>> i am mark halperin. >> and i'm john heilemann. and, with all due respect there is no roid rage here. first, on day two of the reddening of america, mitch mcconnell fell in line. two leaders, one script.

>> i believe it the president continues to act on his own he is going to poison the well. >> the presidential choosing to do things your lateraling will be a mistake. >> you play with matches you take the risk of burning yourself. >> it is like waving a red flag in front of a bull. >> the american people made it clear. they want to get things done. >> the american people have changed the senate. we have an obligation to change the behavior. >> the big question, can boehner and mcconnell remain joined at the hip? >> my suspicion is these guys have been strategizing for a while. they were on message, poll

tested and smart. they are not talking about social issues. we're talking about accountability, issues like not on immigration,, they are being very smart and disciplined. they are not being angry. they're not going to impeach the president. right now this is a smart inside game. >> it has been impressive. it is early days. mcconnell has the easier task. he has a few rabble-rousers. i don't think these senators are going to be problematic for him. he can manage his caucus. down the road the question is boehner. that tea party caucus in the house which is still large. the problem is not going to be mcconnell, it's going to be on john boehner side.

>> you have heard no talk of orphanages, you have not heard from being excitable and far right members of the republican conference with anyway and that is distracting from the message. this is a big moment for the party. so far they're handling it well. >> while the congressional republicans have been vocalizing in perfect harmony, the right wing opinion misers have been singing a different score that sounds like outtakes from metal machine music. >> the republican party was not elected to compromise. they were not elected to work together. >> they just surrender the power of the first to barack obama. they are working with the administration. they're going to say this demonstrates bipartisanship. you are screwed. >> it could get ugly. we're in the most dangerous time than the republicans have been in since the civil war. >> it is to stop barack obama. it is to stop the democrat party.

there is no other reason why republicans were elected. >> if they don't do their job and put out a competing agenda they are going to lose in 2016. >> i would agree. stay paranoid. >> newspeople have no incentive to have compromise, quite the contrary. >> barack obama has been good business for them. >> will the establishment be able to withstand the pressure from that? >> i'm a big fan of history. there is no -- i can't find any evidence that suggest they will or can. these guys collectively have been the biggest and one of the most pernicious forces for a long time.

there are some counterparts am a but they are a loud voice. they have repeatedly, in a growing strength, but pressure on republican leaders who want to get things done. the pressure has been intense. they have almost always capitulated the leaders. >> john boehner and mitch mcconnell, they are not afraid of a flying monkey. they are not. they have disdain for them privately. when mcconnell said we are not going to have a debt ceiling crisis, government shutdowns that sent a loud message. these guys can attack all they want. i don't think they personally will be intimidated. will people pressure them? >> no doubt. i don't mean personally. i think mcconnell, it relates to

the first topic. mcconnell can manage it. john boehner has not been very good at managing the elements in his caucus that are really afraid of those guys. that is going to be a huge test. those members of his caucus who do listen have been a bad force in the republican house. >> it is the most wonderful time of the year. if you're a republican who wants to run for president. chris christie, jeb bush, rand paul, ben carson take a look. a been carson documentary. i want to make it clear we did not add the soundtrack to this. ♪

>> [laughter] ok. >> putting aside the obvious jokes, which of these potential presidential candidates has taken advantage of this midterm moment? >> two people. it is early, but the momentum matters. chris christie is already meeting with his donors and figuring out how to take a victory lap. chris christie can be surprisingly strong. if jeb bush hesitates, chris christie could be the god who

raises tens of millions. rand paul has continued with the social media want to be the main candidate in the face of hillary clinton. a lot of republicans want somebody who will take her on. he has been aggressive. >> paul, christy is doing a lot of behind the scenes work. he has capitalized in a low-key way. rand paul is a mixture. both of us agree he is not going to be the nominee. his combination of talk about expanding the republican coalition, reaching out to groups that have not been appealed to, he is planned with this anti-hillary, and that is resonating. this is where he is leading the way.

the party is going after hillary clinton. the obama agenda is the clinton agenda. paul sounds like he is leading the chorus. that is a good place to be. >> the person we have not heard from his hillary clinton. she campaigned for a of people who lost. >> a lot of democrats lost. >> she is going to have to enunciate what her lessons are learned. in our ritualistic postmortem we found something we think is extraordinary in the exit polls. nonwhite voters gave substantial chunks to republicans. john kasich running for election got 26% of the african-american vote, up from 8% four years ago. we will talk about why. greg abbott in texas got 44% of

hispanic vote compares to rick perry. this comes after democratic forces from obama made a strong push in texas to help win more support. those are two examples from important states. what does that tell you about the prospects republicans have of winning the white house? >> not that much. these are unique cases. john kasich has shown people mitch daniels had more after the african-american voters, if you are republican governor who departs from right wing orthodoxy than you have social programs, and you reach out to african-americans, you can be popular. in texas you have a case where wendy davis became the poster girl for abortion on demand, that is not a great thing for hispanics. they don't like the far left posturing. >> the democratic party has a lot of thinking for 2016 about what i post obama party is. the big deal is it shows

democrats did not have a hold on the constituencies. coming up, our thesauruses naked. we are running out of words to describe what happened. we have dan pfeiffer to brainstorm with us. we will do that live after this. ♪

>> our guests may just be looking to get out of the white house sooner rather than later. dan pfeiffer, there he is. thank you for joining us. >> absolutely. >> you are famous in the white house for having games a ranking gallows humors of the darkest moments. where does this ring? >> a specific ranking, it is high. i'll be honest. >> top 10, top five?

>> top 10, for sure. like better or worse than the bp oil spill. >> better than bp oil spill in the 2010 midterms, probably worse -- it is high up there. i'll be honest. >> you told me you didn't think -- [indiscernible] you agreed that washington was gridlocked before with the array on capitol hill in your white house. >> correct. >> the president is being optimistic about breaking the gridlock when the new congress gets back. doesn't that mean logically that it is better for the president's agenda to have mitch mcconnell as later than harry reid?

>> no. what it means is after the elections, senator mcconnell offered some hope that he wanted to work with us. we will see where that goes. we are hopeful the realistic about the larger political dynamics in the party. >> you agree you're going to get big things done. >> we are hopeful. the opportunity is there. >> doesn't make sense this is good to say that you will get things done. >> let me be very clear. we would be much better with a democrat in charge of the senate. we fought hard for that. >> but you had that for the last couple of years. >> in 2012 we were hopeful things would get done. speaker boehner and senator mcconnell said many of the same thing they said. we didn't end up with action.

if you take what they said in november of 2012 as gospel immigration reform. i mean 2012. you can do it 2010, 2012. the lesson we know that is we have to wait until they get in they are in there with their caucus, we hear what role the tea party caucus will have. we are going to look for every opportunity to work for them. it is going to take effort on our part. if we get something done that will be great. we have two years. let's take every opportunity to move the ball forward. >> a year and a half ago the president mocked the idea of

having a drink with mitch mcconnell. yesterday he offered to have a bourbon. he admitted he had no idea what mitch mcconnell's drink of choice was. >> i think it is an assumption bourbon will be the drink of choice of any politician. >> unthinking of the cocktail. >> i don't know the answer. >> into manhattan. get a manhattan and that will be the key. >> i have to say if i had not a manhattan was the cocktail of choice that might have been something they could have used in an ad. >> one of the things they keep saying, there is too much regulation on businesses in america. does the president agree? >> we have a process in place to go and look for specific

regulations, regulatory look back. to go through the books, see what we can find to take off. there has been a number of them. >> there are two many regulations. >> he agrees there are some regulations that may not make sense and we should get rid of them. >> give me one. >> i will give you one we have done already. >> one going forward. >> you are saying you agree with republicans on a high priority too much regulation. you have this ongoing process. what is one you would like to work with. >> if this is going to be a negotiation, i'm not going to do that with you now. we have gone through the books and we have taken some off. we will look for more.

if republicans have ideas they should bring them forward. but we are not going to do is go back where wall street writes its own rules, and corporations can do anything they want. that doesn't make sense. if there are specific things that don't make sense we will talk about it. >> do you have a list you're going to bring to the table? >> no. we have a process to look regulations. we have a cabinet to go through. they bring them. if republicans have suggestions they should bring them. >> i'm obsessed with the question about that. the press conference, the president suggested he let john boehner win. >> he and john boehner were on the same side. i think he was being funny.

>> who is the lower handicap? >> i believe john boehner does. he is an excellent golfer. >> who is more likely to take a mulligan? >> i was not part of the foursome. >> no comment. >> neither of them. >> you are known as mr. optimism. sketch this out. for the next two months, in this lame duck session, your most optimistic portrait of what will happen to the country regarding the congressional action and the president's behavior. >> let me see a couple specific things. one, if we can get the funding we need to deal with ebola in africa and here at home, we can make progress on eyes so, that will be progress. we have nominations that are backed up. we want to get through with those.

then we can begin building the foundations to get stuff done next year. and the meeting the president is having is the start of that. >> dan pfeiffer, thank you. when we come back, we will answer a question that has been puzzling scholars for a generation. who is mitch mcconnell? ♪

>> our look at a man in the news this week making headlines, talking about his vision. his name is mitch mcconnell. a simple man, from kentucky. and the minority leader of the united states senate. soon he will be the majority leader. who is this bold new force? >> that voice, his voice, our voice, heard around the nation

and nation hungry for change. a nation that had found its oracle, its champion, its man for all seasons. >> on senator mitch mcconnell. >> mitch mcconnell, an unlikely leader from an unlikely time with an unkindly likeness. >> if we will have a senate that actually -- excuse me -- works. >> born to humble roots, little mitch would grow up to be an intern for senator john sherman cooper who would spark the flames of participatory democracy in a young man whose soul was searching for a number of meaning.

in 1984 he brought together two of the most powerful forces in modern life, television advertising and man's best friend. he quickly rose through the ranks of the republican party earning stripes for his vigor. ♪ a kingmaker, on the laurels of lofty language. >> we believe that romney is the man for this moment. >> as he braces for the task of being the majority leader in the world's greatest deliberative body, mitch mcconnell's strongest weapon may very well be his unwavering command and irrefutable charm, and tackling the most pressing issues of the day.

>> i will vote against and i will explain why. >> beneath his macho shell lies a temperament and width of a quickstart loves nothing more then the spirit of his wordsmith mark twain. >> the president is treating the constitution worse than a placemat at denny's. >> and now you know. we will be right back. ♪

>> we are live on television 24 hours every -- we are always tweeting and facebooking. there is a great story called the cognitive dissonance election. it is a graphic that shows how we have conservative

republicans, and marijuana legalization. >> and there's a great piece on obama. follow us on twitter. we will see you next week. sayonara. ♪

>> one of the most famous lines in hollywood history. >> the truth? you can't handle the truth. >> a few good men catapulted aaron sorkin from an actor to celebrated screenwriter, producer, and conflicted character creator. he went on to bring us the west wing moneyball, the social network, and the newsroom on hbo. if the steve jobs biopic coming soon. joining me today on studio 1.0 and he golden globe an