knowing about the different senators and knowing how the process works on capitol hill. that was the primary preseason n because that person has the background and experience and can bring more to the interview when asking the questions. they will not be afraid to ask informational and good questions. >> here is the schedule for the evening. you will hear from senator claire mccaskill and then after that author brooks and with the conservative heart and senator amy klobuchar is here with the senator from next door and bill o'reilly is after that int interviewed by babe mcrouth. and charles shields to round it out. here is senator claire mccaskill now. >> i am so delighted to be with

you, senator mccaskill, to talk about your new book. i feel like we should start at the beginning with the title -- "plenty ladylike." it seems like it has a little irony embedded in it, your trademark attitude. what were you thinking with that title? >> i hope a little humor. i want people to know this is a book that will make people laugh or smile hard in several places. a teacher took me aside saying i should not speak up in class because the boys will not like me. i was hurt. and then after my debate in 2012, with todd akin, he told the press i wasn't very lady

like. so those instances affirmed in my mind i need to tell girls it is plenty ladylike to be strong. >> host: >> host: your book as a very readable book because it is outspoken and frank. this notion of being ladylike and being a member of the united states senate in the place is pretty much an outlier. people are blown away when i tell them it is only 44 women that have ever served from the entire beginning of time. so not only are women not anywhere close to the 51% muinjum majority of the population in the senate even if you added up a hundred years of history they

would not get 50. >> really that number is smaller because a huge number of the women served because their numbers died and they were appointed for a short period time, sometimes as little as one or two days as the men scurried around to find the appropriate man to the job. so there is a small number beginning with smith and the modern area which women were elected. we are 20-strong now and i would like to see us at a bigger number but we are getting there. >> host: and i think that is what is interesting about this project of yours. you address that head-on. you have a clear understanding that comes through throughout the book that you are a member of a small class in american public life which is the woman politician which isn't to say that is how it should be but i like you address that head-on.

there is a debate always around the discussion of women being different in politics and the military and fear of public life versus the fact there is such a small group you have the experience of an embattled minority. >> beginning in my 20s running for office, and i had been in a prosecutors office where i was surrounded by all men from the judges, defense attorneysx prosecutors, and with very new exception. it was a male dominated area. in my 20s and 30s i had to overcome a lot of sexist behavior. i talk about those things and i am very honest i am not sure i handed it correctly or did the

right thing in those instances but the book will give young women an opportunity to understand how you can navigate around and get smarter and figure out a way to excel despite of the jerks that get in your way. >> host: clearly you were drawn toward politics. they are mounting a calculated campaign to become homecoming queen by lobbying the lesser members of the football team and the guys who didn't get the attention. i was struck by being purposeful at a young age and number two your willingness to tell that story but did you really know at the time politics is going to be my think?

>> guest: i did. i think i knew from the time i was in my 10-13 age. i was told to say when i was seven years old in 1960 trick or treat and vote for jfk. i was in a household where we were taught politics was honorable. my mom stuffed envelopes and my dad was a committee man and worked on campaign. but they were not powerful. but i was drawn to it. i told an embarrassing story. i mounted a secret campaign for homecoming queen. that is a great example of how you think about your goals. i wanted everybody to believe it because i was poplar. i pulled off a campaign and thought it was a great way of

reinforcing that strategy is important. >> host: there is a bookshelf filled with memoirs of the people that wear suits here and i never read an antidote in any of their books because of alet of their calculations is don't reveal too much or say too much. i am struck by that. you have taken a different approach which is to say being willing to peel back the curtains more. did that feel risky? >> guest: it did. i had a colleague try to talk me out of it. they ready the galley and said you should not go there and tell people you were calculating how to become homecoming queen. >> host: they flagged that? >> guest: they flagged several

things. there were two pages they wanted me to take about. but this isn't about dressing me up and making me look perfect and like i'm going to safe america. it was painful to talk about my first marriage and the fact my first husband was murdered and the father of my children and dealing with the shortcomings of my mother and her amazing road modeling. but i don't think we do anybody any favors of trying to dress up politicians as if we are not human beings that made major mistakes and had major problems. if more people saw us as multi dimensional and fallible and vulnerable maybe we could communicate better and they would not be so cynical about government. it will get me in trouble

especially at home because i named names of missourians that were not appropriate to me when i was young but that is okay. my mouth gets me in trouble all of the time. >> host: we ran a part of your book in politico magazine and it was one of the most-read articles and it pulled back the curtain on your high profile senate race against todd akin. it was known you decided to become involved in aaron advertisement in the republican campaign to get the nominee you did get, which is the best one you had a chance of beating, and you never told the story of how engaged you were with that campaign. tell us about that now and your decision to sort of be upfront

with people about what you were doing. >> guest: this is a good example of where i want women to be more comfortable with strategic decisions that are high risk. there is a tendency for my friends through the years where they were in situations and had to take a big risk. there is uncertainty to go there. this is a situation where millions were being spent on me at that time. beating me up, driving my negatives up. they were all in. millions of millions were being spent. and i saw three candidates that had the same positions but one had a record of saying things that were extreme. i knew he didn't have a filter because he had a religious view of government. we decided in summer of the primary season that it would be great if we could send a signal

to republican voters how truly conservative he was. we polled and spent the money to look at what aikin liked. i did an ad. above board and in the open. this is claire mccaskill and i prove this message. todd akin is too conservative for missouri. and we listed the things the conservatives liked him about. we were sending a signal to the base of the republican party that todd was their guy but communicating to independant voters as well. it worked. he went from either second or third in the polls, depending on the ones you were looking at, and most were public polls and most -- >> your public polling

reinforced -- >> guest: it was out there in the public. we ran the ad and watched him climb in the polls. he then won and exceeded our expectations in terms of what he would say. >> host: and his comment after the primary victory but go back to the primary campaign closing in and it was tight and a moment where your campaign got directly involved with the aikin campaign. you personally and your pollster connected with supporters from people getting the message through to aikin about a key advertisement. >> guest: what we saw was that mike huckabee was very poplar in missouri. he was talking about the things we were talking about in our ad.

faith and family, conservative values. they took the ad down and put up another ad about faith and family and the flames of freedom but it was flames of freedom and it was weird. it was just our opinion collectively within the campaign. republican strategist, too. >> guest: if you know the state and the voters. i reached out to a couple consultants in his team and said tell them we don't thing that is a good campaign. they called us and i told the pollster it was fine to talk to them. and broad generality about why we thought the huckabee ad was so good. we gave them what we thought.

a >> host: and within hours -- >> guest: we could not believe they were taking our advice but they did. i have given advice to hundred dollars -- hundreds of candidates in my career. >> host: this is the kind of thing we know and assume occurs actually all of the time in american politics but the transparency and willingness to talk about it is left to hollywood and house of cards. >> guest: i think transparency is good always. i felt a little defensive knowing it was nothing we had done that wasn't above board. that is why it wasn't done through third party committees or operatives.

it was our campaign. i think it is great example of being strategic and i thought it would be great for women to see a woman's campaign engaging in that. a lot of that kind of stuff goes on, not always above board, in men's campaigns. i thought it was important to show a little strategic behavior. >> >> host: you right. the word there is calculating. which is generally the negative version of strategic and applied often to women in public life or big roles in executive jobs. i was struck tat your book has a quote from cheryl sandberg on the cover whose book "lean in" generated questions on how women can get ahead. there was a huge backlash in some circles around her statements that women basically

should be strategic and willing to embrace and plan their careers, not be so much of their thinking about childhood and being mothers, and that as a career killer for women. but just to think more straightforwardly. >> guest: there was controversy around it. but she and i agree completely, and this book because i tell personal stories about my children and family, i want young women to see that you don't have to do it all perfectly but you can do it all. you can prioritize your family in a way that is healthy and everyone is happy without sacrificing a hard edge, maybe, it might be termed a hard edge, toward your career advancement. this notion that you have a good job and don't rock the boat and don't have for more money

because they are giving you extra time off and that is more valuable to you than a little more money. ask for both. ask for more time off and a little more money. i agree with cheryl sandberg about this. i think this book is the vain of this. >> host: i think it is, too. but i am struck by the fact, and i am sure you are, on the one hand that resonates is don't be afraid to take your career in your own hands, but on the other hand when you look at how free women reached the upper levels of whether it is american politics, american media, american companies where we are at 5-7 percent ceo. women leaders in any position, including journalism, politics, are astonishing low. so your account, you know, is like the 1% account.

it is not an account of leaning in but what i have been struck by and written a little about byself is the question of that still doesn't actually explain why we have so few women in leadership positions and visible positions in congress. there is a broader category of class of people that leaned in. that is where this extraordinary level of criticism and scrutiny play a role in my view but i am curious for you. it was elenor roosevelt who said to be a woman in public life you need to have the skin of a rhino and my guess is that probably still resonates. >> guest: my haters have a particularly tough edge.

not too long ago, one of my responses was you have a face like a diaper. you know, lots of things about my weight. really tough stuff. but i had parents and my dad kept saying you cannot get anything done without making someone mad. and the disease to tease, that woman wants everyone to be happy, it makes us good elected officials because we want to bring people together and agree on common grounds. more women in the senate will help government be more functional. but that is you cannot make everyone happy and everyone will not likely. i have a third of my state that thinks i am satan on a horse. they don't like me. that is okay. i am sad they don't like me but i will not let that slow me down. i am focused on what i can get

done, working hard, accomplishing things and i am blessed to get a chance to do that. i cannot sit around and worry about the fact people are going to say mean things about me and that is the main reason i think a lot of women avoid politics. they are afraid of how it is going to feel and impact our families and the horrible things said about their husbands or kids. that is a real fear but you have to get over it. in this day and age a lot of that doesn't work. the negativity doesn't have the bite it used to have. i believe that. i believe people are over this dark, grainy screen and you know her husband as a cheating sob. i think they kind of get this is polit >> host: on one hand it is over but on the other the trolls have never been as empowered as

before. the ability to create and take narratives and judge women in ways that it comes out even more loudly, right? the decibel levels in general is going up. it magnifies what is out there. you are on to the notion of why women are adverse to entering politics but also in general of being in the public sphere. it is hard to recruit women to write, say, opinion columns because that is where you are putting yourself on the line. it is a form of writing that is not on a safe subject. i see that all of the time as a woman editor i have enormous

interest in writing women for opinion columns. women understand the penalty is higher. that is why i was struck by what is it in your wiring, background, maybe family experience, or maybe personality, that you are not worrying as much about that cri criticism or not internalizing it. >> i am internalizing it but it motiva motivates me. >> host: to prove them wrong? >> guest: yes. when i was demoralized about the comments made from colleagues to me and about me i internalized it and said i am going to show them i will do well and continue to get raises by my bosses which

are the voters, i will recognize and be effective and make a difference. and every time one of them did this to me i just worked that much harder and kept by head down that much more. so maybe it is that. maybe that i used it as fuel. >> that is very interesting. and maybe, you know, it is just that conversion machine that is not installed in as many people. obviously, a woman politician who faces all of this and then some is hillary clinton. and another well-known fact about you is your decision not to endorse hillary clinton but barack obama in 2008. you give an account of that in your book. and actually you say that your daughter was a key catalyst for that. tell us the story. >> guest: this was a hard decision. two amazing candidates. both historic in their own way. it wawant like i was choosing between good or bad. was the strong smart women, and

amazing african-american inspirational leader. i was close to barack obama, we worked together and he was my friend, i was inclined to support him because i was inspired by his campaign. but i wasn't sure. and maddy, my daughter said look in the mirror. this is an important moment in history and you are not endorsing barack obama because you are worried about your own political skin. she was right. i was worried about the blow back i would get from my women supporters. they were going to be biter and disappointed. i told the now president i was all in and i was indeed all-in from that day forward and worked

hard on his campaign. >> host: there was blow back. when madeleine arbright said there is nothing worth than women that don't support other women in politics. did that sting? >> guest: it did. but we are fighting for a level playing field. once we begin to achieve at the same level of men we cannot turn around and do what they did to t us. we will assume you are better because you are a woman. equality is equality. so i really did think, while it was hard decision, i felt great working on behalf of barack obama and pleased to see him elected president. and now i am working just as hard for hillary clinton. i think a lot of people who do

what i want and not go all in. but i am not that personality. if i am for you, i am for you. >> host: has she won the all important maddy primary? your daughter? >> guest: she has. not all of the kids are there. >> host: are they supporting bernie sanders? >> guest: they are trying to figure it out. i want them to come to their own conclusion and i am comfortable they and start and independent and will to the conclusion that hillary clinton is the best candidate for president. i am not sure they are there bet but they will get there. >> host: she is presumed to be the overwhelming frontrunner and that was the case in 2008 but now there are questions about

her popilarity on the left. do you think this reflects the discomfortable with her as the nominee or the desire to have a conversation within the party? >> part is within the context. we have a cast of a thousands on one side and they are all aiming at hillary clinton. i am not seeing any of them spending a lot of time criticizing bernie sanders. within our party, bernie is speaking to folks that believe the status quo is a problem. he is speaking about issues we care about. he walks a different path and seems like an out sider to -- outsider to the party.

i understand the attention he is getting. but i think you have get to the independent voters in the country, that decide elections for states, i don't think they will vote for a man who self identifies as a socialist. >> host: it is ironic eight years of obama being criticized as someone who is a socialist when he isn't but they would not elect someone who is. >> guest: she is in an amazing position and the more she keeps her head down and earns the nomination. it is fine in joe biden runs or bernie sanders. she needs to earn this. she is a fighter and this will strengthen in november.

>> host: she was criticized for not embracing the historic nature of her candidate in 2008 not wanting to be seen as the woman candidate. she gave the famous speech in 2008 when dropping out and said she had not destroyed the famous glass ceiling and how she didn't destroy it but made many cracks. clearly she is embracing agendader now as an asset. when you think about your experience on the trail and talk about being a women senator as opposed to a senator, or a woman president as opposed to president, what is your advice to hillary clinton on playing the gender card? >> guest: in my race for governor i was anxious to prove to everyone i was qualified and knew every answer to every

question. i was like this isn't about being a woman. it is about being qualified to be the executive candidate. i saw a focus group with women comparing me to corilla deville. this is after loosing the governor's race. we had a focus group to figure out what went wrong. that is when i realized they didn't know my hopes and fears for my kids were the same as theirs and that i worked through school as a waitress and that my mom was salt of the earth and of rural missouri and my dad, you know, i group in a house where we hunted all of time and his family had the feed mill in a

small rural town. i had not spilled out who i was to missourians as a person. i think that is something hillary clinton should keep in mind. i think she is doing and that is the ad with her mother is very effective. she needs to show vulnerability. she had so many attacked in her hy life it is easy to get in the bunker. some of the mistakes she made around the e-mail came from wanting to protect her personal information. not she was doing anything terrible or wrong or undermine united states of america. what is the motive? is she on the payroll of china? china is getting e-mails without any help from anybody. i don't think she should spend so much time being protective of herself. she has to open up. i did that in the senate race

and i think missourians got a full picture of the good, bad and ugly. >> host: that is an interesting case study that applies outside of the realm of politics because there are so few women in the positions and they attract so much criticism that bunker mentality my guess is it is easy for a corporate executive to be in a similar position. it is easy for any women facing that accent up. let's go back to the very interesting and i think unusual role you have given to n navigating the family and politics i never read in the male senator memoirs and you talk about the antidote where

you are asking early in your public career, and asking your son to get ready to come with you to what was a party but i am gathering not just a party. >> guest: i was going to a political event. when they were young i would say we are going to a party. let's get in the car. we would go to a political event. i told them to get ready and i heard him saying in the next room, listen, if she says it is a party ask if anyone is going to give a speech, because if anybody is giving a speech it is not a party. i was dressing up our time together when i was working as something that was maybe more fun than it actually was for them. >> host: the first idea you were clearly able to establish there wasn't a barrier between the

personal you and the professional you which allowed you to keep integrating their life into the their career. there is either family time or professional time many women believe and one comes at the expense of the other. where do you fall on this? >> guest: when i ran as prosecutor, i didn't put my children in any of my literature. i was worried people knew i had small children and they would think it was inappropriate to take on this law-enforcement type job that had some dangers associated with the children. now i gravitate to not being able to take pictures with my nine grandchildren. i want my children to be part of my life. i want to be part of their lives. that means i want them to under what i am doing, i want them to be a part of it if they want to

be. one of the highlights in my life were my children participating in my campaign. my two daughters traveled with me during the summer of 2012 for the campaign. it was wonderful. when they were younger, no, mom we don't want to do that. but i think this is one of the things about politics. you have more flexibility. you don't have a boss you to check with if you want to take off and see your son in a talent show. i never missed my son -- except in trial a couple times -- but i would take off and see my son and i would maybe have to work s saturday or give a speech sunday night but there was more flexibili flexibility. i tried to integrate and pull them in. and now they are opinionated

young folks. >> host: you talked with a lot of female colleagues in the senate about their own experience and you recount some of them. there is an example of kelly ayote with her small child as a top law enforcement officer in new hampshire. and hillary clinton's campaign office -- >> guest: kidnapped and held hostage and she was bathing her n newborn. she had the phone in her ear and we can all visualize the mother trying to dress or child and getting instructions on the situation about the hostage. she had to call her husband saying you have to get home i have to go. but the juxtaposition of bathing

a new born and directing the highway patrol in a situation of life and death is a great example in the book. but there is a lot of examples about how the integration of your career and motherhood is sometimes funny, interesting and frustrating. >> host: everyone has had a moment like erma bob which many male colleagues haven't. i remember when my son was little and i had to go on a radio program early in the morning and you could apparently here my baby talking the entire time. i had no idea. i came into the office and my boss waved hello saying you were great on the radio but i could hear theo the entire time. no body else told me. and what i felt was mortified.

>> guest: i quit worrying about that. i have children yelling at each other and me in the background and dogs. i don't worry as long as they can hear me. >> host: let's get back to the question of being a minority in the senate and institutions of government. i want to push you a little bit because i feel like sometimes i hear somewhat contradictory things from women in these positions. the there is a rhetoric of famous dinners, and there for each other and more bipartisan, if you have more women in the senate, you will hear and you have said we are more collaborative and will find a way around the problem and here is patty murray and became a deal on the budget where others

failed. you have the women's empowerment and on the hand wait a minute, i will not endorse hillary clinton, she is a woman and we are paying not to create a sisterhood or replicate problems in the past. where do you come down on it when it comes to this bake basic impression. is this because of the historical history or what? >> guest: i think both are true. you can make decisions based on merit without gender and at the same time have a disposition that allows you to work on problems where you worry about whether or not you won or get the credit. i think the difference, this

isn't complicated i don't think. the women in the senate, we had to go through a lot of the sames things to get there. if you get there, we have a lot in common and there is almost an unspoken language and we get each other. even though i have huge disagreements with deb fischer or joni ernst. a lot has to do with motherhood and some getting around the sexism early in your career and overcoming it. we don't want to throw each other under the bus. look at the difference at harry and mitch and how they speak to each other. they are at each other like this all of the time. and it hasn't always been that way between the two leaders but

it is now. we have two people that clearly don't like each other very much. i think you can get more done if you like each other even if you disagree. as long as we keep working at knowing one another, the women, better than knowing everyone else, because we talk about kids and personal life, i don't think there is going to be an idea of winning at somebody's expense and that is what is wrong with washington. mr. mcconnell didn't want barack obama to win anything because he thought it would be at their expense and it would make obama be effective and they would not be able to take over. there is now a lot of, we need to return to the favor to mitch mcconnell and make sure they don't win anything because look what they did to us. we need to do that to them now. there is not as much of that among the women. i think if there were more women we would have more deals and

compromises. >> it is interesting to talk about another incident that got attention in your career and that is a time you had a disagreement with senator gillibrand about insuring there were more military prosecutions for sexual assaults. you objects to the narrative of the cap site. what did you take away from that? >> guest: the first narrative i objected to was the most important. and that was the decision between the victims. that was a false narrative. that is not what this was about. this is about what system protects victims the most. the media picked up on being for the commander or the victims. in my view, having studied it

carefully as a former prosecutor and someone who spent more times holding the hands of victims and crying with victims than any member of the united states senate maybe in history, i felt strongly that what i was advocating was better for victims. but the added cat nip was there was two democratic women that took different views and that elevated the differences way beyond what it would have been. and mask the fact we had gotten so much done together. we just disagreed on one thing. >> host: you are partnering with her in a lot of things and continued after that fight. >> guest: even after the vote, that was close, and you know, we came down in the well and hugged each other. >> host: senators are competitive. you could not get into it if you

were not driven to succeed. >> we were focused on getting the votes to prevail. we were counting votes and the circling around each other and trying to make sure people understand this point of view. part of me didn't want to hug or shake her hand.

>> that is a desire to say that is the past. don't we have more women in office than every before? you cannot sit down and talk with someone like you and say that is a fact. i thought it was striking you did a good job of saying this isn't a crazy world in which this is what happened to women in the 1950s. this is persisting into that. tell us about that. there was an incident with

another female senator's memoir, and she talked about a colleague talking about her weight and pinching her behind. sexism is not dead in the u.s. congress, is it? >> guest: i will say i have never felt demenished or minimalized by male colleagues in the senate. i don't know if they are afraid of me or if i am older and that might have something to do with it. but i had a doorman tell me i didn't have an assumption i wasn't a senator. i am from st. louis and i had a front row seat and i understand

institutional bias in the justice system with racial behavior and the same is true of women. we have accomplished a great deal and can pat ourselves on the back. but if we think this is done or over, just a few weeks ago, two members in the missouri legislature lost their job because young women came forward as interns and called them out an sexual harassment and we had evidence of text messages. that was 1974 when i was an intern and it happened to me. so we cannot think we don't have work to do on both racism and sexism. >> host: when you were first elected, a large class of democratic women senators came in and you pushed the boundaries. there was a small tiny bathroom.

what did you tweet? >> it was two stall, enough room to stand in front of the sink. i am standing there with another senator and then walks in elizabeth warren and then deb fischer and i walked out and tweeted we are going to have to to get a bigger bathroom. now when we get 50-60 we may have to take more space and out of the men's bathroom. >> host: we know in washington, office space is the literal expression of power. gue >> guest: yes, it is. >> host: i think kay hagan from north carolina wanted to go

swimming in the senator's member only den and found out that she was told no, you cannot do that. and i guess they had to press find out why and that is the men were swimming naked. >> guest: not all of them. kay hagan told me who it was among the men senators who like to swim naked and i cannot get it out of my hard drive. i am not make the viewers think about this person swimming naked. that was just a few years ago we had to make a rule -- >> host: that is what i was blown away by. it wasn't like 1965 where it is hike we can walk around naked. it was the 2000s. >> guest: but kay took care of it. the sign changed from men-only to members-only. some of the women swim. it is a

terrible, small pool. i don't want people thinking we have a huge great gym. it is adequate, and modest and the pool is small. and now women, and on weekends you may be able to bring the kids in if they want to come in and swim in the winter time. >> host: amazing. well, you obviously came in to this with a set of expectations and a set point of view about what you you would encounter about being in paul -- politics in missouri. what is the difference between politics in missouri and politics in missouri? i think some comes out in the book. >> guest: some are the same. it is more like drinking out of a fire hose here 24/7 if you are doing the job correctly. if you have staff senator, having people preparing questions and walk through the schedule and meet people and your staff tells you how to

vote. but if you engage and are curious, it is an enormous amount of material to consume. i constantly wonder if i am adequately prepared and informed. i don't think i felt that with my jobs in missouri like this. the dysfunction is different. i had never served in a legislative body that was this dysfunctional. >> host: the highway bill is a good example. >> gues >> guest: you could not get boehner and mcconnell to agree. boehner was pushing a three month extension and mcconnell was saying a here extension. they are not even talking to each other. that is much more frustrating because it seems we are treading

water and doing got you politics way more in congress. i think that is why so many voters are attracted to a donald trump who is all about i can be different. it is obvious he is different. odd, i would say. >> host: it is not just the hair. >> guest: but because of bernie's philosophy, not because he is odd, but he feels like he is going to shake it up, that is why you see the voters attracted to those candidates. they want someone to grab the status quo by its lapel and shake it into submission. i get that feeling. very frustrating. >> host: interesting enough that aspect of the dysfunction, the winging of authority among the party leadership, in part that is what is fueling these outsider candidates.

there is an irony and you are begging for leadership internally and that is a little bit of what voters are looking for, too. you are begging for leadership but part of the problem is the leader's ability to lead has been eroded by the way our politics are played out. >> guest: that is right. the hard ideas on both ends make it harder and harder to embrace compromise as being part of her job. they have to deal with them every day. the rand pauls and the mike sessions. it is hard for boehner. and the tea party is so entrenched in the house caucus and even more so in the senate. that is a problem. our politics is striated. our media, you can go to certain outlets for affirmation but information. both sides are doing that. the people who are the loudest,

the people who are most averse to comppromise. i make the joke that 35% of my state watches fox news and thinks i am satan on a horse and 30% watch msbc and think i think do no wrong and the rest are watching dancing with the stars and not caring about it either way. >> host: do you see that as being a reversible trend? if the parties are going away, the question is are we living, then, in a referendum, donald trump democracy? >> guest: i think time will tell. if someone like donald trump were to be elected i think there would be backlash. i don't think he will be elected. but the money thing is a bug part of it. that is why getting rid of

citizens united has to be a priority. >> host: we are almost out of time so i am glad you brought that up. the nature of campaigning is connected with the experience you have to governor or legislature. you write in your book in your last campaign you raised $40,000 a day and that would be even higher today. how much does money suffuse your experience as a politician? you are not somebody who can write a check for millions to fund your campaign for yourself. how much has that distorted or preverted what you do? >> guest: it made a much less enjoyable and not as good at my job because i spend too much time at it. we have limits. our direct campaigns, it is a matter of making your case, and asking people to contribute, i am constantly disappointing

donors and supporters because i ignore what i want them to do for what i think is right. i disappointed my labor friend when i voted for tpa even though they were donors of mine. i explained that doesn't mean i vote the way i want you to vote. i think the limits really help. what is really driving, i think, a new kind of politics is all of these presidential candidates have spent more time shopping for billionaires that can fund their super pacs. that is different and brand new. there was a piece in politico that talked about the super pac money raised is three times as much as what is raised by the candidate and that money is dominated by 67 individuals. this is becoming an al gargy of campaign and a certain class of billionaires funding political conversation in this country. people have to rise up and say i

will not accept that. we can do it in this country. people have to get mad enough about it. they have to realize what is going on. i am working on campaign finance and ethic reform in my state and i am excited that bernie and hillary clinton have made campaign finance an important part of their campaigns. hillary clinton is talking about cleaning up the citizens united cesspool and bernie feels the same way. i hope the people that are made in politics like this get mad and active in the campaign. ...

>> >> when you share it from

your dad said it is okay. the male figure in your life when you are nine o were 13 years old. my hope is a lot of fathers will understand what that really is. >> host: i really enjoyed our conversation. congratulations.