the west. the more the west pressures him to do something, the less likely he is to do it. so unless there is kind of something happening behind the scenes where they are offering putin an off ramp where he can, you know, tout something at home as a win, as something that he was able to bring home, and to get out of it, you know, on his terms and to save face, i don t think we are going to see much movement on the russian side. julie ioffe, thank you very much. we turn to the middle east. the crisis between israeli and hamas in its fourth week. hopes for a resolution app to be dwindling. israeli hit key hamas locations overnight. the targets including hamas tv station and the home of one of the group s top leaders. the strikes came as israeli prime minister benjamin netanyahu delivered a national tv address. he warned of an extended conflict and said, quote, there is no war more just than this. israeli and hamas are trading blame for an attack that left nine palestinian children dead and dozens injured. palestinian officials say israeli air strikes hit a park as children were playing on swings. israeli, however, says militants in gaza fired the rockets which failed to reach the intended targets and that brings the death toll to more than 1,100 palestinians, according to officials there. 53 israeli soldiers have been killed, including four yesterday, as well as three civilians in israeli. secretary of state john kerry is facing criticism now in the israeli press for pushing a cease-fire that reports claim would be more beneficial to hamas. secretary kerry is standing by its actions. make no mistake, when the people of israeli are rushing to bomb shelters, when innocent israeli and palestinian teenagers are abducted and murdered, when hundreds of innocent civilians have lost their lives, i will, and we will make no apologies for our engagement. andrea, we had had a discussion with david ignatius who has a pretty blistering piece on john kerry. he did. yeah. there is sort of the concept that he put on the table about sort of this giving hamas kind of more of a platform. but i have to say i m not sure what anyone can do at this point. that would be productive when you hear what all three leaders on all sides of this are saying. well, what kerry was trying to do with the support and sort of alliance of ban ki-moon and the u.n. and many other people in the world is get a cease-fire to stop the killing and that was viewed in israeli as a way of, you know, tying their hands because they felt they had to deal with the tunnels, they had to deal with the long-range rockets. and so i have never frankly seen such blistering personal criticism on the left and the right in the israeli press. the israeli people, 87% according to channel 10 s polling yesterday, the prime time top station, the top channel in israeli, 87% popularity what the government is doing and pushing it now to be even tougher. so kerry is just being blistered in israeli and it will inevitably hurt his effectiveness in the short term. he was already being blamed for the long term peace negotiations for nine months that, you know, collapsed. i think that, you know, susan rice came our show yesterday and defended him and the white house is trying to rally around. reports he is still trying to resurrect some sort of cease-fire but the focus now i m told is on a short-term cease-fire, not on the long-term relationships. of course, ignatius criticism is that in some way, he has empowered hamas by going to qatar and hamas sponsors and trying to engage them. i want to bring in some washington nbc news chief white house correspondent and host of the daily rundown, chuck todd. we will get to a couple of political stories with you but sam first has a question. we have gone through a list of horribles in the world basically from ukraine to the middle east. we haven t even touched on the ebola virus. when i talk to white house officials they have a calm about it they are on top of these things, but it seems pretty clear that a narrative is developing of a world that is basically out of control. from your conversations with the administration officials, how are they prioritizing these issues and grasping with the sheer number of them all? funny you say that. i had the very similar conversation it sounds like that you had and it s my understanding that president himself is trying to project more calm and some on his staff are eyes wide open saying when the global chaos going to stop and the president sort of trying to say, hey, this is about a globally connected world. we see more of the problem, more of them are at our doorsteps because there s not many and because the united states is the only super power. he is trying to project calm with his own staff to sort of keep everybody at bay. i think as for the prioritization they see it right now as two priorities and that is you see where john kerry is. there is a reason they sent kerry to the middle east. a, what is going on with russia and the decision they made. they got the europeans on board and we will find out in about a month. i think you have to realistically give the sanctions about a month and we will find out in about a month if what the u.s. has been calling for some time which is serious sanctions from europe, will it actually change putin s behavior in ukraine? chuck, on the question of israeli. obviously, now the israeli press and some members of the government there have been openly critical of john kerry, openly critical of the obama administration. what is happening privately between the united states, the white house specifically, and israeli to try to mend that fence a little bit? well, look. you already have the ambassador here who is the israeli ambassador of the united states. he is very close to netanyahu. he has been trying to ratchet the rhetoric back here look. there has been distrust between the obama administration and netanyahu s administration basically from the beginning since president obama came in and it s never really the rifts have never really healed and there is time they scab over, but the wounds never go away and it s very easy to start up. and remember who the missing player is. the last time there was a hot war between israeli and gaza, you had a member of the muslim brotherhood in charge of egypt, mohammed morsi. regardless of everybody s criticisms of morsi as a leader inside egypt and these other issues, on this particular issue he was somebody that helped broker the last major truce between gaza and israeli and right now egypt is not a legitimate player in the eyes of hamas. chuck, we want to get you in on some domestic politics here. michelle nunn s campaign brushing off the leaks of her victory plan in the state of georgia that calls for the candidate to spend 80% of her time raising money. conservative national review released a atrophy of her strategy memos giving a rare glimpse in inside a campaign. her campaign highlighted what they saw as her biggest vulnerabilities including running the points of life when irs filing show may have provided money to an organization accused of having loose ties to hamas. also a memo highlighting what the campaign saw as an opportunity in the jewish community saying, quote, michelle s position on israeli were largely determined the level support there adding that her message was tbd, nunn is locked in a tight race with david perdue. her campaign doesn t dispute the authenticity of the document writing in a statement, quote. chuck, these plans exist on every campaign. of course. is we have got one in the spotlight this morning. absolutely. look. this is why you hire political consultants and you can them in some way do due diligence on yourself. that is what this was. this sort of, you know, what are her vulnerabilities and what should be working on and focus on and how are the republicans going to attack her. in many ways exactly what you pay a political consultant to come up with is to, you know, look through her background and all of this stuff. here it is. it s the equivalent in football terms of the new england patriots getting a copy of the new york jets playbook although i guess you could argue the jets playbook they could have and it wouldn t matter because it s the jets. the point is it s seeing the other team s playbook. the republicans are pouncing saying she is all image conscience and she is trying to portray she is new to politics and another image want that beel this stuff. it s an uphill battle to run as a democrat in georgia and she is trying to be authentic. in this day and age when authenticity matters this makes it look like oh, my god, it s esche everybody s worst stereotype what politicians look like. the seen in simpsons. gene, 80% of i guess it sounds crazy, but welcome to reality. might she be the only one that does that? it s how it works these day. dialing for dollars 24/7 basically. it looks kind of crazy and artificial when it s all written down like this but i think chuck is absolutely right. this is what candidates do and what political consultants do and this is what it s like to run for office these days. especially for a senate seat. the major embarrassment might not be for michelle nunn. it s how money driven the political process is. everybody, actually. andrea mitchell, thank you. we will be watching andrea mitchell reports at noon on msnbc. chuck todd, see you after morning joe. the cuban missile crisis retold. one of the definitive moments in u.s. history. up next, the quest for 10,000 steps. how running just five minutes a day can literally save your life. dr. nancy snyderman is standing by with that. you re watching morning joe. when salesman alan ames books his room at laquinta.com, he gets a ready for you alert the second his room is ready. so he knows exactly when he can check in and power up before his big meeting. and when alan gets all powered up, ya know what happens? i think the numbers speak for themselves. i m sold! he s a selling machine! put it there. and there, and there, and there. la quinta inns & suites is ready for you, so you ll be ready for business. the ready for you alert, only a laquinta.com! la quinta! that s why i always choose the fastest intern.r slow. the fastest printer. the fastest lunch. turkey club. the fastest pencil sharpener. the fastest elevator. the fastest speed dial. the fastest office plant. so why wouldn t i choose the fastest wifi? i would. switch to comcast business internet and get the fastest wifi included. comcast business. built for business. president obama has been briefed on the deadly outbreak of the ebola virus in west africa has that left nearly 700 people dead. a hospital in nigeria has been shut down and quarantined after an infection there. joining us now on the set is nbc news chief medical, dr. nancy snyderman. we are trying to put into perspective the risk of its spreading and what is happening there because it is a resurgence. he let s talk about ebola. it s a brilliant spectacular virus in that it kills magnificently and shockingly people get sick very quickly and nausea and high fever and 104 and is 105 and have kidney fail and die. it s like a big wildfire but it s not a smart virus like hiv and doesn t now how to get to one person to another and keep itself live. we normally see these ebola outbreaks has are isolated and go kaboom. now we have seen an ebola outbreak jump a border and last week a man who had a fever got on an airplane and ended up in another country and died several days later. so, for the first time, the world health organization, the centers for disease control is speaking to foreign countries to sort of talk about border control, screening passengers before getting on airplanes. no doubt this is very little risk to the united states. however, it does mean that if you are an aide worker and traveled to western africa and you talk to your doctor, where you ve been in the world now has to be part of your basic history and physical. it can no longer be, well, i just had a sore throat and fever for a few days without saying, have you been out of the country? oh, my gosh. and also the person with the fever what came and then died. right. you were talking about screening? right. as you and i in maknow screenin to get on an airplane is minimal at best if any screening at all. health care workers saying maybe let s take your temperature. you just don t get on that plane. if a patient were to arrive in the united states and look like that, that person would be immediately isolated and hospitalized. the only way to really shut this down is treat it like a wildfire. if there are brush fires popping here and there, you have to make sure they are all out. the challenge is, especially for this person who got on the airplane and maybe came into contact with at least we know 65 people, follow that chain link fence everywhere, find out all of those people he may have been in contact with and you have to make sure you do reasonable surveillance. how does the virus spread human-to-human? it s very much direct contact. saliva, vomit, diarrhea, maybe semen, we are not sure. but because aide workers when you see them in the field are in these hazmat suits. right. what concerns us is one of the american women who is infected and now being treated, her job was just to take off the hazmat suits and help bleach down the guys getting out. she was not even in direct contact. so the death rate from ebola is as high as 90% in. in this current outbreak it s hovering around 68%. the idea is jump in early because if you can stop the kidneys from going into failure. we will get to this new study. gene has a quick question. my question was just that, nancy. first world medical treatment, do we think that death rate would be lower than the 90% or even the 60%? probably, gene. so what we are running into right now is people, particularly in guinea and sierra leone haven t seen this before because this is a new illness in these countries. at the same time, they are seeing ebola kill neighbors and friends and family, the red cross is coming in and catholic charities is coming in. some villagers are seeing western medicine come in at the same time family members are dying and stoke the fear that outsiders have brought the illness. so that need for western medicine and sort of old beliefs and i m going to say, you know, like the voodoo kind of home medicine that you see in many villages, it s all colliding. so aide workers have talked about 17-year-olds with machetes stopping their cars, cutting down trees, and putting up road blocks to keep aide workers out. so they really want aide workers to work with local elders who are respected to try to demystify this. it s horrific. and i should say in this part of the world, ritual bathing of the dead is part of the custom but if you touch someone who is dead you re going to get the virus. let s now turn to this new study from the journal of the american college of cardiology on running. fascinating study. you know, we have been told before to run to work out an hour a day and you re going to live longer. impossible for most people. right. this study looked at over 55,000 people and showed that for runners, the reduction of heart disease and stroke is 30% or so. but even for the average person, if you run five minutes a day, you can reduce your risk of heart disease and stroke by almost 50%. so that use it or lose it, a little bit is better than nothing is significant. five minutes at like a dead sprint? no, just five minutes a day. sam wants to know how. how bad can i run? mika, i m not a runner. never loved it and never got that endorphin high and never figured out what is so great to it. mika love to get out there and run. i would like to wave them on. but i am very conscious of how much i walk a day. if you re not a runner, at least get in 10,000 steps. on the weekend, 25,000 steps. i would think that is doable for a lot of folks and it s really nice and probably has the same benefit. about three years ago, yes. 25,000 steps seems like a lot. on a weekend, absolutely doable. i think edition to bars. make sure you re drinking the dark alcohol because that stuff is good for your heart. all i drink. nancy, it s basically 30 to 60 minutes a week. let s say you took the low end 30 minutes a week. you could run twice a week, 15 minutes? that is doable for everybody. i do something every day. there was a study about three or four years ago looking at very fit men with no risk factors for heart disease and stroke. their jobs, however, were desk jobs. and they found that sitting at a desk was an independent risk factor for having heart attack. why you need a treadmill desk. have you seen those? al roker has one. he walks all day long. we should get them here. show it on the air. everyone else is on their treadmills watching. everyone says i watch you from my treadmill every morning. i feel jealous! trip on them. i like that. nancy, thank you so much. great to see you. ahead outrage in new york city as residents in a luckry apartment building want a separate door for the so-called affordable units. really? we will break down the city s so-called poor door policies. keep it right here on morning joe. somewhere out on that horizon out beyond the neon lights i know there must be somebody vo: this is the summer. the summer of this. the summer that summers from here on will be compared to. where memories will be forged into the sand. and then hung on a wall for years to come. get out there, with over 50,000 hotels at $150 dollars or less. expedia. find yours. when folks think about wthey think salmon and energy. but the energy bp produces up here creates something else as well: jobs all over america. engineering and innovation jobs. advanced safety systems & technology. shipping and manufacturing. across the united states, bp supports more than a quarter million jobs. when we set up operation in one part of the country, people in other parts go to work. that s not a coincidence. it s one more part of our commitment to america. i voted for culture. .with a k. how are you? i voted for plausible deniability. i didn t kill her, david. and i voted for decisive military action. america, you cast your votes. now, go to xfinity on demand and select the people s hotlist to see this summer s top 100 shows and movies. i voted! 35 past of the hour. hi, thomas. hi, mika. you re here. okay. two of our favorite senators here on morning joe is pushing legislation to close down a branch of the commerce department that they say is obsolete and they say it s also a waste of taxpayer claire mccaskill and tomcoal burn. the office doesn t make any money doing it. they have actually lost money. 9 out of 10 years. in fact, the reporters of all those government reports offered online can be found on other sites and almost always free of charge. that s why they named their bill the, quote, let me fooling that for you act. mccaskill saying a government agency for paying for things after realizing they could get it for free elsewhere. good foy. she noted a tiny banner at the top of the branch s website informing consumers of that fact seems awfully difficult to read. yep, you could get rid of that. anybody disagree? i know nothing about this agency. so i m going to reserve judgment but it seems like if you did google something. let me google that for you. up next, the stakes have never been higher than back channel. a piece of historical future set during the cuban missile crisis that takes us to the brink of world war iii. keep it here on morning joe. that is coming up. have you ever looked at someone and right away thought you know exactly what they re like and what they believe in? well, odds are you re wrong. what s on the outside and what s on the inside can be very different. the more you know. and cialis for daily use helps you be ready anytime the moment is right. cialis is also the only daily ed tablet approved to treat symptoms of bph, like needing to go frequently. tell your doctor about all your medical conditions and medicines, and ask if your heart is healthy enough for sex. do not take cialis if you take nitrates for chest pain, as it may cause an unsafe drop in blood pressure. do not drink alcohol in excess. side effects may include headache, upset stomach, delayed backache or muscle ache. to avoid long term injury, get medical help right away for an erection lasting more than four hours. if you have any sudden decrease or loss in hearing or vision, or any allergic reactions like rash, hives, swelling of the lips, tongue or throat, or difficulty breathing or swallowing, stop taking cialis and get medical help right away. ask your doctor about cialis for daily use and a free 30-tablet trial. i call upon chairman to halt and eliminate this clan dah stein and stable relations between our two nations. i call upon him further to abandon this course of world domination and to join in a historic effort to end the perilist arms race and transform the history of man. our goal is not the victory of mig might, but the vindication of right. both peace and freedom. here in this hemisphere and we hope around the world, god willing, that goal will be achieved. that was october of 1962. the cuban missile crisis put the u.s. and soviet union and a military face-off. what went on behind the scenes to avoid a full-out war. with us is the new york times best selling author, steven l. carter who is out with his latest novel back channel. great to have you back on the show. thank you. congratulations on this. we will also talk about the poor door controversy here in new york city coming up which i think is fascinating. you reimagined, speaking of fascinating, the cuban missile crisis and you bring in a couple of different aspects to this. the game of chess and young woman by the name of margo jensen. here, there s two historical facts that i worked with. one is that president kennedy really did have an affair with a 19-year-old college student that did actually overlap the cuban missile crisis. second, behind the official negotiations, there was an unofficial negotiation, a secret negotiation only a few people knew about in the white house. my fictional premise supposed the affair with the college student didn t really happen but a cover for the secret negotiations. okay. take it from there. that affair did happen with kennedy, correct? i really did have an affair with a 19-year-old but my fictional 19-year-old he does not have an affair with but she is asked to pretend to have an affair with the president using his reputation as it were as the cover so that she can ferry messages between him and an official of the soviet embassy. when we look back on the history of what that time meant for the world internationally it was a big chess game and trying to figure it out and a lot of it went with the national thought leaders who could think like the luck of trying to figure out the situation. why does chess play to prominently for you in your books? you say you re an amateur at chess, which i doubt. no, i m an absolute amateur. but what chess involves is figuring out what your opponent is going to do and not letting your opponent know what you are going to do. when you look at foreign policy crises today and there are a lot of them and a lot of people criticizing the president or supporting him and a lot of the criticism i think is undeserved. foreign policy is hard. but the one piece of advice that i would give, if ever asked, wanting to learn from this crisis what kennedy did, he kept guessing. whether kennedy was willing to push the button or not. we still don t know. keeping his opponent off balance that way and keeping his cards so close to his vest and his close advisers didn t know i think was the successful completion of the crisis. discussion of the difficulties of writing and melding the two together. i think written seven or eight works of nonfiction and it is my sixth novel. you re right. to me writing novels is harder and writing historical novels is particularly difficult. it appeals to me as a scholar. i get to do the research and i try in this novel to bring washington, d.c. to 1962 to life and it all takes place in europe and so on but i try to bring the city to life as it really would have been. i have a a lot of real historical characters in the novels, not only the kennedy brothers and national security adviser but people like bobby fisher, the chess champion and others. to me half the fun of it is trying to make sure i have to the extent possible my facts right and that takes a lot of time. why not go full nonfiction and retell the story of what happened from a purely historical end? but i like to tell stories. people like to read the stories. you have a story to tell. i do. i want to bring you to real life for a second. as you have written in bloomberg view about the corridor controversy here in new york city and you write in part this. everyone is mad about the poor door. this is the name critics bestowed upon the separate entrance for the affordable housing units on the western side of manhattan. it is a little outrageous but some of it may be optical. the separate entrance for the cheaper units which is hardly heard of in manhattan real estate is part of a consequence of the very policies that new york is trying to enforce. so the title of this is the poor door concept is nothing new in u.s. cities. i don t think that makes it okay. it s not okay. it s not okay. no, it s not okay. it s a terrible thing, but new york is one of the most economically segregated cities in the united states. well studied. already in new york city, there is an enormous separation between where the with to do live and where the poor live. right but to have the poor people who live in the affordable part of that building bringing in a separate door is bringing us to a past time. i m agreeing. the way to resolve this, is number one, the economic segregation in new york we have the sections of the city that are rich and sections that are poor and tend to not overlap with each other is number one. second the way to solve the problem of affordable housing is not only to reduce some of the regulations that make it expensive to build housing but to get people with actual money they can go out and find a place to live that meets their standards rather than some standard that was designed by the city itself. stephen, in talking about this specific building on the upper west side and also to the divide in the city, a lot of people being priced out of living in manhattan directly. if i understand about the building, the residents in one section say the higher cost apartments are not going to share the same amenities and same floors. it s like two separate buildings built in one structural space so that these builders are getting the big tax exemptions and kick-backs from the city? i agree. what i would do i would stomp giving the builders those benefits. what the builders do with these benefits and not only build separate spaces and extra benefits to sell off for millions of dollars. what the city is doing for this program is subsidizing the construction from luxury housing where builders make billions of dollars. you have a lot of buildings in manhattan have the separate entrances we both object to and the only way we are going to stop that is stop giving them the subsidy which they are happy to get. why put the affordable housing units in the building? more housing can be built you may have someone else put in good to have you back on the show. a pleasure. up next, will voters hurt the democrats this november? we are going to explore in the mojo polling place. plus the nixon tapes you never heard. historian douglas brinkley will be on the set and some of these are fantastic. did you hear some of these? yes. family friendly. yeah. we will be right back. shopping online is as easy as it gets. wouldn t it be great if hiring plumbers, carpenters and even piano 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[ male announcer ] that s why there s ocuvite to help replenish key eye nutrients. ocuvite has a unique formula not found in your multivitamin to help protect your eye health. ocuvite. help protect your eye health. ocuvite. hey, i heard you guys can help me with frog protection? sure, we help with fraud protection. if there are unauthorized purchases on your discover card, you re never held responsible. you are saying frog protection ? fraud. fro-g. frau-d. i think we re on the same page. at discover, we treat you like you d treat you. fraud protection. get it at discover.com 25-year-old junior bishop dressed as spider-man took a photo with two people, and when the couple attempted to give the man $1, bishop says he only takes 5s, 10s, and 20s. a police officer overheard the conversation and stepped in and told the couple they could donate whatever they wanted. the police officer asked for bishop s i.d. and he said he didn t have an i.d.. his real name s peter parker. i guess the real question everybody has in this situation is, did batman think that the police were justified? somebody get choked, just like that, you know what mine? he can get choked for that. you know what i mean? bruce, bruce we can see your face, bruce! oh, my gosh. that is too much. all right, to politics now. there are some circles, which is just as funny, sometimes, there are some circles of the republican party that would like to see mitt romney make another run for the presidency in two years. and as morning joe polling analyst derek kips reports, there s a whole group of voters who wish the former governor were in the white house right now. it appears some americans may be having buyer s remorse about their decision to re-elect president barack obama to a second term. despite the fact that president obama beat mitt romney in 2012, 51-47 in the popular vote, a recent cnn poll shows if the election were held today, mitt romney would be the people s choice, topping the president, 53-44. and according to gallup s recent survey, the president s approval rating has flatlined at 43%. it s a number of that has the gop hoping to capitalize come november. the cnn poll further reveals that 45% of americans believe that president obama has expanded his presidential power too much, with only 3 in 10 saying the president s actions have been about right. however, despite the president s low approval rating, the president doesn t seem to buy the gop s legislative agenda of lawsuits and impeachment either. by a 57-41 margin, americans say house republicans should not file the lawsuit challenging the president s health plan. with even fewer supporting the gop s growing calls for impeachment. if the gop truly hopes to capitalize on the president s weak approval numbers in the midterms, lawsuits and impeachment may not be the best option to do so. guys, back to you. okay, gene, just chime in on the buyer s remorse. is it fair? well, look, this is that phase of a presidency where people have seen him for six years and things are not going well in the world and, but they don t like the republicans either. i think, just not at a great move. so that s where i think we are. we re not in a good place. up next, andrew cuomo defends the ethics commission that he commissioned, as a new report suggests that his office isn t completely free of guilt. we ll talk about that. plus, a senate candidate s strategy for a victory is leaked, revealing an inside look at the game of politics and the role of money. and then as the crisis in the middle east taking a toll on the relationship between the u.s. and israel? nbc s kate snowe joins with us a live report from tel aviv. all of that and much more when morning joe returns. as long as i ve lived in iowa, there s always been wind. (strauss blue danube playing) the summer that summers from here on will be compared to. so get out there, and get the best price guaranteed. find it for less and we ll match it and give you $50 toward your next trip. expedia. find yours. lactaid® is 100% real milk? right. real milk. but it won t cause me discomfort. exactly, no discomfort, because it s milk without the lactose. and it tastes? it s real milk! come on, would i lie about this? [ female announcer ] lactaid®. 100% real milk. no discomfort. and for more 100% real dairy treats you ll 100% enjoy look for lactaid® ice cream and lactaid® cottage cheese. he gets a ready for you alerty the second his room is ready. when sales rep steve hatfield books at laquinta.com, so he knows exactly when he can prep for his presentation. and when steve is perfectly prepped, ya know what he brings? and that s how you ll increase market share. any questions? can i get an a , steve? yes! three a s! amazing sales! he brings his a-game! la quinta inns and suites is ready for you, so you ll be ready for business. the ready for you alert, only at laquinta.com! la quinta! flares have turned night into broad daylight in the skies over the gaza strip. today was supposed to be a cease-fire. it didn t work. an explosion on a busy street where children were playing. israel says it was a stray hamas rocket. hamas doesn t accept that, and uses the attack on the children as a reason to go on the offensive. intense fighting prevented investigators reaching the crash site of mh-17 for the second day running. much more substantial sanctions will come into place across broad sectors of the russian economy. two americans are fighting for their lives, infected with the deadly ebola virus. the spread of a dangerous illness like ebola is no longer someone else s problem. last july, governor andrew cuomo created a special commission to tackle public corruption. and now, a three-month examination by the new york times claims that governor cuomo s office deeply compromised the panel s work. if you had watched the movie to the end, the name of the movie would have been independence. you named it interference. welcome back to morning joe. sam stein, eugene robinson still with us. joining us now, columnist for bloomberg view, al hunt, in new york. i m confused. first time on the set here in new york. is it really? it s usually a d.c. thing with al. my dream has been to be with mika in new york and finally that s one way to put it. and with steve. what about me, al. don t leave sam out. former mccain campaign strategist and msnbc political analyst, steve schmidt is here as well. nice to have you on board. thank you, mika. let s start with breaking news, as the crisis between israel and hamas enters its fourth week, nbc news has confirmed moments ago that two u.n. staff members were killed in gaza today. the new barrage of strikes came as israeli prime minister benjamin netanyahu delivered a national tv address, warning of an extended conflict there. joining us now from tel aviv, nbc news correspondent, kate snowe with the latest. kate? reporter: good morning, mika. secretary of state john kerry is still pushing all the parties for an end to the bloodshed here, but i have to tell you, he faces an uphill battle in israel, because look at what the public and the press are saying about john kerry. here s the headline in this morning s paper, it says obama and kerry are playing with fire. overnight, more explosions in gaza. this morning, the main power plant took a hit, columns of smoke are still rising. israel confirmed ten soldiers died yesterday, pushing the number of military deaths over 50, the highest casualty count since a war in the north in 2006. that s only increasing israel s resolve to keep going, and it helps explain why it s been so tough for john kerry to negotiate a peace deal. i just want to say a very few words, quickly about the events in gaza. kerry s been soundly criticized in the israeli media for the way he pushed for a cease-fire. a columnist for the liberal newspaper says senior government officials in jerusalem described carri kerry s cease-fire proposal as a strategic attack. it s not just that kerry and the obama administration is taking the side of the palestinians, but in the arab world in general over israel. and the feeling is that this america led by this president won t actually be there when it matters for israel s security needs. one paper called kerry a nudnnik. somebody coming again and again and again and doesn t do much. reporter: the coffee crowd in tel aviv thinks kerry is out of his league. he thinks he can make some agreement, he can write some nice words, some nice statements. come on. get real. reporter: the obama administration spent monday bending over backwards to defend kerry. the reality is that john kerry, on behalf of the united states, has been working every step of the way with israel in support of our shared interests. reporter: so here s the situation. a lot of analysts are worried that kerry, with all this kerry bashing going on, is going to lose some of his power to even negotiate some kind of cease-fire, let alone a lasting peace over here. and meantime, while all the diplomats are talking, more than 70 palestinians were killed in that fighting overnight. sam stein? kate, i had a question for you. the israel ambassador to the united states yesterday spoke out in defense, actually, of john kerry, and tried to minimize the distance between the netanyahu government and the secretary of state. do you pick up any sense that the israeli government thinks that the talk has been overblown, or what is the imperative for them in having the ambassador come out and saying something like that? reporter: publicly, they still want to talk about their alliance with the u.s. they need america as an ally. behind the scenes, it s harder to say. the sense from here, when you talk to the people, at least, is that israelis, they re not giving up. they don t want a cease-fire. they re not going to stop this offensive, because they strongly believe that those tunnels still exist and that they haven t yet demilitaryized hamas. that s the mood on the street that benjamin netanyahu is dealing with here. and of course, he has to balance that with the diplomacy. nbc s kate snowe in tel aviv, thanks so much. al, you heard netanyahu in the past 24 hours pulling this just war. kerry, obviously, the secretary of state in the crosshairs of criticism. and you know, at what point, really, is he to blame for continued fighting, when all sides of this are so at each other s throats, literally, and show no sign of backing down. it s almost like the criticism of kerry is an excuse to keep fighting, instead of to listen and to stop. it s kind of hard to blame john kerry for for trying. for fighting in the middle east. he may have made a tactical mistake. i don t know enough about what s on the ground there. but to say that john kerry is not a friend of israel. to say that john kerry is somehow trying to help hamas is just utter and complete nonsense. it s ludicrous. and i think for the israeli those israelis who perpetuate that are going to find it self-defeating. they re not only perpetuating it, this time it s being stirred up as an excuse not to consider a cease-fire, which, i mean, at this point, we re looking at day after day after day of video of civilians and children, getting caught in these massacre. i think the key quote from yesterday was when netanyahu talked about continuing this operation until they closed all of the tunnels from gaza into israel. that could be a serious and long-term operation in terms of the war hostilities. and it suggests that israeli is in this mind-set where they want to, you know, figuratively, mow the lawn, chop down hamas s military capabilities for now, for a couple of years, and they ll have to end up coming back. and my question for everyone who talks about this is what is the long-term strategic objective of israel here? i m having trouble figuring out what they re trying to do in the long run. what replaces hamas as the military outfit of the palestinians? and does it spread to the west bank? steve? look, the reason there is fighting now, today, is 100% entirely the fault of hamas. this is a terrorist organization. the lobbing of missiles into israel, the attacks on the civilian populations in israel have precipitated this crisis. and the strategic goal of the israeli nation, of the israeli army is to demilitaryize, to disarm, to defang hamas. and they have sustained casualties, great sacrifice on the part of the israeli people. and it should be the job of the government of the united states in this situation, to communicate with absolute moral clarity that we will stand side-by-side with israel. that we will not give cover to those who draw false equivalence with the two sides. the images on television are tragic, because all war is tragic. but the israeli people don t live in the fantastical world of washington, d.c. the threats that they face are real, they are lethal, and the people that you just saw being interviewed in cafes have a visceral understanding of that in a way that our policy makers can t seem to at an intellectual level. and i don t want to start a because every conversation usually results in an emotional back and forth, and i don t want to get there. i think, in theory, that s fine. but you can t just ignore the severe humanitarian crisis that s going on in gaza, as well as the civilian casualties. we can t have a foreign policy in a vacuum. yes, it makes sense to stand with israel. yes, israel has vulnerability from hamas. but at the same time, there are clearly issues in elements of the palestinian cause that resonate with the american public, and certainly with the european public and the world public that can t just be wiped away. who is that you re negotiating with? that s the great question. when the people that you are trying to do a deal with do not recognize at any level your legitimacy nothing, exactly. the hamas chief said that s true! gene, jump in? the question, to me, steve, is, okay, who are you negotiating with? well, if you don t want to negotiate with hamas, because that s the opposite party, under any circumstances, and the only way to get at hamas is essentially through the people, the civilians who live in gaza, there s a problem there. and we can t ignore that problem, that if the only way you can get at hamas is, you know, killing thousands, potentially, before this is over, of civilians in gaza, there s a real question there, that we can t just look past. and you know, there s a question of proportionality here and i think it s, you know, i can understand, you know, i know what israelis feel, i know how under attack they feel, with good reason. but there is a question of proportionality. and in the end, can you bomb hamas into oblivion? can you totally get rid of hamas? and if so, isn t it replaced by something very much like hamas? or worse. or worse. well, look, at the end of the day, you have a densely packed civilian population. hamas operates within that civilian population. they use that civilian population to hide weapons systems, to hide rocket systems. the israeli army does everything it can conceivably do to avoid civilian casualties in its operation. this is a moral country. this is a moral fighting force. what is happening in any war, where there are civilian casualties, where there is collateral damage, it is very tragic. but now that this has begun, it must be finished. sure. and the israeli army must be supported by this country in its quest to do as much damage to disarm hamas and to demilitaryize them, to degrade them, and to weaken them as much as possible or these losses will have been in vain. and the secretary of state should not be drawing false equivalence between the two sides. i don t think he did draw he did not draw a false equivalence, steve. that s just not right. he tried to get a cease-fire. you can argue that was a mistake. but to what to end violence. but the strategic goal here should be the degrading of hamas, not the the strategic goal is not the achievement of a cease-fi cease-fire. a cease-fire achieved without a degraded hamas means we will likely see more military con fli flikt in the future. now that this has begun, there is only one way for it to end, and that is for hamas to be defanged to the largest stent as possible. we re saying, what happens? what are the ramifications of a defanged hamas? as eugene possible, i don t think any of us know this, but is it a possibility that what replaces hamas in gaza could end up being worse. it could be a series of terrorist groups or terror cells that we have no control over, that provide no social services to the people of gaza. those are the questions we re not grappling with. we have a very short-term mind-set about this conflict when we should be thinking about the long-term. it s entirely possible that it could be worse. and if it is worse, then the israeli army will need to continue into and here we are. this is why these conversations i want to get two political stories in this block, before we go to break. first this one, u.s. senate hopeful michelle nun s campaign is brushing off the leak in georgia. it calls for the candidate to spend 80% of her time raising money. the conservative national review released a trove of nunn s international campaign strategies. it highlighted her biggest vulnerabilitie vulnerabilities, including her work, an organization that may have loose ties to hamas. and there s a memo highlighting what the campaign saw as an opportunity in the jewish community. saying, quote, michelle s position on israel will largely determine the level of support, adding that her message was tbd. nunn is currently locked in a tight race with georgia businessman, david perdue. her campaign doesn t dispute the authenticity of the document. writing in a statement, quote, this was a draft of a document that was written eight months ago. like all good plans, they change. but what hasn t changed is all the more clear today, that michelle s components are going to mischaracterization, to mischaracterize her work and her positions, and part of what we ve always done is prepare for the false things that are going to be said. i m not sure if that s in response to what happened or not, but that s their response. al, are you surprised by anything in the memo when you know the inner workings of politics? no, i m really not. i m not. it hurts, but i m i can t stand that 80% of her time has to be you wish you didn t have campaigns, where you spend 80% of your time. but you do. points of light, as i recall, was a george bush foundation, a george bush initiative. look, it s embarrassing and it doesn t help. michelle nunn is a very strong accompanied. is the best single opportunity to win a republican seat. her father is still revered in the state of georgia. he s running with jimmy carter s grandson. and they ve got a shot in a red state, in a year that s not going to be you must have written tons of these memos. has anyone what stands out? i have a couple of reactions. first off, she s only spending 80% of her time raising money? only?! good god! i m serious about this. my line to candidates has always been, you re going to submit about 90% of your time raising money. in that this is a revelation to anybody is just shocking to me. look, this is what american politics is like. candidates spend more than 80% of their time, spend much more like 90% of their time raising must be. and that s how broken the system is. and then the second part of it is, and i ve been for a long time now, in a campaign. i just don t hand out paper around the table. everything gets put on the dry erase board. the notion that you re going to put this into long strategic memos and pass out 100 copies is beyond crazy. well, this one was accidentally posted online, which is even crazier. oh, come on! that s how they got it. who would post that online? the former campaign aides. look, when i was running the arnold schwarzenegger campaign, we got a call from the l.a. times one day, saying they had hours of taped conversations, we had no idea how they got them. we eventually figured out, with arnold schwarzenegger talking, you know, in, you know, you know, off the cuff. and i love him to death, but let me assure you that s good stuff. he s a colorful character. and i always thought hours of arnold schwarzenegger tapes with nothing particularly damaging in the media was the equivalent of a 747 doing an emergency landing in lower manhattan and doing no damage and hurting no one. so you can survive this thing. you can. sam in 2008, the obama campaign accidentally sent us their district by district plan from february through june. went through every district. and when i called him up and said, it s terrific, they said, you can t print that, and i said, i can, and they said, we have lots of plans, and i said, send us every one and we ll print every one. and they survived. i got a memo about how to court a high-profile donor and what it was going to entail and how they were going to talk to the guy. it was what would you expect they wanted to do to a high-profile donor, but it was hugely embarrassing to have something like that revealed in public. i don t know what happened to the donor. i assume he department donate. probably ambassador of lu luxembou luxembourg. i remember infamously the in 2008, the giuliani campaign memo about how he was going to run for president was leaked and obviously that didn t turn out well for giuliani. we re also following a story with andrew cuomo. you seen this? new york governor andrew cuomo pushing back hard against allegations that his office interfered with a political ethics commission, a commission he himself put in place. it stems from a front-page article last week in the new york times which alleges cuomo s office squashed certain subpoenas is that would have looked into the governor s own dealings. including one to a media firm connected to new york s democratic party. but now, one of the firm s three co-chairs at the center of the times story, william j. fitzpatri fitzpatrick, is claiming that the panel was, indeed independent. he says, quote, the bottom line is that no one interfered with me or my co-chairs. but disappoint yesterday s denials, e-mails obtained by the times show that fitzpatrick had expressed frustration with meddling with the governor s office. at one point, e-mailing that mr. cuomo s office needs to understand that this is an independent commission and needs to be treated as such. yesterday, the governor disputed the times characterization of the remarks. read it again. the second floor, larry, needs to understand that an independent commission needs to be treated as such. okay, so what he s saying is that at some point in time, larry is having a conversation with him and larry is advocating a point. that s what that is saying. that is true. follow the movie to the conclusion. and what does chairman fitzpatrick say? no, resoundingly, no. what does the chairman s actions show. no. resoundingly no. because he rejected the request. the rejection is ipso facto a statement of independence because he said no. and he could and he did. if you had watched the movie to the end, the name of the movie would have been independence. you named it interference. okay. so, i want to get steve s take on this. the governor is has also said i spoke to him on the phone yesterday, most of it off the record, but denying vehemently that he didn t they did not squash subpoenas. so the times is making a connection that everyone is running with. and the question is, in terms of looking at his response here and looking at the story as it was laid out, the actual facts making no connections, just the facts, is he in trouble in any way? no. and by the way, what i think is, and what he said, i find very compelling. and i think he is correct. and my advice to him would be to speak no more of this matter ever again forever. if the chairman of the commission says that i was not interfered with, and as the governor just went through, and the e-mail to me is dispositive of the fact that he asserted his independence, did not yield to political pressure in a conversation with a political aide who was trying to make a point, and there s no actual evidence, just supposition that there was a quashing of subpoenas, i don t know what the story is here. he didn t squash a subpoena? i think the answer is no, there is no evidence that subpoenas were squashed politically. so in the context of the story, you understand why he seems a little bit emotional, what his reaction is on that. but i don t know what the basis of the story and the allegation is, given the other facts that we just laid out here. i think you re i m not quite so benign on this. he may not have squashed subpoenas, i don t know. i m not familiar with this story. but what is clear, albany is a cesspool of corruption, they tried to clear it up, they tried to interfere, someone from his office, maybe they didn t succeed. i think andrew cuomo does not look good here. and here s a governor, ipso facto, he is in trouble. that s a different issue. i just wanted to get ipso facto in there. people have been trying to clean up albany since the 1920s. it s always been a sacesspool. the fact that albany is a cesspool has no bearing on this story. unless you said you came to albany to clean it up. but bring that up in the re-election. is there any evidence that the governor was involved in squashing subpoenas? there s no apparent evidence to me of that. if the chairman of the commission says that he did shut down the commission. there was no political interference. that s a problem in its own right. it s a problem, i suppose, if people want to make a political argument that he ought not to have closed down the commission. but the notion that, you know, that the story that ran, i think, is absent facts, alleging what he did. the question is what is interference, right? guys, so we have chris christie on one side of this thing and tri-state area. the tri-state governors are being looked at, and in both the cases, the optics are very bad. but to the governor s point, there are no facts right now that prove that he quashed subpoenas, right? does anybody have any? okay, we don t. but it doesn t look good. i think that s fair to say. closing down the the optics are bad. shutting down a commission that you created and it looks like there may be some timing that would indicate that it might be effective, but you ve got no proof. you created it because you were a great corruption fighter. and then you shut it down. but, again, there s no actual fact that chose that. and you could also say that the new jersey governor, you know, tried that as well, saying there are no facts that show i was connected to the lane but that did not stop the press from talking about it is and saying these could be connections that could be made. it s an interesting trifecta. all right. we ll revisit this. we ll be following this. and maybe we ll hold a news conference closer to new york city. that would be nice. because that s another optic issue. buffalo s not good enough? buffalo is hard to get to. i m like, are you kidding me, buffalo? now it seems like you re trying to make it far away tim russert is looking down on you somewhere, be careful, mika. i love buffalo, i m just saying, but if you want to address the story, come to the reporters who are covering it. eugene robinson, thank you, steve schmidt, thank you as well. al hunt, stay with us. 40 years ago after his resignation as president, we ll take a look at some new uncensored tapes from the nixon administration. they re fascinating. and later, the impact of two opposing forces on the modern family dynamic. we ll explain what those forces are with a fascinating new study ahead and the impact of women working and making money and how that potentially affects marriage. but, first, here s bill karins with a check on the forecast. bill? morning to you, mika. a lot of activity lately. we had those tornadoes in boston yesterday, one in virginia last week. and then we had that lightning strike on the beach that killed that person in california, three rare events. what s not so rare is summertime fires in the west. and they continue to spread and we ve been having a very active period. these are coming from near yosemite national park, and we re going to watch this area closely today, because they do have the chance to spread with warm temperatures and some breezy conditions out there. in all, we now have 27 large fires burning in the west. it actually died down just a little bit. we had about 36 last week. so some rainfall has been beneficial. this picture came to us overnight. this is from yosemite national park, and you can actually see on here, how active the fire is, right through the middle of the night. a pretty eerie looking picture there. so across the country, we had that storm in new england yesterday, gone. now we re looking at beautiful conditions. no problems with the mid-atlantic, ohio valley. dry air all the way to the south. one area that s needed the rain, new mexico. and you re getting drenched. we ve seen too much, too fast, and we have some flash flood warnings. colorado and new mexico, flash flooding. your tuesday forecast, flash flood threat continues for colorado, new mexico, some afternoon storms in florida. and as we head towards the end of the week, the predominant weather story will be what happens with this tropical disturbance. it looks like it could become tropical storm bertha by the end of the week. somewhere near puerto rico by the time we get to sunday. and it could go somewhere just off the east coast it looks like, next week at this time. so that s good news with that. shouldn t be much of a problem for the lower 48. but our friends in puerto rico, we ll keep a close eye on it. you re watching morning joe. we ll be right back. over 20 million kids everyday in our country lack access to healthy food. for the first time american kids are slated to live a shorter life span than their parents. it s a problem that we can turn around and change. revolution foods is a company we started to provide access to healthy, affordable, kid-inspired, chef-crafted food. we looked at what are the aspects of food that will help set up kids for success? making sure foods are made with high quality ingredients and prepared fresh everyday. our collaboration with citi has helped us really accelerate the expansion of our business in terms of how many communities we can serve. working with citi has also helped to fuel our innovation process and the speed at which we can bring new products into the grocery stores. we are employing 1,000 people across 27 urban areas and today, serve over 1 million meals a week. until every kid has built those life-long eating habits, we ll keep working. machines will be sprayed to be made. and making something stronger. will mean making it lighter. one day, factories will work with the cloud. one day. is today. one of the first recordings made after president richard nixon installed a private taping system, and an eerie warning from his chief of staff. joining us now, professor of history at rice university, douglas brinkley, who is the father of cassidy, it s cassidy, right, sweetie? yeah, i m good. also the co-editor of a new book, the nixon tapes: richard nixon unfiltered, uncensored, and in his own words. is your dad nice? yeah. a good writer, right? and cassidy says she s best behaved in the household. i ll let you go figure that out between your brother and sister, because we re going to be talking about inappropriate behavior among pandas, apparently. so cute. so good. we ve got a lot of fascinating things to talk about pertaining to your books and these tapes. here s a conversation between president nixon and henry kissinger when they wanted to produce criticism against soviet jews, worried it could harm their secret talks with the soviet union. what do you think of this conversation? henry kissinger, being jewish, is constantly worried he s going to be taken out of being a negotiator in the middle east, anything to do with israel or foreign policy in general, but nixon told halderman, i don t want any jews regarded with foreign policy. so kissinger always trying to overcompensate and being macho. in this case, he says, i don t care about the human right s jes and soviet unions. it s none of our business. we don t ask russia to tell us about african-americans, we don t care what happens to them. at one point, he says, i don t care basically if they go in gas chambers, it s none of our business. they re in russia, it s not america. he s a realist, kissinger, and this is his real politic vision. al, have you been listening to these tapes at all? i ve listened to some. it s fascinating. i can t wait to read doug s book. everything about nixon is fascinating. the contradictions, this incredibly smart man who was so insecure, had good policies and did them in the worst possible way. but kissinger also was pandering to him. absolutely. and nobody spoke up to the boss. and you have to give kissinger to you know, he didn t know he was being tape recorded. nixon had everything voice activated. it wasn t like johnson or kennedy, where they were doing limited taping. this was everything. they even bugged camp david. so you can imagine kissinger, years later, when these come out, you have to be you get mortified. but nobody, except halderman, and maybe once or twice, really stands up to the boss. they re afraid of him. and kissinger in his defense, pandered to him rhetorically, but it didn t affect policy. often would just do the opposite or at least try to work other channels. in fact, we owe kissinger a little bit of credit in october of 1973 with the yom kippur war, nixon was drinking all the time, completely dissolving, because of the pressure of watergate, and it was kissinger and scowcroft who kept our foreign policy going. so had it been today, there could be cameras everywhere. it would be like the kardashians. one of the more humorous exchanges in the book, nixon s conversation with a washington reporter about chinese pandas heading to the national zoo. nixon was apparently amazed at how they mated. pandas are voyeurs. what in the world?! what in the world? well, nixon s sort of an odd man. yes. but, of course, his best moment in history is the 1972 breakthrough to china and the pandas coming to america were a big deal. and on one of the tapes, nixon was talking about the problem of what zoo, san diego, st. louis? and he decided on the national zoo, because he thought the climate was right for pandas. so he started reading a lot about pandas, so far that he was getting into their mating habits with a reporter. a real aficionado. so 72, you talk about, that s when the breakthrough he had with china. but when we look at his most powerful years, really is just prior to that. because watergate, you know, 73, as you say, he was drinking a little more than he should have been. but 71/ 72? yeah, he was a big deal. he won in 68, improbable as it was. 72, the biggest landslide in american history against george mcgovern. on one of the tapes, he s so victorious, he says, why isn t somebody writing a book about 1972. all that i ve accomplished. his sense of grandiosity is extreme. and of course, we know, by 73, watergate just starts ripping him down. and you get a whole new batch of tapes that a man name stanley cutler had put into a book called abuse of power, a great scholar from wisconsin, and now john deans also adding to that record. did you like putting this together? it was unbelievable, because my friend, luke nicktor, we had transcripts so high, he s been working on it for a decade. and we went through and edited it down to try to be fair. ones that are historically significant, some lighter moments, and some moments of dark nixon. before we go to break, we re going to bump out with him talking about women who swear, which we ran earlier. it is something to listen to. the book is the nixon tapes. and you can read an excerpt on our site, mojo.msnbc.com. douglas brinkley, thank you so much. thank you, cassidy! your daughter s adorable! always bring her. al hunt, thank you as well. i know you ve got to run. tomorrow on morning joe, we ll continue our look at president nixon. john dean will be our guest for his book, the nixon defense, what he knew and when he knew it. coming up this morning, the revolution at home. how men and women are learning to coexist in a new era of equality, or no coexist. morning joe will be right back. think the tree we carved our names in is still here? probably dead. how much fun is this? what? what a beautiful sunset. if you like sunsets. whether you re sweet or salty. you ll love nature valley sweet and salty bars. caman: thanks, captain obvious. wouldn t stay here tonight. captain obvious: i d get a deal for tonight with deals for tonight from hotels.com. and you might want to get that pipe fixed. the dynamics of the american working family are constantly evolving. affected in large part by the economic gains and losses made by women in the family. it creates what the director of the research council, research at the council on contemporary families call the new instability in a piece for the new york times . she wrote in part this, over the past 40 years, the geography of family life has been destabilized by two powerful forces, pulling in opposite directions. and occasionally scraping against each other. much like tectonic plates. one is the striking progress toward equality between men and women. the other is the equally striking growth of socioeconomic inequality and insecurity. and here with us now to weigh in on these two trends, editor in chief of glamour, cindy levy, and chairman of myers biz.net, jet myers, the author of the upcoming book, the future of men and the age of dominant males. we ve got to talk. i don t know who s losing more in that. but let s talk about this study. so cindy and jack, and thomas, show us some of the numbers here we re talking about. because there are some real shifts taking place. there are definitely shifts. let s talk about gains for women and redefining the ideal family arrangement. the question was asked, how have these two trends impacted the notion of an ideal family relationship based on these numbers. and look at this, we have the ideal family arrangement, 1977, two-thirds believed the husband should work, and the wife should be at home. now, 2012, we ve got one third believe that the husband should work and the wife should be at home. so, obviously, there is huge gains in terms of how families are looking at who s going outside the home to work. and add one more outcome to that, looking at divorce, which is so interesting as well. so marriage 101, we look at the 1980s. if the wife was better educated, divorce was more likely. in the 1990s, if the wife is better educated, there is no e added divorce risk. let s stop there with this new instability. what s happening? cindy and then jack? what s happening is work is a reality of women s lives. and it is basically holding up the american economy. and most americans are pretty fine with that. i mean, the statistics that you just showed, showing how people s views towards women bringing home the bacon have changed are remarkable. you know, there used to be this idea that that was a men s world. and now, particularly, young men and women think, you know what, as long as there s bacon coming into the home, i m good. it doesn t matter who s brought it. it s not just a push for equality anymore, it s a necessity. i look at the next generation as girls are going to work. it s not about having it all as some sort of greedy or selfish choice. it s about, this is what the economy and everybody s family is but it is impacting the family, jack? there are clear economic and marriages. it s impacting across all society, culture, business, education, politics. but the reality is that in 2015, for the first time, women will surpass men in the workforce, in managerial and professional jobs, in 1970, men represented over 75%. today, they represent only 45% of managerial and professional jobs. and while women s income has been increasing since 1970, about 25%, men s income has been flat. so while we have more women in the workforce, there s still overall family income, even with more two-family homes is declining. and that s the real challenge. that we can t raise total income, even as more women are entering the workforce. interesting results from this, also, in terms of who does the housework. who bears the brunt of the family responsibilities. well, there was this study last year, that got a lot of attention, that hinted that couples in which men do more of the housework or at least their fair share, actually have less sex. and that turns out not to be true. i m pretty sure it was a rumor started by a guy who did not want to unload the dishwasher. it s a good one! but i think that speaks to something that jack just raised. as women gain in education, they are not actually raising their risk of divorce. that has been a long-standing fear among a lot of women. and it was based on the fact that it used to be true, up until about the 1990s. but one of the things that the times piece points out, is that for the last couple of years, couples where women have equivalent or greater education than their husband, have more stable marriages than those where women are lagging behind. and that s reassuring. and even where there s a working husband and a working wife, the working wife still does on average 25% more housework than child care. and in working homes where there s a working wife and a working husband, the husband still has 40 minutes more per day of leisure time. so women are there s definitely not a balance it s almost matching up. but in your new book and talking about the age of men and male dominance lacking, is that, and these numbers may contribute to that. the fact that when couples are getting together, men and women, they re deciding that their personal and professional lives don t need to be mutually exclusive. and they can achieve these dreams together, communicate about it, talk about it, and achieve it together. it seems like that s the big difference we re seeing in modern relationships. it is a balance. and a good man today is not defined by his conquests. he s just hard to find. that s the opening line of my book. very good! okay. very good. it is so interesting, because i think we re kind of in the middle of all of this, these challenges, watching, and reading this article, it was sort of like, i don t know where this is going. i think part of what it means is that the definition of being a great man and a great provider has changed. it doesn t necessarily mean that you are doing the providing as a man. you might also need to support your wife if she needs to go back to school to increase her earning power. move across the country to take another job. all the things that wives have traditionally done for their husbands, it s a two-way street. thank you both for being on the show. come back when your book comes out. still ahead, new earnings from wall street, including new concerns from bp over russian sanctions. business before the bell is next. welcome back, everybody. business before the bell now with cnbc s sarah eisen. bp warned about further sanctions if the eu and the u.s., as they re discussing, but economic sanctions on russia. it could have, according to bp, a material adverse affect on their operations in russia. remember, bp has about 20% stake in rosnef, which is a major russian energy giant, controlled by the state. so obviously these countries that do business there are starting to worry about more sanctions as discussed. also i want to mention some moral outrage today. okay cupid, the offline dating site, apparently has been lying to its users, doing all sorts of social experiments, taking away pictures, taking away content on professional. and get this, telling people that they were 90% matched when, really, they were only a 30% match, which, guys, they found actually worked in terms of the number of correspondences. people are pretty upset about that. but okcupid says, this is what websites do. doesn t that mean that people will just keep shopping on okcupid? or it doesn t matter. good point, sarah eisen, you re the best. up next, what, if anything, did we learn today? 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that s it for special report. make it a great weekend. greta goes on the record right now. government contractors pretending to work and you are paying their salary. the whistle blower blowing the lid off obamacare right here on the record. somebody has figured out how to a lot of money off of this deal to do nothing. a billion dollars. your money gone. poof. they would tell us to come in dressed professionally and to sit at our desk and act like we were working. and then: this is shameful under any circumstances a night mayor at the v.a. but will anyone land in prison. if these accusations are true, someone should be going to jail. marine jailed in mexico. his desperate 911 call. i m at the border of mexico right now. i crossed the border by accident and i have three guns in my truck. his mother goes on the record. first though a whistle blower goes on the record. she says $1.2 billion of your tax money was pay to obamacare workers who were told to pretend to work. she was one of those workers paid to do nothing. paula joins us for her first national tv interview. paulla, nice to see you. hi. paulla, tell me, where did you work? how long did you work there and what did you do? i worked for a company contracted by circo to helpful fill the they have have with centers for medicare and medicaid services. i worked there from early october to just before thanksgiving in 2013. okay. in that time period, what did you see? i understand the contract was to process paper applications under obamacare. did you see that work being done? it was done in such a small scale. in the from months i was there i processed at best a dozen applications. most of the time we were sitting around doing nothing. that was the gist of it. did anybody say anything like why don t we have any work or why isn t anything being done? yes, i did. others did. early on we got a lot of excuses about the health care.gov site not working properly. once that was working properly, the case was still the same. as it is today as well as you are hearing from other employees that still work there. were they getting any specific instructions employees about the work or why they didn t seem to have a high volume of work? they mostly alcoholicked it it chokd it up to system problems chocked it up to system problems. i have been a supporter of obamacare all along. my experience there was so disappointing and i exal contacted claire miscass kill s office because i wanted them to know what was going on out there and how i felt about that. what was the response from senator claire mccaskill s office. first of all what did you tell them and second of all what was the senator s response? i told them exactly what i had been saying all along, what i told channel 4 locally in st. louis and what i m telling you now that we were sitting around every day doing nothing and applications were not getting processed and questions were not getting answered about that. they forwarded me to subcommittee on oversight of committee budgets in washington where i spoke to someone about the situation there. we tried to get some information. cms said they were committed to working wither serco. they closely monitored the work that serco was doing. it doesn t say the quantity of work or ever on site to monitor. did you ever have any sense that cmf was on site monitoring what was being done or not done? well, in the short time i was there, they came once to my knowledge. but they never visited the site of the building that i worked on. i don t know how they can say they monitored the work coming out of that building and supporting the knowing what i know and people that still work there. i want to say everybody who works in that building knows what what i m saying is the truth. the people who came forward whether they chose to identify themselves or not are telling the truth as well. why did you leave? i imagine. why did you leave? why did i leave? because i was bored out of my mind. it was driving me crazy and i have a conscience. that s not what i signed up for. that s not what i wanted to work there for. i was excited to be a part of something that i supported and i couldn t have been more disappointed. why do you think this happened? why do you think that there is no work being done? well, as i said before, i think somebody figured out how to make a lot of money off of this thing, some way, somehow. i know there is a lot of crookery and corruption and self-gain these days, for all i know maybe our own politicians are benefiting from that. i don t know. paulla, thank you for joining us. all right. thank you. and you won t believe this one. but there is new information tonight about the former top watchdog for the homeland security department. we recently told you about a blistering congressional report showing former dhs acting director altered and delayed investigations in order to help his pals. senior administration officials. now there is more disturbing question. is the whole watchdog system broken? the washington examiner susan crabtree joins us. thanks for having me. you wrote an article. explain what a watchdog is in the government. how does it work in the government? each agency, there are 73 different watchdogs that are attached to an agency. the will be in is that they have the same budget as the same agency, so they are not really independent. you would think that there is an act, 1978, that created these watchdogs after the watergate scandal. and they are supposed to act as the rooting out corruption at the agency and be independent. they are getting their salary from the same higher ups that are from the whole budget. is it broken this watchdog system? well, the ethics experts and attorneys who have experience in these cases say definitely. they point to this case with charles edwards who had multiple allegations against him. and he actually was stepped aside just recently after the secretary jay johnson called on him to step aside. he was under investigation himself and hee j? that s exactly right. it seems what we have found is that the allegations against him langished at this group, the council for inspectors general for integrity and efficiency. that s the wash dog of the watchdog. we found it is actually pretty broken. we have sources telling us that the system doesn t work that these complaints against him languished for years and years. especially. can think of anything more sick. watchdog in every single agency that at least in one agency we know that at least the one instance very helping his pals. that watchdog. then you have got for whatever reason, we now need to have watchdogs. we have a watchdog organization looking over the watchdog. the watchdog organization this watchdog looked other way because they didn t want i don t know why, they didn t do their job. why even have these watchdogs? that s why when you are the president and jay carney say the inspector general for the v.a. is going to get to the bottom of this i start to cringe a little bit. the system really is broken. the watchdog of the watchdog only meets, what i have been told, four times a year and lacks the tools and efforts really to look into this and do something about it. is sigy, are these full-time jobs? these are actually no, different inspector generals from different agencies make up the cigi. they sit on the council. jury on the their own trials? their pier s trials. overseers see if they are doing the job is themselves. you can say that definitely they are piers. they have have the transportation inspector general is looking into charles edwards problems. it took a subcommittee investigation. it took the release of the report just last month to get him on administrative leave. for a while there, he was still acting and he had all these allegations piling up against him. and he is he is the watchdog. susan, thank you. and today a resignation in the wake of the veterans affairs health care scandal, the v.a. for secretary for health. one day after he and v.a. secretary eric shinseki were grilled by lawmakers. jennifer griffin is live at the pentagon. jennifer, why did he step down? who is he and why did he step down? well, greta. a senior v.a. official says secretary shinseki demanded robert petzel s resignation. he was slated to retire thisser i don t. his retirement announced last september. his replacement is from the same pines v.a. medical center in illinois that came under fire this week for having secret wait lists for veterans. last september, we reported on the record petzel told it a congressional hearing he quote had no regrets when he learned veterans died of legionnaires diseases where he recommended bonuses for the hospital s drars. the two more administrators came forward. chief psychiatrist at the v.a. medical center in st. louis, he was removed from his job when he complained that psychiatrists treating veterans with ptsd were working only a few hours a day, seeing half the patients they could. as patient suicides rose. they all got bonuses, you know. so that is the sad part. because, you know in reality not doing a good job but in relation it looks like we are. he was fired when he complained that his bosses were delaying life saving clone colon ososcopies to cut costs. i i was treated like a leper, how dare you attack me or say what you are saying. congressman jeff miller who is responsible for v.a. oversight said robert petzel s resignation is the pinnacle of political double speak since he only had a few more months on the job. greta? radio accountability or show or something in between? joining us the political panel. john, is this resignation some form of accountability or, what? i think jennifer just laid out the case this is completely just for show. i think he had to go or go a little early after his performance this week before congress. you know, he was asked a simple question: would someone be fired if it were proven that they had manipulated these waiting lists and created a secret waiving list? apparently not if you are the watchdog at dhs. he couldn t answer that. he said i don t know if that would be the appropriate punishment or not. these people should be in jail. democratic senators on the panel saying why didn t you make any sentence republicans calling for it of the i.d. only has limited resource was. get in the other law enforcement agencies and this is a nationwide problem. in this isn t isolated i understand as shinawatra then secy said the other day. you need as much help as they company get. neither gave impressive performance. sen seq.y. sen seq.y is not going anywhere for a while. why this. this move was part of. i was there at the hearing and went around and talked to people about what his fate is on capitol hill. people said they are billing to give him a chance. the problem is he has been there for some time and this has been happening end his. the buck has to stop some place. i am a ventricle. choose he was very popular. let him go back to active duty. he inherited a huge mess. awful i m saying he has big problems supporters up there. people really are looking for him to start showing some action here. they don t thism he has accepted stepped up to the plate yet. we will give shinseki to do their time. i heard kathleen sebelius rit away when things blew up. this is blowing up why is he asking for his head? he has the military brass as well. this week i spoke with the current army chief ray odierno. he stood up for him and strongly defended him and said there are problems at the v.a. that s like the watchdog s watchdog standing up for the watchdog. he has a very distinguished military career. but you know the fact that the military is standing up for him. i mean, just look at this. this is his job. what strikes me about this is something john said, the bipartisan nature of these attacks. these aren t just republicans. he they are not just red state democrats worried about re-election. this is balloon that. even more question why is he still there? it wases white house worried. it comes on the heels of the irs scandal and obamacare rollout it speaks to wows official. they don t. the resignation is north going to do the trick. i know republicans and democrats both are deeply disturbed by this but the fact that people are not calling for his head when he sad all these years and people have died under. this not just that they have had to sit at their computer trying to log on for three months. people died. think were citing memos back to 2010. shuffling people around. if he knew about it if he did why didn t he do anything about it. 2013 a letter was sent to president obama yesterday the chief of staff was asked why didn t you respond to this? why did you ignore it? they went easier on shinseki yesterday than i saw at any of the hearings where kathleen sebelius was defending the health carrollout. like you say you are talking about people who died. panel, stay with us. let s all go off-the-record for a minute. washington, d.c. is the city of no consequences. i have never seen anything like it. theist targets the tea party spends $100 million on furniture, hands out millions to irs employees who owe back taxes. no consequences. hhs 1.2 billion-dollar contract to it a company serco. whistle blower says they aren t actually doing any work but no consequences. capitol hill, lots and lots of committees. they are supposed to monitor all these agencies to make sure bad things don t happen. that s almost laughable. lots of hearings, no consequences. or in the case of the v.a., lives are lost. anyone responsible? anyone know anything? v.a. chief eric shinseki after it is exposed says is he mad as hell and president obama is angry. so what if he is mad as hell or angry. that doesn t do any of you was god. each agency has a watchdog. even the watchdogs are suspect. they seem to looked other way. former edwards was under investigation for doing dastardly thing. no one owes anyone anything. no one takes responsibility,ens can sequences, admit it insane asylum. barbara walters and letterman talking barbara lieu ebb ski. call for help before he makes desperate call. you will hear from the marine s mother coming up. 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(elder couple laugh) okinawa life! david letterman is apologizing to monica lewenski. is he is sorry for all the relentless jokes and mocking like this top ten list first line of lewenski s book. like i hate hate hate hate hate linda tripp. number four, does this font make me look fat? number three, it was the best of times, it was the worst of times, no, it was mostly bad. number two, by the time you read this i will be on to my next president. and the number one possible first line for monica lewenski s new book is me and my big mouth. that was then and this is what letterman and walters are saying about lewenski now. i like monica. i felt that she has never had the chance to move on. when she came back and there was ininterview or article about her. says she can t get a job. i started to feel bad because myself and other people with shows like this made relentless jokes about the poor woman. she was 21. she is 40 now. i was thinking oh lord the violence in the elevator. is it funny because they re just famous or overall with some perspective do you realize this is a sad human situation back with our political panel. these are are celebrities getting soft in their old age. date letterman has h. has said bad things about an awful lot of people. like the time that sarah palin took her 14-year-old daughter to the yankees game and he said one awkward moment for sarah palin at the yankees game her daughter was knocked up by alex rodriguez and her daughter was 14. he actually was mistaken. he thought he was talking about the older one apparently. he hasn t apologized for that one. no, and i don t think he will. lewenski is unique here in that unlike august the other characters in the situation that happened with her and president clinton. they have all been able to move on, including the woman who leaked the taped phone calls. all these people have been able to lead their lives. she has been frozen in time. she was victimized by the whole thing. she was very young, just in her early 20 s and her life just basically stopped point was a good one. it s a little bit late. career. the clintons are all doing great. everyone else is doing fine. she was chasing a story. she wanted a scoop. now she is pretending barbara walters didn t mock her. she didn t make cruel jokes not funny, like they are insulting some young girl to make them feel better about themselves who has been in this situation. obviously she was of legal age. when you step back and think about that anywhere in society a 50-some-year-old man preying on a college student practically. which monica doesn t say. she says they were two consenting adults. she s has handled it all rather gracefully in this last interview. she has not blaming anybody. it s true though that everyone else got something out of the deal except her. she stopped in time she was offered a good deal of money. she wrote a book. she certainly made the rounds for herself. what about letterman? i like suddenly, all of a sudden now he suddenly sees that maybe he was nasty. you have seen some of that. craig had a great monologue in recent years. even celebrities, even brittany spears is a human being and sometimes we should really a human moment very human moment where he said i was an alcoholic and drunk and going through these problems maybe we should think about this and be funny and not just mean to people. i would like to see him apologize to the sarah palin jokes. that was horrible to willow. she was 14. making cracks about the older daughter not being married at the time he was not married to the mother of his child. things going on on the side we learned later. is he is no angel. panel, stay with us. a u.s. marine jailed in mexico. you will hear the call and hear from the marine s mother. the cat who is now a national hero after saving a child from the dog. that s only the beginning. see what the talented cat suspect to now. stay tuned. instead of hanging out on the couch, you could be hanging ten. what are you waiting for? 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[ whirring ] [ train whistle blows ] she makes trains that are friends with trees. my mom works at ge. for what reality teaches you firsthand. in the face of danger, and under the most demanding circumstances. experience builds character. experience builds confidence. and experience. has built this. the 2014 glk. the engineering and the experience of mercedes-benz. see your authorized dealer for exceptional offers through mercedes-benz financial services. was killed june 28,2005benz in afghanistan. my husband s death was the hardest thing i ve ever faced. the special operations warrior foundation stepped in to help. now you can help, too. purchase new cherry 5-hour energy now through july thirty-first and a portion of each sale benefits special operations warrior foundation to help families of fallen heroes. i will always miss my dad, but thanks to special operations warrior foundation i will never feel alone. jug released 91212 call. will it help free an american marine jailed in mexico. arrested for carrying guns in mexico. he insist is he never meant to cross the border. he just made a wrong turn. mother hoping the 911 call will help prove that. 911 emergency. i m having a little bit of an emergency here. what s going on? hello, are you here? i m here. what the address of the emergency. i m at the border of mexico right now. my problem is i crossed the border by accident and i have three guns in my truck and they are trying to take my guns from me. so you are in mexico? yeah. there is nothing i can help you with sir, i do apologize. you are not on american soil anymore. i can t really help you. i don t know i m not sure if i crossed yet. is it mexican authorities talking to you. mexican authorities. you are in mexico. so they have the right to just take my guns? there is huge sign that says it it is illegal to enter mexico with guns when you are driving down the five freeways. okay. there are warning signs that do state that as you are driving down the freeway before you enter mexico. glifs hoping that there would be a turn around point. there is a turn around point before you get across the border. not where i was. there was no turn around point. then that means you were way far down then if you already passed it if you didn t see the turn around point. so, yeah unfortunately you are on mexican soil there ising in we can do i apologize. andrew s mother jill joins us. good evening, jill. hello, greta. this 911 call is, it going to help you get your son out? i hope to got it does it certainly proves what i have been saying the conversation he had with me. he called 911 first as his first incorporate stingted and then he called his momma second. that s exactly what he told me that he had gotten lost. made a wrong turn and ended up at the border. what is the reaction from the mexican government or court system is the state department helping you? the tape just came out yesterday. it s literally came it literally just came out of his memory bank i think from all the trauma of the seven weeks it s the first time he had even told us there was a 911 tape when he spoke to his sister on the phone. immediately i got the tape. i gave to his attorney. i know he is preparing a motion to present it to the court. i don t have a date for when it s going to be presented to the judge. how about our state department, are they helping you at all. no new action or support since the 911 tape came out o. i haven t yet heard from the white house or the state department other than the personal support that we received from the u.s. consulate service in tijuana that we have received from day one. what have the conditions been like for your son since he got arrested march 31st? tragic, near fatal, h was almost killed. he had to escape a certain execution and then he was shackled in four point chain restraint for 35 days. so it s been brutal, worse than any of his two tours of combat in afghanistan when he left in 2012. he has been moved. they could not protect him. he moved him to a federal penitentiary there he is under constant surveillance and guard. he feels safer. that may be why he is finally able to relax a little bit and let some of the details come out sphblf when is the next time or first time is he supposed to be in court? it s just sort of languishing he has never been in court. since march 3 is 1st. does he have a court date? no. all we have is our first formal proceeding on may 28th. and that s the scheduled date where the border officials give their statement to the judge. the customs agent and the mexican military who first encountered andrew that night. jill, thanks for joining us. it s been way too long. march 31st that he is sitting in there. i don t understand this one at all. hopefully he will get out very soon. thank you. thank you, greta. the may 2011 raid on usama bin laden s house exposing direct and clear ties between al qaeda and nigeria s boko haram. so why didn t secretary clinton state department put the nigerian group on the terror list? 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[gasps] there s my steps! i should stop talking. perfectly paired savings. now, that s progressive. and the award goes to ceramics house. congratulations. thank you. the success of your small business depends on results. go vests! all organic, and there s tons of info on our website. that s why you rely on the best for your business. and verizon delivers the best devices on the best network. you re all big toes to me. so go ahead, stream and download with confidence on america s largest, most reliable 4glte network. activate any 4glte smartphone and get $100 off. for best results, use verizon. new information, direct ties between al qaeda and boko haram the terrorist group holding almost 300 school girls hostage. the weekly standard reveal the documents usama bin laden s house senior al qaeda leaders were in direct contact with boko haram during the same time secretary of state hillary clinton. they refused onto put boko haram on the official list of foreign terrorist groups and our political panel is back. jason reilly, the washington examiner susan ferrechio. john, this was your publication that wrote. this why wasn t this group put on the terrorist list? no one really knows. tom wreath the story for us. he has great sources. other reported. other national security reporters places like the the washington post reported that bin laden s own files contradicted boko haram to senior al qaeda people the question is why didn t they put them on the terrorist list. they were pressured to do so by the doj, the fbi and many others and josh rogan reporting at the daily beast has indicated is that they didn t want to offend the local government. for some reason the local government didn t want them on thattist. will i m not sure about the internal dynamics of politics but that is the with excuse for why they didn t do it. they wanted to keep the influence of this group kind of a lower level. declaring them a terrorist organization that it would somehow elevate them and make it harder for the nigerian government to get rid of the problem. but, of course, it clearly didn t do any good. what the state department also isn t saying is that not putting them on that lists will set a narrative that the owe become that administration was put up to the election. al qaeda is on the run are the terrorists are on the run. when you are adding to it a terrorist list though, it doesn t help that narrative. the white house had an inventive there to play down this group, to play down the impact of this group i don t think the administration will push back very hard. going to be harder if hillary clinton disadz to become a presidential candidate to distance herself from these problems that seem to be cropping up from her tenure at the state department. from what i hear this may have been a decision made just underneath her whether to declare this a terrorist organization. it says here in the article the owe boom that administration was sitting on files that showed that al qaeda s senior leadership had been in direct contact with the group. sharing it with the state department? we don t know. she could have some kind of excuse for her rationale here. it was her state department, the fact that they weren t declared a terrorist organization was under her watch. explain that. she will have to explain it as this stuff comes trickling out, it really just points the niddle right at her all part of one gig terrorist, jihadist think that s happening in africa. she clearly understood there s what a big problem there. free bank accounts and things like that that can be used now. and actually hillary clinton she did label a few people in the organization like the head of it as a terrorist and we could take certain actions against them. use certain tools under the patriot act for espionage against these people. again, it was group 2013 on the terrorist list. we have been able to use these tools since then didn t stop the kidnapping of all these girls unfortunately. panel, thank you. here is what is being hard out right now. senior executive editor trending right now. there is more news about jill abramson. backs out of one commencement. another one backs out. brandeis university saying she decided not to attend commencement where she would have received honorary degree. she decided wake forest university. rob ford surfaces. spotted in muskota and dry cleaners. along with this photo. that s rob ford dropping off his dry cleaning, taking a pic talking with passers by. he is in a rehab facility nearby. what do you think? will rob ford make a come back? who knows? and they are calling it the tweet heard around the world. star wars account tweeted officially begun, production h along with the first photo from the set. at long last star wars episode 7. it s officially underway. use #greta on all your tweets and posts. and the rnc is all fired up taking on an actress eva longoria rnc chair reasons reince when does your work en does it end after you ve expanded your business? after your company s gone public? and the capital s been invested? or wn your compan s bought another? is it over after you given back? you never stop achieving. that s why, at barclays, our ambition is to always realize yours. for $175 dollars a month? so our business can be on at&t s network yup. all five of you for $175. our clients need a lot of attention. there s unlimited talk and text. we re working deals all day. you get 10 gigabytes of data to share. what about expansion potential? add a line anytime for 15 bucks a month. low dues. great terms. let s close. new at&t mobile share value plans. our best value plans ever for business. rnc taking on actress eva loan gore i can t. latino victory project claiming it does not support latino candace. only democratic ones. rnc priebus joins us. good to see you. good to see you too. blasted the actress. totally bogus organization. here s the thing. they started out and say we want the political landscape to match the identities and reflect the realities of the american people. great. they say they are nonpartisan organization. okay. then you start looking at who is in charge of this organization. well, okay. eve longoria was the co-chair of barack obama s campaign in 2012. the other co-chair, a finance chair of the dnc. okay. put that away in the back of your mind. doing interviews on tv with the dnc logo behind his head sometimes i do interviews behind head rnc logo this move forward and say we are going to endorse five candidates all democrats. turns out one of their endorse. s is charlie crist who is running against the first latino lieutenant governor as a ticket, you know, in florida, that florida has ever had with a hispanic as the lt. governor in florida. so they are partisan. not really name partisan. would you be content or happy if they didn t call themselves nonpartisan? yeah, here is what we are doing. at the republican national committee and i think republicans out there in general, just kind of sick and tired of our party sitting around and doing nothing about the fact when people are purposefully and very openly lying about what they are doing. putting front groups out in front of entire country. claiming that they are for everybody. when, in fact, it s just a democrat front group. look. do you think they mentioned in their releaseds and in their documents the fact that the only two hispanic governors in hurricane happen to be republicans and martinez in mexico and brian sandovol in nevada? did they mention the two most popular hispanic politicians in our country right now which is ted cruz and marco rubio? no. why is it this is a part san group. eva longoria long time democrat. assume she is a democrat and not going to promote. why is it that the democratic party seems to have the lock on the latino vote? look, that goes back to what we have said as the republican party. we have tone gauge in a long-term year around operation to engage in hispanic, african-american, and asian communities across the can country. are you doing that? we are. what are you doing? so we are putting out a field organization in every single community across the country. on a four year basis across the country for all four years. and part of the problem is the republican party has become a party nationally that shows up about oncer four years, five months before an election. this is the entire basis of our growth and opportunity project, that we put together last year. in fact, today i was in philadelphia announcing hispanic advisory counsel still in philadelphia and something we haven t done enough of. but what i m tired of and i think a lot of people are tired of are these sort of bogus organizations that pop up and they claim they are nonpartisan. they file as a c 4. under the irs code and then they go and do interviews in the studio of the dnc. always nice to he see you sir. thank you, greta. star studded salute to barbara walters as the legend retires. walters is officially retiring. leaving herr co-hosting job on the view. today it a parade of. please welcome diane sawyer, robin roberts. spencer, elizabeth vargas. debra roberts. this is my legacy. these are my legacy and i thank you all. and they end of the show barbara saying goodbye. well, sort of. so now having had this amazing career, how can i just walk away and say goodbye? this way. from the bottom of my heart to all of you with whom i have worked and to all of you who have watched and been at my side for so many years, i can say thank you, thank you. but who knows what the future brings. maybe instead of goodbye i should say i will be in tow, which in french means see you later. so i will be in tow. by the way i don t think barbara is really going away. i think she just wanted to have a party. she will be the view s executive producer. in 2009 we paid a visit to barbara in her dressing room at the view. it gives you a feeling about yourself. that gives you a feeling about your career. i never thought i would be in front of a camera. when i think of the people that i have met because i have interviewed every president, i was going to say every president since abraham lincoln since that s not true, since richard nixon and every world leader and so on. what a blessed life i have had and never expected it to happen. it was in great part by chance. and, of course, we wish barbara a very happy retirement even if it s only a few minutes. the cat that s become a national hero but saving a child from the dog is only act one. wait until you see what the cat is doing now. that s next. life less complicated. it s about people. we are volvo of sweden. when folks think about wthey think salmon and energy. but the energy bp produces up here creates something else as well: jobs all over america. engineering and innovation jobs. advanced safety systems & technology. shipping and manufacturing. across the united states, bp supports more than a quarter million jobs. when we set up operation in one part of the country, people in other parts go to work. that s not a coincidence. it s one more part of our commitment to america. [ male announcer ] it s one of the most amazing things we build and it doesn t even fly. we build it in classrooms and exhibit halls, mentoring tomorrow s innovators. we build it raising roofs, preserving habitats and serving america s veterans. every day, thousands of boeing volunteers help make their communities the best they can be. building something better for all of us. if you re looking to buy a car,t this?? now is the time and truecar is the way. just go to truecar.com to lock in guaranteed savings. without negotiation. thank you! happy memorial day weekend! bill o reilly is next. get ready to speed read your way through the news. california wildfires is forcing more people from the homes. third fire breaking out on the grounds of the camp pendleton area. as you can see the fires are really burning. we have been watching these fires for the last two days. those wildfires are scorching thousands of acres across southern california. the feds slapping general motors with a record 335-million-dollar fine after it took g.m. more than that decade to disclose ignition switch defect in millions of their cars. and the defect which apparently has now a little bit under control is was linked to more than a dozen deaths. under the agreement g.m. does promise to report problems faster. a hero cat one saved little boy. the cat has been special honor for bravery. throw out the first pitch. we re not sure how a cat can pitch. sure the cat suspect to the challenge if anybody is. that s tonight s speed read. thank you for being with us. see you monday night. rush limbaugh is going on the record monday night 7 p.m. eastern. don t miss it right now go to gretawire.com and answer this question. should obamacare contractors serco be required to pay back $17 an hour they were paying employees to do
they have the legal authority. basically he formed a commission promising you can even look at me. then when he looked at him he said, lookin at me? that s it for special report fair, balanced. streaming into the united states, children. streaming out of washington, the president. senate leader harry reid and speaker john boehner and hundreds more politicians, the entire house and senate are all streaming out. nothing is going to get in the way of their vacation, even the crisis they helped create. they re illegal. they re breaking our laws. hearing complaints about some the conditions in some border patrol states. there s nothing being done at the border. what s going on is absolutely insane for this country. president obama is jetting off to martha s vineyard for two weeks and the house and senate go into recess for five weeks. this crisis, as some call it crisis, we have to view as an opportunity. stay in washington and insist that it be resolved. we can stop this crisis in one week. harry reid, take up our bill. i invite senator reid and president obama to stop playing billiards and going on vacations. come here and see for yourself. i don t think people would care he was going on vacation if he was doing his job. make a statement to the american people that you give a damn. the only way we re going to make this problem go away is whether the gop takes over the senate. there s no sense of urgency around it. president obama, where are you? our political panel, the washington post wes lowery, washington examiner chief political reporter. byron, it s vacation time. there s a reason that congress has a 13% approval, 78% disapproval rate in the latest fox poll. and the president just went to 39% in a three-day gallup. i m told by people on capitol hill that both houses are making contingency plans to do something, to stay longer if nothing happens on this border crisis. the house s next day is next thursday, the senate s last day is next friday. we should point out they re all going home to campaign as well as vacation. every single member of the house of representatives is up for reelection. that s more appalling to me. they re all going home to get their jobs back, kiss babies and get their pictures taken while they re kissing babies, meanwhile they haven t done their job, which is the immigration. the reason they have an immigration problem is because they didn t do their jobs. we re about to hit the 100-day mark out from reelection time. you can t blame them for going home i can. i can and i do. i m not convinced it would do much good to keep them around for the weekend. it would at least show the nation they give a damn, a problem they created. you ve been hearing a lot from them. they ve been talking a lot. i don t want talk. i want product. you keep them around from now till christmas and all we re going to get a is lot of talk. how long have we been talking about immigration and the border and we ve seen nothing. the senate democrats are so far away from the republicans and the house, what would they do even if they stayed? i don t care. i want them working. that s what they get paid for. why are we going to pay them to get their jobs and campaign? we pay them to work. this is a problem they created and they should do it before they take vacation. it would be good to have a real debate with time pressure, when they have a continuing resolution, the government is going to run out of money. as wes said, this is on the issue of changing this 2008 law that s at the center of this whole border controversy that makes it very difficult to quickly return children who come here illegally from central america, on the issue of changing that, that has become this enormous divide between republicans and democrats. it s a must have for republicans and it s a deal killer for democrats. it would be good to see a big open debate on that. and my thought on that is figure it out. you asked for the votes, you said could you do the job. i m so sorry you have political opposition, i m so sorry people disagree with you but that s your job. all you re doing is legislating by crisis. that s why they need to run out the clock. they said my home is speaker boehner won t leave town without doing something about this and he s leaving town. the president has made his vote, he made his ask. i thought the president was going to start doing things with his pen. and when he does that, we ll see republicans taking up votes to criticize him for doing things with his pen. some house republicans want him to do this through executive action if only that s because it s fodder for their lawsuit and criticism of him. you can t have this both ways on the right. either you want to take a vote on what the president has asked for and vote it down or you want him to do it on his own pup can t criticize him for doing things on his own and then get upset with him when he doesn t. and you see a standard washington way of doing things rising up in this. the president in his $3.7 billion requests asked for money to fight wildfires. and now democrats have attached extra funding for israel s iron dome defense. these are important issues that have nothing to do with it. the $3.7 billion, where do they come up with these numbers? they pulled it out of a hat. there s no accountability. the senate wants 2.7, the house wants 1.7 and nobody can tell us where they came one these numbers. panel, have a good weekend. you, too, greta. now to the surge of immigrant children overwhelming the border control. last night we reported on sleep deprivation, inadequate food and water. tonight the border patrol respond to those complaints. good evening, sir. good evening. how are you? i am well. i know you re overwhelmed. what s your response to the complaints? you know, greta, the border patrol facilities are not designed to hold people for more than 10 or 12 house. they ve designed to hold 250 people, we have 1,200, 1,500 people at a time. there s no beds, no hot water. we re stuck with these people. and in the interim basis, they re throwing them in our lap. we re doing the best with what we have. the food, rightfully so, it s terrible. i wouldn t eat it. the food the sleep deprivation, it s a detention center, it s an active process center. we just can t turn off the lights and go to sleep. we work there 24/7. go ahead. i take it that it would be very helpful to you because there s these conditions are tough and you have a very tough job, it would be helpful to you if congress and the president of the united states and the senate majority leader harry reid didn t go on vacation while you struggle with trying to give food to these kids you wouldn t eat yourself and problems with overcrowding. i take it you would like this solved as fast as possible? yes, ma am. we would like it to be solved quickly, the kid in custody would like it to be solved quickly. if harry reid wants to go on vacation, he should come down here and see what s going on down here. that might be a good idea. it s much better to take a look at something. they re on reading at it in the newspaper at best and i know you guys are really struggling. i guess the biggest problem is this just isn t your job to be essentially sitters. no, ma am. and unfortunately it is a humanitarian crisis but it is creating a national security crisis because so much of our manpower is being diverted away from preventing criminals from coming in, gang members, narcotics coming through the borders and everybody s caught up with the baby-sitting aspect that the real criminals are getting past us. agent cabrera, thank you very much. i know you all aren t taking extra vacation, you re working overtime, it s overwhelming and difficult and heart wrenching as well and the people who should be handling it are getting out of dodge. thank you, sir. thank you for having me. the border crisis raging right here at home. meanwhile, wars rage between israel and hamas. fox news is covering it all. we re going to take you to the fierce and dangerous war zones. first just yesterday the honduran president went on record right here today. so wendell, how did it go? reporter: after those talks, the president said he s considering allowing limited refugee status, triggered by the crisis of central american children arrive on the u.s./mexico border. their numbers are down in recent days but as we heard from agent cabrera, they re still taxing housing facilities and swamping the housing courts that a 2008 law requires for them, some communities doesn t want them an immigration hearings take more than a year to schedule, during times they re placed with family or friends and often don t show up for court. granting them refugees in their own countries would keep many from making the dangerous trips during which many are physically or, sexually abused. the central american leaders told mr. obama the u.s. bears some responsibility for the problem because the kids are fleeing crime fueled by america s appetite for illegal drugs and by the illegal sale of guns in their country. the president conceded there is a shared responsibility. meanwhile, republicans, even some democrats, are skeptical of his $3.7 billion request for funds to address the border problem, republicans aren t convinced he d spend the money the way they want and time is running out, set to take their summer recess at the end of next week. and president obama is heading out of town as well. wendell, thank you. this is a fox news alert. just moments ago israel and hamas agreeing to a 12-hour humanitarian cease-fire. after rejecting john kerry as long-term peace plan. now john kerry is scrambling to figure out what to do next. greta, the good news is they have agreed to a cease-fire here in gaza. it is seen as a positive step. tomorrow morning both israel and hamas have agreed to a 12-hour humanitarian cease-fire that will allow for medical supplies and food and gasoline to be brought in here to gaza to the many who are sick and in need here. more than 150,000 people have taken shelter in u.n. facilities across all of gaza. secretary of state john kerry and others were hoping there would be a wider, longer, much bigger cease-fire put in place. kerry was pushing for a seven-day temporary cease-fire. hamas never responded to the framework. israel s security cabinet rejected it outright saying it was too close to a hamas proposal, which was ironic because many thought the terms of the agreement that hamas would have rejected it outright, the big, the long-term cease-fire would have allowed israel to keep israeli troops here in gaza during a seven-day period. that seemed like it was des tend to be rejected by hamas but it was israel that rejected it. now we re trying to see if there will be a longer extension of this 12-hours. no word just yet but israel s defense minister has warned the izs military may expand the scope of operations here in gaza in the next 24, 48 hours. so there is a potential after this cease-fire, greta, that the fighting could escalate going forward. thank you. and developing now, an investigator stepping over debris, walking over that site where a missile took down a passenger jet killing more than 298 people and after more than a week, that crash site still not secured and russia escalating its military action in ukraine. steve? greta, no real signs of progress in the investigation at that crash scene site. a small number of european crash site experts have been at the scene for several days, special from the osce, where in the past to days, they have found more human remains at the scene, more body parts. but for the most part, the site is unguarded. there have been talks about bringing in perhaps some armed security, some dutch police, some australian police but eight days in really that s still just talk as far as the return of the remains of the recovered bodies go, 74 more bodies in coffins were brought from eastern ukraine to the netherlands. it s likely that the transport of recovered bodies will finish up tomorrow. still some remains at that crash site. and it s really the fighting that s kept people and experts away from a that site. in a fighting going on between ukrainian government forces and russian-backed rebels but more and more as the fight goes on and the rebels continue to lose ground, the russian military playing a more direct role in the fighting, even shelling from the russian side of the border, something that has alarmed not just ukrainian officials but u.s. state department and pentagon officials that the russian military increasingly is playing a direct role in this fight. as the rebels lose ground, their headquarters is heretsk, they promise to hold up here and fight it out to the end in what they promise could be another stalingrad. weapons, tanks, shelling systems may help them in their fight. and president obama taking heat for fund-raising. 12 fund-raisers in just three weeks? rnc chair reince priebus joins us. hey, greta. i take it you have something to say about 12 fund-raisers in the past three weeks. can he not multi-task? well, the frustration by the border, you can have a fund-raiser by the border and get the president there and he can see firsthand what s going on. i don t know what it takes to engage the president. some of this frustration you have and others have, we have at some point we have a speaker that s a republican, if you have a president that would engage, would knock heads together, i just think that this president is unfortunately, he s bizarrely aloof i think to the world around him. you have 300 people nearly that get shot out of the sky, all this conflict around the world, we have our own issues on the border. at some point i think the president has to engage and say maybe we re going to cancel the fund-raiser. maybe we re going to stay here in washington and i m going to march down the halls of congress and try to handle some of this stuff. the word we keep hearing over and over, it looks bad if he keeps going to fund-raisers. air force i is an office. president bush in 2004 but people would have been fired in bush s administration if a plane went down with almost 300 people on it and instead he went golfing. but he went to a fund-raiser in 2004 when 200 people died on a train in madrid as a result of terrorism. my point is others have done it. is this any different? i think it s different because it s a fixation on the politics, it s a fixation on constantly campaigning. this idea that people are tired of the gridlock. i get it but harry reid s got over 330 bills sitting in his office. it s not like the republicans aren t passing bills. you need somebody to actually take the reins and try to get on top of this stuff so we have a president. why doesn t harry reid put them on the floor? if he doesn t like them, let them get defeated. at least great vote. the problem with senator harry reid is he has a pocket veto. in order for anything to get to the president, it s got to be agreed to by both the house and the senate but by his inactivity, he stops everything from being considered. you can t even get it to conference. what the president is doing instead, he s doing fund-raisers for the dnc and party committees. he s not going out by mark udall in colorado. they re avoiding the president. the president s numbers are at 39% approval. all he is doing is raising money because that s all he can do. 30 seconds. it it doesn t go unnoticed that you and senator rand paul have gone into an area where we typically don t see republicans, which is the urban league today. i assume this is a new strategy in the republican party? i think we have to show up, earn trust. it s about time that the party reclaims or rightful history of the party of equal opportunity, freedom. that s what our party is. we re the party of equality and freedom. it s the other party that has a shameful history. you wouldn t know it because we don t talk about it. mr. chairman, nice to see you, sir. thank you, greta. and the nfl, boy, are they in hot water. many are outraged by the slap on the wrist that a player gave his wife for knocking his wife unconscious. a very young driver crashes a jeep into a house and then flees to watch cartoons. and joan rivers is telling people what she thinks about the israel/hamas crisis. it s blistering. you ll hear from joan coming pup. if new jersey were firing rocket noose new york, we would wipe em out. you make a great . it s been that way sincthe day you met. but your erectile dysfunction - it could be a question of blood flow. cialis tadalafil for daily use helps you be ready anytime the moment s right. you can be more confident in your ability to be ready. and the same cialis is the only daily ed tablet approved to treat ed and symptoms of bph like needing to go frequently or urgently. tell your doctor about all your medical conditions and medications, and ask if your heart is healthy enough for sexual activity. do not take alis if you take nitrates for chest pain, as this may causan unsafe drop in blood pressure. do not drink alcohol in excess with cialis. side effects may include headache, upset stomach, delayed backache or muscle ache. to avoid long-term injury, seek immiate medical hp for an erection lasting more than 4 hours. if you have any sudden decrease or loss in hearing or vision, or if you have any allergic reactions such as rash, hives, swelling of the lips, tongue or throat, or difficulty breathing or swallowing, stop taking cialis and get medical help right away. ask your doctor about cialis for daily use and a 30-tablet free trial. could help your business didavoid hours of delaynd test caused by slow internet from the phone company? that s enough time to record a memo. idea for sales giveaway. return a call. sign a contract. pick a tie. take a break with mr. duck. practice up for the business trip. fly to florida. win an award. close a deal. hire an intern. and still have time to spare. go to comcastbusiness.com/ checkyourspeed if we can t offer faster speeds - or save you money - we ll give you $150. comcast business. built for business. the nfl announcing a minimum two-game suspension of pro bowl running back ray rice. he s out two games and a little over a half million dollar. many are comparing it to one player facing a possible season-long ban testing possible for pot. i would think you would get more than a two-game suspension for knocking a woman out. he physically assaulted his wife. video showed him dragging his wife out of an elevator after a prosecutor said he punched her. it sets a tone in america that men can do whatever they want to do. two games. that s the suspension for baltimore ravens running back ray rice following his arrest for knocking his then girl friend, now wife, unconscious. now outrage over what many call the nfl s slap on the wrist. joining us is women s right reporter gloria allred. gloria, two games suspended. what do you think? greta, it s a disgrace, an outrage, it s a slap in the face at women and how much they matter. it s a sign that the nfl doesn t value women and violence against women. it s ridiculous. this woman was apparently knocked unconscious and apparently then later they made up and then they got married and then they went and saw the commissioner, but the commissioner should know better. and he needs to have a more serious consequence because unconscious. and it was terrible to see. so i thought for sure that the league would they had a chance here to really make a statement, to come out and do something positive and say that they had zero tolerance for domestic abuse and they gave two games. when you look at the history, even the recent nfl suspensions right here in philadelphia, there are two players that just got four-game suspensions for using p.e.d.s. then you have justin blackmon suspended definitely for drug abuse. this is a slap on the wrist for beating up your wife but do not hurt yourself by using drugs. it s a terrible message. john harbaugh, the coach, said that the player ray rice is a heck of a guy. he has done everything right since then. well, he has to say that. well, he doesn t have to say that. he has said that and by saying he s a heck of a guy, that s a supportive comment of him. again, it doesn t recognize the violence against the woman. look, she s married to him. at this point she doesn t want to hurt him. this is typical of a battered woman. and right now i think they have to have sense. even the law is not fair because apparently now there was an intervention and he will be able to get himself criminal record expunged from this. that is wrong. the whole culture is not valuing violence against women and putting serious consequences on those who commit it. you know, colleen, it s interesting. i looked to see what the two games were for the suspensions and the two games are against the bengals and the steelers and the steelers is the big rival for the ravens. when ben roethlisberger shows up at raven stadium, they all chant no means no because he had some problems with some alleged sexual assault. what are they going to yell when they finally get ray rice playing the steelers? i don t know. i don t know either. the whole thing here is you look at what roger goodell wrote to ray rice. he wrote a letter to him. let me read you one sentence. the league is an entity that depends on integrity and the confidence of the public and we simply cannot tolerate conduct that endangers others or reflects negativity in our game. what? two games for that? i mean, i don t know, but i would think that that s pretty negative. right? gloria and colleen, thank you. we ll be watching. we ll see what the chant is when ray rice shows up in pittsburgh. thank you both. and has president obama checked out? charles krautheimer calling the president vacant. my name is michael, i m 55 years old and i have diabetic nerve pain. the pain was terrible. my feet hurt so bad. it felt like hot pins and needles coming from the inside out of my skin. when i did go see the doctor, and he prescribed lyrica. it helped me. [ male announcer ] it s known that diabetes damages nerves. lyrica is fda-approved to treat diabetic nerve pain. lyrica is not for everyone. it may cause serious allergic reactions or suicidal thoughts or actions. tell your doctor right away if you have these, new or worsening depression, or unusual changes in mood or behavior. or, swelling, trouble breathing, rash, hives, blisters, changes in eyesight, including blurry vision, muscle pain with fever, tired feeling or skin sores from diabetes. common side effects are dizziness, sleepiness, weight gain and swelling of hands, legs and feet. don t drink alcohol while taking lyrica. don t drive or use machinery until you know how lyrica affects you. those who have had a drug or alcohol problem may be more likely to misuse lyrica. having reduced pain is great and i m grateful for it. [ male announcer ] ask your doctor about lyrica today. it s specific treatment for diabetic nerve pain. 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[ female announcer ] everyone has a moment when tomorrow becomes real. transamerica. okay, charles. vacant presidency. why? look, the world is going to hell in a hand basket. you got war in ukraine, war in the middle east, you got isis on the move in the middle east. you got christians being expelled from parts of iraq and we ve got the crisis on the border. and where is the president? this isn t news. he s in the hampton, he s raising funds, he s playing golf, he s doing photo ops. he s not involved. now, some people are saying he s checked out, he s depressed, he s overwhelmed and he s withdrawing in some way. but that s not completely true because on domestic issues he s very engaged. he says i ll do stuff even without congress. this is about mostly foreign affairs. my theory, which i wrote in this column, is he thinks in the end things like aggression won t pay so the u.s. does not have to be involved. while he certainly isn t interested in chicago or the violence there or detroit falling apart. the extent the border is considered an international problem, it s bleeding over and it s now a humanitarian matter. he wants to do stuff in immigration and changes in tax laws he s got to work! he s still interested in that. you can t work with congress, part of the reason he s checked out. but the place where he is shockingly passive is ukraine, is iraq, is the border, a lot of these other things. to me what i thinkd this is an ideology that says, for instance, let s take ukraine where he s essentially done nothing. this is the first time a country since the second world war has chomped off a piece of another in europe. this is new and we now have russia firing into ukraine as if it s preparing for an invasion, which just doesn t happen the last seven years. i think he thinks this and he says this, putin is on the long side of history. he believes history punishes aggression. it can be 50 years or 100 years until it disappears. the point of a president and point of a leader is to make history react to what you want and not to wait for it to unfold. i think he s not interested in the job, he s not doing the job. things are getting terrible and people are now dumping all over him because now it s getting catastrophic. he s not picking up the phone to call senator harry reid and say let s do these things, he s not calling speaker boehner. he has no interest in the job and he is exploding all over him. you are tougher than i am and i commend you for that. i wish he would do his job. i think these are real problems. i travel the nation. these are real problems. i ve traveled the world. we need help. we need leadership. we can agree on this. we need a president. doesn t look like we have one. charles, it s always great to see you. it s a great book. now to a driver in diapers. you heard right, a 3-year-old boy jumping behind the wheel of a jeep and crashing it into a house. watching cartoons, playing games, having fun with toys, these are things 3-year-olds normally do. but in one small oregon town, a toddler going rogue. 911 emergency. yes, hi, ma am. i ve just seen a little kid in a diaper, he just rolled a jeep across the street and into a house. a kid in a diaper and a real jeep, a full-size jeep? it s a jeep sitting here in the side of the house right now. do you think i need to send an ambulance? i don t know. the little kid jumped out. he can t be more than 2 years old. the crazy story starting at 9:00 in the morning. police seen the toddler unattended in the jeep, issuing a warning to the relatives. but at 7:30 p.m., the toddler is at it again. he was going across the street pretty good. he jumped the curb and the tires are buried inside of the house. police racing to the scene, only to find the boy watching cartoons at his house. as he hit the house, he got out of the jeep and ran back across the street to home and sat on the couch like nothing happened. the little boy got away unscathed but police cited his relative for failure to supervise a child. if you want to hear more of that 911 call, go to gretawire.com. and are we giving up liberty for security? and it s not your typical march on washington. america s hero dogs taking to the capital coming up. d gives you tools and support to get the career you ll love. find more real possibilities at aarp.org/possibilities honey, look i got one to land. uh-huh there s good more. honey, look at all these smart rewards points verizon just gave me. ooh, you got a buddy. i m like a statue. i just signed up and, boom, all these points. .and there s not-so-good more. you re a big guy. oh no. get the good more with verizon smart rewards and rack up points to use towards the things you really want. now get 50% off all new smartphones. then boom. what happened? stress, fun, bad habits kids, now what? let s build a new, smarter bed using the dualair chambers to sense your movement, heartbeat, breathing. introducing the sleep number bed with sleepiqtm technology. it tracks your sleep and tells you how to adjust for a good, better and an awesome night. the difference? try adjusting up or down. you ll know cuz sleep iq™ tells you. only at a sleep number store, mattresses with sleepiq start at just $999.98. know better sleep with sleep number. security versus liberty. what does it take to police america? you hear banging and screaming on the door. he s standing over me with an assault rifle. some americans are bad and pushing back against authorities. what are you placing me under arrest for? some are upset the government spies on us. what you do on your cell phone is none of their damn business. i can t understand what rand paul was yelling about. today everyone can spy on everyone. that was pretty cool until it started taking pictures of my wife over there. i could do it if could i just control the drone. the private spies, the police. it s big brother looking at us. policing america. where s the line between security and liberty? and john stossel joins us. good evening, john. what is the line between security and liberty? well, if somebody s going to kill us, security does become really important i don t presume to know exactly where that line is but the police have crossed it in arming themselves like they re going to war. in what way? tell me more. we used to have a s.w.a.t. raid once in a blue moon, now there are hundreds a day. they get mine resistant vehicles. just in two years we found 4,000 m-16s, 72 grenade launchers. why do local cops need that? and then when they have it, they tend to use it instead of say a ruse like, oh, we re the ups man or, congratulations, you re won a contest, come pick up your money. of course, we re also using a lot of privacy with the drones. you have one. i do. and the one you saw in the clip i couldn t operate very well. that was a few months ago when i started researching the story. it cost $1,200. this week we bought this thing. it s $60 with a camera and it would allow you to go over your neighbor s yard. i m just not very good with this. but if one would practice, you could spy on your neighbor. where s the line? we have peeping tom rules which say you can look across to your neighbor s house but you can t jump on a step ladder and look over his fence. i ll tell you where the line is for the police. i brought along my trustee copy of the fourth amendment, which says you can t get anything unless you have a warrant. nsa would nab a whole bunch of stuff and they didn t have a warrant. hillary clinton agreed that nobody looks at this stuff, the fourth amendment. is that part of your special at all? we do touch on that. i m impressed you got hillary to agree with rand. it was a little bit squishy but i think she said we need to look at our laws but she agreed that nsa went way too far, they never got a warrant, they just nabbed stuff. i don t want anyone to miss your special tomorrow night, policing america, at 10:00 p.m., fox news channel, and it going to be again sunday night, 10:00 p.m. eastern. don t miss it. dvr it if you can t make it. it s a great special. thanks, greta. straight ahead, u.s. veterans and their best friends go to washington. find out what these war heros are fighting for next. really. so our business can be on at&t s network for $175 dollars a month? yup. all five of you for $175. our clients need a lot of attention. there s unlimited talk and text. we re working deals all day. you get 10 gigabytes of data to share. what about expansion potential? add a line anytime for 15 bucks a month. low dues. great terms. let s close. introducing at&t mobile share value plans. .with our best-ever pricing for business. test. test. when folks think about what they get from alaska, they think salmon and energy. but the energy bp produces up here creates something else as well: jobs all over america. engineering and innovation jobs. advanced safety systems & technology. shipping and manufacturing. across the united states, bp supports more than a quarter million jobs. when we set up operation in one part of the country, people in other parts go to work. that s not a coincidence. it s one more part of our commitment to america. that s why i always choose the fastest intern.r slow. the fastest printer. the fastest lunch. turkey club. the fastest pencil sharpener. the fastest elevator. the fastest speed dial. the fastest office plant. so why wouldn t i choose the fastest wifi? i would. switch to comcast business internet and get the fastest wifi included. comcast business. built for business. you are so lucky because you are about to meet some very special dogs. they give a whole new meaning to man s best friend. they are warrior dogs and sfrd with their soldiers in war zones. now u.s. veterans are fighting to bring these vets, these dogs, home. i love this dog more than anything. why? because he s my best friend. a dog, a best friend and a veteran of the war in afghanistan snp. in afghanistan, he was my everything. all i had was him. everyone else was on post and patrol with him when we had free time. i spent every second of every day with him. are more than 2,500 warrior dogs around the world but very few make it back to the united states, instead the military leaves them in the community. if they become a retired military working dog, overseas they re classified as a civilian and not afforded that free military transport home. this doctor pays to bring warrior dogs back. we re going to bring back to congress today to retire all military working dogs and contract working dogs on u.s. soil. that s why these dogs and their veteran owners are marching on washington. what s your dog s occupation? he s an i.e.d. guard dog. we have another lab and he barks. any idea how many bombs he s found? do they record that? i don t know. i never asked that question. i was just happy he was coming home. but with me exactly, i didn t fine anything. but they stressed in the course when we were going through, because everybody was like, be ready for it. people will ask you this, and in the course they told us it is not about how many you find, and it is about how many you miss. as long as you didn t miss any, you are successful. we didn t miss any. no marines hurt on the missions we went on. jason boss reunited with his warrior dog, ceecee. sergeant boss and ceecee were at at capital. a group of people separately and we were attached to big divisions in iraq. must have been awful when you had it say good-bye to her. i felt worse for her. she didn t know why i was going. i was hoping that one day i would see her again and it just worked out that i did. and another reunion. james and his dog, ricky, both served in iraq. she was with the u.s. army. she developed canine ptsd from being deployment. we both suffer from issues. her timidness around environments, loud noises, sirens, keep her on edge at any given time. she is a great dog, isn t she? oh, she isn t my pet, she s my partner. go to grettawire.com to find a link to the american humane society association. let s all go off the record for a minute. what s up with president obama? he seems indifferent to sergeant andrew tam raesy. don t tell me he is busy and doesn t know about him, he knows about him. certainly the president is concerned about all detainees, or americans held against their will in other countries. and while i don t think president obama can big foot mexico to just release him, he can cut deals. he can get mexico to fast track his case. he never mentioned sergeant tamarisi. i hoped it was just an oversight. that can happen. but then is happened again. we broke the news last night, president obama again talking to president of mexico just yesterday and according to the white house s own notes from that call, no mention of sergeant tamarisi. i don t get it. viewers he mailed me, saying fox news wouldn t do anything we report about. in other words, if fox urges to help this marine, it won t happen. i have no idea if the viewers are remotely right. if they are, that s cold. but i just want our marine out. i don t care who helps or why. i just want him out. that s my off-the-record comment tonight. coming up, joan rivers lets loose on reporters asking her about the israel hamas crisis. you have to hear this, next. we hear they are digging tunnels from new jersey to new york. woooo. i know what you re thinking. you re thinking beneful. 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that s what separates people that live for a purpose and those that just live a life that doesn t mean anything at the end. the president hit that one on the head. thanks for watching. i m al sharpton. hardball starts right now. nada, let s play hardball. good evening. i m chris in washington. let me display this horrible display by the republicans in the house of representatives. after three weeks at the huma humanitarian crisis on our southern border, it became clear the congress will agree to give the president not a sinkal lincoln headed penny to deal with this crisis, nada, nothing, no way. nothing for the 57,000 young people now in the hands of the american people. the blame for this lies on the reputation of a weak speaker of the house who was unable to even tie his sure without the daily permission of the tea caucus. a fiery texas senator called ted cruz when killed john boehner s hold on a majority vote. the failure of the president to take an out-front lead to correct the 2008 law against human trafficking passed by president george w. bush who helped owning the gate for the young people to come from central america and for senator harry reid to alleviate the border crisis with the comprehensive bill waiting action in the house. the effort to do a lot, compress their advantage by both sides, ended in the congress about to leave town and doing nothing at all as they pack their bags for a five-week vacation. mission accomplished? you have to be kidding. basking on the afterglow is the party ring leader, ted cruz, whose sole purpose in politics is to parachute into moments like this and raise hell. emanuel cleaver is a democrat from new jersey, and joan is an editor at large at salon. congressman y have been listening to you lately, and you have a lot to say about it, but i m dumbfounded by the utter incomp tense of our government. coming at this at a crisis mode for three weeks, everyone in america caring about those kids once way or another, and it looks like the congress is going to leave with nothing done. well, they re trying to talk about staying overnight and doing something tomorrow morning, but even that, chris, is absolutely nothing. this is insulting to the people of this country. insulting to people who are in washington because we thought we were here to solve problems. and i m not a name caller, a bomb thrower, but i can tell you, i m sick and tired of what s going on here in congress because there s nothing going on. and you know, there are people who it seems are coming, have come to washington for the sole purpose of disrupting the government. they are anti-government. and people out in the country are the ones who are going to have to stop this. who wins when ted cruz, the senator from texas, the firebrand of all firebrands, he comes over and meets with a dozen of your republican colleagues. next thing you know, boehner, the supposed speaker, at least the nominal speaker of the house, finds he doesn t have a majority to do anything. what s going on where a senator, there he is walking across the capitol or whatever, and jamming everything up. well you know, in some ways i don t want to hate. it troubles me deeply, to believe that one human being can disrunt the compassion a nation of 300 million people. as a realist, that troubles me deeply, but i know there are people under regular circumstances are good and decent people, but they come around here with people who hate the government, and they re different. they don t get ulcers, they re carriers. that s what s going on here. we have a lot of carriers of people who come in and get the whole body of politics sick. and we are sick right now. maybe sick unto death. is there a fear in the republican caucus anytime there s a line drawn, for example, are you for suing the president or not, you always have to be on the right side of that, the right-wing side of that? well, i mean, what people won t say, and nancy pelosi, i have to give her a lot of credit. she continues to remind people that was a question that the media dropped on her repeatedly during her speakership, and she always said impeachment is not on the table, no matter how many weapons of mass destruction were not found, that s not impeachment, speaker boehner won t do that. he doesn t want to offend anybody. he won t even say birtherism is wrong. he said, i don t want to tell people how i think. joan, we have been watching politics a lot, me longer than you. i have never seen such failure and fear. they won t help those kids. they won t give them a nickel. as i one said, not one lincoln-headed penny. it s tragic, chris. the congressman is right. there are some carriers of a real sickness. ted cruz is doing his best to spread it. but bill kristol laid it out this morning in the weekly standard, i have to give him credit. he told the house gop kill this bill because we don t want you to do the heavy lifting of governor, having you back in your districts defending something you did or didn t do. we want to drop this on the president. we want the finger of blame pointing at one man, president obama, and we don t want you to get your hands dirty with compromi compromise, with actually thinking about the complicated set of reasons that this problem wound up at our border. you can t do that. we don t want you implicated in governing. that s when you burn your own field so the enemy won t eat. it s sabotage dressed up as political genius. so it s not just ted cruz. it s a lot of people, but ted cruz is the symbol, one man out for himself. no principle in this. he wants them to cut the funding for the deferring the deportations. it s not funded by congress. these applications, it s a self-funded program by application fees. they can t even cut the money. what he s trying to do can t even be done. that doesn t matter. what matters is grinding up the gears of government and making people believe we can t do anything as a country. and it s very sad. it s august vacation time. looks like congress is going to leave and not get this done, although there s a last-gasp chance tomorrow. look at this comment by the governor of texas. anger and outrage has already begun to pour in from members of the republican party after the house pulled the border bill. rick perry issued this statement. it s beyond belief congress is abandoning its post while our border crisis continues to create humanitarian suffering and illegal aliens pose a threat. congress should not go into recess until our job is completed. do you think the republicans are going to scatter back tomorrow, have a quickie and pass it, and will it go anywhere in the senate? will we get anything to the president s desk? i don t it. they don t have the votes right now, so they re going to beat people up all night long and hope to have them tomorrow morning. and even then, it s going to be questionable. and if something comes across, it s going to be watered down from what it is now, trying to accommodate the far right in the republican conference. so when it gets over to senator reid and a more sensible senate, i don t think it s going to go anywhere, which ought to make americans so angry that they began to react to all of these people who come to washington to disrupt the nation. it is sick, and i m sick of it. i hope the people around the country are sick of it and they ll come out and express their sickness in november. well, let me ask you about this, and i ll go to joan on this, too. you know, back in 1948, i love history like you all do, too. i was thinking, harry truman had a do-nothing congress after world war ii. they did nothing except investigate people for communism. maybe they caught one here or there, but basically, they were wasting time. they used to open with a prayer and close with a probe, as someone once said. wasting time in investigations. darrell issa right across the floor. my question is, do you think the american people are going to vote for nothing, a party that stands for nothing, because that s what the republicans are saying? we ll do nothing. my fear is people don t realize there s only one human being who can bring a measure to the floor in the house of representatives. it s the speaker. i appreciate for the governor of texas is saying. that sounds like something i could have said. the problem is, he needs to instead of saying congress, he ought to say the republicans in congress. and call names, because my fear is that the american public does not understand the nuances and they may not understand that it is the republicans, not the congress. it s the republicans. well, the border bureau of the house was reworked four times to appease the red hots and it still failed. july 8th, president obama asks congress for $3.7 billion to address the crisis on the border, all the young kids down there. the house does nothing until july 23rd and then it began putting together a $1.5 billion counter offer. three days after that, the package is scaled down to $1 billion. on july 29th rblths it shrunk to $659 million. last night, ted cruz began whipping support against it, so this morning, the speaker anonsed a package to get their support by announcing a plan to block the president s power to halt deportation of certain groups of immigrant children. this afternoon, still without enough support, the speak eer pulled the bill from the floor. joanie tried to appeal, tried to pander to the regard right. it didn t work because as congressman cleaver just said, they don t want to be at peace. they want to say we don t have our hands on this thing. exactly. if you read that statement that the speaker s office released, chris, where he says the president can take actions on his own without congress, that s what they re suing him for. that s what some want to impeach him for. they re saying he does too much through executive action, and now they re saying he can handle this through executive action. i know some of my friends in the mainstream media want to go on and on about how it s the left and democrats talking about impeachment. certainly, we didn t start it. i don t know we get to finish it either. this is designed to depict our president as a tyrant and dictator who is usurping power and they re now telling him to do it. then next week, they ll tell us they re going to impeach him over it. sorry for misproducing your name. emanuel sour who was around this place for years. you re far more lively and alive than that gentleman. thank you for joining us very much tonight. and thank you, joan walsh. coming up, tea party types are thrilled with the immigration breakdown. a lot of hand wringing among establishment republicans about how much party this will cause them in november. they re the nada party, standing for nothing. also, the businessman on the stand, bob mcdonnell with his wife. while prosecutored showed notes with jonnie williams and mcdonnell to discuss a loan to mcdonnell. we re seeing a lot of quid pro quo stuff. a democratic congressman talked about how he was duped by the bush administration into voting for the war on iraq. there s some powerful recent history. let me finish with my question for all time. when it comes to our involvement in the iraq war. how did we get talked into it? not me, a lot of people. this is hardball, the place for politics. s already thinking about tomorrow. which is why he s investing in his heart health by eating kellogg s raisin bran ® good morning dad. hi, sweetie. here s another eye opener, not only is kellogg s raisin bran ® heart healthy, but its a delicious source of potassium. mom make you eat that? i happen to like raisins. now that s what i m talkin about. invest in your heart health. with kellogg s raisin bran ®. you owned your car for four you named it brad. you loved brad. and then you totaled him. you two had been through everything together. two boyfriends. three jobs. you re like nothing can replace brad! then liberty mutual calls. and you break into your happy dance. if you sign up for better car replacement, we ll pay for a car that s a model year newer with 15,000 fewer miles than your old one. see car insurance in a whole new light. liberty mutual insurance. well, the congress is already on track to become the least productive in history. now, everyone s about to head out for five weeks of august vacation. let s compare this congress with congresses in the past. back in 1948, when harry truman famously ran against the do-nothing 80s congress, that group managed to enact 906 public laws. that s the blue bar all the way to the left. compare that to the 112th congress. but so far, this current 113th congress has enacted just 142 bills into law as of today. again, on tract to be the least productive ever and a lot of those bills are just let s make it maple sunday. we ll be right back. when you run a business, you can t settle for slow. that s why i always choose the fastest intern. the fastest printer. the fastest lunch. turkey club. the fastest pencil sharpener. the fastest elevator. the fastest speed dial. the fastest office plant. so why wouldn t i choose the fastest wifi? i would. switch to comcast business internet and get the fastest wifi included. comcast business. built for business. welcome back to hardball. yesterday, with republicans in congress racing to vote to sue him, president obama had these strong words, calling out the do-nothing congress. let s watch him. the main vote that they ve scheduled for today is whether or not they decide to sue me for doing my job. they re mad because i m doing my job. and by the way, i ve told them, i said, i would be happy to do it with you. so the only reason i m doing it on my own is because you don t do anything. but if you want, let s let s work together. you don t do anything. that s my favorite throw away line of his in a long time. as if on cue, congress lived up to the president s words by literally doing nothing in the face of the crisis on the border. how will this play out with the american public and who will they blame? peter king of new york has his finger pointed in one direction, southward, to ted cruz. he told the washington post this morning, before republicans pulled the vote, quote, the obama white house should put ted cruz on the payroll. we have a chance to pass a good bill, not a perfect bill. boehner is working hard to get to 218 votes and yet there is ted cruz telling us to do nothing. if he wants to come over and run for speaker, that s fine, but otherwise he should stay over there in the senate. i love peter king. sometimes. steve mcmahon is a democratic strategist, and john is a republican strategist. this is set up politically for obvious reasons. john, it looks to me like the president has found a message. a harry truman message, which is i m not running against the right. i m running against nothing. these guys whole strategy is freeze the ball, do nothing until the election is over. turn that into they re a lazy bunch of no-good people not out to help the people. you heard congressman cleaver. and yet the president s approval ratings keep going down. let s get that straight, 41 to 7. we ll find out. i think this is going to be like all midterms, go to be a vote about president obama and his popularity. i think that s why republicans will do well. i have not given up hope on this border bill. i think they re going to meet tomorrow and pass something. it s going to be hard. where is it going to go? to the senate, and maybe they ll pass it, which they haven t done. let me ask you this, do you think congress deserves re-election based on its performance. forget party for a second. do you think congress which has a 7% approval rater led by republicans in the house, democrats in the senate, do you believe the body of congress has done a good job. i believe the house has done a much better job than the senate and why the senate is going to change control. are we living on the same planet? watching what they did today, john says he thinks the house is doing a better job than the senate, the senate that passed an immigration reform bill. john is normally a level-headed republican. today, he s defending the indefensible. he s generally right what the midterms are, a referendum on the power, unless the boneheads in the other party step in the way and make a skeptical of things. like in 1998. like in 1998 and today. the president has found a voice and someone to run against. for three weeks, we had pretty good headlines about the american people. some think there s too much illegal immigration, but even within that group, there s a lot of sympathy for the kids because they came over from a horrific situation. not from mexico which has problems but not horrific problems. from places like honduras, like the worst neighborhood in the united states is better than that. people are actually conflicted, but then the republicans come along and say we re not doing nothing. how is that going to sell? nothing, not a nickel. ultinately, i think they are going to pass something tomorrow. i think that s why boehner is pushing hard and why peter king who is going to flip? they re working on it. that s why peter king is so frustrated with ted cruz, who should run for speaker if he wants to be the speaker of house. they re going to get something and then bargain with the senate. how can one guy who verges on joe mccarthy every week in his talking about people, show up and walk the capitol, i never heard of a senator going to the house and lobbying. stunning, actually. i think that s why more and more house members are getting frustrated with cruz s leading role. isn t there a happy bunch of 30 of them waiting for orders? about 15 to 20. that s what makes it difficult. he comes over there, he brings the cameras. this people generally don t get on cameras. he has them over for pizza. it s like a movie like mr. smith. they re on the take with this guy? well, i think that ultimately, a lot of these members are listening to the views of the american people. and the phone lines for the american people are melting down. that s a problem. i think that for ted cruz and the speaker, they have to get on the same page and find a way to get this done. right now, it looks like the democrats could lose the senate this fall. how is this going to play? is it going to hurt the republican challenges. this is the best thing in the world for the democrats running for re-election in the house. the republicans trot out and the only thing they can pass is a bill to sue the president, or the only thing they can talk about or not talking about is taking impeachment off the table or not off the table. every time these conversations extend themselves, it s great for the democrats. it s not great about the things we talked about a few months ago. it s things that make even john boehner blush. almost every analyst understands and have predicted that the republicans are going to take over the senate. this has gotten worse for the democrats. let s listen to some of your party members, guys you hang out with. steve stockman tweeted, quote, any border package that doesn t defund barack obama s amnesty is a crap chimichanga. those are his words. figure him out. and erick erickson defended ted cruz against critics tweeting, house gop twitter fans are behaver toward senator cruz like justin bieber fans after someone has pointed out his lack of talent. that s playing to the younger crowd. what deyou make of that? you have crazy people. the crazy card chasing after the speaker. that s not the person. they have to get other folks who are going to vote for the package and not worldy about the folks who are always going to vote no. is there more crazy people in the republican party? i think it s about the same amount of people. far more. i think actually with social media, people are more able to express their opinions in a crazy way. the tweeting world is filled. this is a story ability gerrymandering and 57% of the republican base thinks the president should be impeached. these guys are trying to navigate the speakership and hold the house with a bunch of crazies who are perfectly willing to take you down, perfectly willing to vote to impeach the president and perfectly willing to change the entire conversation. let s stop right now, let s be fair. why doesn t the speaker take impeachment off the table? he has, like 30 times. the only one talking about impeachment is you guys. you do it because you want to raise money, and everybody knows it. did you see the fox news sunday show when scalise was asked to take it off the table, and he wouldn t do it. he s the leadership? the leadership. this morning, boehner warned obama not to take these actions. it the president takes these actions, he ll be sealing the deal on his legacy of lawlessness. he ll be violating the solemn oath he made to the american people on the day of his inauguration. and he ll be sacrificing the integrity of our laws on the alter of political opportunism, and i can guarantee you the american people will hold him accountable. if it talks like a duck. constantly references the president giving up the integrity of his office, breaking this law, breaking the constitution over and over. you don t thick that s a threat? what is that? the politics of this are democrats don t want obama to overreach on immigration either. he s enforcing a law that was passed and promoted by george w. bush. he s decided not to follow the law. that s a real problem for senate democrats. you know that. you think the president is going to issue work permits? i don t know what he s going to do. i think there is an area he would be avoiding, but these are threats that are endemic. speaker of the house boehner talks like the tea party people think. he talks about the president betraying the constitution, betraying the integrity of his office. all the lingo you would use in an impeachment trial. that s right. 57% of the republicans who vote in primaries would like to see congress impeach the president. and he s aware of that, and so is the tea party. are you in the 57 pest? i have lived through impeachment. it doesn t work politically. it s never going to get through the senate, so don t bother. we have tried impeachment. what we should probably do this lawsuit thing is not a bad alternative. would you do it. impeachment? you don t want to go back and read ken starr s feetnotes. thank you, steve and thank you, john. great to have you on. you were flacking a little bit tonight. up next, one of my colleagues responds to a coleague. you know who she is. this is hardball, the place for politics. since robert taira openedsion king s hhis first bakeryd, in a small hawaiian town. making bread so good, that people bought two loaves one to take home, and one to eat on the way. so good, they grew from here. to here. to here. but to grow again, to the east coast they needed a new factory, but where? fortunately, they get financing from ge capital. we not only have teams dedicated to the food industry, we re also part of ge, a company that s built hundreds of factories. so we could bring in experts to help king s hawaiian make sense of transportation routes, supply chains, labor pools, and zoning to help them make the right decision. and, i d like to think, to make their founder proud. if you just need a loan, just call a bank. at ge capital, we re builders. and what we know, can help you grow. when folks think about wthey think salmon and energy. but the energy bp produces up here creates something else as well: jobs all over america. engineering and innovation jobs. advanced safety systems & technology. shipping and manufacturing. across the united states, bp supports more than a quarter million jobs. when we set up operation in one part of the country, people in other parts go to work. that s not a coincidence. it s one more part of our commitment to america. so, when i heard that somebody at fox news said i should go soak my head, i was like, happy thursday, what else is now. then i found out it was shep smith. because i m about to have that bucket of ice water dumped on my head, shep is going to have to make a $50 donation in my name to his favorite charity. that s rachel maddow responding to a challenge from shepherd smith. they re both participating in something called chilling for charity. and the concept is simple. if a person accepted the challenge and allows himself or herself to be drenched in ice water, the challenger must d donate to a charity of his choosing or her choosing. let s take a look at how that played out. ready? couldn t be readier. i hate cold. should we count down? ready? yeah, three, two, one. ahh! ahh! okay. bye. that s her executive producer, bill wolff. that s teakwork there. anyway, in turn, rachel has now challenged liz cheney. hopefully she ll take that plunge. the library of congress has released correspondent from warren g. harding and his miszerous. as we have seen from what was already publishled, they were decided lee r-rated. jimmy kimmel celebrated with a dramatic reading from a hip-hop artist who has something in common with the former president, his name. here is warren g. reciting the works of warren g. harding. here tonight to read the love letters written by warren g. hardi harding, please welcome warren g. honestly, i hurt with insatchant longing until i feel there will no longer be any relief until i take a long deaf wild draft on your lips and then bury my face in your pillowing breasts. oh, cary, wouldn t you like to get sopping wet out on superior, not the lake, but the joy of fevered fondling and melting kisses. wow. nothing changes. anyway, finally on monday, we look back at barack obama s keynote address, that 2004 democratic national convention. a lot has changed in the ten years since that speech, and david letterman made that perfectly clear. let s take a look. we have a segment for you. i think this is a valuable comparison. it s called barack obama then, 2004, and now, present day. barack obama then, now. barack obama then. we are one people, all of us pledging allegiance to the stars and stripes. all of us defending the united states of america. barack obama now. what are your ideas? see you next time on barack obama then, barack obama now. same barack time, same barack channel. anyway, up next, it wasn t person. it was strictly business. the businessman at the center of the ex-governor bob mcdonnell s trial now going on in virginia said he and the first couple weren t friends. the thing was all about money. you re watching hardball, the place for politics. over 20 million kids everyday in our country lack access to healthy food. for the first time american kids are slated to live a shorter life span than their parents. it s a problem that we can turn around and change. revolution foods is a company we started to provide access to healthy, affordable, kid-inspired, chef-crafted food. we looked at what are the aspects of food that will help set up kids for success? making sure foods are made with high quality ingredients and prepared fresh everyday. our collaboration with citi has helped us really accelerate the expansion of our business in terms of how many communities we can serve. working with citi has also helped to fuel our innovation process and the speed at which we can bring new products into the grocery stores. we are employing 1,000 people across 27 urban areas and today, serve over 1 million meals a week. until every kid has built those life-long eating habits, we ll keep working. wouldn t it be great if hiring plumbers, carpenters shopping online is as easy as it gets. and even piano tuners were just as simple? thanks to angie s list, now it is. we ve made hiring anyone from a handyman to a dog walker as simple as a few clicks. buy their services directly at angieslist.com no more calling around. no more hassles. start shopping from a list of top-rated providers today. angie s list is revolutionizing local service again. visit angieslist.com today. i m page hopkins. here s what s happening. israel and hamas have agreed to a 72-hour cease-fire. it s set to begin at 8:00 a.m. local time friday. secretary of state john kerry spoke a short time ago and talk about difficult road that led to today s agreement. it is up to the parties, all of them, to take advantage of this moment. there are no guarantees. this is a difficult, complicated issue. years and years in the building, and i think everyone knows it has not been easy to get to this point. meetings are expected to get under way shortly in cairo, the most recent violence has left more than 1,000 citizens dead in gaza. back to hardball. governor, what was it like to sit there listening to jonnie williams on the stand yesterday? well, this is this is a marathon. it s not going to be decided in a day, and we look forward to day after day the truth will come out. welcome back to hardball. today, we re returning to peyton place, if you will. that was bon mcdonnell on his way into the court with the prosecutor s key witness, jonnie williams. be careful with guys like that, jonnie williams continued on the stand. a huge part of today s testimony involved establishing that williams and the former governor and first lady were not close friends, as they had claimed. the reporting on this soap opera have become primarily a burst of tweel tweets. the trial is not on television, and we re getting some of the best from the washington post reporters. they were not my personal friends, williams says of the mcdonnells. i thought it was good for our company. he said of all the gifts he gave to them. they were also shown videos of mcdonnell telling the convention that williams was an old friend of the governor. and he said, quote, i wasn t going to correct her, on mrs. mcdonnell s claim he was a close friend of the governor. finally, i knew it was wrong of the rolex watch he gave to the governor. i shouldn t have had to buy things to get the help i needed. inrolex watch he bought to the first lady so she could give it to her husband for christmas, was presented as evidence today and passed around by jurors. joining me now is katie glik and carol linnic who broke the story two years ago. i want to start with you at the post. i just think are you allowed to say you re skeptical of both arguments or do you have to say i m just reporting this? reporters are always skeptical, but there s a lot of efdz that raises doubts about the idea that maureen mcdonnell was taking a lot of gifts from this fellow was she was interested in him romantically. there are a lot of things that raise fundamental questions about whether or not that s true. what about the prosecution argument that they were not friends? that s coming from a guy who the governor thought was his friend? the prosecution has been hammering that home for weeks in terms of some of the prearguments and now in the trial. they re really trying to stress a case that this individual businessman really was pursuing this for out of business concerns and of course, the governor and the defense team are really pushing back. let s generalize this to the country. start to run for office at the local level. to run for state assembly. then you run for state senator and then you work for congress and you may work up to governor or senator. all along the line, you re picking up what we call friends. they re not necessarily a guy you grew up with, a woman that you grew up with. they re people who attach to you because you have these offices. they become your friends because you re in those offices. they re getting acquainted with a slot, and you re the slot. you begin to take they take you to dinner. you try to honor the rules. you honor the rule says no lunch more than $3500 for lunch or some stupid rule like that. you can t take them to basketball games. they find a way to go on vacation together or to invite them to give a speech and have the perks that go with that. but this is, to me, typical politics. i want to start with you, carol, on this. you accumulate friends. then when they go to court, they throw you under the bus and say we were never friends. i was buying influence and i copped a plea. i m going home. this guy is going to the can. it s true, jonnie williams got a great deal. all this immunity as a result of agreeing to tell prosecutors his side of the story. and what they wanted him to say? yeah, but you can t completely fake all of this. there is a lot of information that backs him up, but clearly, here s one problem with the friend thing you mentioned. when the fbi went to interview maureen the first time, she said jonnie is a good friend from forever. he and my husband met decades ago. i love the way we pick these pictures sometimes. go ahead. that was a complete fabrication. when the fbi comes calling and asks you questions, you would think she would say they met for the first time in a plane when jonnie wanted access to my husband. you think they re making a pretty good case in court he was after influence, he was paying for it? today was a good day for the government. we ll see what happens. i ll agree with the governor, it s not all one day. your read, katie. do you think the government, the prosecutors are making a good case that this governor was bought? his wife was bought? i would agree with carol that today was a good day for the government. it was a number of revelations coming out. photographic, you know how about the rolex watch being passed around? why do you think the judge would say you have to hold it like a religious article? you have to have this in your hand. it s worth, what, $3,000? i wonder about people wondering where you can go. you have to go to pretty nice neighborhoods without somebody grabbing it. but the idea of a $3,000 item on your hand. that sort of gave people sort of a clear sense of what money we are talking about. that was only one of the gifts that was talked about today. we have heard, you know, the whole gamut from trips for some of the mcdonald children could it be people who never had their hands on a rolex watch and they knew the jury would never forget. i think the rolex is so critical, too, in today s sort of outlay of evidence, trying to say, look, this governor was on the take. first, they hand it around so you can see what it looks like, because remember the governor s son said, i didn t know it was real. and then they show the picture. you know what worked for me in the prosecution case? you start with this, the alleged or the testified argument that mrs. mcdonnell, the governor s wife, offered to this guy jonnie williams, she would go to every doctor in the state, there must be thousands of them in virginia, and sit with that doctor and make a case for this guy s products. that s one heck of a commitment. and why would you ever do that except to get something for it? you don t do that for a pal. right, and a lot of scrutiny of their relationship. of course, in this trial, as a whole. that argument. that s not what you say to a guy you sort of like. i mean, if there is this flirtation going on, which could be harmless, of course. a lot of people like each other who don t get involved. that s normal. the idea she would say i m going to every doctor in virginia to help self your stuff, sounds like a deal. that does bolster the prosecution s argument this was not just a friend situation and this had nothing to do with the crush that the defense was bringing up earlier this week. this was a business proposition. as you know, thanks to you guys in washington, it s a huge story. everybody who doesn t live here should know that washington is sort of between virginia and maryland. heavy influenced by maryland. this is a bedroom community. we thought this guy was kind of dull, mcdonnell? i remember, about six months before it broke open, people were saying, gosh, you have to interview him. he really understands the budget and how to run a state. no one had any idea this was behind the scenes. a sad story. anyway, either way you look at it, if it s a flirtation, whatever it is, a lot of stuff changing hands that shouldn t have. thank you, katie and carol. one of the great reporters still working att the washington post. you guys have grabbed a lot of them. it s said the truth is the first casualty in war. coming up, how the iraq war proved that principle before the first shot was fired. this is hardball, the place for politics. knows her way can run in high heels. must be a supermodel, right? 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no evidence at all. why did everybody get sold with the idea of the mushroom cloud? it was a selling job by the bush white house. they took classified intelligence they were being given about the status of hussein s weapons of mass destruction. that intelligence was filled with caveats, reservations, uncertainties and they turned around and said in public it s absolute, it s certain, he s got weapons. he wants more. he s about to use them. and none of that was true. why did they spin it so to pushing us into war if they weren t sure? in other words, they got the raw data, they knew the uncertainties. yet, was this a selling piece? they wanted to two to wgo to wa other reasons, middle east peace, pushing the rejectionist states with israel, was it about oil, was it about george w. being mad because they tried to kill his dad? what was the real motive behind all thisdishonesty? some of all those. i think president bush thought he could establish who told him that? i don t know. he was listening to the intellectuals intellectuals, the one he never listened to in college. when did you first begin to think you made a boo boo, classic blunder in voting for this bill? hillary clinton voted for it, john kerry voted for it, joe biden voted for it. a lot of people i like. ed markey voted for it. when did you decide you got something wrong here? well, i believed i had to vote to disarm saddam hussein, and i was uncertain about the vote but i thought i had to do it. in the winter of 03, when the international inspectors were reporting to the u.n., they were not finding weapons, getting full access but there were no weapons, i began to realize there was a huge problem. what made you think when you saw that they were you never trust saddam hussein. basically the u.n. people going all over the place, couldn t find anything. what did you think then was driving the administration when they weren t getting any evidence? why were they pushing? i don t know. george wubush is not will to reconsider his decisions. a great president would have called a time out, said, wait a minute, i m basing this war on weapons of mass destruction, if they re not being found, i better hold back. bush, frankly, wasn t a good president. when bush got in there and realized there were no weapons of mass destruction, got in there and took a couple months, then were blaming the white house. the cia was blaming cheney. the special service of defense with wolfowitz and everybody. what were we doing in iraq after we realized the goal was not going to be there, there was no goal line there, there was no weapons there? why did we stay? well, the country was committed. our troops were being shot at. yeah. the troops are in danger. once you go into once you invade a country, you know, you own it. you know teddy kennedy, the best vote he ever cast was nay. well, it was my worst vote. thank you. read the book. thank you. the iraq lie by joe hoeffel. a great congressman. thank you for coming on. and we ll be right back. since robert taira openedsion king s hhis first bakeryd, in a small hawaiian town. making bread so good, that people bought two loaves one to take home, and one to eat on the way. so good, they grew from here. to here. to here. but to grow again, to the east coast they needed a new factory, but where? fortunately, they get financing from ge capital. we not only have teams dedicated to the food industry, we re also part of ge, a company that s built hundreds of factories. so we could bring in experts to help king s hawaiian make sense of transportation routes, supply chains, labor pools, and zoning to help them make the right decision. and, i d like to think, to make their founder proud. if you just need a loan, just call a bank. at ge capital, we re builders. and what we know, can help you grow. hey, i heard you guys can help me with frog protection? 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[ male announcer ] polident. cleaner, fresher, brighter every day. let me finish tonight with this insiders account we got tonight from a u.s. congressman, a democrat, who voted for the iraq war. who did it based on the sales pitch from the bush white house. i oppose the iraq war ever since i saw it coming in the days after 9/11, when i got word paul wolfowitz of the defense department was pushing it at that first meet in camp david. i d gotten word that w. had pushed back on that argument then, only to realize that some time later before the end of the year, bush had set us on the course for war. my question for all times is how a president of such limited ability was able to sell this country on a war with a country that had not attacked us. that led the united states of america on a mission to take over a country in the middle east, a country that was only, not only secular and opposed to islamism, but served back then against iran. what we were thinking? one thing we were led to think and think a lot about a mushroom cloud over our country. a nuclear weapon somehow delivered here on some kind of vehicle, a ghastly scenario we were instructed could well occur if congress and the american people did not make war in iraq. that was the benefit of a war. keeping that mushroom cloud from occurring. as for the cost of the war, well, we were told it was going to be a cakewalk. a slam dunk. a matter of a few weeks dick cheney said with his usual avuncular assurance. go worry, we were told. at a very cheap price, we d also get the bonus we were assured by administration insiders that the war would pay for itself and would get cheap gas afterwards to boot. such a deal. well, someday, while all the people are still with us, we ought to have one of those commissions, truth and reconciliation jobs to settle who pulled off this number and