tv Piers Morgan Tonight CNN June 11, 2012 9:00pm-10:00pm EDT
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trail. we'll ask her husband mark kelly. and the man they're both campaigning for. the man who told a high school graduating class, you are not special. the commencement shock heard around the world. this is "piers morgan tonight." we begin with a big man with big ideas. jesse ventura, the alwayso outspoken former governor of minnesota. a hollywood action hero. a man who famously never holds back. he's tried very hard not to hold me back. his book, demo crips. he joins me now exclusively. how are you? >> i'm doing well. >> you are looking well. two things i want to clarify.
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one is why you're not with me in the studio. secondly, where have you been? you've disappeared. >> first reason why i'm not with you in the studio, i've quit flying because i have metal in my body so every time i go to an airport the metal detector goes off and they treat former governors like criminals out there. i won't be treated like a criminal anymore. so the only alternative is not to fly. i tried to bring a federal lawsuit against the tsa and homeland security. imagine this, the judge threw it out, claiming she did not have jurisdiction. now, it was a constitutional question. so if she doesn't have jurisdiction, no one does. and people in this country need to understand, when you go to any airport in the united states, you are not protected by the constitution or the bill of rights. they can do anything they want
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to you. there's nowhere you can go to seek redress. >> you've been grounded. you're also -- you've been what i would call hibernation. where you didn't watch television you were telling me before we started for 45 days. >> right. well, i live in mexico in the wintertime and i live off the grid down there. now, i do have television but i decided it was time to see if i could withstand no television in my life. so i did it for 45 days. it was wonderful. i didn't even watch the nfl playoffs for the first time. i did not watch the super bowl. i got to tell you, life was grand without it. i urge more people. no offense, piers, but i urge more people to try it now and then and see what else goes on in the world besides the old tele. >> you look very good. i can't really encourage you in your campaign to stop people watching television. this book is fascinating.
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is this fascinating, the timing is perfect because i've got you on this show the day after jeb bush comes out and hammers all the politicians basically for their lack of bipartisan politics. he said both reagan and his father george h.w. bush would have had a hard time getting nominated by the more conservative voters in today's republican party. extraordinary thing for him to say. he's a leading member of the republican party. and lends itself exactly to the premise of your book, which is things have become so fractured and so fractious in washington that the whole process of political parties is now almost obsolete in your view. explain why. >> well, i just think, to save our country, need to abolish the political parties. make them political action committees. there's one thing we could do to start off with. why do we put -- and i refer to them as the democrips because
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they call the blue states democrats. that's also the colors of the cripps. blue. and naturally the blood's color is red. the republican states are called red states -- >> for those who don't know what you're talking about, these are two of the most infamous gangs. it started in los angeles. bloods and cripps. they want to kill each other. they wear these colors. the blues and the reds. you're likening the politicians in washington these days to gang leaders and gang members. is that right? >> yeah, that's true. let me explain why they're worse. the cripps and the bloods, the street gangs, while they can be devastating to a certain small part of the population, the democripps and republicans, they affect everybody in this country and they've been in charge for over 100 years. how can they say they're not responsible for the horrible state that our country's in today? our debt is beyond control.
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we've got politics now. as jeb bush said, there's no compromise anymore. nothing gets done. if obama wants to do this, the republicans are opposed to it. if the republican want to do something, the democrats are opposed to it. the best thing we could do is on every ballot remove all gang names and gang symbols. allow them to only run on their names. that way, it becomes important that the voter educate themselves. what does john smith stand for? because right now, when you go in to vote, if you're conservative, you don't need to know any names. all you need to do is look for republican. if you're liberal, all you need to do is look for democrat. you don't even need to know the name of the candidate. >> this sounds great in theory. of course, the reality of the kind of american government you're looking for here is you would end up with a whole thing of disparate souls.
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all different kinds of policies. how does it actually work? reality, jesse? be sensible. be realistic. how does that work? >> i will. what's wrong with that? read chapter two. chapter two tells who backs me up on this. okay, what backs me up in chapter two, george washington, the father of our country. thomas jefferson. looked up to by many today. and john adams who actually stated that when political parties take control of the government, that's what will destroy it. it won't be a force from outside. it will come from within. i think those are three pretty good allies to have with me. >> jesse, jesse, again, i come back to reality check. so you get all these brilliant independents. and they're all standing on their neck. and the american public -- i like him, i like jesse ventura. i like all these people. but the truth is, how do you actually govern when you have a whole load of disparate souls?
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because human nature says -- >> how do -- >> let me finish -- >> piers, how -- all right. >> -- take, becomes like a factious state. the strongest take charge. you end up with people who are the most independents of the independents. you're basically endorsing a form of fascism, aren't you? >> we're also fascists. the basic definition of fascism is when corporations take over the government. they already have. they can give unlimited amount of money. they said money's free speech. and i love how it works. you know, the democrats and republicans have built a system based completely on bribery. you bribe the politician. you get what you want. you don't bribe them, you don't get anything. now, in the private sector, if we do that, we go to jail. and then also they lied to us.
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yet, if we lie to them, we go to jail. well, how come the road doesn't go both ways? why is it just one way? >> well, i guess that -- here's what i thought when i read your book. i thought you made a lot of very valid points. you hit a lot of those big bell moments that go off in people's heads. where they go, jesse ventura has a good point. about the lack of bipartisan politics. about the corruptive element now. et cetera. i come back to my point. it's all about identifying it all as a complete basket case. how do you actually have a government that works if everyone is an independent? >> well, you can still -- you can turn the democrats and republicans into special interests, which is what they are anyway. they can still endorse. you get encoursemedorsements fr
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teachers union. all these different things. make them equal to that. you just don't put it on the ballot. you put just the name down. why is it so weird to think there should only be a name there instead of democripp or rebloodican? >> you end up like that ridiculous scenario of the pop star prince who then renames himself the artist formerly known as prince. these would be independents formerly known as democrats and republicans, wouldn't they? >> no, not necessarily. just don't put the party on the ballot. like i said, turn them into political action committees. i mean, right now, you got a scenario in this country where they can receive any amount of money from corporations, from anything. and they don't even have to declare who they got the money
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from. i'll give you another one that you'll laugh at, piers, i think every presidential candidate should be required to wear a nascar racing suit. you know why? >> go on. >> you know why? >> no. >> well, that way, it will show who owns them. on nascar, they always got all the patches for who their sponsors are. that way, us, as the voters, can then look at their suit and realize who owns them. >> that's actually a very -- >> who they're going to favor and that would make us more informed voters then. >> it's actually -- >> if they'd wear nascar suits. >> jesse, it's a brilliant idea. the only problem is absolutely nobody would ever do it. let's have a short break. i want to come back and ask you if it's the new land of promised opportunity for the independent, why you as one of america's great independent politicians isn't going to throw his hat back in the ring. so think about a good answer for me on that one. ♪
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it's time for us to cut back on government and help the american people. >> top democripp there. i rather like this, these new names. they have a certain ring to them. when you hear the president and republican nominee going at it like this, given the state of economy, what's your reaction? >> my reaction, it doesn't matter. when we went from george bush to obama, the only difference was their skin color. everything else has been pretty much the same. it doesn't matter if you elect a democrat or republican because they both sold out to bribery, to the same corporate sponsors. i mean, barack obama's large could contributor was goldman sachs. if you go to both their conventions, you see the same lobbyists paying off both sides so they win either way. it does not matter who you elect. i laugh when i hear "change you
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can believe in." the only way that's going to happen is if you elect someone like me. i'll give you change you can believe in. you can rest assured there would be change. nothing's changed. nothing ever will as long as democrats and republicans are in there. >> i'm getting an explosion on my phone here of twitter. which i know you don't partake in. a lot of people tweeting to my surprise but to your joy a lot of he's got a point, jesse ventura. if you're watching watching, @piersmorgan, keep the tweets coming. the obvious question i guess, if you're so fed up with the system, you want independents to take charge, why do you throw your hat back into the ring? twitter suggests to me you have a following. >> well, i'm certain i would because there's a lot of disgruntled unhappy people out
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there just like me. they're wising up finally i hope. i've been pounding this for my last four books i've written. it doesn't seem like anyone wants to listen. i'll tell you this, i'm 60 years old now. i'm not too sure i want to tie myself up in this nonsense. i have a great life in both minnesota and mexico in the private sector. i love to go in the water down in mexico. i love my life down there. i would have to give that up. in order to do that, i have to see something out of the american people. i want to see the american people give me a sign that it's worth it to me to company oe ou put my ass on the line again. >> how much do you think the media have to take responsibility for the way it has gone? you now have very partisan cable networks. fox on the right, msnbc on the left, cnn sort of squeezed in the middle. when you see them getting more vociferous and partisan, does that matter? is that good for political
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debate? is it corrupting political debate? what do you think? >> i think it's awful. it's terrible. you know, the news used to be to report facts and allow you to make the decision. all these shows are nothing but opinion moderators. they're hired guns to push an agenda. i think it's horrible when our forefathers created this country, the media was supposed to be the fourth branch of government. the unwritten branch. their job was to keep track of what the other three were doing and report it to the american people so the american people could judge it accordingly. what you have now is nothing but a media with opinion and a media that i remember the death of anna nicole smith. it was the headline for a month. a month. and yet the meat and potatoes of running our country gets cast aside because why, the media today is not in to reporting the news, they're in to creating it, and that is very, very
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dangerous. the light went on with 60 minutes. they found out the news could make money. so the bean counters came in. now the news is nothing but entertainment. it's done to get ratings. where in the old days of walter cronkite, the news took a loss and they accepted that and they made up for it in their entertainment division. not today. the today, the news is expected to get ratings and expected to generate money and that is horrible. >> so presumably you'll be boycotting fox and msnbc on your book tour, will you, jesse? >> i won't be boycotting them. they boycott me. i'd go on happily. no, that's the truth, piers. neither of them will have me on. neither of them. >> really? >> -- will have me on. nope, it's been that way for my last three books. none of the fox nighttime people will have me on. now, fox business will put me on.
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i think they're another division. some of the business shows at fox will have me on. no, fox and msnbc have banned me. i'm too controversial i guess. you know who else wouldn't let me on? don imus. his producers and all them wanted me on but they wanted to know what five songs i wanted to have played. so i told them i wanted -- no, i told them i want rage against the machine. those are the songs i want. from tom more rell la. he's a new bob dylan. he's a man who can play guitar like peck and rage against the machine. none of clear the channel stations would play anything. they censored rage against the machine. so i guess so did don imus. >> well, jesse, you are outrageous and controversial. you're difficult. you can be menacing. that's exactly why i like you as
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back with my special guest jesse ventura. let's turn to your conspiracy theories in the book, as some would say. you would argue they're factual assessments of issues. one of which is you call iraq and afghanistan, the wars there, the first contract wars. saying the government hired corporations to do the jobs of our troops. paying them more than they would the troops. explain. >> sure. well, you've got all these contractors, former u.s. military special forces people. they realize they can get paid a whole lot more money to be a private contractor than what the military pays them. so they leave our military in
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droves and go to, like, blackwater, i don't know what they call themselves now. they changed their names around. they go over there and they're nothing but cowboys. they don't fall under any of the rules of war. they're mercenarmercenaries. our military has turned into contract killers now. contract for hire. you know, and we're using them more and more. they're very much more expensive. when you go to war to hire them than to use the regular military. what troubles me is this, piers, i'm 60 years old now, and i'm born post world war ii. i was important in 1951. my country has been at war for over half of my life. over half of my life. we have been at war. no other country in the world, save israel, can say that. >> when you look at obama, who you have little time for, it e seems, but in terms of his
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foreign policy -- >> wait, i have less time for mitt romney. >> right, but isn't barack obama doing exactly what you would do? he's pulled the troops out of iraq. he's pulled them out of afghanistan. >> he has? >> well, he is pulling them out. >> he has? >> he's pulling them out, isn't he? >> well, i guess he is. but he's leaving private contractors over there. a lot of them. he hasn't closed g ed gitmo yet. he didn't prosecute anyone for torture. we're now a country known throughout the world, we torture people, you know? i'm ashamed of that. shouldn't we take the high road? no. now, is barack obama better than george bush? yes, i will say that. but he's still -- you know, he told us he would end the wars. he told us now we're ramping up to go to war with iran, you know, the war's not going to end. >> what would you do with iran? >> well, i'll give you a scenario. here's a scenario i would have asked at the republican debates.
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i would have said, hypothetically, if you're the president, let's say hugo chavez of venezuela because of his fear of our military and the fear of the united states, if he went and bought an unmanned drone and flew it over united states airspace and if that drone crashed in the united states, you, as president, i would have asked the republicans, what would you do? i better you they would have declared war. yet, we fly unmanned drones over iran space. no one gave us permission to do that. the hypocrisy is unbelievable. if our country, we believe we can do anything throughout the world. and if any of them people did that back to us, we would declare war on them immediately. am i not right? what if chavez did that? or say hugo chavez bought 1,000 acres of land by palm springs and moved the venezuelan military in there. i mean, we've got our military in, what, 270 countries
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throughout the world. well, that's an empire. you know. i don't care to live like that. >> jesse, isn't it -- >> it's wrong. >> isn't there a slight naivete to this? to say the world's number one military power should simply sit back and not do anything in any of these dangerous countries like iran, north korea, pakistan, wherever it may be, doesn't america have to get involved? >> so the u.s. -- the u.s. is definitely threatened by these countries in what way? >> you don't think -- >> they can't shoot a rocket at us. >> let me give you -- >> we have the technology we have today -- >> let me give you a for instance. if iran began to develop nuclear weapons and built up a nuclear arsenal, same rate, say, north korea, pakistan, would you not, as an american, feel threatened by that development, given they are such unstable countries? >> do you know why they have to
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do that? you notice the united states doesn't mess with anybody that's got the nuke. so we're forcing countries like iran to get the nuke so that we won't mess with them. we don't mess with nobody that's got the nuke. we only go after -- you're talking about this build-up. i've heard that before. i heard the same thing about iraq. i heard that a few years ago. it was all a lie, wasn't it? they had no weapons of mass destruction. they had no ties to al qaeda. the american people were boldly lied to about that entire war. and then we go into that war and we discover it's all a lie. and yet nobody holds anybody accountable for it. well, now they're using the same scenario on iran. the same identical scenario. they're telling us they're putting fear into us because i believe the united states has changed today where we must be in a perennial war. and those perennial wars will bring us down just like the
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roman empire fell. >> well, jesse, you are at perennial war with almost everybody verbally and long may you continue. it's a fascinating book. "democrips and rebloodicans. come back soon. >> thank you, i will. and thanks for having me on. because a lot of people don't have my courage. >> i have no fear when it comes to the ventura. see you soon. >> okay, thank you. >> when we come back, jerry san dusky face-to-face with alleged victims in court. the penn state scandal that shocked the nation. will justice be served?
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it's been a day of accusation and revelation in the courtroom. sandusky is charged with years of sexual abuse of young boys. the scandal tore the school apart and cost football hero joe paterno his job. cnn's jason carroll was in the courtroom all day. summ up for me what happened on day one. >> the most compelling part of
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what happened today was the testimony that came from the man identified as accuser number four. he's a 28-year-old man. when he took the stand, jerry sandusky himself leaned forward and listened to everything that this young man had to say. which basically spelled out a pattern that prosecutors, piers, have been talking about all along. basically this young man described how jerry sandusky befriended him, than gave him many gifts. things such as a snowboard. a golf bag. football pads. hockey stick. he then said that led to physical contact in the showers. soap battles that led to wrestling that eventually led to sex. or what he said in some cases oral sex. so this is the pattern that prosecutors are basically laying out. and this is what we saw when we first heard from this accuser identified as accuser number four. it was very compelling. the jury seemed to be listening very closely. certainly the courtroom was listening very intently. piers. >> we also got a hint i think of
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what the defense strategy's going to be. they've been appealing to have the impression of this grooming behavior removed from the equation. they're trying to make out the letters are consistent, i'm quoting here, with a person who suffers from a histrionic personality disorder. what did you make of that? >> well, i think that's what -- the defense basically filed that motion today. it remains to be seen if the judge is going to allow expert witness testimony to say jerry sandusky suffers from this order. this disorder which causes emotional sort of outbursts that might explain why we saw some of the letters that were introduced in court today. prosecution were calling them love letters. the defense is saying these aren't love letters at all. these are love letters encouraging young men like accuser number four to be better students, better athletes, better people. one of the things the defense is trying to build in terms of
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trying to say jerry sandusky did not do what all these young men are saying he did. it remains to be seen whether or not the judge in this case, judge cleland, is going to allow this expert witness testimony with this condition that they say jerry sandusky suffers from. >> joining me to explain what happened in court is alan dershowi dershowitz. and the former head of the new york sex crimes unit. there have been so many victims prepared to come on, stand there and say "that guy abused me." >> i have to say, it's unusual in the number of victims that have come forward and are willing to testify and whose cases were within the statute of limitations so they could testify. i think it's a strong case for the prosecution because of that. >> is it damaged at all by the fact that quite a few of the boys who are now men obviously have also filed civil complaints so there is a potential financial incentive here?
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>> i don't think it's damaged. i think the defense will exploit that. i think the prosecution can more than overcome that by the fact that the prosecution went and found most of these boys before they ever got lawyers, before they had a financial incentive. they didn't come forward first. and they came and they told what had happened to them. that they filed civil suits. don't they have a right for restitution if this abuse really did occur the way they said it did, don't they have some right to some recompense? >> you shake your head vigorously. >> i don't understand what the defense strategy is. the cross examination today was inept. it was worse than inest. it was simply repeating the direct examination. the only -- he tried to make -- to try to get him to say he had a financial interest. the kid said, look, i haven't
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even gotten -- i haven't paid my lawyer. we haven't discussed money. there was no financial interest. this letter, trying to introduce this hysterical whatever -- i've been teaching law and psychiatry for 25 years, i've never heard of it. it sounds -- when you introduce any kind of psychiatric defense juries think, oh, he did it, now they're trying to explain why he did it. and so i think that just leaves -- >> chicken and the egg. it's almost like an assumption now. okay, he definitely is guilty. it's now about his state of mind. >> they're going to say, look, we have to explain why he wrote these letters. we're going to explain the letters and still argue that he's not guilty. that's going to be a very, very hard sell -- >> you've dealt with a lot of pedophiles over the years and cases like this. are these classic grooming behaviors, isn't it, we're looking at? >> oh, absolutely. people who aren't aware of what grooming is, it's the behavior a pedophile engages in before he actually gets to the sex act
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with someone. so it man fecht ifests itself i ways it one is the gifts a pedophile will buy someone to make that victim beholden to them. the places that sandusky took these children. they wouldn't otherwise have been allowed to go. but the other classic grooming is how you start with some innocuous kind of touching you might say. the touch on the arm. the touch on the leg. and then you move from there. that is absolutely classic. it breaks down their defenses. it's one step further each time. and it makes it hard for these kids to stop it because they're already kind of partway along the bae halehavior and they done h know how to get out of it. >> i would not use the term "grooming" and not try to introduce an expert. the concept of grooming is a very controversial one empirically. i think they have such a strong case. they're better off not
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introducing grooming. they're better off letting everything -- if i'm the judge here, i let the defense do anything they want. this case is going to come down to whether the defendant takes the stand. and if he does, all the rest of this is going to be preview because they're going to sit in judgment on him. i think the defense should be allowed to put anything it wants in because the evidence looks so overwhelming against it. >> one thing -- start with you on this. i was personally staggered by. is the composition of the jurors. because there are 16 jurors. including 4 alternates. half of them have direct ties to penn state. one retired professor. unbelievably to me, one current student. what's that all about? >> i think both sides probably think this is going to advantage them. remember, all the defense needs to win this case is one juror who says i'm not sure. and the fact that there are so
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many that have associations with the university may give the defense a possibility of having one juror who says, look, this is going to hurt the university, i'm going to resolve doubts in favor of defendant -- >> that's exactly my point. is that i would have thought there's a very good chance of one of these eight taking that exact view. we know in the campus itself, opinion was split students. the idea of a current student -- >> sounds to me like the wrong decision. >> i agree. >> going back for a second to the o.j. case, both sides wanted black women on the jury because we had a different perception. the prosecution thought they were going to be women and therefore very, very upset about what o.j. is accused of cdoing. we knew they were going to be black women and we had our research that showed that black women in that part of the country at that point in time identified more with their race than with their gender. whereas from other groups,
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perhaps it was different. marcia clark had a different view. >> fascinating case already. only been day one. thank you so much for joining me. when we come back, gabriel gifford and her astronaut husband mark kelly. i'll talk to the man who wants to win her seat in congress.ore . blast of cold feels nice. why don't you use bengay zero degrees? it's the one you store in the freezer. gives that instant cold sensation. that's chilly. same medicated pain reliever used by physical therapists. and it lasts for hours. [ sigh of relief ] [ short breath ] [ longer breath ] [ short breath ] [ male announcer ] new bengay zero degrees. freeze and move on.
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this is more than just an ordinary election. this is a little bit about closure. you know, this is closure on gabby's career in congress. >> this was former arizona congresswoman gabriel giffords and her husband mark kelly at a fund-raiser for mark barber. now he's running for her seat in congress. joining me now is ron barber and mark kelly. welcome to you both. >> good to be here, piers. >> mark, get an update on how gabby's doing. >> she's doing great. we've been here in tucson for a few days, going around. gabby's been thanking ron's supporters and volunteers. and motivating them to get out
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the vote here for the election tomorrow. >> now, ron, obviously, a poignant time for you, as much as anything else. you were involved in this ghastly incident. you were injured yourself quite bad ly badly. what is your motivation? why are you running? >> well, i've been in public service just about all of my adult life in addition to the time my wife and i spent running a small business. so to me this is an extension of my ability and opportunity to serve the community i love so much. we have very deep roots here, my family and i. so i'm really grateful to be able to step up to a new arena, new level of public service. i really believe we need to serve our community and give back as much as we can. >> it's not an easy election. the republicans have got their gander up down where you are. your critics say, look, you suffered a bullet to the cheek and to your leg. you're not a young man by comparison to your opponent. what do you say to those who say, you know, you're no spring
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chicken and the young guy should get a run? >>chicken. and the kwlouyoung guy should g run? >> that's a good question. i feel youth sometimes is part of a mind-set rather than an aging process. i feel strong and fit and ready to run for this office. i think i have a lot of experience to bring to the job, having been in this district for over 50 years. i came here in '59 when my father was in the air force. i love this community very much. i'm ready to run and ready to serve and i'm looking forward to the opportunity to be elected by the people of arizona. >> one with thing that struck me were the comments of jeb bush over the weekend, wishing that everyone could be more collegiate, work together more to get stuff done for the benefit of america. i know that's something that gabby's felt strongly about.
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what did you think when you heard that? >> i think he's got a good message there. when gabby first entered congress, one of the first things she did is walk from -- across from the left to the right side of the aisle to greet the republicans, that she hadn't met before, and these were people she was able to establish a relationship with with and work to get things done for this country. we have an election here on tuesday. and ron plans to carry on with that attitude of bipartisanship to solve the problems here in southern arizona and around this nation. >> ron, again your critics say you're not that keen on being too vocally supportive of president obama, is that true? >> i think that's the distraction my opponent has tried to use to move us away from what's really important to the people of arizona. i go across this district, they don't ask me about the presidential race, that's way
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off in the future, that's not what i'm focused on. i'm focused on, what are are the issues here? what are people concerned about in southern arizona, they tell me plenty about that, about middle class concerns, about seniors who are concerned about veterans. they want someone to go to washington who is going to be focused on their issues. not be subject to a diversion of the race. this is a race for district 8. >> you are both democrats, he is the president. just for purposes of clarification, are you a big supporter of the president? >> well, when it comes to the november election, i will support the president, i will vote for him, quite clearly his policies will benefit the middle class much more than his opponents, it's really clear than what we've seen so far. i want to go back to the real issue for me, which is what is on the table for people who live here. >> ron was gabby's director of
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district operations when the awful shooting happened, and she wanted him to stand to run for th this. why should he run? >> one with of the things we talked about early, who would be -- who's the right candidate for this district? i mean, who is the pen that is going to stand up for these people in southern arizona the way gabby did. we went around the room and through a lot of names and people we thought would be interested. at the end of the day gabby turned to ron and asked ron if he would do this. it wasn't something that ron had been thinking about for a long period of time. gabby asked him to do this, he thought about it. it's absolutely the right decision. it's because ron has a career in public service. he's lived here for 50 years, he understands the issues that are important to the people here in southern arizona.
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there's a stark -- a very -- there's a choice tomorrow that the people here will need to make. the difference is, between the two candidates are pretty striking. and gabby and i are here this week. not because ron had wagged for gabby for three years or three terms, while she was in office, but because he's absolutely the right candidate to take over in cd-8. >> regardless of the outcome, i think we both -- mark, you and i can agree, it's fantastic to see gabby and ron alive, well, back on the campaign stump, that's a brilliant place to find yourselves after what happened that awful day. it's been great to catch up with you again tonight. thanks very much. >> thank you, piers. >> thanks, piers. coming up, only in america, the best advice the graduating class could ever get. all energy development comes with some risk, but proven technologies allow natural gas producers
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for tonight's only in mick, the commencement address. it is the season after all. newly minted graduates and their proud parents listen to the same old cliches, you are the future. make a difference. follow your passion. one english teacher put that tradition on its head, he told the unvan ornished truth.
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you're not special, you're not exceptional. >> what? not special, not exceptional? little timmy? it's enough to make a graduate tear off that polyester cap and gown and storm off the field. but he bravely soldiered on. contrary to what your trophy suggests, your growing seventh grade report card despite the assurance of a nice purple dinosaur, that nice mr. rogers and your batty aunt sylvia, you are nothing special. >> yes, i salute you, sir. that's a message that all young people need to hear. it's not as harsh as it seems. >> you see, if everyone is special, then no one is. if everyone gets a trophy, trophies become meaningless. >> exactly. that's the point. a heartening sigh for those of us who agree, the speech has
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gone viral with over half a million views on youtube. which ironically makes mr. mccallick special. "ac 360" starts right now. piers, thanks. good evening, everyone. it is 10:00 p.m. on the east coast. we begin tonight with breaking news in colorado where additional resources are being called to battle a fast-moving and giant wildfire outside ft. collins. there are already more than 400 firefighters trying to battle the blaze. it now covers an area 57 square miles. we just learned the number of structures burned from 13 to more than 100. now the forest service says federal teams are trying to take over management of the fire. in just a few minutes, we'll talk to chad myers and whether firefighters can help the weather help them or make their efforts to battle this giant blaze even harder. we begin with crime and punishment tonight. jerry sandusky. faced one of his accusers on the first day of testimony in his trial.
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