♪ theme cenk: welcome to "the young turks," everybody. we've got a special show for you tonight. boy, what a panel. so, in-house right here, former governor of new mexico, two term governor gary johnson, former libertarian candidate for president in 2012. great to have you in studio. >> great to be with you. >> jayar jackson is here with us as always in the studio and then congressman alan grayson from the great state of florida. he's from the good part.

of course, david sirota joins us, as well. we've got an all star panel here. david is hosting the war room this week. you should check that out, right before "the young turks." >> thanks for the plug. >> let's get started, guys, let me start in on the latest story about president obama and of course, the leader of russia, russian president vladamir put tin. president obama has canceled the meeting they were going to have in mass cow partly because of the edward snowden asylum issue. let's show a report and then discuss. >> u.s. russian relations have been strained and the kremlins decision to give edward snowden temporary asylum fueled the flames. today the white house announced that president obama will not meet one-on-one with president vladamir put tin next month when in you russia for an international summit. the white house said that there wasn't enough progress on the

agenda to offmeeting, but there's also this. russia's disappointing decision to grant edward snowden temporary asylum was a factor. >> there's an alleged law breaker in their country. we evaluate it, and we try to work with them. they didn't do that with us. >> those were president obama's first comments about snowden's asylum. he was also candid about his relationship with put tin. >> the truth is that when we have meetings, we can have some pretty blunt exchanges and animated exchanges. >> president obama was facing significant political pressure at home from republicans and democrats. >> russia has stabbed us in the back. >> russian officials from put tin on down have said repeatedly that they didn't think the snowden situation should affect the u.s.-russian relationships. but american officials thought otherwise. >> obama had to be more confident that there was going to be some really deliverable

substantive reasons to meet. >> the invitation is still on the table. >> i think that the russians stab us, it's usually from the front. i take issue with what chuck schumer said there. congressman, do you think the president should have canceled this meeting? >> i think they're both better off. they reward it as an unpleasant social obligation and they can spent time elsewhere doing real work instead of getting together for a coffee clutch. it's hard to think of any summit that has resulted in anything important other than perhaps the ulta. nothing would happen if they did get together, nothing is going to happen, nothing would have happened, it simply did not matter. the excuse for canceling it, i think that's unfortunate. you have a long-standing

tradition in this country of giving political asylum to people who flee other countries, including russia and the former soviet union. stalin's daughter lived in the units for many, many years. i don't think we should be making our foreign policy on the basis of one incident, no matter how much it may be in the headlines. >> governor johnson, we've had all these different issues with russia about a missile defense shield, et cetera. apparently that doesn't do it. we have those summits anyway. it's human rights issue, we have the summits anyway. they gave asylum to a whistle blower, so that will do it. that's it, we're canceling the summit. is that a particularly poor reason to cancel the summit? >> if that's really the reason. i've got to side with alan gray son. the notion that these summits really are just a bunch of, really, it's just a social get together. it's much to do about nothing, so the fact that they cancel this kind of thing, great.

i mean these things can take plagues over the phone. edward snowden, i think that's a mixed bag. i'm glad for the disclosures, glad for the disclosures when it comes to information gathering, and what that means. now, on the other side of this, i'm concerned that, and we'll see how this plays out, but there may be secrets that were led out that actually put americans in harm's way. we'll see how that plays out. bradley manning, i have the sense that he was not guilty of harm against the united states. that came to pass. we've yet to see all that play out. one of the factors i hope we don't boycott the olympics. there's talk of that. look, let's go to the winter olympic and kick ass, that's how we can address best that situation. cenk: before i go to jayar here, all these, to me, the bush era, partly with the obama era, being afraid to talk to people, my

feelings were hurt, or you're part of the axis of evil, you stabbed me in the back, i'm not going to talk to you, boohoo. we talked to stalin over and over. he was stalin and we needed to, because of word war two, but we got it done. you talk to people. you never know what comes out of it. >> i simply ask governor johnson and congressman grayson, i want to rewind it and ask each of you, starting with you, governor, i mean, there was the question from the beginning about edward snowden and the leaking. is he a traitor or a hero and is there a level of wondering what he was going to do and if he could do more, is there a fear, is there any basis in the fear mongering, which we were calling it or any basis in what he released from one side to the other? i'm still somewhere in the middle. >> i side with you. on one hand, i'm glad for the information that there is this huge information gathering taking place. i'm glad that we're having a

debate over civil liberties in this country. i think that this is why we've gone to war is to protect our civil liberties and the government is amassing this huge amount of data and there's a complacency on the part of u.s. citizens, look if they want to listen, let them listen, i'm law abiding. this is so, this is such a throwback to preworld war ii and germany. germany was a democracy, they elected hitler. it was a result of a monetary collapse information was being gathered by the government and this is hitler talking, you know, that if you're law abiding, you won't have to worry. look what happened? i don't want to carry that to any extreme, either. we're a constitutional republic, a country governed by laws which protect the minority. it isn't majority rules. >> can i make a point about

going back a little bit on the idea of this not being a big deal in terms of the summit. i agree that oftentimes summits are social events, but i think the importance of what's happened in the last 24 hours is the fact that the united states government is apparently so committed to getting edward snowden, to apprehending him and scaring other whistle blowers like edward snowden that it is willing to on the world stage make a statement, a spectacle, if you will, about canceling an international, a serious international event. i think that what that shows us is not whether the summit between president obama and putin was going to be a big deal or make progress or not, it's the united states government finds this so important, this is such an administration priority that it's willing to make the kind of spectacle that it's made on the international stage.

cenk: i'm with david on this one. i actually want to read you a quo from a fellow congressman, that's john lewis. of course, he was on stage with martin luther king in their famous i have a dream speech and he's the only one alive who was on that stage. he said in keeping with the philosophies and disciplines of non-violence: cenk: so, do you think edward snowden is in that category, do you agree with congressman lewis or not? >> well, as st. augustine said 1700 years ago, an unjust law is no law at all. snowden has said that the reason why he stepped forward is because back in march, the national security advisor lied to the american public, lied to the senate, and said that there was no mass surveillance of

americans. he was asked point blank are you keeping records on americans, and he said no. now we found out since then that he tried to correct his testimony the next day, but said that his correction was classified, so you or i or no one else could hear about it. cenk: hilarious. >> it would be funny except for the fact that it's so sad. the national security state that we've created now takes a picture of every item that we put in the mail. it records information about every phone call that we make. for a while, they were collecting information about emails, as well, but they stopped doing that, apparently according to their public explanation, because it was too voluminous. it wasn't that they saw anything wrong, it's just that the file got too big. cenk: can i ask a question? >> it should be the

fourth amendment, it tells us where to draw the line and they've stepped all over it, trampled it and destroyed it. >> let me ask a quick question if i can. there was a report by a yale law professor in the foreign policy magazine about former senator mike g. jacki: sel in alaska. the pentagon papers he read into the record some of of the disclosures, put in 400,000 pages of pentagon pairs. there's rumors that there's more to come in these disclosures. whistle blowers have suggested the n.s.a. whistle blower that there's more that we don't know that we should though. will you or will some of your colleagues, are you willing to use the privilege that constitutional privilege that's outlined and used in the 1960 to see put that into the record so that we, the public can see that kind of thing? >> you're referring to the speech and debate in the

constitution. we've already gone so far beyond that in what's already been disclosed. every time there's a new disclose that you are comes out, the people in charge, like general alexander are asked is there anything else. they always say no, and then there's something else. >> i got to ask one last question on this topic, before we go to the break. you know, you mentioned the fourth amendment. i know that you've got to include it in one of the bills, the provision sailing that you can't vital the fourth amendment, but they're clearly vitals it with this spying. i can't imagine how it would be a matter of dispute. it's the most plain reading amendment i've ever seen. we have a secret fisa court ruling saying that the program is illegal and unconstitutional in some respects. how do we get the government, forget edward snowden, the people breaking the law is the executive branch. how do we get them back within the law if you've already got a provision in the bill that says

what they're doing is unconstitutional and hence illegal? >> i find no problem with the so-called intelligence community. they never met date that they didn't like or what. if it's out there, they want it and have no respect for privacy. as a lawyer, their interpretation of constitution, the case law that comes up is faccical. with regards to the constitution, they've taken a 1979 decision that said local police officials could get information about calls being made by one person once and now say they can do that for everyone everywhere forever. that's their mangled interpretation of that decision. with regard to the statute, they are limited to get information that's only relevant to an investigation of terrorism, and they say that every phone call that's made, including every call that i make to my mother is somehow relevant in their

opinion to an investigation of terrorism. it's gotten to be ridiculous. the court has rubber stamped them year after year after year. all these people, these right wing republican appointees put on the fisa court for the purpose of rubber stamping are doing their job so well, there is no oversight at all and congress is kept in the dark. i asked a copy of a court order issued by the fisa court, they told me they wouldn't give it to me and within a week released it to the public because they thought it served their purposes. they wouldn't give it to the congress, but then a week later, gave it to the public. it's become ridiculous. it must end. cenk: we're going to talk about the depths of how ridiculous it has become. president obama went on the tonight show to explain the program and his fallout with russia. there's a new program, at least new to us called the insider threat and how the government is ready to crack down on any government official or employee

that disagrees with the government's foreign policy. it's unbelievable. it reminds me of east germany. we'll talk about it when we come back. >> do you think there is any chance we'll ever hear the president even say the word "carbon tax"? >> with an opened mind... >> has the time finally come for real immigration reform? >> ...and a distinctly satirical point of view. >> but you mentioned great leadership so i want to talk about donald rumsfeld. >> (laughter) >> cutting throught the clutter of today's top stories. >> this is the savior of the republican party? i mean really? >> ... with a unique perspective. >> teddy rosevelt was a weak asmatic kid who never played sports until he was a grown up. >> (laughter) >> ... and lots of fancy buz words. >> family values, speding, liberty, economic freedom, hard-working moms, crushing debt, cute little puppies. if wayne lapierre can make up stuff that sounds logical while making no sense... hey, so can i. once again friends, this is live tv and sometimes these things

happen. >> watch the show. >> only on current tv.

>> we're back on "the young turks." well, where can the president explain his foreign policy, but obviously on the tonight show? he went up to talk to jay leno and here's the first thing that happened. >> this intelligence gathering that we do is a critical component to counter terrorism, and obviously, with mr. snowden and the disclosures of classified information, it's raised questions. a lot of these programs were put in place before i came in. i had skepticism and we should about what government's doing. i had the programs reviewed. we put in some additional safeguards to make sure that there's federal court oversight as well as congressional

oversight, that there is no spying on americans. we don't have a domestic spying program. what we do have are some mechanisms where we can track a phone number or email address that we know is connected to some sort of terrorist threat, and, you know, that information is useful. cenk: it's classic obama. i got to be honest with you, i don't believe him. oh, the bush stuff, oh, man, that was a shale. i had to continue it, but i was super skeptical of it but did the same thing he did, except put in a couple of safeguards that i can't tell but. we've got our panel here. governor, i want to start with you on this one. he says he was skeptical about the program, but he just had to keep doing it almost exactly as bush did. are you buying it? >> no, no. i think there's an awakening

here on the part of americans. i just wish there was a smoking gun somewhere in all of this and i think there is, the more and more and more this progresses, we might actually find out just how this is affecting ordinary americans. as a result of these disclosures, i've found out that, you know, our cell phones are open microphones, even though they're turned off for the government, if they so choose to listen to our conversations. cell phones are being made now so you can't remove the battery. that's the only way you can actually turn it off. most americans, look, they want to listen to what i want to have to say, let them have at it, because i'm law abiding. well, this is why -- this is america. we don't do this in america. these are our civil liberties being trampled on, and with each passing day, it's justify amazing the new revelations. this really is a positive thing. cenk: well, the problem is we do do it in america now. >> we do it in america, yes.

cenk: and it changes the definition of america. president obama talks about the american people and balancing. >> we should be skeptical about the potential encroachments on privacy. none of the revelations show that government has actually abused these powers, but they're pretty significant powers. if we can make sure that there's competence on the part of the american people that there's oversight, then i think we can make sure we are properly balancing our liberty and security. cenk: here we go again, david. i'm all about balance, i'm the guy in the middle, and, you know, we got the security and liberty, would you have just balanced it perfectly. golly, gee, i'm so worried about the abuse that could happen, but i'm assured none of it has happened and i'm backing it anyway. are you buying it? >> no, i'm not. i remember what senator obama said about all of this. there's a big article comparing senator obama's positions on

n.s.a. and surveillance issues versus president obama. guess who's one of the biggest critics in the world of president obama's n.s.a. programs? senator obama. obviously there are politicians who change their mind, who flip-flop, assume we don't know what they said before, but i think this is something bigger than even the programs themselves. we ask the question, i mean governor johnson made the point a lot of americans hear about this and say i'm not doing anything wrong, i have nothing to worry about. there was an interview that former president bill clinton did with bloomberg news now a couple months ago in which he said americans have to essentially now watch what they put on email and watch what they say on their cell phones. the problem with all of this is not whether what you're saying is not law abiding or going to get you in trouble. the problem is that one thing freedom means at least in my estimation, knowing that you're

not being watched, knowing that you can say certain things or essentially not have to worry that there is a big brother. what's been taken away from all of us in all of this, and what i'm not sure can ever be regained is now the perception that you are being listened to, the perception that big brother is listening. that is a loss of freedom for all of us, whether you're a criminal, or whether you're a law abiding citizen. >> yeah, if you love in a police state, you're constantly worried what government is going to do to you. by the way, we have private contractors if they don't like you for whatever reason, exgirlfriend, boyfriend, whatever, they can spy in on you. half the people in this studio now put tape over their cameras on their laptops. that's what happens in a police state. >> i think a lot of people assume this already. people assume if i'm saying something outrageous, doing something, planning something, someone can tap my phones.

there's also the figure that someone could be watching. we get into that now that they are sweepingly doing it to everyone, basically. so, and i like listening to the very specific things that president obama was saying. he quells these fears saying if we can make sure there's confidence and i think we can make sure they properly balance our liberty and security. it's not saying we did it. i think we can i think we can and i think we can. can we and will we are two different things. hearing i think we can, i think tells one party saying i think we can, have not done it, though. cenk: if you catch me later, i'm not lying, i said if we do it, wouldn't it be lovely. to that point, we go to this new program called the insider threat. that goes across not just n.s.a. or c.i.a., but all departments

in the government. it's a defensive systems agency that's doing it. they are saying if you work for the government, people should watch out for you if you frequently visit family abroad or if you have money troubles or speak openly of unhappiness with u.s. foreign policy. congressman grayson, is this east germany where we look at the government workers and say are you unhappy with the official foreign policy of this government? then we're going to put you as an insider threat. >> well, the question you left out is are you now or have you ever been a member of the communist party. we seem to be unable to learn from our history. the reason why it matters that there is continuous and pervasive domestic surveillance, whether it was bush who started it or obama who extended it is time and time again, we've run into serious problem with civil liberties. we went through a communist witch hunt in the 1950's.

j. edgar who haver had a file on virtually every elected official in congress. over and over again, reporters have been speed upon by the administration going back 50 years. these are the problems that we face. if the occupy wall street movement had taken off, it's safe to say all of them would have been speed upon. you can reach a point where environmentalist tried to stop the key stone pipeline are spied upon. it's pervasive. the president is wrong when he says it's limited to people who might be terrorists. that's farce asking, every piece of mail has a picture taken of it, of the outside of the envelope, every single one. it goes on and on like that. according to the prism program documents that snowden released, according to those documents, there's records of emails, records of cloud storage in the

cloud that the people keep for storage of their own files, photos, emails, all sorts of things, even when you log on and off your computer, google searches, snowden said he could get anybody's emails, even the president of the united states if he knew the president's personal email address account get those emails. he called it turnkey totalitarianism. it's not a question of do we trust president obama or george bush, the real question is are we going to trust government palin. my answer is no. cenk: i would go further, though. i would ask the question can we trust president obama. they always say it's in the future. well, my god, what if a republican came into office. we had a republican named bush. we elected a guy who put up a lot of placards that said change and then decided not to change a damn thing and then expanded the programs. we found out yesterday that the

d.e.a. is actually using some of the spying to go after criminal cases, normal average criminal cases in the united states and covering it up from the prosecutors, judges and of course the defense attorneys. so, it's here. it's already here. so, canning man grayson, i ask you as i often do, what in the world happened to president obama that the guy who ran on change said no, i love what the bush-cheney administration did and i'm going to continue it and build upon it? >> well, it turns out that president obama in some respects is a deeply conflicted person who always looks for the middle ground even when there is no middle ground and when the law tells you otherwise. he was a professor of constitutional law. he must know the fourth amendment. it tells you whenever the government collects personal information of any nature, it needs to be done through a warrant that is particularized. you can't grab everyone's telephone records and hope for the best. you can't do that.

it has to be particularized and based upon "probable cause." there needs to be some reason to believe that you have information about somebody who's doing something wrong, committing a crime. we're not all guilty until proven innocent, we're innocent until proven guilty. the current system is even worse than guilty until in cent, you could have eight cardinals singing your praises and it doesn't matter. they'd still get a copy of every phone call you make. >> a very quick question. one of the things in the vote on n.s.a. surveillance that happened in the house that i was concerned about was that you had meetings with high level n.s.a. officials and obama officials in the house to try to pressure lawmakers to vote essentially on the side of the n.s.a., congressman, i had ask you, was there any perception by you that your colleagues may be a little nervous about voting against the n.s.a. out of kind of j edgar

hooverrish fears that they not only have data on all of us but on all of you and your colleagues in the congress? >> it's possible. one of my colleagues asked the n.s.a. . blank will you give me a copy of my own record. the n.s.a. said no, we won't. they didn't say no, we don't have one. they said no, we won't. [ laughter ] cenk: wow. >> that's possible. i think the real division, it's obviously on a party division either. you saw how many departments and republicans voted to end this domestic spying program. the real division is between people of principle and people who are scared. they're not scared of the political consequences of voting one way or another. they're scared that there might be some kind of terrorist attack and that they'll be blamed for it, because they weren't in favor of domestic surveillance, domestic spying. you tell me why was it necessary to create files on 320 million

americans to catch a few hundred or couple of thousand people operating abroad? it just defies any sort of common sense and yet that's what it comes down to, it's principle versus fear. cenk: there was one other division between the people who voted for n.s.a. spying against u.s. citizens. the people who voted for the spying on americans got twice at much money from defense contractors than those who voted against. when we come back, we're going to turn to the republican party, their internal fighting, what governor johnson thinks about that and the correct path that they should taking. we'll be right back.

cenk: all right, we are back on "the young turks" and we've got a lot of conversation ahead of us. now we turn to the republican party and it turns out, mitt romney is back. he was speaking to republicans in new hampshire and had

interesting things to say about this idea of possibly shutting down the american government in an effort to get rid of obama: cenk: now, we have this fantastic panel with us, david sir, alan grayson, jayar jackson. governor johnson, what do you think of the idea of ted cruz, rand paul, et cetera saying it doesn't matter, we are going to shut it down to get writ of obamacare and the other republicans saying are you nuts? we're not going to get rid of obamacare and we're going to destroy the popularity of the republican party.

>> as governor of new mexico, there were many instances where i did what i thought was right, and it went to court and the supreme court you determined that what i did, i could not do administratively. i do not believe that this can be done through defunding. you can't do it. this has to be a change in the law. do i believe that we should balance the federal budget? yes. should we shut down government to potentially balance the federal budget? yes, i think we should. i don't think it should be tied to obamacare. i'm in the camp that really believes that we are going to come to a man atory collapse and when the dollars we have don't buy a thing, because of the accompanies inflation that is going to go along with printing money to the tune of 30 cents out of every dollar that we spend. cenk: so, but, inflation is incredibly low right now. >> exactly. but it in my opinion is going to rear its head and short term,

no, it's not. you've got the entire world right now printing money. it's like gee, it's a race to the bottom, everybody's doing it, i guess it's going to be ok. i don't think this is going to have a happy ending, cenk. i really genuinely don't feel that way. the only chance we have to fix it is to balance the federal budget now and that isn't a guaranteed fix, either, but at least i believe that gives us a fighting chance. cenk: congressman grayson, you know, policy-wise i'm sure you don't want the government shut down, people might not be paid their social security, you might not be able to pay the f.b.i., et cetera. politically, god, wouldn't the republicans be doing you guys an enormous favor? >> yes, they would. i think it would be the end of the republican party, as we know it. let's talk a little bit about how we've come to this point. what obamacare actually does is it extends health coverage to 50 million americans who didn't have it before now.

in addition, it makes coverage affordable by letting buyers pool their buying powers through these exchanges and coming up with traps parent form contracts for insurance so that you get all the coverage you think you're getting without having to become a master of the fine print. simple things like that, and they are so far against letting poor, sick people see a doctor, that the republican party, many in the republican party are willing to shut down the american government in order to prevent that from happening. they are so in as he anally bent on seeing to it that there's no health care for 50 million americans, that they're willing to go that far to do it. that's crazy. that is absolutely crazy. you know, barney frank had a bumper sticker saying democrats may not be perfect, but republicans, they're crazy, and that really is crazy. some bosama bin laden could neve

dreamed of shutting down the american government and here the republican party is going to do it for him for what? to make absolutely certain that sick people can't see a doctor. it's crazy. cenk: on obamacare, we all seem to agree, shutting down the government for that seems misguided. >> don't connect the two. because you end up with more than beyond a perception, but you would have an overwhelming perception of just exactly what congressman grayson said. they're going to shut down government to prevent people from getting health care? we should balance the federal budget, but these should be separate items. yeah, take it -- and i disagree that i think essential government does go on, and that that kind of bargaining would take place, and that we would have essential government even in the face of a shutdown, but that is a way, i think, to bring about a balanced budget and that

debate that needs to happen, needs to happen. this needs to happen now. i don't think we have much time. cenk: i want to challenge you on that. >> quickly, i think part of the motivation from representatives like earl cruz, rand paul, they win the blame game, saying it's not us that's doing it, they're saying ted cruz also said we're going to tell them with he don't want to shut down the government, president obama if you don't want us to do this, are you willing to shut it down. they think there's a line they can tow and tell the american people don't blame us, we are doing it for you and if he doesn't go along with it, he is shutting down the government. they are seeing since last elections. ted cruz doesn't understand that public perception is realizing we are blaming you, too, now. cenk: when we go to the blame game, at least the question i was going to ask the governor, how do the republicans say yes, we shut down the government

because we really care about a balanced budget, let's say that's the reason they did it along the lines of what you're saying, right? and then there's the underlying hypocrisy that republicans spend as much money as democrats. all the congressman have earmarks in these bills. cenk: put aside the earmarks, saying we'd like a balanced budget, but are not going to raise taxes. we are going to continue all of our global expansion on military expansion, and we're going to keep the oil subsidies and subsidies for corporate jets. when wouldn't they get their ass handed to them because they're 100% wrong on everything? >> add to that and don't cut anything from my -- from the constituency that i represent. that's the hypocrisy. this has got to be a belt-tightening across the board, and if there's a fairness about it, where everybody, everybody takes it, everybody sacrifice's, then i think it's really viable, but there's not

that leadership out there to see this happening, to oversee this. >> congressman gray son, the progressive caucus budget, i've seen it before actually does a better job of balancing the budget than any proposal in congress, including the most rye wing proposal. because the right wing proposals refuse to increase taxes, so they just end, they refuse to cut from defense at all, in fact add to it so they can't ever balance the budget. how come the progressive caucus neve gets any attention in washington or from a democratic administration? >> well, because of the overton window. it's this concept that certain things are considered part of regular political discourse and certain things are not, and it's completely arbitrary. this is why ted cruz, somebody who really has no grasp of government whatsoever and never has done anything constructive that would justify listening to

ted cruz gets listened to on the sunday talk shows and so on that and so forth. it is in fact true that the progressive budget caucus budget would balance the budget much quicker than any other proposed budget, even the lunatic fictitious ripe budget, which is makes up numbers and fills in blanks that remain blanks. the fact is that this core concept is volleyed in the prospective budget. the core concept is if you're serious about ending the fiscal government and the good afternoon paying its bills, you must raise taxes on people with money. the problem with the right wing is they've put out this idea that the real problem in america is that rich people don't have enough money, so we need to cut their taxes. somehow, it makes sense somehow on some level that supposedly it makes sense that mitt romney pays less in his percentage of income in his taxes than ordinary people like secretaries do or nurses do, or people who,

you know, struggle and work for a living. somehow, that's a good thing, because somehow, that creates jobs, when in fact that's not the way the system works. companies create jobs because they can make a profit on the worker's work. that's why they create jobs. it has nothing to do with the rate of income tax that they pend. because of the overton window, away obvious common sense observation like if you want to lower the deficit one need to raise taxes and you can only raise taxes on people who actually have money, put toys national corporations, billionaires, they are the ones who can afford to pay it, that somehow doesn't get considered as viable public discourse, but death panel gets repeated over and over and over again. >> if you want to create jobs here in the u.s., you have to let mitt romney hide his money in the cayman islands. oh, ok, that makes accepts. governor gary johnson, thank you for joining us today. >> thank you. cenk: when we come back,

congressman grayson's going to stay with us and we'll delve into how he is one of the most productive members of congress. wait, i thought he was far left. how did he get republicans to go along? come back, you'll find out.

cenk: would you look at that, the aggressive progressive is back and who better to do an aggressive progressive segment with than congressman alan grayson. he is with us and has been for the whole show. i want to talk to you about some of of the things you have gotten done in congress. it's interesting. you had a hearing plan to bring in glenn greenwald to talk about the n.s.a. spying situation. the president happened to call meeting at the same exact time to talk to house democrats, so

it had to be postponed. glenn greenwald said obama developed a new found interest in the house departments and settled a meeting with them taillight. what do you think happened there, any chance that that was not a coincidence? >> well, in fact, we've been inundated with so-called information, the same five talking points over and over and over again, misleading information from the so-called intelligence community. the morning before the vote on the amendment which would have curtailed domestic spying by the n.s.a. on the morning before that vote, both the democratic caucus and republican caucus invited over general alexander, the head of the n.s.a. to address them in a special meeting so that he could give those same five talking points over and over again. it's highly misleading information. i know it. i've compared it to what classified information i get access to, and, you know, they treat congress, i'm talking about the intelligence committee

like a mushroom farm. they keep us in the dark and spread the fertilizer liberally all over us. i was trying to hear the other side. i invited in glenn greenwald. he said fine. i invited the cato institute and aclu. it turns out they both understand the fourth amendment and agree that's what's happening right now is unconstitutional and illegal. i wanted to get for the sake of my fellow members of congress the other point of view. i had both democrats and republican it is lined for that hearing. the president decided for the second time all year that he had to speak to us at exactly the same time as that hearing. you can draw your own conclusions. cenk: and i have. let's talk about something we mentioned earlier in the show, the department of homeland security funding bill in which you got this provision added, it prohibits funds in the bill from being used in dronevention of the first, second or fourth es.

now, it's hard to vote against that. that's why, of course, it got into the bill, but then the n.s.a. spying program where they are collecting data on 300 million americans is clearly in violation of the department of home land security funding provision that passed. how do they enforce that. >> the interesting thing about that is that it's become very controversial that the department of homeland security has used racial profiling, but since the grayson amendment passed and by the way, that was one of 13 amendments we passed and i passed more than any member of congress, either democratic or republican up to this point. we've passed 33 other amendments in the science and technology committee and foreign affairs committee, five which have passed through the house. because it's the grayson alternate, i get to interpret it, say what it means and i said in the congressional record that what that means to the department of homeland security can't vital the first, second or

fourth amendments is they can't engage in racial profiling. now, someone like the aclu can take the homeland security to court and say it was explained the meaning of the grayson amendment by grayson itself. it discourages the agency from doing what i say the amendment means and they can lay a successful court case against the agency that they're inviting that amendment. cenk: overall, you've gotten 31 amendments passed, according to the latest tally. >> the latest count is 13 and 33, but go ahead. cenk: all right. that's pretty good, even better. >> it was a busy week. it was a busy week, 13 on the floor of the house, total for the year, and 33 in committee, but please go ahead. cenk: so, how? how do you get republicans and of course house controlled by republicans to vote along with you? >> well, to some extent, i think

we've gotten into their heads. for one thing, they see that there's a mammoth fight on their hands if they don't go along with one of our amendments. in one case a represent said he wouldn't go along with it and we ended up with a tied vote. they had to scurry around and make dose and promises to their own members to fight back and keep a grayson amendment frock patting. that's the only time in the past five years there's been a tied vote in the house of representatives, and that's not one of the 13. with regard to the 13 that did pass, sometimes it's a good idea and they recognize that and they have no reason to say no. that does happen occasionally. sometimes they're scared to say no. sometimes they realize if they say no and i bring it to a vote, they're going to look really bad. just this past week, one of the ones that we passed this past week was one to increase funding for by lingual programs at hud. it turns out many of the people who need help from the housing and urban development department are people who don't speak english, but hud spent a tiny

pittance in translating the materials that they created. it's almost all english, even though much of their clientele doesn't they english. i decide'd to put an amendment to increase it. it was clear that the republicans if they opposed that amendment, they would be properly labeled as anti hispanic. they decided to go ahead and pass the grayson amendment. it was unanimous. it happens that we do it sometimes that way, sometimes in other ways, but the bottom line is that i often think of what will make it appealing to them and to us, even though it's a progressive principle. we had another example recently when i introduced an amendment. democrats loved it because it was pro environment. republicans loved it because they thought it was a state's right amendment and i was happy to let them think whatever they wanted, as long as they voted for it, which they did. we put throwing these unusual coalitions based upon progressive values. cenk: i want to find out more

about these tricks. i want you to tell me one or two more of those tricks that you have up your sleeve for actual success in congress and give me some hope. we'll do that when we return.

cenk: we're back on "the young turks" and talk to congressman alan grayson. he represents florida's ninth district in congress. now, congressman, you and i have talked in the past, people go on you tube.com/tyt and see our interviews. the thing i think is the ultimate issue in congress is money in politics, that until we decide how our politicians elected through money is fixed, we can't get anything else done. that's my sense of it. now, can you give me some hope? is there any way that this congress can agree to stop funding their election in the way that has already gotten them elected? >> yes, and i'll give you an example. i recently got in the defense

bill a prohibition against torture, why? because the republicans would have been ashamed to vote for torture. we have amendments on campaign finance form that the republicans are literally ashamed to vote against. a prohibition against foreign companies interfering in u.s. elections, against c.e.o.'s spending shareholder's money without shareholders approval. i have come up with bills that literally they'd be ashamed to vote against. that's my plan, that's what i'm going to do. cenk: i understand that, but the disclose act was pretty close to that. all with he wanted to do was find out where the money was coming from and that's what the supreme court, even citizen's united said. obviously they can disclose the donors and mitch mcconnell said that that's actually threatening their donors and they were against it and they wound you the defeating it in the senate, so it is possible that the republicans are beyond shame. >> well, they filibusters in the

senate and that is sort of a deep problem that you have discussed frequently in the past. there's the filibuster problem that lets minority rule the majority time after time and again and again, as long as they're unscrupulous and do nothing to limit their own discretion. cenk: one quick note on what you just said in an earlier answer. shareholders from all over the world, so is it possible that since there's foreverrers who are shareholders that we can stop all corporations from giving money through that route? >> it's possible, but what we need to do is to force them, force them to defend their position, and to vote on it. we've come up with a program that we're going to spread hopefully in the house of representatives and senate that will force republicans to take these hard votes and shame them into doing the right thing. cenk: one last quick thing, do you have a similar strategy for shaming the obama administration into actually being progressive? [ laughter ] >> that ship has sailed.

new well, ok. that's fair enough. i'll leave it right there. all right, congressman, clearly an aggressive progressive, right there in the people's congress. all right, thank you so much. >> i consider myself as lovable, but thank you, anyway. >> you can get both. all right, thank you for joining us on "the young turks." >> thank you, too. cenk: when we come back, one final important note. the loop. >>we tackle the big issues here in our nation's capital, around the country and around the globe. >>dc columnist and four time emmy winner bill press opens current's morning news block. >>we'll do our best to carry the flag from 6 to 9 every morning.

cenk: we're back on "the young turks." in the last segment, the congressman said it might be too late to make president obama a progressive. one of the ways that we know that is he actually co wrote a letter saying that he would: which, of course, any progressive should be in favor of, which of course president obama is not in favor of that and has vowed to cut social security if the republicans would ever agree with him to cut social security. so we're in a top asy-turvy wor.

anybody who disagrees with policy is a threat to this country. please check that out. >> tonight, a very special view, dick cavett is here as is jim norton, baseman the same guy. we'll talk politician, comedy, you name it. you know you're the most powerful man in the world when you can turn down meeting with put tin on your way to meeting with jay men know. the tea party is so used to eating their own, they could legally change their name to the doer party. marvin the martian and charlize