al: i am al hunt. mark: and i am mark heilemann. with all due respect to the voters in kentucky and oregon, tonight trump may be outfoxed. ♪ mark: what a show we have for you on this semi super tuesday. donald trump, backup and, in the bluegrass showdown. but first, hillary clinton's opening act. there are primaries today, in kentucky and oregon, the latter voting by mail, and this is driven by two ads by a super pac supporting hillary clinton's campaign.

here is one of the ads that people have been talking about which uses trump's own words, specifically about women against them. mr. trump: you know, you could see blood coming out of her eyes, blood coming out of her wherever. does she have a good body? no. does she have a fat -- absolutely. you like girls that are 5'1" coming up there. if ivanka weren't my daughter, perhaps i would be dating her. i view a person who is flat-chested, very hard to be a 10. announcer: does donald trump really speak for you? mark: the other at has a similar message, saying donald trump would cut off funding for planned parenthood and that women should be punished for getting abortions if the procedure was banned. spent $6 reportedly million on the spots between now and june 8 to keep the battleground states of ohio, florida, nevada and virginia.

today, trump unleashed a twitter storm, defending himself and issuing what seemed like some warnings. he wrote "the pathetic new hit ad against me misinterprets the final line. you can tell them to -- themselves, was about china, not women. tweetther tweak, -- "amazing that crooked hillary , can do a hit ad on me concerning women when her husband was the worst abuser of women in u.s. political history." hillary clinton's allies are picking the fight about women and donald trump warned if her team did that, he would counterpunch hard including on bill clinton's personal life. is it smart for them to pick this fight now? al: i think so. they don't really have a choice. if they play nice with them, he will not play nice with them. we had an online poll about a month or so ago, and these ads are very similar to the ads that republican katie packer did when

they were trying to trump, stop trump a couple months ago. they were not very effective. i think the super pac people will argue their reaching a different audience, a general election audience and these were states, and they believe at least they reaffirm how women feel about trump. this is a first of a series. national security, trump's business failures, very, very negative. bring the children and dogs in. mark: i may be missing something, but i am surprised they love this way. they are leading on something that is personal and involves gender, knowing that donald trump will take this as yard he has to defcon whatever. these ads will clearly have an audience and energize people, but i cannot imagine why they did not lead with either national security or the economy when they had plenty of time to get these spots ready.

al: well, i think they want to make sure that he does not have any kind of a comeback, and they are rallying around. it is the super pac. i think they clearly are representing her. i think it is just going to be negative from now until november, mark. mark: i agree, but why not start on the economy? why not start on where you say you want to raise to be? al: well, you may be right on that. let's turn to the other clinton. bill clinton was in puerto rico today. he had some things to say about the debt crisis there but also addressed for the first time publicly the advisory role he might play if hillary clinton reaches the white house. mr. clinton: i have been asked, actually, to be given the job of trying to help every part of the united states that has been left out and left behind economically. al: during a campaign stop in

kentucky yesterday, hillary clinton took the chance to not just promote her own economic message but mock donald trump's as well. is the question, what is your plan to create jobs? his answer is, "i am going to create them. they are going to be great. i know how to do it, but i am not telling you what it is i'm going to do." al: today, trump returned to his favorite social media microphone and tweeted -- how can crooked hillary put her husband in charge of the economy when he was responsible for nafta, the worst economic deal in u.s. history? mark, her advisers say she will make the case and in the end she is better for working-class families then trump. which of her proposals better make that case? mark: i think she has to talk about college affordability and anything she has got in her

arsenal to raise the incomes of working and middle-class families. i do not know what those proposals are. there is nothing to me that seems new and fresh and the breakthrough on her website and something that hates her that can unify the country the way other presidents have. when her campaign says, as they said, they want to make this about the economy, it seems they should have the specifics to say, hillary is for this, donald trump is for this and that is what voters should vote on and i'm just not hearing that. al: market, i basically agree with you. what this plan is the 2016 version of putting families first from 1992 with bill clinton. she has the middle-class tax act, paid leave, and you mentioned free public t education in state, and childcare, but you are right. it does not excite, and so far, the candidate has not done a very good job of telling people

what we are going to do with you to help struggling families. mark: not only does it not excite, she is not talking about it with the kind of message discipline bill clinton did with his economic agenda or george bush did. barack obama did this as well, but the economic crisis happened and he had his chance to step up. i'm really surprised they are not focused like a laser beam on the economy from 1992. today in "the washington post." donald trump says he was planning a public campaign to rehabilitate his public image by addressing some of the bad headlines he has garnered head on. trump put that strategy to the test in the same interview, the billionaire builder brought up on his own months ago when he appeared to be mocking the physical disabilities of the new york times reporter, serge kovaleski. he told "the post," i would never say anything bad about a person who has a disability. i swear to you it is true. 100% true, to the handicapped?

i have spent a lot of money making buildings accessible." to remind you of the context or, what he is talking about, this is the original set of remarks from november. mr. trump: the poor guy, you have got to see him. i do not know what i said. i do not remember. he goes, i don't remember. maybe that is what i said. mark: so the reporter in question does have a disability, and trump claims that is not what that imitation was about at all and claimed that the reporter, even know they had a history together. now, how convincing deified has attempted a to try to defuse the issue? al: not the least bit. he is lying to put it simply. i have watched this take dozens of times, and i have talked to surge the reporter, i have a son with disabilities, so we are sensitive to these issues. there is no doubt that donald trump knew he was ridiculing a reporter, that is clear from the tape. he was upset with the story, and

he went on to deny that he even interviewedo had him multiple times, one time for two hours with another reporter in his office, had written on the comp shuttle pr thing with the donald, and he and others doubt trump knew he was. he had decided disabilities. you do not forget that. this is one of the cruelest things trump has done in this campaign, and the focus group says this resonates more than any other issue, and my guess is that donald trump knows it shows that. mark: al, i talked to people about all of the things that trump has said that has offended one group or another, that comment and that performance really has resonated with a lot of people, not just people who know someone or have a family member with a disability, but people think the cruelty of what they saw their is beyond the pale, beyond the notion of politically correct, beyond the

notion of an offhand remark. yeah, he could've called him, apologize, said, i got carried away and people would have forgotten it, but to double down on this demonstrable lie is something, this is not going to go away. i suspect you will see a clinton super pac at on this one as well, mark. mark: i agree. up next, there was chaos and that nevada democratic convention this weekend. bernie sanders and a response to all of the hullabaloo after these words from our sponsors. ♪

♪ mark: the aftermath from a chaotic democratic party convention in nevada reached new dramatic heights today. ,if you have not been following the story, here is a quick, cliff notes version.

hillary clinton won the nevada caucuses back in january, but that is not stopped sanders supporters from try to pick up a few delegates on those potential saturday. delegates clashed after the rules, prompting it to close down early. reportedly, there were some chairs thrown as the team supporting sanders claimed they were being steamrolled by pro-clinton sources associated with the party bosses. since then, some of these states that were state superdelegates and party officials said they have been receiving death threats from angry bernie fans. addressing reporters a few hours reidnevada senator harry said the confrontation was a test of leadership for sanders. the two of them spoke today, and harry reid said he was confident the nevada senator would soon be bash the vermont senator would soon be releasing a statement addressing the matter, and boy, did he ever. this was an incredible statement, he was emphatically

unapologetic. he took the opportunity to deride leaders for not welcoming new, energetic voters, and he defended his backers wholeheartedly and did as an aside to announce violence, but it was not, i suspect, what harry reid and the hillary clinton and state party folks were expecting. the state party officials have put it a statement pushing back on sanders, accusing him of misrepresenting the situation. so, al, what does this dustup in this area mean for hillary clinton and bernie sanders? al: i have been downplaying the tension of this contest, but i think this changes it. this is really ugly. she is going to be the nominee, and she needs the sanders people. they cannot sit on their hands, they cannot feel like they have been disrespected, and i tell you the other thing, the longer this goes on, the tensor it becomes, what it may force her

to do is pick elizabeth warren is a running mate, which i do not think she would relish. mark: this goes back to talks i had had with bernie supporters in iowa and new hampshire, and i clinton supporters, if bernie sanders ends up wning, they were great, but when i asked the sanders' supporters, even young people who looked perfectly friendly, what do you think of hillary clinton, they would spew vile. they do not like her. they do not feel good about her being the nominee. i agree with you. the symbolism of what we are in a reflection of where we are and i think it will make things raw. this is about his message, his vision, his backers and is not about bringing the party together, and i suspect this is more than just a small setback. al: i think you are right. every read could not get to bernie sanders. mark: we will see if some other democratic senator can step up.

as we mentioned, today is a voting day. it is primary election day in oregon, where they vote by mail, and it is also voting in kentucky for democrats, a coal country state, where it seems to be a problem for the hillary clinton, who lost both west virginia and indiana. sanders has outspent clinton on kentucky airways. not uncommon, he has money still. a loss for clinton will be the first and he is lost a full primary state. she has won all of the states where it has been democrats only , so that would be a bad loss. sanders if he wins, without 124 -- 21 contests overall which compares to clinton's 26. with more coming that sanders could win next month. so the clinton campaign seems more hopeful they can pull this one out tonight, but if clinton loses kentucky, does it matter? al: i think it does, going back to what we were talking about. she can ill afford another loss because i think it heightens the tension.

kentucky is a state, a closed primary. if she wins the general election by 10 points, she is going to lose kentucky. it has nothing to do with the general election. it has something to do with getting out of this struggle in the best possible shape, and the last couple of days have not been helpful in that regard. another she loses kohl's day, another statement democrats only, the economy and working-class voters are a big deal, if she loses a state at this point where she is the presumptive nominee, all of that is bad news, and of course, the closer bernie sanders gets to matter, not in the popular vote, but the closer he gets in states won the more he will be in bold and today again in the he may ask for things that she could just not deliver on. al: yes, that is right. i think this is a contest they thought would be over. very few people thought this would be settled.

not always, but you can pay a price for that. mark: up next, we get all of the answers from the bernie sander'' campaign manager, joe weaver. he will explain the nevada situation, what happens after tonight, and more after this quick break. ♪

♪ mark: waiting to be flooded with returns for the races in oregon and kentucky tonight, and we want to bring in someone also waiting patiently, we assume. joining us now from burlington, vermont, bernie sanders campaign manager, jeff weaver. thank you for coming on. we were surprised by senator sanders statement on nevada and his calling out, of what he

thought was bad practice. tell people, what is the worst thing that happened on saturday that really voter should know about around the country and care about? jeff: the way it started, i think if you watch the video online, you can see it, and it is confirmed by a senator who was there in the room, a former senator from ohio, where they try to pass temporary roads to show debate in the event, they and naysd for the yays and it was indecisive in the chair overruled them and proceeded to run the convention on a modified temporary roles which were designed to foreclose debate. mark: so what is the difference between the outcome now and the outcome that according to you would have happened if it had been done fairly? jeff: i am not sure what the outcome would be differently, but that is not the issue.

the issue is, there is a huge segment of the democratic party that is treated with fairness, and i do not think that is happening in nevada. bernie sanders has run in states all across this country, and by and large, the state democratic party has been very fair and evenhanded. that was just not the experience in nevada at the state level or at the clark county convention recently where they tried to depose against their own roles and credentials chair in a most had her arrested because there was the perception that she was being too unfair to the sanders people. this is not just center, there were a lot of events leading up to and a lot of frustration. campaign does not support threats or violence. it was something we saw in not other states. -- something we did not see in other states. al: jeff, this is al hunt here. tell us about the harry reid/bernie sanders conversation. jeff: i do not talk about people

posing conversations. they have been having a couple conversations, positive conversations. they are friends and i think there's a lot of mutual respect, but i'm not going to get into -- al: senator reid did not anticipate what senator sanders said this afternoon. there was obviously something said before hand. jeff: what senator sanders said as he is against violence and he wants people supporting them to be treated fairly. resistance among some establishment players and the democratic party whether it be in the nevada state party or the dnc who were not as welcoming of all of these new people who have come into the process, all of democraticallye, allied independents who have come out and support senator campaigno deal with a finance system and a rape economy.

al: do you include the clinton campaign in that criticism? jeff: no. the clinton campaign have not weighed in on this per se, but obviously, i think people perceive themselves as operating in the interest of the clinton campaign. mark: given the success you have had and will likely have the remaining contests, is it fair to say you will go to the convention with the posture of winning over super delegates in philadelphia, and so philadelphia will be more about or partially about fighting for the nomination rather than coming together behind secretary clinton and fighting donald trump? is that fair to say? jeff: i think it is fair to say whoever comes out of the convention as the nominee will come out with a united party that is prepared to take on trump and the republicans. i think that is certainly fair to say. this process has a long way to go. we will see how the final states go, with the delegate margin narrowing substantially. there would be an appeal to superdelegates in the center has

said that himself, but there are issues that have to be dealt with, including the platform and the ways that we give with the nominating process and things we've seen over the course of the year in the various states that are often not a result of malice but institutional impediments to people of being able to persuade desperate display. mark: it seems to me you all have had enough success, no matter what happens tonight or june that your posture seems to be that the convention is about having disputes about who the nominee is going to be, who the superdelegates should vote for, what should be the platform, should the roles of how theiratics nominate party in the future, that that is up for you all, that that is what philadelphia is about, rather than uniting at the beginning of the convention around hillary clinton. is that fair to say? jeff: i think at this point, that is exactly right. the convention is about

nominating the democratic candidate for president of the united states. mark: so you're not looking for ward to showing up in philadelphia from day one and saying, let's figure out when senator sanders is going to get his big speech endorsing her? jeff: let's be clear, the media has anointed clinton ever since that a senator sanders announces campaign. this has always been an uphill fight. going all the way to the convention. so you do not need to hear it from me. he has said it repeatedly. al: jeff, give us one or two of the most important platform planks for the sanders campaign. jeff: well, i think there are many issues he has been talking about. universal health care with a single-payer system, a fair minimum wage, free tuition for public colleges and universities, dealing with the broken trade policy. i can go on. those are the sort of things, dealing with climate change--

al: that is a big list. mark: all right, mark, last question. what word would you use to describe the attitude in your headquarters right now? jeff: i think "determined" would be the adjective i would use. mark: all right, very determined leader jeff weaver, thank you. coming up, we are bringing in the gold standard to talk about donald trump's fundraising. a guest joins us after a few words from our sponsors. ♪ iaae-m"

♪ mark: joining us now, our guest to read a story about the

chaotic pro-trump super pacs to try to defeat hillary clinton. her story says, the dynamic to run a sophisticated independent campaign. two rival super pacs are in the mix and are viewed with skepticism by major donors and their advisors. the free-for-all environment alarms veteran party strategist who recently signed on to try to help donald trump win the white house. thanks for joining us. great story. let me ask you about one thing that stuck out in her story, you got a response from corey lewandowski, saying mr. trump does not really like super pacs, so is that a bit of a fiction or are they actually happy these things are happening? i think we are seeing conflicting messages coming out of the truck campaign, both from the candidate and his advisor. they maintain that he disavows all super pacs, even though i've been able to determine that the top trump advisor has been

actually frantically seeking strategists to set up an entity they feel would be a professional operation that could harness these huge sums that will likely come in from wealthy trump supporters. posturet of the public is contributing to the confusion in this environment, trump took a hard line against super pacs throughout the primary and really beat up his opponents like ted cruz for being supported by them. now, there is an acknowledgment inside the campaign, they have to have some sort of outside entity that can take in these big donations that they do not know what that will be at this point. mark: these two super pacs as they think about raising and spending, are they dreaming of $2 million checks, $3 million checks, $10 million checks? >> i am sure they will take eight figures and happily put those to work. both of those groups that said they want to raise as much as $100 million, which is doable. we have seen some of the super

pacs bring an incredible sums just from a couple of donors. ted cruz was able to bring in $50 million contributions from just a group of members of a single family. while the sums are not out of reach, i think the real question now is the organization and let strategist are going to be trusted with this money. i am a huge fair and of your writing on money and politics. you do a fabulous job. you say it has to do with organization because our a lot of the fat cats, he is going to divide up to $100 million, are most of the big-money people coming around out to donald trump? say would not necessarily most of the big-money people, but one thing that is really fascinating and we have seen a real involvement in political activity by wealthy people who never had engaged in campaign up until a few cycles ago, so there

is plenty of money to be had out there, and trump clearly has relationships with very wealthy people he can tap. in some ways financing outside super pacs is easier than financing the hard money for the campaign. it will not take much to have a well-funded super pac if you get a couple billionaires to step up to the plate because there are no limits on what they can give. fundraising for the campaign and taskarty is a harder because of the limits and that will be the true test of trump's organization. al: one of the reasons i think, and correct me if i'm wrong, if he needs the super pacs is because most people who know of trump and his finances do not think he has the money to throw a billion dollars or is not liquid enough to throw that in his campaign. is that what you hear? >> he sort of alluded to this a week ago when he said, i guess i could sell a couple buildings, suggesting he does not have the toh really readily available

immediately inject any campaign, and he said he wants to raise a million dollars in conjunction with the rnc, which is a -- a billion dollars in conjunction with the rnc, which would be an incredibly steep goal, are to see how they reach that, so i think he is going to be incredibly dependent on a well-funded outside super pac or multiple groups that can pick up some of the flak his campaign will not be able to do. mark: to go back to the first question, sometimes donors do not want to get to the super pac because they are not sure they will spend the money wisely, sometimes they are worried the candidate will not like it, sometimes they want to make sure they are with the official enterprise. are all of those reasons that play as donors hesitate? >> all of those questions are still unanswered. most owners now have read trump's language on super pacs, the softer posture he is taken in some media interviews as a sign that he does not want these, so i think there is less

ambivalence about whether they would be in trouble with him, so to speak if they pursued a. it. he tweeted a link referring to sheldon adelson's pledge to spend up to $100 billion so that seem to be a minimum, and acknowledgment that this money would be out there' supporting him. the real unanswered question is who can they trust with their money? donors are incredibly skeptical of these outlets that crop up out of nowhere. mark: great story and great coverage of this really important topic. when we come back, the guy fighting the political system long before donald trump in bernie sanders. his effort to recruit more independent candidates. we will have that for you in a second. you can now listen to us on the fm -. bloomberg 91.9

♪ mark: there has been a lot of talk about allegedly rigged political systems and potential third-party challengers to try to shake things up. these issues are nothing new for next guest, kansas businessman you might recall, mounted an unsuccessful independent bid against pat roberts in 2014. he has now written a book called "the declaration of independence, how we can break the two-party stranglehold and restore the american dream." recently, i sat down with him and asked him what he learned from his third-party run in about how the current system works for our democracy. >> i learned a lot about what voters want and what voters care about.

it was clear to me in running that in fact, voters feel like they have been presented a series of false choices. voters feel like the two parties really ultimately don't care about them, and i think we are seeing a lot of that reflected in the unconventional choices they are making in this presidential season. mark: doesn't the fact that the two unconventional choices, bernie sanders has done well, although he will not be the nominee, and donald trump, doesn't it suggest that the two-party system can accommodate outsiders who are not part of the party system? ere aer of those guys w member of the party until they ran recently. greg: what we saw with the ryan and donald trump meeting is an example of how eventually this system co-opts them all. trump ran as republican, he got republican votes, but now is trying to co-opt the republican finance system and raise a billion dollars for his campaign through the party. when he goes to washington dc,

he's going to go as a republican who has obligations to the republican party, and perceived by democrats as someone they cannot trust. because that is what the two-party system has devolved to. we've gotten to the point where both parties don't trust each other. so they spend their time focused more on seeing the other party fail than on seeing our country succeed. if you read my book, you see that we've got to a point where a lot of the most partisan folks in both parties consider the other party evil. when you consider the other party evil, by definition, any compromise becomes the deal with the devil. i think that is what we would see in a president trump and a president clinton. even if they extended an olive branch, the other side would look incredibly skeptically at that. if you look at the last 25 years in american politics, we've had three presidents, two-term presidents elected, all talking

about some nature, some desire to be post-partisan. clinton talked about a third way. actually, george bush went to the democratic house meeting, there off-site meeting, and talked about the fact that he wanted to work with them. we saw barack obama talk about becoming a post-partisan president. the reality is both parties are so invested in partisanship that even when the leaders of their own party extend an olive branch, the other party rejects it. it does not matter who is president. that is one of the reasons i have called for more independence. i believe independents are an essential element of our problem-solving process and if we don't have them, fundamentally we will continue to be guided by mistrust in the parties and lack of accomplishment for the american people. mark: so if you and like-minded colleagues have your way, don't go all the way to utopia, t what would the country look like

in 10 years as far as how the government would function, if a lot of independence got elected, how would things be different? greg: i believe whoever is the next president would be better off with five independent senators than five senators from their own party. those independent senators from the president who wanted to extend an olive the bench -- all of branch could serve as a bridge between the two parties. i've often likened it to a couple going through a bitter divorce. they don't talk to each other anymore, they don't trust each other, they question each other's intent and sending democrats and republicans to solve our problem is a little bit like asking that divorcing couple in a room and saying figure it out. it's not going to happen without a catalyst like independents to come and help both sides reach their differences. mark: if you had gotten elected, you would have caucused with the democrats.

greg: i said this consistently, ultimately if one party or the other is clearly in the majority, then it's in the best interest in my state of kansas for me to caucus with the majority. but if i were in a position where we got to decide who held the majority and the chairman's gavels, i would've gone to both sides and said we need to engage in a pro-problem-solving agenda. mark: so you need some luck, that the balance of power would say to both parties, you need to appeal to us. is it possible for someone who is an independent in the senate to not join a caucus, or do you just give up too much power that way? no committee assignments, no ability to be part of the benefit that comes with being one party or the other. >> if you look at what has 113th congress passed as many bills as the do-nothing congress truman ran against in 1948.

without doing something different, washington will continue to be besieged by gridlock and not a whole lot will get done. i do not know how valuable it is to sit on a committee that get something done. mark: and we come back, we are joined by our guest to talk about his latest project and what it means for daily news, -- commute, traffic and weather. that's right after this. ♪

♪ >> if goldwater gets elected, you can forget about poverty. you can forget about civil rights. is that what you want? i trying to turn this country am around and prevent a major war. why the hell did i ever

consider you? the first sign of trouble, you cut and run. mark: that was a scene from the film "all the way," about lyndon johnson. it appears on hbo this sunday at 8:00 p.m. and joining us now is the director of the movie. we will watch another clip and talk about the incredible film you have made. this clip depicts johnson discussing the civil rights bill with his vice president, hubert humphrey. >> you told dr. king you wanted this bill passed without one word changed. >> you don't sell a horse by talking about it being blind in one eye. >> this is about votes. that's the problem with you liberals, you don't know how to fight. mark: jay roach has made another great film about america, this ourwith i would say, if not

greatest, one of our greatest actors. tell us about why you were interested in lbj. >> he is a complex guy, and unbelievable politician. someone who actually believed you could do things in the government and got a huge amount done. we sort of forget looking back through vietnam, looking backwards to what he accomplished in the 1960's. one of the most important things accomplished was the civil rights bill in 1964. to take that on at that time when he was seen as the accidental president after the gfa can -- the jfk assassination seems incredible. he channels him. he got his physicality. it is pretty amazing to watch. i can say that. hunt.y, al i saw the movie last night at the national archives and it was absolutely brilliant.

there would be times when you would see cranston and in you would go back to an lbj scene in 1964 and you are not sure which was lbj and which was cranston. i thought lady bird and richard russell and j edgar hoover were absolutely phenomenal. guided in theyou play in the movie about robert caro's great works on lyndon johnson? >> our playwright became our screenwriter. he had done most of the research before the play. i got to inherit that, but then we did a lot of her own research, went out and spoke to a number of people that were there directly, number of the civil rights leaders, congressman john lewis, congressman jim clyburn, ambassador injure young was a consultant on our film -- ambassador andrew young was a consultant on our film as well as a number of people in the johnson administration at the time. al: you mentioned vietnam earlier.

lyndon johnson does very poorly when asked about the public view of presidents, i do not think there is an airport in the country named after him because it is all vietnam. do you think this film will begin to educate people on the fact that there was another side of lyndon johnson, that he was able to do more works than any president since roosevelt? >> that's how i usually describe it. i was about 10 or 11 years old when he decided not to run again due to the unpopularity of the war. i have forgotten, and you look at the work he did in 64, 1965, 1966 on medicaid, quadrupling the national financing of education, npr, pbs. he passed more legislation in those few years than almost any president since fdr.

i think what people will notice when you watch the film is just what it's like for someone who actually believed government can improve the quality of life of americans and has spent his whole life learning how to do that, and did it incredibly well during those early years. mark: the film had an incredible cast and you have worked with a lot of people, but i'm just obsessed with bryan cranston. you have done two films with him. what makes them so good at this? >> he did not become famous right away, early in his career. he was a great character actor for so many years. i like to work with actors who are great at drama but also great at comedy. he has that range. johnson was a prankster sometimes. to get you to jump on his side to pass a bill, he might tell you a ridiculously off-color joke or drive you around in his

amphibious car to throw you off balance, and then pressure and even bully you to get things done. bryan's range, from the most intimate, suspenseful moment to the big, larger-than-life texan that johnson could be, an actor ryan, you need a guy like that during a story like this. mark: are there models for that, because it doesn't always work out. >> it doesn't always work out. in this case, you open it up. what i love about johnson's character is you would get in your face, right next to you if you inches and puts -- a few inches and put so much pressure, people called it the johnson treatment of the texas twist. i thought to make it more

cinematic, it would be to go smaller, to get in there and watch this great performance. you forget it is bryan cranston. bradley whitford is a pretty incredible humphrey. to get great performances and be right in a privileged position that the camera can get you into. al: as well as the political brilliance of johnson, you capture the dark side, the really extraordinary insecurities. at one point he said he was going to quit before the 1964 election. was that hard for cranston to capture, because he certainly did it vividly. >> those few days during the democratic convention when he curled up in bed, like you said, sure the south would abandon them, that he would lose the election depending on labor to give him enough courage to get out of bed, i heard all of that in the phone calls, there are

these incredible, many, many afforded -- recorded phone calls, and you can feel that on stage but on the film, you get a sense of helpful herbal he was, how great the psychologically swing was. again, bryan has got it all. he's got the range, so i wasn't nervous about pulling that off. mark: to paraphrase donald trump, we are getting sick of your success. [laughter] congratulations, another incredible achievement both art and commercially. the film debuts on hbo at 8:00 p.m. this saturday night. jay, congratulations. we will be right back. ♪

♪ >> still ahead, another super tuesday. >> another super tuesday on the campaign trail. >> you're watching super tuesday. mark: you like super tuesday, huh? if you do, check out our coverage on bloomberg politics.com. the reaction from both kentucky and oregon tonight. also, emily chang talks to the chairman of microsoft, john thompson, that's on "bloomberg west." thank you for watching. big thanks to al hunt for joining us. until tomorrow, sayonara. ♪

wednesday, the 18th of may. i am rishaad salamat. this is "trending business". ♪ right, were visiting sydney and beijing this hour. japan dodging a technical recession last quarter. asia-pacific markets on the slide, the case for higher interest rates