tv The Dylan Ratigan Show MSNBC August 9, 2011 1:00pm-2:00pm PDT
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well, the break news at this hour a showdown. we are watching a major game of clicken play out in the financial markets, and really around the world. good afternoon to you. i am dylan ratigan. it is the private multi-trillion dollar bond investors versus the u.s. government and european central banks. each one betting whether any of these nations can pay off their tens of trillions in debt. the side effects of this game of chicken between the bond margaret and the central banks being felt everywhere, from the u.s. stock markets as they gyrate and swoon to the streets of london, where riots prevail at this hour. at stake, the value of european and american pensions, not to mention all assets and more importantly prospects for western prosperity. investment, job creation, problem-solvi
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problem-solving. after decades of government and bank manipulation of assets, the chickens are coming home to roost and they are being led in this bond war to that effect. the markets here in the states on the stock market side which really is but the tail of the dog in this battle, closing after the fed today announced it will extent record low interest rates for yet another 24 months. again, the markets, quieter by a lot re toiv has we saw yesterday, but the conversation if anything louder. joining us now, director for equity research iq and author of "bailout nation." todd harrison, founder of media and author of "the other side of wall street." a pleasure to see you both again. what is the bet we are seeing play out between the bond investors of the world in europe and here as the central banks and why are the rest of us stuck in the middle of this? >> part of the bet is that uncle sam and various central banks are the cavalry and will come to
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the rescue of banks of investors, of speculators, not so much when it comes to mom and pop working and struggling to save, to put their kids through college. >> why would that bet be a good bet? is it because of the pensions? is it because of the implied threat of the bond default, todd? is there something that -- these bonds speculators have mom and pop don't have to leverage the government and central banks into bailing them out uniquely? >> speaks to the enormity of this and it's been cumulative, building in the course of the last ten years. and it's been skewed by spending margins, the haves versus the have nots. worst for main stream america but most of the media and financial markets are just now waking up to that has everybody sort of experiencing, like waking up to something you thought was a bad dream and finding out it's not. it's actually happening. we actually do owe this money, we actually don't have a lie grade of employment growth or investment, and we do have
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politicians that do not appear to be having a conversation that goes to solving this. before we get to the politicians, are problems like this solvable? is there precedent in history for this, word war 2? give me a sense, when has this happened before organization a version of it. >> understand what we're stuck with. just a marriage to bad ideas. there are ideologists, theories. history shows -- yet people stay married to them. and that includes things like, you could have free lunches for as far as the eye can see. >> i get that. forget the problem. what's the solution? >>-following -- >> what's been used in the past? >> following the great depression we put in a number of prophylactic rules. >> preventative rules. >> okay. >> separated the investment banks that run into spasms every few years from the main street savings banks. >> got it. >> when wall street has one of these regular convulsions it doesn't spill over.
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think back to 1987. a huge crash that didn't affect wall street. once we get rid of the protections -- >> i can use nor analogiesry prof lactics, i'm not going to. why this time it's different, dangerous words. fdr did not another the derivatives. so many -- >> so many equations happening at the same time. >> it's moving so fast. the difficulty, the politician process takes type and the markets move dynamically and with speed. you're seeing it today in an automated robot factor. >> we get that. >> in my opinion, we've seen a lot of drugs that mask the symptoms in terms of policy. >> i get that as well. my question is, have we ever been in a situation like this before? and has anybody ever solved it? for me, i like at 1945. debt restructuring. >> right. >> forbearance for germany. the latin-american bond crisis and the brady bonds, restructuring of all that debt. >> that's right. >> i look at the civil war. has we did with all the debt in
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this country after the civil war, and it's impossible for these, at least for me, to see how you get around $70 trillion here and 2etens ever millions there that looks like the room after world war ii or the room aftery brady -- how do you do this with a debt restructuring? >> the needle pointed towards war. the manifestation of policy now is societal acrimony, check the box. social unrest, check the box and geopolitical conflict. and what has prevailed, we stop saying we're democrats or republicans and start saying we're americans this is just going to fester. >> look, look at what took place after previous crises in some of the small european countries like finland or sweden. they went through that process. you know, the one thing we -- >> which process? restructuring debt? >> completely restructuring bad debts from bad banks. we say to general motors, we're bankrupt?
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we have a court called the bankruptcy court. as uncle sam is the only one -- >> we're going to restructure your debt. >> we'll be the lender to temporarily but yput you throug that. >> that's one company. you're talking about one country. >> one at a time. i get it. across the board, did it with the brady bonds, with the marsh marshall plan. granted a huge incentive after six years are war. let's work this out. high question for you guys is, were there to be the finance minister, the presidents, the leaders of the west and the east in a room and they said, listen, we owe a ton of money. no one's going to pay it back. screwing around with things for decades and we have to make -- have to square the system, in order to move forward. is that a real -- is that conversation possible, todd? >> the most rational outcome, but the most realistic? look at the fed meeting today. three descenter on the federal reserve board of the board members that are actually there.
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>> absolutely. >> we saw with the debt ceiling. we exported the financial crisis. rest of the world is looking at the dollar down 40% in the last ten years and saying why us? why are we taking os taurty measures, we take the bitter pill and you can't agree on policy? no wonder the rest of the world is looking at us in that way and it's up to us to turn around and show what we're made of. >> to add to that, we will eventually get to the point cooler heads prevail, everyone gets in a room and works something out. i fear that's going to take place at much, much worse economic levels. just look at what's going on in greece and what's going on in london with the crowds rioting, buildings burning, cars overturned. here we don't get that unless a team loses a hockey game. the american public hasn't reached the point where they're ready to riot in the streets and nothing's going to change until that happens. >> can i show you the optimistic side? i've been cautious for some time now. we talked in 2008 about how the crisis was manifesting from the financial to the economic to the social sphere knop now argue
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infected the political sphere as well. i've been bearing for some time because i felt we had to go through it to get through it. one could argue the fact we're going through it now and i think that this is going to come in a second wave. the financial crisis was the first wave. i think the sovereign sequel will be the next wave. coming through that, if we can hold it together i think we can there's going to be generational opportunities but we're talking two to three years out from now if we're lucky. >> the rubber, where the rubber meets the road in this instance is in the white house. >> uh-huh. >> at the head of the treasury department. at the head of the american central bank. and among the ceo suites of the currently aaa rated financial institutions and i guess the question i would posit to the two of you is of the board rooms at the big banks, treasury department, federal reserve and the white house, does anybody have any understanding, because my experience has been there's absolute total ignorance to even a willingness to have this conversation, to, can either of
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you report a conversation that goes to the threat of war, the reality of the risk of this level of perpetuated unfairness and distortion in any society going back to rome, and until you square the system either through debt restructuring or some more violent means, it will fester. in other words, you have to go through it, as you were just saying? does the president get this? >> i don't know if he gets this. my instinct says he doesn't, but -- and the evidence of that is the people he put in charge of the treasury, of the rest of the system. you know, when there's an accident or an error in a hospital, and they send in the team of surgeons to fix it, they don't send the guy who screwed it up in the first place. they bring in someone's who's objective and can say, oh, this cut shouldn't have been made and they fix it. the team we have is tim geithner who is he have had the new york fed. certainly a player in sending everything going where it was.
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larry somers under bill clinton. >> unleashed the beast. >> commodity accusation act, released derivatives he signed off on. might have been a republican proposal but a democratic president and treasury secretary said, yeah, this doesn't look too bad and the same with the repeal of the last eagle. putting wall street and main street banks together a government proposal, democratic president and treasury secretary saying, this is okay. so forget whether or not they get it, the guy whose caused this are returning the show. how are they ever going to fix it? >> to be fair i agree, somebody trading derivatives 20 year, the complexity of this, look back to the financial crisis. the people, cooking the brew, the ones that ultimately got poisoned the most. the lens of culpability go to consumers overend tending -- >> my question is, does the president get this conversation? >> i think -- well eeshgs think he's a smart guy.
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i think he has to get it. ultimately he's going to get it but i think the economic condition right now is moving so quickly that it's tough to put your finger on it. i know i stare at the markets all day. it's moving that fast. they have to get in front of it. i don't think -- >> how do you get in front? how does one -- if you have a root problem, you have lied and misrepresented the overall structure. there's misaligned interest in the banking system, in the trade agreements, in the tax code, that have been extracting money from a country for decades. and then that has now covered up through money printing and all the rest of the nonsense. how does the need to acknowledge the existence of the base problem, which is the extraction. >> uh-huh. >> have anything to do with your ability to keep up with the markets today? >> because -- >> why, in other words, why am i less able to understand that my nation is being extracted systematically by multimillion -- millions of multivariable mathematical equations happening constantly every day to my country, why do
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i have to stay on the edge of my bloomberg terminal monitor edge to understand at the root of my problems and until i deal with the root of my problems is that basic extraction? >> okay. in order to understand where we are we have to appreciate how we got here. it you're asking why i have to -- >> i'm saying, i got to wrap it up. i would be loathe to excuse the president, his trite say i don't know what's going on because the stock market's crazy, when the price of the stock market is immaterial to understanding that america is suffering from a vampireic extraction of wealth driven by the tax code, banking policy and trade and whoever the president is has to acknowledge that and reconcile that before we can move forward quickly. >> this all comes back to we used to be a democracy, we're out in a corporateocracy, and the corporations -- >> invested facilitated by the politicians. >> the court is giving them permission to do. so a radical change -- >> right.
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and it's a shame we're left to discuss it at 4:00 in the afternoon on msnbc, these type of conversations should be had in place where is there is a lot more influence over what happens next. i appreciate both of you joining me. joining me for a this conversation. so that all of us can better benefit from an understanding. thank you, todd and barry. from the showdown on wall street to the showdown that is washington. when are they going to quit playing high stakes political games for their own personal advantage when it is the prosperity of the wealthiest most powerful nation in the history of the world that hangs in the balance for their little tittly winks? and it could be game over in wisconsin as voters decide whether to bounce a group of state senators. on location. plus, if you thought politicianless 2340 shame, let us remind you, the author of a flu book on humiliation. that's ahead this hour. just one phillips' colon health probiotic cap a day
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on wall street, cooler heads always prevail. >> you can see the dow jones industrial down almost 300 points. >> we are down more than 400 points's. >> the dow is now down 500 points. >> down 600 points. >> down 631 points. >> wall street spending yet another day in what's being described at freakout mode. >> don't panic! everything's fine. oim just -- i'm just down here looking for my emergency hobo satchel.
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>> ah, yes. we're going to do this all over again. really? we're going to go through a whole other financial crisis because our government can't acknowledge the root cause, which is the fact that there is an extraction in trade, taxes and banking in this country that has been going on for a long time and covering it up by printing money is only a recipe to make it worse. well, government showing no sign of dealing with any of it. so the markets continue that panic and the panic transfers down to washington, where they act all confused as to why it is ignoring al of these problems all these years would possibly make people freak out in the financial markets. critics say the president failed to do enough following the s&p downgrade. that is petty and minor by any order of magnitude. even the president's biggest supporters on every level with this are fed up. we know the dow plummeted after he spoke monday. today the white house cancelled the president's morning speech as well as the white house press
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briefing. which makes me wonder whether there's any way out of this that doesn't acknowledge the root problems that are at the root of trade, taxes and banking, removing trillions from our nation and if this president won't acknowledge, will anybody? let us bring in the mega panel. karen finney, susan del percio and washington inside are jimmy williams. i might add that as of 3:52 this afternoon, karen and susan and jimmy were stuck on a train outside of penn station. they were in a tornado, but because of their obligation and their sense of responsibility not only to me and to susan but to all of you our viewers -- >> you are so full of it. >> they made it. >> anyway, nice to you have guys here. susan, with the political structure being what it is, i lose my job if i intervene in
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someone that takes away a special interest because of what they're into or whatever it is subpoena any way any president or any congressman can intervene with the problem we have right now. whether the need to actually tackle the banking system ignored in 2008, the need to tackle the tax code ignored for god knows how long they've been ignoring it. the need to tackle the trade negotiations that were brilliantly frented and have lots of here toy when they came out in the '90s but proven not to create investment or prosperity but the primary driver of our trade deficit, look no further than china, in this political system, can a leader address these issues considering how dependent they are for funding, for political campaigns, from the banks, from the international trade organizations, and from those who benefit from those tax loopholes he or she would have to close? >> right now you -- it's not going to come from congress. it's not going to come from an individual congress, house of rememberives or the u.s. senate.
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nor does anyone expect it to. who does it fall on? on the executive. on the president. and the president since day one, since refusing to even say where he stood on the public option when he came into elective office has not led this country. i've given this president credit and breaks here and there certainly and i give him credit for what he did with obama excuse me, bin laden, but he has been a complete and utter failure and disappointment to this country, and you know what? and i go to the president, because that's who you hold accountable. just like in you city you hold the mayor or the governor responsible. >> it is the congress that holds the power of it's purse. back to dylan's president. this president was willing to put on the table, who couldn't get the votes, john boehner. $4 trillion. >> we owe $70 trillion. >> i understand that. walk out a $4 trillion solution, a way for the demming to avoid dealing this until 2017.
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i'm not here about plans for 2017. i'm say we have a real problem and i'm tired of republicans and democrats, republicans who want to burn the place to the ground and democrats, all due respect, who want to offer a plan that gets it through the end of their second term of their presidency and then screws me and my kids when it's over. until we do that we have to deal with the extraction that is at foot, it is the reason the financial markets are behaving, they're behavioring, a plathmatical fact. this is not some opinion. this is a mathematic fact. tens of trillions of dollars are being extracted from the united states of america. democrats aren't doing it. republicans are not doing it and entire integrated system, financial systems, trading system, taxing system, that was created by both parties over a period two decades, is work on our entire country right now and we're sitting here arguing about whether we should do the $4 trillion plan that kicks the can down the road for the president to 2017 or burn the place to the
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ground. both of which are reckless, irresponsible and stupid, and the fact of the matter is, until we actually -- i'm sorry to lose my temper, but i'll tell you what, i've been coming on tv for three years doing this, and the fact of the matter is, that there's a refusal on both the democratic and the republican side of the aisle to acknowledge the mathematical problem, which is that the united states of america is being extracted. it's being ex-trated through banking. it's being extracted through trade and it's being extracted through text agency and there's not a single politician that has stepped forward, susan, to deal with this. >> there's only one right now. the leader of the free world, werther you like it or not, the president of the united states is arguably one of the most powerful individuals we have out there and he's our president. >> exactly the point that dylan is making. it's not about one guy. it's about all of -- them together -- >> no. dylan --. >> i agree with her. it is about one guy. >> what would you like him to do? >> i would like limb to go to the people of united states of
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america and say, people of the united states of america, your congress is bought. your congress is incapable of making legislation on health care, banking, trade or taxes, because if they do it they will lose their political funding, and they won't do it, but i'm the president of the united states, and i won't have a country that is run by a bought ko congress. i won't work with congress and working with congress. i'm going to abandon the congress, like teddy roosevelt did and go to people of the united states and say, you've got to block congress. and until we get rid of the blocked congress, jimmy williams' constant point. get the money out of politic, and until the president says that's the problem and says he's going to fix it, there is no policy i can possibly see no matter how brilliant your ideas or my idea or her idea or your idea at home is that idea will not happen as long as there's a capacity to basically fire a politician who disagrees with me by taking funding away from
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mere. was that a fair assessment? >> money and politics is the root of all political evil. it corruption at its worse. until we step up and kick that out of the park, it's going to be the same system all -- >> and only the president can do that. >> no, no. yong la to do it, too. >> how bad does it have to get? how much money has toish extracted? >> physically, what do you do? >> you go and give a speech. >> right now? >> yeah. right now. >> right now? then what happens tomorrow? >> tomorrow what happens is you begin the process of actually investing in solving the problem. >> how? >> how? i create an infrap structure bank with 2% lending immediately. there's -- once i explain to people the problem, i explain you have cancer, once you understand how screwed up your trade, tax and banking policies are, believe me, you will have no issue when i incorporate an infrastructure bang i fund with repatriated offshore money i
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bring if it and use to direct lending to every business in america, when you realize that the banking system is fully corrupt and defrauding us, and i come out and say that, which is what i want my president to do, that that is -- at that moment i say, you know what? we've got a screwed up situation here, people. you all know it and now i'm going to admit it. as a result, not only have i admitted it but we'll begin the process of solving it like grown-up, did it after world war ii, in a latin america with the brady bonds. what am i going to do? work this afternoon. the middle class attempting to fight back in wisconsin. what today's big recall election tells us about the mood in america. ed schultz joins us and wisconsin, the jumping off point for the latest blog on dylanratigan.com, two-thirds of corporations pay sill ch zilch congressing while teachers and cops pick up the slack.
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the theme today, gamesmanship. playing out not just in wall street but in the state of wisconsin pt voters in the polls in six districts in what could be largest recall election. the latest in the battle over union rights and budget cuts and viewed as a referendum on conservative governor scott walker. our specialist today no other than than ed schultz live from madison what he calls ground zero in the fight for the middle class. we're talking about the policies and the financial markets shenanigans. edward, you are smack dab in the middle of the street level realities of these problems. give me a sense of just how disproportionate and unfair the asset tax and employment picture is.
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>> well, right now watching you, dylan i think that's kind of the emotion that has been shown here in the leadup to this recall election, which is absolutely astounding. on the ground right now in all six districts they are seeing presidential turnout. presidential turnout. it's august 9th. it's hot out. it's in the middle of the summer. this isn't an election year, and these middle classers are passionate about what's being attacked, and that is their livelihood, that is their ability to be involved in collective bargaining and the people are responding at an unbelievable rate. now, the democrats will sit here and tell you, well, this is our ground game at work. republicans saying, well, we've outspent, buts 40ds million into six races in this state. there's a tremendous amount of anticipation as to how this is going to unfold, and, really, nobody knows who it favors. the democrats are pretty confident right now that they're going to get the magic number of
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three. and this is, dylan, about justice's injustice. maybe an leelectorate asleep in 2010. but when a radical governor came in and proposed things never seen before, it kicked sleeping giants. everything that happened in this state, the protest, the due diligence, getting the signatures signed to have the petition recalls put in place, going through the state candidates, everything's been big. everything about this has been big. today it's a big turnout, and we're going to have a big result tonight. i think the democrats should be feeling pretty good about what's going on right now, because it seems rare that people would come out in droves to protect what they have and that would be the republicans. okay? so all of these six districts were won by barack obama. all of these six districts were won by governor walker. so it's a toss-up. we'll see how it goes.
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it it's interesting to see. >> karen finney, ed. your thoughts. regardless what happens, obviously i hope the democrats win, we've accomplished so much. talking about kicking a sleeping giant. i feel dylan every plap phis a lot of the anger we're seeing in the kutht, but if we can see this level of activism going forward, i firmly believe it's not just up to the president to fix the problems. i think people have to get engage and fix the problems people weren't engage fld 2010. that's why they got the republican legislature but ehope republicans feel be emboldened to keep going regardless of what the results on tonight. >> karen, it needs to be poibtszed out the president has been non-existent in this process. president obama visited wisconsin numerous times before the election in 2008. he also came here and stumped for russ feingold, but throughout this entire process, he has been non-existent and the white house has been pretty much quiet. a lot of folk here in wisconsin
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have noticed that. and they are taking the bull by the horns. they're doing it on their own, and they're showing the message tonight to the white house is going to be, stand up and fight. if they get the victory here tonight, it's going to be big for the progressive movement. if they get three, maybe four seats. it will show the rest of the country that grass roots organizing, the passion of the people, can outdo the coke brothers' money or any other money that comes into the state. this is also, as dylan said correctly, this is a referendum on governor walker, but it's also a statement against citizens united. this is the template on how to beat the big money. that's what's so intriguing about all of this. >> go ahead, susan. >> susan del percio. i'm wondering you said a few times here we are, it's it's people's fight. seems it's a national fight actually from what i read you have labor folks coming in from around the country. tea party folk coming in from around the country. the democrats outspent the
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republicans at least two to one from what i've seen in the reports, and i'm just curious. how much is this really about the folks in wisconsin versus someone trying to make this a national movement? >> well, respectfully, let me correct you. all of the democrats have been outspent in total dollars in every one of these districts. now, on a local level, there are some democratic candidates who have raised more money personally than some of the other republicans that are up for recall, but total dollars coming in, it's not even close. the republican money, the tea party money, that has come into the state far exceeds what the democrats have been able to do. that's the first thing. the second thing it is a national referendum, because we're in this big conversation in this country about priorities. what's important to families? collective bargains. health care. wages. pensions. all of these things. you can go to new jersey, the attack on education.
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you can go to senate bill 5 in ohio. can you go to what rick snyder is doing in michigan, but right now all eyes focus on wisconsin. but it's really a microcosm of what's happening around the country. >> yeah. >> that's what makes it intriguing and it's important in many ways for the democrats to score a victory here tonight, because if they don't, you can believe that the republicans are going to say, see? they're making a lot of noise, but we have the correct path for america. >> my own issue with that, the same democrats who may be substantially better than the republicans but the same democrats giving me extractionary bank code, trade agreement, i'm not sure how relieved i feel when democrats beat the republicans this way. getting a passive/aggressive murderer as opposed to about ax murderer? do you feel much better? we thank you, ed, and the panel for indulging and unexpected emotion on my part quite honestly, but one i actually
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feel fortunate to be able to communicate, and i thank you for indulging it, and i hope you all have a good rest of the week. karen, susan, jimmy. coming up here, match game has new dna brought the fbi any closer to catching d.b. cooper? the results next. on our car insurance. great! at progressive, you can compare rates side by side, so you get the same coverage, often for less.
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wow! that is huge! [ disco playing ] and this is to remind you that you could save hundreds! yeah, that'll certainly stick with me. we'll take it. go, big money! i mean, go. it's your break, honey. same coverage, more savings. now, that's progressive. call or click today. whose non-stop day starts with back pain... and a choice. take advil now and maybe up to four in a day. or choose aleve and two pills for a day free of pain. way to go, coach. ♪ way to go, coach. navigating today's real estate market is complicated. you've seen the signs. that's why having the right real estate agent is more important than ever. at remax.com, you can find experts in short sales or bank-owned properties or commercial real estate, agents who can help speed up the process, no matter how intricate. and that's good news, whether you're trying to sell or hoping to buy. because the only sign you really want to see is "sold."
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well, the feb fib's hoped to get answers in the d.b. cooper mystery turneder into another dead end. the man who hijacked a plane in 1971, claim head a bomb, demanded money. never blew the bomb, didn't have it, in fact. escaped parachuting out the staircase of the back of the plane. one you don't want to walk down. still on the run 40 years later, doesn'ta provided by a woman claiming cooper is her uncle does not match, does not match,
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dna left on the tie left on the plane. maria cooper claims her uncle showed up injured at her oregon home days after the hijacking, talking about, well, a hijacking and being rich, but, again, didn't match the tie apparently his found on the plane. so d.b., if you're still out there and watching, just know you have an open invitation to drop by the show anytime, or if you prefer the hot line in the control room is always open. give us a call. do stay tuned here. our next guest says a life of humiliation can tell you about being human. ♪
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our next guest says he was inspired to write his book by three national speech, michael jackson, the bill clinton monica lewinsky scandal and abu ghraib humiliation, our obsession with an fear of seeing our vulnerabilities exposed. joining us, anger of "humiliation." we were discussing going to commercial what is the point ever this book? what is the point ever this book? >> to recognize we all have been humiliated at some point in our lives and to acknowledge there might be actually some perverse game in having survived this. >> what was the benefit of going through that level of humiliation? of bill clinton, with monica
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lewinsky, of michael jackson. of tiger woods, another one that gets talked about a lot in that scheme of humiliation. what is the potential benefit? >> for them, they lose their false self. they lose their brittle poses. they can integrate their personality, perhaps, but for us watching, i think there's the benefit of pity, terror. what spectators felt. >> marketable -- >> yes, marketable. i'm not for exposing public figures. there's a point in my book that says we should not shame those in power or even those not in power. you should never scapegoat. that's bad. >> what of the benefit that comes through humiliation which allows you then to see another way? >> well, you have gone through hell, and everything after hell is a skeeth lounge basically. first class.
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>> once bill clinton makes it through monica lewinsky. >> it's just coasting, hang gliding for the rest of his life. >> and is there a lesson for all of us in that? in other words, we need to humiliate ourselves in some way such that we can have that free pass? >> a stenographer's lesson, don't make unfun of somebody when he or she is down because it will come back to haunt you later. so don't -- >> sound like my first grade teacher which, by the way, was right. >> when the next bill clinton comes around, don't stand mocking on the sidelines and say, bad boy. say, i've been there, too. get give him his privacy and basically don't -- let's not behave -- >> people are not going to do that. listen, not that i don't agree with you or that -- and i understand that, but you and i both know that that's not how it's going to be which i think is an interesting, presents an
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interesting psychological theory almost. had is what is it in the crowd that is so delighted, so pleased had anthony weiner puts his penis on twit jer when bill clinton -- there's glee in the crowd when this happens? >> i think just to laugh, a lot of us feel glee but a lot feel pity and terror. we say, how embarrassing for him, for his wife. you know, it was just his genit genitals. it's not the end of the world. >> right. >> i think we don't all feel clear. i think the loudest voices in the country express a kind of a tuperative glee are spripted into imagining it. i didn't fee glee. i felt commiseration and identification. >> in that is an impeccably made point on your part. let's accept your premise. i agree with it. you have humiliation. you have a small percentage that speaks to monotize, a population
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that grabs attention. no better than these humiliating events. make a lot of money. anthony weiner, anne casey, kim kardashi kardashian, whatever it is, attention creates money. it's for silly people. if there's a sense that you described of self- -- of empathy, of shame, of, oh, with wish we weren't dealing with this, whatever it might be, but there's an economic mod that can get rich exploiting that event -- where does that leave all of our relationship with each other and our own respect for one another and our own humility to actually solve problems at a time when we're going to need a lot of it? >> let's just say economic motive should not determine ethical conduct any more than slavery was good for the economy. >> it was. 2 was. >> that does not change the fact it's morally reprehensible and
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scapegoating may make money but not necessarily the behavior we should encourage. i should say, i like reading gossip. >> understand we know that of course. >> i don't buy it. i just watch it for free. >> so if it's free content -- >> waiting in line on supermarkets. >> then you're fine. >> yes. >> if you were to look at resolution. >> yes. >> which is really has humiliation is something that tends to happen on the road to resolution. >> yes. >> where did, does the resolution lie for those who have been humiliated? not everybody does it. in other words, some people go through humiliation and then ge through a period of resolution and they come out and they're happier, healthier and more engaged, and others go through a period of humiliation and don't go through resolution and don't know what to do and they're tiger woods, never show -- they can't play golf anymore. the whole thing. how do you go from humiliation
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to resolution? >> you don't kill yourself. survived childhood. become an adult, you'll survive it. go on. wait for your second act, wait for your comeback. nixon did it. i don't like nixon but he survived the chequer speech. the public has amnesia. look how quickly eliot spitzer renovated himself. totally applaud him for that quick rehabilitation. i think it's just -- wait -- go silent for a while. return with -- with a more sophisticated story. perhaps. and a more thoughtful attitude towards yourself. >> if you were to look at all the stories of humiliation in this book. you did say that you loved to read it. i'm assuming -- >> it makes me sick a little, but -- i'm on the side of the humiliated. it's a project of -- >> your ssolidarity was humilia
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quietly sickened by observing the humiliation. >> it is, but i learned how, i think, to be more humble in my own life by watching these spectacles and i don't think i engender the spectacles. we're not talking about abu ghraib which is just a whole -- >> that is a national humiliation. >> like liza minnelli i talk about a lot in the book. i i'd like in a way to see had you blow it on the air, but i still love her. >> you are, i think, somebody who speaks for a lot of people when you say that. and it's a pleasure to meet you and it's nice to see the book. "h "humiliation." check it out. >> thank you. coming up on "hardball," another wave election in 2012. hoop gets drowned? we both know unless they actually reform the political system we're all getting drowned. first, madison, wisconsin, a home town bringing the
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cheesehead perspective officer the state of the state's politics. ♪ ♪ introducing purina one beyond a new food for your cat or dog. i was told to begin my aspirin regimen. i just didn't listen until i almost lost my life. my doctor's again ordered me to take aspirin. and i do. [ male announcer ] be sure to talk to your doctor before you begin an aspirin regimen. [ mike ] listen to the doctor. take it seriously. but when she got asthma, all i could do was worry ! specialists, lots of doctors, lots of advice... and my hands were full. i couldn't sort through it all. with unitedhealthcare, it's different. we have access to great specialists,
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all right. joining us now, david goodfriend with an ode of his own state of wisconsin. hi, david. >> hey, dylan. i have a devotion make. i didn't come here to my home town of madsoison, wisconsin fo the recall. i came home for my 25th high school reunion to see if the other men lost as much hair as i have. i learned i'm about average in the madison west high school hair loss department. that's the good news. but the bad news is that the administration of governor scott
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walker and his republican allies have done more to divide my home state than anything in my lifetime. my high school buddies and i hailing from many different political we are situations agree. it's makes perfect sense wisconsin would turn out to be ground battle for america's future going into this presidential election. wisconsin has always been a closely divided state politically with leaders of conservatism and progressivism emerging here. to conservatives this is home of red scare leader joe mr. clinton karnlgy. welfare reformer tommy thompson and budget cutter paul ryan. 0 to progressives wisconsin is the loam of fighting bob who took on big business and fought for liberal wage or nelson or russ feingold. two very different traditions living side by side for decades. my high school friends and i to this day can have friendly debates between the thompson republicans and progressives. that's how it used to be.
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but not anymore. governor scott walker by aligning hems with out state wealthy conservative zealots like the coke brothers in citizens for strong america turned this quiet state into a political war zone. the other side is not blameless, taking lots of union money from washington to fuel their side the debate, but this election today broke all funding records with a vast majority of the over 30 million compare dollars coming from outside groups. just match fn that money had been spent on schools like my old high school here. could the coke walker crowd, destruction and division are the goal, not something to be avoided. recently it was discovered that the walker administration sought to cut the number of drivers' licenses offices in democratic neighborhoods, and then increase them in republican neighborhoods. a totally transparent attempt to reduce democratic voter registration. this was after republican legislators in that building behind me forced vote after vote without allowing full debaters sufficient public input.
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we are talking slimy, sleazy, paranoid anti-democracy, anti-american tactics pitting neighbor against neighbor all sponsor bitd out of state interests that don't care about this community. that's what walker brought here and what wisconsin now wants to stop. that's what america wants to stop. before the destroy and divide crowd drives our country off a cliff. after my high school wree union i have hope. if a bunch of balding cheeseheads from different political persuasions system can hoist a brew honor of bucky badger, there's hope for this state and this country after all to forge its way around wreckage of the walker republicans and their big money union agitators. dylan? >> so i guess my only question is, if all of those democrats and republicans were all bought off by the coke brother, would the democrats be any better? in other words, your narrative subjects it's the republicans's fault when on a national level it was actually the democrats who unleashed bank trade and tacticxt
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