newshour productions, llc >> woodruff: good evening. on the newshour tot: the wave of the future. after sailing across the atlantic ocean, 16-year-d activist greta thunberg gives one of her first interviews e the u.s. on ngers of the climate crisis. then, it's friday. mark shields and david brooks are here to analyze the performance the leading democratic candidates at last night's debate, the abruptpa ure of national security advisor john bolton, and much more. plus, three chords and the truth. filmmaker ken burns on his epic, multi-part documentary series, "country music." >> countryusic addresses, in unbelievable ways, these universal truths that we all go through-- loneliness and, and

love, and everything in between. and there is a country song for each one of those moods. >> woodruff: all that and more, on tonight's pbs newshour. >> major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: ♪ ♪ moving our economy for 160 years. bnsf, the engine that connects us.

>> you can do the things y like to doith a wireless plan designed for you. with talk, text and data. consumer cellular. learn more at consumercellular.tv >> financial services firm raymond james. >> the ford foundation. working with visionaries on e frontlines of social change worldwide. >> and with the ongoing support of these institutions: and friends of the newshour. >> this program was made porible by the corporation public broadcasting. and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you.

>> woodruff: a new tropical ather system has hit the northern bahamas tonight. four inches of rain and winds of 30 miles an hour, complicating relief forts in the wake of hurricane dorian. many are living in tents, or under tarps in badly damaged homes, on abo and grand bahama, where dorian wiped out whole communities. the new system could grow into a tropical storm and hit florida on saturday. much of southeastern south dakota struggled today with widespread flooding after two days of downpours. streets were submerged in several citiesmeafter some got more than seven inches of rain. parts of madison were under three feet of wate the flooding also closed schools in at least 20 districts for a second day. actress felicity huffman now faces 14 days in federal prison in a college admissions scam. a federal judge in boston

sentenced her today, and added a fine of $30,000. the former "desperate hoewives" star admitted paying to rig her daughter's s.a.t. scores. we will return to this story, later in the program. california's largest utility company agreed today to paypa ur$11 billion, to settle ice claims from deadly wildfires in 2017nd 2018. pacific gaand electric said today that it has a tentative deal covering 85% t claims in the northern california fires. a federal bankruptcy couap will have tove the deal. in france, commuter rail workers went ostrike in droves across paris today over pension reform proposals. paris streets were clogged with traffic jams after ten of 16 tsubway lines shut down a morning rush hour. strikers condemned the pension changes, and complained they will have to worlonger before retiring.

>> ( translated ): they can't take away our social benefits i have been working for almost 25 years for this company. i don't want to work until i'min 70, geup at 4:00 in the morning, it's very hard. so today we speak for all paris metro network workers. >> woodruff: president emmanuel 42 public pension systems into one, and says the result will be eater fairness for new retirees.ap a federaals court in new york has revived a lawsuit involving president trump'snd hotelsusinesses. t the suit allegt he is violating a constitutional ban on accepting payments from foreign governments, foreign officials patronize his properties. a lower court initially found lthat the plaintiffs had al standing to sue. china made a new move today toward easing trade tensions with the united states beijing anunced that it will exempt american pork and

soybeans from additional import riffs. president trump had already postponed a planned u.s. tariff hike on chinese goods. the two countries plan new tal next month. on wall street today, the dow jones industrial averagein gained 37 to close at 27,219. the nasdaq fell 17 points, and the s&p 500 lost two. and, two passings of note. civil rights figure juanita abernathy has died in atlanta, after suffering a stroke she joined her husband, reverend ralph abernathy, and dr. martin luther king jr. in the front lines of the movement. behind the scenes, she wrote the plan for the 1955 bus boycott in montgomery, alabama. juanita abnathy was 88 years old. and, rock singer and songwriter eddie money died today inlo angeles, of cancer of the esophagus. a he htring of hits in the 1970s and '80s, including "twoar tickets toise" and "take

me home tonight." eddie money was 70 years old.to stilome on the newshour: teenage activist greta thunbergs on the dangers by the climate crisis. the first sentence is handed down in the celebrity college admissions scandal. romark shields and david bs analyze how the candidates farez at last night's democratic debate. and, much more. >> woodruff: a growing number of americans are worried climate change is a real crisis. that is one of the findings of a new poll by the "washington post" and the kaiser familyam foundation. it found that eight in ten americans believe man activity is fueling climate change, and nearly 40% now consider it a just five years ago.nt jump from yet, fewer than 40% also believe

that they will have to make "major sacrifices" to tackle the problem. but young people across the pushr are now mobilizing t gent action. william brangham spoke today with the swedish teenager who's helped galvanize this movement. our story is part of a special initiative called "coveringw, climate a global collaboration of more than 250 of the climate story. coverage >> the younger generation came to the white house today demanding that the grownups inside stop acting like they said, acknowledge that climate change is a crisis and ac accordingly (chanting) among the crowd was 16-yeagrold a thunberg from sweden. in the past four years, tuneberg, who has mild autism,

has helped drive this youth climate movement. she repeatedly called out wor leaders for their claimant inaction like here at the u.n. climate change coerence in poland. >> we have come here to let them know that change is coming whether they like it or not. the people who rise to thech lenge and sinc stop behaving lie children, we will have to take the repoibility they should have taken a long ago. >> reporter: and at the economic conference the yearly gathering ofa the welthy elite in switzerland. >> people like to tell success stories, their financial success has come with an unthinkable price tag, and on climate change, we have to acknowledge that we have failed. >> reporter: acreuoss rope, thunberg has helped spur demonstrations called fridays for future where school kis reeve class to draw attention to climate change. thunberg arrived in the u.s.

last month after crossing the she won't ly because of air travel's carbon output. she's participating in climate events leading up to the general assembly in new york next week where climate activists are planning mass rough protestons friday. i asked her howe sh first learned abut climate change. >> i w completely unaware of everything like everyone else, and i leard abo thiin school, and i learned the basics, that the planet is warming because ofncreased gas emissions that would lead to -- at the global temperature would rise, there would be more extreme weather, a so on. i thought, is this really as ses ser -- serious as they're saying and why isn't it a high

priority. so i started to read about it more and more, ad then i started to understand how acute it actually was and is. >> reporter: why do you think it is? because a lot of other people read the same studies and understand the same facts and, yet, they don't see it as the crisis that you see it as. why do you think other people >> i don't know. it that way? many people seem to have this double moral tha they say one thing and then do another thing, that they sy the climate crisis is very important and yet they do notng about it. and like cognitive -- >> reporter: cognitive dissidence. >> yes. if i know something, if i want to do something, then i go all in and i, like, walk the walk,

walk the talk, because ito want practice what i preach. >> rheorter: you havlorped llgalvanize young people a over the world to care about thidos. ou have a sense as to why young people, in particular, have so embraced this movement? >> it is probably because we are the ones who aree going to be affected by the crisis the most, and for many it seems soor distant, but f us i less ditant because we are the people who are going to live in the future. we have a future. we are those who are going to ha to adapt from this crisis, and, so, that's why i think a lot of people seem threanedd about this, young people more than adults. >> reporter: there isy seemin much evidence around us. we see wildfires, droughts, heat waves, intensifying storms, melting in the arctic and antarctic, extinctn of species, and, yet, as we were

discussing, the evidence is there beforhaus tt it does seem that the sense of urgency is nt as intense as you feel it ought to be. i'm just curious w you think that is. >> i mean,f course, it could be many different things, but i think it is because humans are socialnimals, we follow the stream. no one else is behaving like this. we see this and we think i should probably behave as they do. >> reporter: just go on with life as usu. >> yeah. but for me, i amon the autism spectrum, and i don't usually follow social coding, so that's whi go my own way, and i think that it's a ver strong reason why people just continue because they don't see anyone else t reactithis.

>> reporter: you think your autism in so sense has given you an insight t this or a way to act in response to this that others may not have.e, >> that could definitely. >> reporter: as you know, we have a president here in the wunited state seems dismissive of e science of climate change, and the political party, a major with that, he pulled out of the the nations that did acknowledge the severity of the problem andn on to the paris accord, even those nations are really not toving up heir commitments. so, given that, why do you have hope that we will, as a global society, react? >> i think that peoplare good, that people are not evil, and i thk not everyone, most people, so i think people are just simply unaware of the siuation and people are not feeling the urgency. i think that, once we would

start treating this crisis s an emergency, people will be able to grasp e situation more. all these climate movements that have plyeout during the last i don't think anyone could have predicted the school strike d friday of the future movement to become so big and many other >> reporter: you ta solar-powered boat to come here because u're trying to reduc your own carbon footprint by noi at all anymore. is there a concern that if people are too focused on individual actions like eating less meat or not flying as often, they might bedisomtracted he much larger policy changes you're talking about. is that a worry you have? >> oncourse, that we focus these isolated problems, that we talk about people need eat

less meat or something, that people focus on that.d hen someone else says, no, it's much more effective if everyone stops flying and so on, >>d someone says, no, we need to -- eporter: drive electric cars. >> -- yes, or shut down the coa poants. and we need to focuweon all of these things. of corse, individual change doesn't make much difference in a holistic picture, but it inuences others around you. we need both system change and individual change. >> reporter: if people are listening to you, what one thing would you like them to take away from this? what one thing would you like them to do? >> everyone can ma a hge difference. we should not underestimate ourselves because it's lots of -nif lots of idividuals go

together, en we can accomplish almost anything. so that's what i want people to take out from this. >> reporter: gre thunberg, thank you very much. >> tnk you so much. >> woodruff: we return now to the college admissions scandal. amna nawaz takes a loobeyond today's sentencing of a prominent actress. >> nawaz: this college admissions scandal, which includes felicity ffman and other wealthy parents, has essentially turned into a public indictment of some elite institutions. but, it's also spurred a larger conversation about admissions, access and inequality throughout r system of higher education. paul tough's new book focuses on these very questions. it's called "the years that matter most: how college makes or breaks us." and paul tough joins me now. welcome to the thawrs. tell us, these high profile cases like the one involving

gericity huffman, in the lar world of college admissions, are these the exceptions or the rule? >> i think they are the most extreme exprsion of the kind of inequality, the extra advantages people of affen have. certainly felicity huffman andt other afflurents went further but the competition makes a lot of affluent parents behave crazy. >> reporter: the message we get from higher institutions is we're here to reward higher educatiol excellence. >> there's a disconnect between ways that college institutions part ofeges that are the system talk e abouity and merit and what you actually see when you look at the populations of american colleges and universities at the most highly selective institutions. the student bodies are almostar entirely made up tfhe top

income quintile and those from the bottom are almost absent. affluent. dominated by the >> reporter: is that story true regardless of the type of inns -- institution, whether the harvard's ortanfords, or sta schools, is that the same story everywhere? >> no, there's a real variation, so the mosigt hly selective institutions which are mostly private institutions are dominated by the affluent.t en you look at the less selective institutions inluding community colleges, those are the institutions wherelow income students are most likely to go and the ones we spent least on the students. i feel flip side of the college admission scandal is the scandal of how little we are spending on public higher education. over the last couple of decades, we've cut public funding on higher education by 16%

student. that means the kind of public universities where most low-income students go are not only raising tuition but having to cut corners and that affects the education the students are getting. >> from the college admissions perspective, is this justabout them admitting students who had access to better education and have a leg up in the admissionsr process,aking a decision based on who can pay and what c th pay? >> depends on the institutions. there's a han ul of institutions where the endowment is so huge they don't depend on tuition revenue at all. the reason they're admit morgue high-income students has more to do with culture. for a large number i hghly selective private institutions, there are real financial pressures. about a quart are running a deficit and many more are close to that line. so when they're selecting students to admit, they've got t to think more thasn anything ele about tuition. they're really looking for

stomers and that means affluent students. for admissions officers that leads to a cogti dissidence because they know they're looking for customers who can pay, b the communications department and the president's office at their colleges often talk about merit and diversity >> reporter: tell s how are making the decisions.ces college in hartford, connecticut and the admissions director there a man elmed angerez was and is trying to change th way that trinity does its admissions to become more diverse i socioeconomics ad race. in some ways, he's succeeding, he's making definitely strides. understood, spending time with him is all ofthe precious that exist for him and other admissions officers, the pressure of early admissions, the pressure of sports, the pressure of s.a.t. scores, all

of these factors are weighing on admissions directors like angel and are almost all pointing in the opposite direction. the pressure you get in the admissions office is admit more rich kinds and if you wan t to push back it's often quite >> reporter: you've air feud in your book parts of the admissions process -- things like the s.a.t., right -- but even those give an unfair advantage to wealthy students or students from a wealthy background that they can get tutors and get their s.a.t. sces pumped up and helped justify their admission in many cases. thege board has pushed back on that and said the more information th can provide tofo college admission members, the better, that s.a.t are just one to have the factors that should be considered as a holistic admissionsprocess. what do you say so that? >> there's a longstanding debate si higher edation and particularly adms on the value of the s.a.t. most people agree your high scol grades are the best predictor of how well you will

do in college, and if you add o e s.a.t. te factor, you get a slightly better prediction of how well a student will do. what people who are opposed to the use of sa.t. in college add medication missions is the slight cities b cal benefit of the s.a.t. is outweighed that the s.a.s correlate closely with family income so when you use s.a.t. scores in admissions it's hard not to admit rich kids and admit few poor kids. that's the pushback. >> reporter: part of the ry is we have been told college is the place where there's ennine of opportunity. regardless of where you came from, college can training the trajectory of your life. you'reelling ushere are in-qualities that are institutiothlized based on e wealth you grew up in. what can be done to make it more equal? >> both things are true. absolutely, for individual studeno whom i fllowed in reporting for my book, higherti education is a fantastic

engine of social m mobility. if they're the lucky ones, affluence gives them a boost, their lives change. but the scale is tilted and there are advantages at all levels o. on the higithly elected sids an admissions question and the departments ed to make different decision and use different criteria in the way they're selecting students, but in the system as a whoacialtion what really needs to change, the way that we fund public higher education. i thi part of then.eason that families are so competitive about those mosgt hihly reflective private institutions is we don'tve a robust public system to compete with the private system. if we goun back todi public institutions they will become the real engines of social mobility. >> reporter: paul tough, author of "the years that matter most: how college makes or breaks u" thank you very much. >> thank you.

>> woodruff: stay with us. coming up onhe newshour: ken burns on the story of his upcoming 16-hour film. of on one stage for the first timeh top ten democratic presidential candidates-- according to opinion polls-- squared off in houston last night. over almost three hours, they underlined their own cases for why they should be the party's 2020 nominee.li desjardins was there, and has this report. >> desjardins: it was thete longest deet, allowing for deeper discussion of policy divides, starting with healthcare former vice president joe biden touted his idea to let more americans opt in to medicare, and charged thatniversal healthcare plans from vermontca senator bernie sanders and massachusetts senator izabeth warren simply cost too much. >> my plan for healthcare costs a lot of money.

it costs $740 billion. it doesn't cost $30 trillion. such far, my distinguishedmy friend, the senator on my left is not-- has not indicated how she pays for it. and the nator has, in fact, come forward and said how he's going to pay for it, but it gets him abouhalfway there. >> the answer is on medicare f all-- costs are going to go up for wealthier individuals, and costs are gointo go up for but for hardworking families across this country, costs are going to go down. >> desjardins: vermont senator bernie sanders, who first proposed micare for all, wasme in his e. >> let us be clear, joe. in the united ates of america, we are spending twice as much oh heare as the canadians or any other major country on earth. >> this is america.ut >> yeah,mericans don't want to pay twice as much as other countries. what people want is cost- effecte healthcare. medicare for all will save most

ams icans substantial amountof money on his or her health care bill. >> djardins: the tone turned more aggressive after biden said this about givinmore people the option of buying into medicare: >> if you want medicare, if you lose the job from your insurance-- from your employer, you automatically can buy into this. >> desjardins: former housarg secrjulian castro seemed to misunderstand, thinking biden said people would have to buy in. >> but the difference between what i support and what you support, vice president biden, is that you require them to opt in, and i would quire them to opt in. they would automatically be enrolled. >> they do not havuy in.y in. they do not have to buy in. >> you just said that. >> no. >> are you forgetting what you said just two minutes ago? >> desjardins: some hed castro's words as attacks on biden's age. this morning, castro responded. >> i wouldn't do it differently.

that was not a personal attack. >> desjardins: with that exception, it was a civil debate, with candidates raisingt hands, and calling for common ground. >> a house divided cannot stand. >> desjardins: an emotional center hovered around former texas congressman beto o'rourke, whose hometown of el paso was devastated by a mass shooting in august. o trumpeted his call for a mandatory buy-baassault style weapons, pointing to the bloodshed in his state. >> hell yes, we are going to take your ar-15, your ak-47. >> desjardins: a night rich in policy, candidates weighed in on a constellation of topics, from education... >> sp one, i would appoint a secretary of educaon who actually believes in education. >> desjardins: ...to rac.. >> we have more africaner ans incarcerated today than all the slaves in 1850. we need a plan. >> desjardins: ...to the military. >> i've signed a pledge to end

the forever wars. we've been a state of continuous armed conflict for 18 years, which is not what the american people want. >>esjardins: california senator kamala harris spoke directly to her would-be republican opponent. >> so, president trump, you've spent the last 2.5 years, full-time, trying to sow hate and division among u and i plan on focusing on our common issues, our common hopes and desires, and in ay, unifying our country, winning this election, and turning the page for america. >> desjardins: candidates next widely expected that moret's campaigns will qualify for thell stage. the pbs newshour, i'mrd lisa dess. >> woodruff: and that brings us to the analysis of shields and brooks. that's syndicated columnist mark shields, and "new york times" columnist david brooks.

what did you take away? did one or another help himself or herself? >> if you go by raw qualities, i think klobuchar and buttigieg did the best. otional, the sort ofsom,ut i candidates donald trump probably couldn't pound down very far. among the aders and the people who seem likely to get the nomination, i thought joe biden while wobbly a lot, had the besg night, ning to hit back on warren and sanders on they're going to take away the private insurance. i think warren had a good night, too. the fundamental thing, common iagreement, nothing shift the debate but things sort of solidified a little more and that's probafy good joe biden. >> woodruff: solidified for jodr biden? >> i don't avree with daid, i think he's too glib and too -- (laughter) no, judy, sehow, since the last two debates, the democratit

cand discovered that there had been one democrat since frank lynn roosevelt who twi won the white house with over 50% of the voarkts his name was barack obama. he was the big winnerast night. all of a sudden, he banal th most papillar guy, everyon wanted a piece of barack obama, which worked to joe biden'sad ntage because joe biden is obviously the closest in everybody's mind and actlity to barack obama. so i thought that, to me, there wasn't aame changer, i did not believe. i think elizabeth warren set out -- she's probably maximized her support based upon her plans and ideas which are, let's be fran the senate wilnot pass with 93% support in the co,nt the background checks will not pass it. the likelihood of passing these comprehensive, sweeping changes is remote at best, but, at the

sameime, she fled out her -- she's been al message and little messenger. i thought her messenger part was filled in last night very well. bernie sanders is all message and not messenger. i don't argue with david and his assessment of who did well. thought pete buttigi -- >> woodruff: who did you think did well? >> i thought biden had a good night in the sensee went in wobbly moments. the leader, with he's not somebody who's going to let your guard down al at all times. i do think buttigieg had a good night. he is as disciplined and as thoughtful and as coherent as anybody, and his answer onal natiecurity, he usoned his credential of a military person, i thought, most thoughtfully. the democrats were ptt shallow on national security, and i thought buttigieg, on hisa argumentt it should be a

reupping every three years of an authorization of the use of military force by the congres c thgress has beenissing in action for 18 years.k' >> i think mareference to obama reminds me that where the party center of ideological gravity is. e some of thearlier debates, ama and that sort of democrat was seen as complicit in the status quo and, therefore, that all had to be torn down. >> yeah. and now obama is saying, well, no, 's viewed as a very progressive guy but not asth progressive a sanders-warren wing. so what you saw was a bit ofsu ence of the normal progressive center, and biden's apoll supports suggests s a real thing, in the part becausev african-americers are not the warren-sanders wing and ares sticking with biden. so you saw the klobuchars, thete y tigiegs begin to hit back especia the healthcare issues where people

y you want to pu everyone in the same system. at the same time, people on thet leftiden inays that attract sympathy for biden. weh aw that witthe castro exchange, with the protesters late in the debate when biden was lking about his late wife, and sometimes some of the attacks become so vitriolic people say i lee biden. d> there's a reservoir of goo feeling for joe biden and i saw that among democrats last night. castro was everybody's short list for vice president until he >>sn't, and -- oodruff: do you think last night -- >> i think he was the queen of mean. he was the leonahelmsley of the democrats. >> woodruff: it was low. it wasn't just a throw away line, he came back and repeated it twice to make sure you got it. >> woodruff: he said it wasn't personal. >> who was he talking about? i'm sorry. d i miss something? talking about the institution? so, no, that did not work.

but the one organic moment of real humor in the whole eveningb was coker hen he said my answer is no, talk about wase going to impose his vegan taste upon beef eating texas, and he said, no, and i'll tratens that into spanish, no. that was od. amy klobuchar had good lines, but hiwas organic, and i give him credit for that. but somehow it just doesn't come together with cory booker. >> woodruff: another piece of politics today quickly was the makeup race nrth carolina, the ninth congressional district, a do-over. the repheublicans won, y held on, put by a much narroinr mahan what we saw president trump take that district in 2016. is there a message here for republicans? >> i mean, it could be that there's a message. trump won it be 12 and then they carried it by 2, so that's not a

good thing. my buys is we tend to s clover local regulations with a strictly national perspective, and that we see it only as about donald trump, but the republican party behaved pretty disgracefully in this race of 2018 with corruption anall this stuff which is why we had to have a do-over. so it could have been in part, also, personal sickness with the republican party, ando mccready, as the democrat, he did worse in rural areas than he did ithe first version of this electio and that highlights the core problem for ocrats in places like that, which is they've got to get out of their core and sta winning over people in the more rural areas, and they're still not quite able to do that and mccready is a very centrist candidate, good for that district. >> bleeding for reprkublicans, in the suburbs around charlotte, big time. is disid right that s more local, it's different because of the congressional race or is that something republicans nationally suld worry about? >> republicans have to worry

about it. s we're going to see it tll in virginia where the the statewide election.ected in judy, the meek lynnbercount which is the heart and soul of the republican greater charlotte area, 13% mccready won by. david's absolutely right that these are historically democrat areas. robson county, barack obama got 58% me, 57% another time. hn kerry rar carried it. donald trump carriedt over hillary clinton. those conversions, if youill, those white rural democrats left the democratic party, they f barely brom mccready. he should have carried that county big on tuesday for the democrat. he didn't. i think republicans have a big suburban problem. democrats have the white alrha problem, then it's real.

but they have voted democratic in the past m deocrats can dismiss it and say they're all ra st, they'rel narrow minded. they voted for barack obama in that county, robsocounty. t woodruff: what happened the white hoe this week, david? the president has parted ways with yet anoer national security advisor, representing just the latest sign of a lot of turmoil in his foreign polic policy-national security staff. is thithe typical washington turnover or somhi the american people should be worried about? >> trump administration, always the dippicle washington thing. you should give john bolton credit he did stop some pretty bad things. he seems to have persuaded trumm frting with the taliban at camp did and doing a deal with north korea. trump wanted headlines in the tv ow and bolton looks to be among those who slowed him down

so he gets some credit. there are lots of different players in the foreign policy game, he state department, defense department, the intelligence agency and thesc n is to be running the process, but with trump there's no process. so there are supposed to be principals' meetings, undersecretaries' meetings and differt laser of metings and apparently that the not happening. so trump is conducting foreig policy in the room. we have people in theen intell agency, military, state department, all of whom are irrelevant now because donald trump is watching cnn or whatever and making foreign policy, and i think that's scarca >> woodruff:? scary, judy. john bolton never met a foreign engagement that he didn't like, in my experience. i mean, he loved military confsntation, except when number came up in the draft and he says, i confess, i think the

war in vietnam is not winnable, and, so, he confessed he had no desire to fight in it, which, you know, being an arm cha commando you think might inhibit him from sending other people'so children i war. but watch the shootout or faceoff between him and donald trump was reminded of being an gnostic at a football game between southern methodist trand dame. i wasn't rooting for either side. he was not a yes man. trump wants a yes man and he was not a yes man. >> woodruff: are you sayingou that abt secretarof state pompeo. pompeo played donald trump like a stradivarius all the way to the point where donald trump c gave him tredit for making the decision not to wear both

hats, kissinger, to be both national security and secretary of state. so he's figured it out, just as nikki haley figured it out. >> woodruff: former u.n. ambassador. >> former u.n. ambassador. so i'm just - noti'm not going to miss john bolton. i think he probably did ve a sobering influence at certainnc ons, as david points out. >> woodruff: last thing, ickly, i want to ask you both about ishe prospect for any sort of legislation on guns. all these mass shootings, the democrats are now talking about . ey're pushing legislation. it came up in theebate lastt night. david, democrats are pushing it, mitch mcconnell, the majority leader in the senate, is saying i'm not gointito do this l i know president trump is going to sign something. has it look lik?e right now >> i think the smart thing woulg be to -- marco rubio, susan collins and a few other senators have a red flag bill to withhold

weapons from people who set off psychological red flags, and it might seem modest. beto says he's going to seizewe assaulons, but i think at least crack the wall of inaction and if you get one thing done, then maybe the n.r.a.'s wall has been cracked and you get other things done down theline. i'm not sure democrats see it that way. they may want to have the issue and have some big thing down the line. donald trump said he would be open for background ches. i'm dubious he'll actually do it. ted cruzame out today said don't weaken the republican base, you don't want to do tt. i wouldn't be surprised about >> woodruf 1/5 15 seconds. this has been a huge change, third rail of the american politics, can't go near it. guns changed to violence. we autosaw it in c.e.o.s coming out. i think there's a chang i think beto o'rourke became the

public witness and the plic source last night in a very large way, i think amrica is changing on guns. >> woodruff: mark shields, david brooks, thank viyou. >> woodruff: the latest documentary on pbs from ken burns starts this sunday, and tapping.ely get your foot "country music" is an eight-part series, featuring never-before- seen footage and photos. amna nawaz sat down with burns,a who has d more than t30 films on pbs, chroniche the conversation is part of our ongoing series on arts and culture, "canvas." ♪ ♪ >> reporter: song writer harlan howard famously called

country music three chds and a the truth. merlhagrd said it wasn't fiddle, banjo, melody or lyrics, but a feeling. in a new 16 and a half hour documentary, ken burns and writer davidt duncan trace roots of uniquely american music that hasefied definition. >> country music rose from the bottom up, from the songsng americans o themselves in farm fields and railad yards to ease them through their labors, and songs they sang toer each on porches and parlors and home. >> reporter: burns and duncan chronicle nearly a cetury of country music, all the way back to the big bang moment in bristol, tennessee. jimmy rogers first sang intond rudimentary recording equipment. ♪ ♪ >> reporter: it was opening shot of what would

become a multi-billion-dollar industry. including everything from so-called hillbilly music, to bluegrass, honky tonk son, outlaw jam andhe neotraditional, hard-rocking and pop country sounds of today. eth the music that changed with a medication, caught in a constant tug of war between tradition and progress. ♪ ♪ this latest work by burns comes after deep dives into topics like the civil war, the vietnam war, probition and baseball. and ken burns joins me here now. welcome back to the "newshour". >> thank you for having me. >> reporter: you>>'ve described yourself as a child of rock and roll and r&b. what led you to dig into country music this way? >> good stories. that's what we're looking for. i don't necessarily want to delve into stuff i think i know about, like r&b and rock and

roll. i want to delve into stuff don't know about. but i knew in my gut this eighty and a hars ago that this was going to be filled with unbeliable stories. i just was not prepared for how unbelievable going to be and how revealing they were of us h eaning botthe u.s., the upper case, and us the lower case, the kindf sensitive school yard together. >> reporter: you said one of the goals in the stories is to get beyond the cliches. what are some of the cliches? >> i think thedea that country music is one thing. it's always been many things. even at the beginning, the big bang, there's the carter family and jimmy rogers, but each of them are many different elemts, just like the united states, that make them. they're alloys of i african-americfluences as well as gospel and all sorts of things. so that was a big su we also tend to say, oh, you

know, it's about good old boys and pickup trucks and six-packs of beer and hound dogs. there's nothg wrong with at the and that is a legitimate part of country music, but it's mostly about tw four-letter words most of us would not rather talk loal -e and loss. ♪ we all know and i think obviously the roots of a lot of american music, the uniquely american music are as wide as the wasn't itself. does it surprise you the degree to how wide they are when it comes to the country? >> exactly. it abuts jazz, blues and rhythm and blues. in fact, with brittum and blu, it's the -- with rhythm and blues, it's the par ienof rock and roll. african-american artists are listening to country as wknow and country people are listening to rhythm and blues. so you have a sense of mture where commce and convenience might categorize t into its ownro separate, nband width,

imprisoning it. it's not true and people i country know it's not true and the artists outside of country know it's not true. bob dilan went to nashville. the rolling stones, the beatles played coury songs. that music was singular influences on all those people and somehow we want to segregate it a make it a southern, white, rural conservative force and it may have those elements in it, but what matters is it is popular from maine to san diego to and from alaska to miami, and there's no explaining that with cliches. >> reporter: and that popularity you track beautifully of a century of music, it's now a multi-billion-dollar industry, , 's going to have some of the biggest pop stao, of our american history. one of those is patsy cline, one of the songs that everyone knows is "crazy." there's this one moment in the series in which trisha yearwood is unpacking the power of that one sonatg.

here's a clip from that series. >> wheyou hear h sing, it's sounds like she's in the room d you feel the emotion of the lyric. if you can find the perct song and marry it with the voice it's supposed to go with, it's timeless. ♪ >> reporter: this isf the ideas you come back to again and again, the simimplicity of country music is its power. that's exactly right. if you are distilling these univerl human experiences, as whit my mar sal ease the jazz great says, in country music, the joy of birth, sadness of death, a broken heart, anger, jealousy, rage, getting right with god, skingedemption, all to have the stuff that everybody within the sound oyf m voice has experienced at on point or another in their lives, then you've got a powerful force. now, that song,t perfect song was written by willie nelson, and it's married with

this voice that's entirely different from wilnlie son, and what comes together was an atomic explosion. that's the number one jukebox tune of all time. more nickels were put into jukebox to listen to crazy in honky tonic and bars and is a loons in evethry country ie world more than any other song. >> reporter: despite the roots of the music coming froa t of black music tradition and the gospel songs, songsf enslaved people singing as they worked, black people's stories weren't included in cntry music until charlie pride. a quick clip of the stories he tells in the series where he white audience anhey don'tn all know they're about to see a black country music singer. >> he could drop a pin.

i saiied, land gentlemen, i realize it's kind of unique me coming out of here on a cntry music show wearing this permanent tan. the annute i said that, a big applause. ♪ so i guess they said, well, i'll sit back and see what he's goter to off >> reporter: how does a man country music?ride make it in >> because he's so good. his talent is so good and, at the end ofhe day, that's what people hear. it's what dr. king said. at the end of the day when he opened his mouth i detroit andst ted to sing, it was the content of his character, the quality of his art and not the color of his skin. d he goeon to have 29 number one country hits. he's the first artist of any color to be th cma artist of the year two years in a row. it's an amazing stor when you realize it's us, then there's no them. and i thinthat's the message of country music, i think it's

the message of r&b, jazz, rock, of art itself.s art tee tale of us coming together. >> reporter: there's also the challenge you document in here that women often face in the industry it was largely seen as a bo club, and arguably still today much of boys' club, but there are increble artists, dolly parton, tsy cline, lo ttta lynn tels great story about how she was understanding that women, a growing part of the audience, were receiving her music at the time. i just want to take a quick listen to how she describes what women were doing. ♪ st knew that i was ing through the same thing, too. ♪ and many a night i' laid awake and cried here all along ♪ >> they just bought threcord and see their husband coming on and turned it upan that's whathey did. ♪ don't come home a-drinking with loving on your mind ♪

>> reporter: loretta lynn was singing about some prettra cal stuff for her time. >> one to have the surprising things about the series is women are central to the story in a way they aren't with jazz and other forms. and country music isn't immune to the indigties women have tond suffer, but what's interesting is the original guitarlayer is mother maybelle carter, singing with sarah carter, and you've t a whole line of women. when you get through patsy to loretta, we're in the d 60s. nobody in rock and rs singing don't come home a-drinkin' with lovin' on yourmind. we're thinking about spousal abuse, spousal rape, a woman'st ri her own body even in marriage, this is the same ar women's liberation enters the lexicon. lorea is not copping to a philosophy, but she's speaking to women e erywhere who know exactly at she's talking

about. for me, all of these things, race or creativity or commerce or women, are all trumped by how powerful this music is. i did not expect to beo moved, as someone. who i was in love with other kinds of music. i have fallen love with this music, it has moved me to my core when hank williams says i'm so lonesome i could cry, ere's nobody that doesn't know what he's talking about. the silence of a falling sta rights up a purple sky, and as i wonder where youre, i'm so >> reporter: the wnd the songs and the stories of country music will stay with all of us. ken burns, thank you so much for being here today. >> thank you. >> woodruff: and the domentary series starts on blackberrys on sunday night. and that is the newshour for tonight. i'm judy woodruff.

have a great weekend. thank you, and good night. >> major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: >> kevin. >> kevin! >> kevin?>> dvice for life. life welplanned. lear.more at raondjames.com >> bnsf rameway. >> consucellular. >> supporting social entrepreneurs and their solutions to the world's most prsing problems-- skollfoundation.org. >> the william and flora hewlett foundation. for more than 50 years, advancing ideas and supporting institutions to promote a better wod. at www.hewlett.o. >> and with the ongoing support of these institutis and friends of the newshour.

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♪ hello, everyone and welcome to "amanpour & co." here's what's coming up. >> i think theepublican party of late has lost its way. the most c financial stormrds in the history our country. >> another challenger arises to taken trump. republican candidate for president mark sanford tells us why he thinkse has a shot. then -- >> have i reached the party t whom i am speaki? >> the legendary lily tomlin joins us with her partner in comedy and in life je wagner. plus are we abondninghe children whoccants to an affordable college education. >> >> the message that we're sending to the students is you' on your own. this is not our job to take care of this. this is your problem.