goodwill. thanks for starting your morning with us. >> "smerconish" starts right now. we will see you at 10:00. a few minutes ago, secretary shinseki offered me his resignation. with regret, i accepted. >> good morning. i'm michael smerconish. the drum beat has caught up with eric shinseki. that is the headline. v.a. chief relisigns over the delays at hospitals. it could have been lifted from any major newspaper in the country. today, all the media are covering the story and for obvious reasons. the scandal over american war veterans dying at v.a. facilities has no end in sight. it began with cnn, with tips that spurred suspicion and

months of investigation into hidden mismanagement and negligent. the reporter who got the story is jim griffin. he believes we are about to see more heads roll. >> i think it is nationwide. i think with a strong leader at the v.a., if the right thing happens, you will see hospital directors across the country being fired. that is where i think this needs to go. and perhaps then, those fired employees of the v.a. will be brought down to the department of justice and asked to explain why there was so much apparent criminal behavior in changing data. fudging numbers, cooking the books and perhaps, michael, for one purpose. to get performance levels up and bonuses paid. >> joining me now is mike hoffman, a republican from

colorado, sits on the veterans affairs committee and one of the first house members to call for eric shinseki's resignation. dinah titus sits on the committee. congress member, i spoke to drew griffin. he fears phoenix is the norm, not the outliar. does that comport with your level of the scandal? i think it does. first of all, there are a lot of great men and women that work for the veterans administration. a lot of them are upset about what is occurring. they certainly contacted my sub committee. they turned over information to us. this is systemic and nationwide. veterans were denied care because managers were seeking financial gain at their expense. >> congresswoman titus, allow me

to play something that griffin told me that relates to congress. watch. >> you can go to congress like i did and sit in the hearings like i did for the last year. the republican house led veterans affairs committee has been screaming about this. no one paid attention. over in the senate, veterans affairs committee was a different story. members of congress have been screaming about this and banging their heads on the wall trying to get the attention of the v.a. i'm not excusing anybody on capitol hill. certainly there has been a lot of blame to go around. in the end, isn't it the v.a. secretary who is running the veterans administration and not some guys in congress? >> from an oversight standpoint, what went wrong here from congress' point of view? >> this is not a short-term problem. this has been going on for de deca decades. we had 18 reports issued to this committee about the delay and

wait time and the problems specifically with health care at the v.a. we sat in seven hours of hearings in the two days we were back there this past week with different officials from the v.a. we all have been calling for it. the house just recently passed a bill. i voted for it allowing the head of the v.a. to fire people who aren't living up to the standards of providing the best care possible for our veterans. >> yesterday, congresswoman, president obama spoke of record level investment in the v.a. it raises question in my mind are we dealing with a funding issue or mismanagement issue or combination of both? >> i think it is a combination. we put great demands on the v.a. because we want to give the best services possible to our veterans. a grateful nation wants to provide that. in the last year, you see the increase of veterans coming back

from the war in the middle east. you have seen the addition of vietnam veterans suffering from agent orange. the homelessness and ptsd. our demands are great. we need to meet that with increased resources. >> congress member coffman, some of the republicans who were mr. shinseki's shrillest critics were among those in department financing. i know you were first to call for his ouster. you voted against the bill to help the backlog. respond to the criticism in the times. >> that was an omnibus bill. there has been funding. there was dramatic increases in the v.a. that is not the issue. the fundamental issue is the transparency and integrity.

the fact is the big problem right now is the fact that they were covering up the wait times for financial gain. so, we need to know the difficulty is not having transparency, you don't know what appropriations are necessary to make the v.a. run when there is not integrity and mismanagement in the organization. it needs a completely cleaning from top to bottom. the culture needs to change. i think the first step is certainly the firing of general shinseki. i want to thank him as a combat veteran with service in the army and marine corps. i want to thank him for his service. it did not translate in the v.a. it has a culture of mismanagement and fraud. >> congresswoman titus, you did not call for the resignation. why not? >> i think general shinseki is a

good man. he is a war hero himself. with all due respect to my colleague, i thought this was about making change. not about making headlines. removing him is not going to change the culture. these are problems that are beneath him out in the different areas of the different hospitals. that is where you need to see major changes. i know mr. gibson. i worked with him at the uso here in las vegas to get a facility at the airport. he will do a fine job, too, but he has to be brought up to speed. he has only been with the v.a. a few months. i think we will see changes at that lower level. there is transparency now. there has been an audit called for. they are looking at all of the medical facilities. 60% of them have been found to have problems. i asked them to look at the las vegas hospital. i think you will see some changes now. his leaving was noble act on his

part. he would like to complete the mission, but it was a symbolic gesture. >> quick answer. congress member coffman, should members be able to join medicare? should veterans be in medicare as a quick fix to the problem? >> what veterans need is choices. when the wait times are so long, because the system is so inefficient or if there are resource questions, veterans need choices to go into the private health care system and have the care reimbursed by the veterans administration. i think it would be great to have competition to improve the services. >> i think the track here is a good system. if you start to dismantle the v.a., you will find a lot of veterans without care. they cannot go into the private sector and get the care they want automatically because

doctors are scarce in many parts of the country. try to get an appointment with a doctor in a private practice. you will wait months there, too. that would make the system worse. >> congress member coffman and congresswoman dina titus. thank you. let's go back to the headline. the way i would have written it, shinseki departure alone won't cure the v.a. by most accounts, the family of the murderer in california, no one took his guns. why? and donald sterling has been ruled mentally incapacitated. does that mean he cannot be forced to sell the clippers? it starts with little things. tiny changes in the brain. little things, anyone can do. it steals your memories. your independence. insures support. a breakthrough. and sooner than you'd like... ...sooner than you think.

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showing california shooter had bought guns. even though california has a database in this instance, deputies did not check the database. the clock winds down to violence by a ticking time bomb and we are incapable of stopping him. the california assembly member is proposing a way to get guns out of the hands an of the mentally unstable when family and friends fear this is is eminent. we have author of the book, "my life among the serial killers" and has interviewed dozens of serial killers. helen morrison. >> well, the parents in this case saw red flags and close loved ones see the red flags, but there is no legal avenue for them to appeal to a court to

remove weapons or to be able to stop the purchase of weapons. and this proposed law would initiate a gun violence restraining order in which they could take to a court and if the court deems that this person is a possible risk to themselves or others, because of mental instability, they would be prohibited from buying guns and if they have guns in their possession, they would be temporarily taken away. >> how do you protect the civil liberties of the gun owner in the process? >> we protect the process by making the burden of proof on the state and the requirement to have a hearing after the court order is made. >> this is pretty troubling news today from the washington post. couldn't you agree in this particular instance, the deputies went to the door and conducted an interview, but never accessed the database which is unique to california which told them this man

recently purchased multiple magazines and firearms. >> it is troubling. if this law had been in place, there would have been a mechanism for them to have to be initiating the will of the court in the matter to remove any possible firearms. >> dr. morrison, this guy in california, does he fit the description of a serial killer? >> no, he is just a mass murderer. he is someone who has been disenfranchised and feels angry and is going to get revenge any way he possibly can. >> i'm listening to assembly member williams' proposal to create a restraining order relative to firearms. it seems that will involve mental health professionals. do you think mental health professionals will accept an added role in this?

>> yes, especially in california with the duty to warn. it becomes imperative that the therapist knows and is able to pass on the information that this may be a dangerous individual. >> dr. morrison, my heart breaks for the family members of the victims. i would be less than forthcoming that my heart breaks for the parents of the alleged perpetrators. they were trying to do the right thing. speak to parents who are out there watching and may have a troubled youth under their roof. what should they look for and what should they be doing? >> what they need to do is to let somebody know that they have a concern. to let somebody know they have a person in their family who may be dangerous to others and even if it seems too much to do, make

that call. make that call. >> do you think assembly member williams' proposal is one with merit in a circumstance like this, a recourse for family members and friends to go to law enforcement and say this individual poses a danger and you should seize their firearm? >> yes, i think it is very important that they know that there is an avenue at which they can stop someone. these parents were driving from their home to try to stop the child before he committed the crime. can you imagine what it felt like for them to know that their son was going to commit a mass murder? >> assembly member, what is the likelihood of success of your measure? i think some may not understand the politics of california. jerry brown, your governor, has a pro-gun record. is that not fair to say? >> i would say he has been

discriminating about which gun control bills he is signing and which ones he is vetoing. he has done both. he has not been on one side of the issue. i have to tell you, in california, we are sick and tired of this. we feel that the question of how many mass killings have to take place before we take action as a society is a worthy one. i think most of us are very inspired by the words of the victims' father, mr. martinez of not one more. we should not let another incident like this happen. and i think i can't tell you i'm not initiative enough to say we will stop them all. parents and loved ones have the red flags. this will reduce the likelihood. >> assembly member williams and

helen morrison, thank you for being here. here is how i would have written the headline on the story. when it comes to mass killings, mental health matters most. donald sterling now suing the nba for more than $1 billion. now it comes at the same time the two doctors ruled him mentally incapacitated. what happens now? and the hunt for bin laden and how the cia is involved in that mess. at od, whatever business you're in, that's the business we're in with premium service like one of the best on-time delivery records and a low claims ratio, we do whatever it takes to make your business our business. od. helping the world keep promises.

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time for headlines redefined. the headlines that got the story half right. the first from the new york daily news. texas congress member loses seat and now congress will no longer have any world war ii veterans as members. there is more to the story. 91-year-old ralph hall lost the primary in texas last tuesday. he and john dingell were the remaining world war ii veterans in congress. congress was comprised of majority veterans. it is not just we are losing men of the greatest generation. there is something congress member hall pointed out.

when he joined in 1981, these were men of shared sacrifice and we had a common bond. we could pass anything in the nation's best interest. i think he speaks to yet another cause of the partisan gridlock in washington. the headline which said texas congress member loses seat. now congress will no longer have any world war ii veterans as members. i would have written, the last of putting nation first. the next headline from the times. the cia's deadly rouse in pakistan. anybody who has seen the movie "zero dark 30" in an effort to determine whether bin laden was behind the wall of the compound, was a rouse. the real purpose was to try to get dna from the individuals behind that door to figure out are they members of the bin

laden family. that is what the times is being critical of. what is important to keep in mind is why we did that. we did not want to launch an assault on a house full of innocent individuals. one more observation i would make. i think the fact that today's parents in pakistan are shunning polio vaccines was an unforeseen consequence. there is no way it would have come to this when they concocted that rouse to get bin laden. the headline of the deadly rouse in pakistan. i would have written, cia vacan vaccination rouse. then donald sterling ruled mentally incapacitated. i should mention that his lawyers say this is vastly overstated. it may be a strategy to ease the

path to sell to steve ballmer for $2 billion sum. if donald sterling is seemed to be mentally incapacitated, it will surrender to his wife the control of selling the franchise. times points out that sterling stands to reap a 15,900% return on the $12 million investment. the original headline. donald sterling ruled mentally incapacitated and removed from power. the headline i would write, crazy like a fox. the decision to rule same-sex marriage sits in your hands and yours alone. what do you do? you are about to hear from that man who made the decision for his state and why he came to the conclusion he did. the argument for why we should stay in afghanistan. you heard that correctly. [ laughter ]

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kudos to the salt latribune. hatch concedes gay marriage will likely become legal in the u.s. 20 years ago, the idea of senator orin hatch would make that statement farce. it is thanks to laws and decisions of same-sex marriage is being challenged. federal judges are tossing them out. the federal judge who struck down the ban in pennsylvania last week is no stronger to big cases. he talks to those of us in the media because he thinks it is important that we all understand how legal sanehood resolves our

scuffles. you stopped the teaching of intelligent design in a public school system. how do the cases come your way in the middle of pennsylvania? >> at the risk of the bad pun, since i had evolution case, it is random selection. it is because i have a certain capability. i received both of the cases. >> here you were called upon to make a constitutional determination of pennsylvania's ban on same-sex marriage. surely, you know in the court of public opinion, the trend is all in the direction of making these things unlawful. paving the way for same-sex marriage. how do you block that out and approach your task? >> the teachable moment here and the overarching less than i want the public to understand about judges is we don't respond to public opinion. that is not part of our calculus

whether it is going our way or not. frequently courts make decisions that are not with public opinion at that particular time. it is not part of our calculus. >> i think viewers will look at map on the screen and show where same-sex marriage is lawful and recognized and all of these decisions are going in the same direction in which you taken the commonwealth and they assume there is a connection between the two. the public sentiment and trends. you are saying that is not the case. >> we are not blind of the decisions of other courts. there may be persuasive in logic in other decisions. >> i'm glad you said that. how developed is the law in the supreme court on this issue? because all the federal judges seem to be doing what you have done. >> the one particular question that was not addressed in the windsor case that was decided last year is whether there is a fundamental right to marriage that extends to the same-sex

couples. ultimately, michael, when the case gets to the supreme court, it will likely be incumbent upon the court to address that particular issue and that has not been developed at the level of the supreme court. >> your task in this case was to apply what portions of the constitution to pennsylvania's ban on same-sex marriage. >> the due process in the 14th amendment in particular to state laws that run afoul of those protections in the constitution. those are the things we applied. >> when you wrote your opinion, you did it creatively by citing the marital vows that so many of us have uttered. speak to that. >> i think that when you have a case like this, where you know the opinion is going to be widely disseminated, you can make it more readable. i hope it is more readable.

some people might disagree with that. i think that added something to the mix. it also showed, i think, the.yancey and the basis for the opinion and the stories, if you will, of the individual plaintiffs. >> judge jones, thank you for being here. i wish more of you who wear the robe speak as freely as you do. let's go back to the headline as orrin hatch, that gay marriage will likely become legal across the u.s. this is the headline i like to write. he won't say it, i will. judge jones is on the right side of history. so many people are happy that the president is bringing home the troops in afghanistan. not my next guest. is it your right to bear arms in one of my guests says you were never meant to have that 9 millimeter tucked away under your bed. he thinks he can prove it.

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remission is possible. let's take a look at the next headline. u.s. troops to leave afghanistan by the end of 2016. that the new york sometimes fast forwarding to the end of america's longest war. the end is now in sight. president obama announced his

plan on tuesday to muted resistance to republicans who say it is too driven by politics. with americans having long ago soured on the war, obama critics seethed with fury. in a piece written for politico, this caution, a war for americans are so patient, we risk losing our cool. michael o'hanlon is with me where he is with the brookings institution. how do we know it is the end stage? >> good morning, michael. we don't know when we will be done. that is why i prefer flexible. i think the president is generally correct to get down to 10,000 troops next year. that is, as you know, fewer than we had. we were up to 100,000 a couple of years ago at the peak of the effort. there is no doubt we are

leaving. do we leave completely by 2016. one reason we need the force after 2016, what if, let's say, al qaeda leader shows up in the tribal areas of pakistan? how will we get him without bases in afghanistan? leave aside afghanistan itself. our ongoing concern is suggesting we may want to have drones in afghanistan beyond 2016. >> the president delivered a major foreign policy address this week at west point and attack a middle road of isolationism and unilateralism. i want to show you a quote not from president obama, but from his predecessor. thanks, jess. in cases involving other types of aggression, we shall furnish military and economic assistance when requested with the treaty commitments. this was richard nixon. we should look to the nation

threatened to provide the manpower for its defense. did it strike you as nixonian that which president obama said at west point sf. >> a great piece of history. the nixon doctrine was. yeah, i think there are antecedents. i think the real issue is on specifics. i would say on ukraine, the administration is doing well. also on iran. i would say on syria, they are not doing so well. and the same with libya and egypt. i would see that level. as you say at the broad level of philosophy, mr. obama is not an outliar. >> had the president done that which he set out to do six months ago, it would have been at odds with the nixon doctrine.

>> you have to interpret the doctrines. what critics have been saying about syria, we should have been aiding the insurgents from 2012 when virtually all of mr. obama's national security team advised him to do that. he was reluctant. he wanted to keep america out of it. he thought that assad would fall anyway or lead a peace effort which has failed so far. i think mr. obama made a mistake at that point. it was an understandable mistake, but look what we have. two more years of conflict. assad is winning. al qaeda is rising. we have to take a new approach. we have to be more helpful to the resistance. it doesn't mean american boots on the ground. >> final question, can america maintain the most powerful

country on the globe in the path of we will fund you and provide military intelligence, but the burden is on you. >> i think we are doing just fine. we don't take that idea too far. we don't make that the only concept. in the asia pacific, it is american military power that is reinvigorated not with the intention of fighting china, of course, but condition china as it rises and to make sure any kind of chinese role in the region is peaceful because we will push back if need be with forces. not just through the help we provide to allies. >> thank you so much for being here. i appreciate your expertise. >> thanks, mike. >> here is the headline. u.s. troops to leave afghanistan by the end of 2016. the way i would have written it, obama sites ike and jfk, but is channelling nixon. let this statement sink in.

your right to bear arms is not your right at all. we will take a close look at the second amendment in a moment. and actor seth rogan is having been blamed an an influence on the california shooter who went on a rampage last friday night. is the argument fair? we will talk about it. what can i do on a $7 a month android plan from tracfone? check the weather. borrow ted's wheelbarrow. post big tomato pics. buy a birdhouse for sparrows.

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richard martinez responded to members of congress who called to express condolences over his son's death. his son was gunned down in a deli in a murderous rampage in california last week. this brings me to the next headline. deputies seize guns and ammo from the santa barbara's student's home. his senseless rampage brings the gun debate back in the murky spotlight. the right to bear arms was never a right at all. i want to read the second amendment to you. a well regulated militia necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms

shall not be infringed. it is a topic of the book "the second amendment." written by my next guest michael waldman. michael, how much deliberation went into the 27 words? >> they are foggy and confusing. a lot of debate over the constitution. the second amendment was not the marquee item these were debating. they were talking about these in the constitutional convention. it is clear that what the framers were thinking about overwhelmingly were the militias. the militias were the state military forces back then. they did involve all adult men, white men, being members for their entire lives and required to own a gun and keep it at home. it was not an individual right to serve.

>> i guess the question it begs is does the constitution recognize the individual's right to a firearm apart from the militia? >> certainly not in the what it means a sacred right and no gun law could be passed because that would trample on that right. they had gun laws and using guns for other purposes and more significantly ewe can't get the answer by going back in a time machine and tapping james madison on the shoulder and saying, well, what did you mean? the country evolved and it's always been the subject of a fight over what it means. the reason we think it means this individual right now is more because of the push and pull of public education and a long campaign by the nra and others than some kind of pristine original understanding. >> the case changed the debate

and justice scalia wrote the majority view and it did recognize an individual's co constitutional right to a firearm which strikes me at being at odds with justice scalia calling himself a strict interpreter of the constitution. as you point out, a well-regulated militia, and everything in the second amendment follows that opening preamble. >> this was the vindication of his approach of relying on original intent. i would argue and others have criticized it, too, that it really reflected a lot of other things. in fact, the opinion for all its finery dressed up with all the talking about colonel era dictionaries and what words meant and it recognized an individual right which is a pretty comen and widespread view these days. it also said that right is limited, just like other rights and didn't say precisely what

those limits were. we're fighting that out in the courts and dozens and dozens of judges have ruled and overwhelmingly, interestingly they upheld gun laws. yeah, it's an individual right but society still has a right to protect itself and there could be limits but we're continuing to fight it out. this is one of the great debates throughout our time. >> if i go to the nra headquarters and i walk in the door, what am i going to see missing from the second amendment? >> well, an amazing thing. you go to their headquarters and you walk in the lobby and there on the wall in big letters, the second amendment. except you kind of have to look carefully because they edited the part about the well-regulated militia and they have two dots, not even three. >> the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed. >> right. their view, they would argue that is the part that really matters and others say, no, if you read the debate in the congress when they were talking about the second amendment, james madison's original

proposal had a kaunsh consyenshs and you don't have to do military service in person. it's changed from this civic right to a more individual right and we can't pretend that's the way it's always been. >> as you describe in the book, people today, the nra has been immensely successful because today the perception is that there is this unfetter constitutional right that people have to a firearm, even though you say in the bock it's much more complicated than all of that. anyway, thank you for writing, i thought it was a good read and informative read, as well. >> thank you. remember that headline, and your book is titled the second amendment, a biography. want to point that out. the headline we began with. 1,000 rounds of ammo, what i would have written, the second amendment. every word matters. so, let me ask you this. how much are we able to blame the deadly shooting in

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hey, one last headline and this one comes from "new york post." killer virgin sparks a culture war. we're sparked by a murder spree that left six victims dead and 13 wounded. and theories abound as to cause. access to weapons? was it mental health? well into the debate stepped ann horn film critic at "washington post" and after commenting on the production values of a video a killer left behind she said "his delusions were inflated by the entertainment industry that

he grew up in." and then made specific reference to the movie "neighbors." well neither were amused at being linked to a mass murder. i find your article horribly insulting and misinformed. i myself tweeted, i said i agree that movies may have informed this unstable young man's ideas, but the key word is, unstable. by that i meant that his unstable mind may have been activated by culture. but culture is itself not to blame. there's nothing new about killers taking their cue from culture. the gunman who climbed the clock tower at the university of texas in austin in 1966 had just finished reading "in cold blood." john hinckley shot ronald reagan in 1981 to impress jodie foster who he just watched star in the movie "taxi driver." cultural influences may have

shaped the warped views of the assailiants because they, themselves, were mentally ill. we should try to scrub society of all triggers for the mentally ill. our focus should be on better diagnosing those among us who might be susceptible to such deadly outbursts. now, having said this, there remains a legitimate question for the rest of us. for those of us who are mentally stable and not about to kill innocence. and the question is, have we grown too complacence. are we too accepting. because our attitudes towards female sexuality have become cavalier because male characters are so entitled in the world of entertainment that we have failed to separate fiction from reality. now, that's a conversation that i think ann horn today, jud and seth rogen would all agree is worth having. you remember that original headline? killer virgin sparks a culture war? here's what i would have written. hollywood doesn't kill people,

people do. that's it for me, thank you so much for watching. i'll see you back here next saturday and until then have a great weekend and a wonderful week. so, one man out, but will there be more to go? the scandal that sacked the leader of the v.a. is far from over. >> if people have criminal acts, they should be punished. no ifs, buts or maybes. the embattled clippers' owner is not going down without a fight. a billion dollar fight, if that. donald sterling takes another strange turn. two women face off over a radio legend. daughter versus wife in a courtroom drama or casey kasem.