i have not read it. i don't have a copy yet but thanks to charlie savidge at "the new york times" reading it we know that while dick cheney was unconscious last year for weeks after a heart surgery he had a long vivid dream living in the villa. to get coffee and newspapers. knows e regret as his time as vice president is he did not start enough wars. cheney's book says he aurnged for bombing syria in 2007. mr. cheney's first interview about his book will air sunday on "dateline" nbc, on the "today" show on wednesday and "morning joe" on thursday. will dick cheney ever be on this show, will he? i very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very hope so some day. now it's time for "the ed show." good night. good evening, americans and welcome to the "the ed show" live in from minneapolis. tonight a state of emergency has been declared in maryland. the president has signed an emergency declaration in north carolina.

hurricane irene is getting ready to pound the east coast and we will have the latest with live reports and then there is the latest with the republican front-runner for the presidential nomination. the more we find out about rick perry, the less there is to like. this is "the ed show." let's get on work. >> i dislike washington. i think it's a shady place. >> tonight there, is more on rick perry's seed i record in texas. an expect report in "the huffington post" says rick perry's administration wanted to help wall street investors gamble on how long retired texas teachers would live. author of the report zach carter and our rick perry expert, jim moore are here. the dick cheney memoir keeps popping out dandies. guess which country he wanted to bomb in 2007? tonight, "daily show" co-creator lizz winstead and mike papantonio are here. and the party that couldn't be

bothered to pay for two wars is back at it again. republicans are playing politics with disaster relief, as irene gets ready to pound the east coast. >> good evening, folks. good to have you with us tonight. texas governor rick perry is now the clear-cut front-runner for the republican presidential nomination. he leads the pact by double digits and three new national polls. gallup has perry ahead of mitt romney 25% to 14%. public policy polling put perry ahead 27% to 17%. and rasmussen shows perry with an 11-point lead over romney, 27% to 18%. so let's welcome governor rick perry of texas to the national spotlight that comes with being the new front-runner. now, the american public is about to find out who this guy is at the top of the polls, and i don't think they're going to like him. in many ways he's a lot like his republican opponents. like mitt romney, perry is a

flip-flopper, changing his positions on social security and immigration. like michele bachmann, he's prone verbal gaps sist as threatening violence against fed chairman ben bernanke. but this new information that is coming out shows perry could be just another sleazy texas politician. this is another rick perry classic. check it out. >> and i'll promise you this, i'll work every day to try to make washington, d.c. as inconsequential in your life as i can. >> this self-proclaimed anti-government crusader has created thousands of government appointments for his political benefactors at taxpayers' expense and provided over an attempted insurance scheme that tried to profit from retired texas schoolteachers. this is unbelievable. we all know trading campaign contributions for government

favor's almost a sport in washington, d.c. and i think if rick perry becomes president, he will be the sport's mvp. here's what happened down in texas. a state fund was setup by perry called "the texas enterprise fund" and it was supposed to promote business growth, got it? now "the new york times" revealed that the fund game millions to companies that made campaign contributions to governor perry and the republican governors association, and of course, rick perry was the head of that association. in fact, since 2001, almost half of all megadonors to rick perry's gubernatorial campaign received business contracts, tax breaks or political appointments. this is crony government at its worst, folks. and if you have a hard time remembering what crony government lead to think back to almost six years ago this week. >> again i want to thank you all for -- and brownie, you're doing a heck of a job. fema's director's working 24.

>> one of the biggest lessons of the bush administration is that crony government leads to bad government. in texas that chronee government helped bring in campaign money but that's peanuts compared to the $700 million perry tried to grab in 2003 by setting up an elaborate insurance scheme that targeted retired schoolteachers in the state. "the huffington post" reports that the plan would have allowed swiss banking giant ubs to buy life insurance policies on elderly teachers and create a speculation business with wall street investors, gambling on when these teachers would die. the state would get paid for being the middle man in this gambling ring. if this sounds familiar to you, it's because the setup is similar to the same market scam that allowed wall street to bet on the value of people's homes leading to the financial collapse of 2008. i know it's unbelievable, isn't

it? one of the architects of the mortgage-backed securities scandal was former republican senator from texas phil gramm. and here's a shocker for you. graham was the ubs employee who helped perry set up the insurance scheme. now the scheme ultimately collapsed when the details went public. but even as perry was planning on creating an elderly teacher death pool, he was signing off on cutting benefits to retired teacher health plans. he doesn't quit. you know this is your front-runner, republicans. this is your guy that's leading the polls. and if he does not waltz to the nomination, this is the man who will be facing barack obama in 2012. many think he will waltz to the nomination. he says he wants to make government insignificant. it turns out, it seems to me that government is very significant for rick perry's wallet in the way he operates. get your cell phones out. i want to know what you think. tonight's text question. given the reporting on rick

perry, do you trust him to run the government? text "a" for yes, text "b" for no to 622639, and go to our blog at ed.com msnbc.com. zach carter reporter for "the huffington post" who broke the details of perry's insurance scheme. zach, good to have you with us tonight. excellent reporting. how did perry get retired teachers to sign on to this? or did they even know that this was going on? >> well, of course, the scheme ultimately collapses, so nobody does actually sign up for it. but the basic pitch that the perry administration was making was to pay people $50 to $100 to sign over their consent to have ubs, this swiss banking company, take out life insurance policies on them. and if these life insurance policies paid off when these people died, ubs and a bunch of wall street speculators would make money, but the families of the retired teachers would make nothing. and one of the biggest problems,

technical obstacles for this program, of course because it was targeting elderly, was figuring out how to get people between the ages of 75 and 90 to actually sign over their rights here to give informed consent while proving they the mental capacity to do so. >> unbelievable. how active of a participant was governor perry in all of this? was he a ringleader in it? was it his idea? was he pushing hard for it? how involved was he? >> this is what's remarkable. when the texas press catches ahold of this in 2003, perry sort of let's rick -- sorry, he let's phil gramm. he was well aware of the details of the plan and that his administration really wanted this to happen. he was trying to get teacher's groups on board with this from the very beginning. >> all right, well, rick perry has been re-elected governor

since this was all happening and since it went public. how did he handle this in the campaign, and why didn't it affect his campaign? because he won. >> well, that's remarkable. just about nobody involved with this scheme ends up taking a serious political hit. rick perry and phil gramm remain very close to this day. phil gramm's just endorsed perry for president. rick perry's son goes to work for ubs, shortly after this happens, and then ubs makes a big pitch led by phil gramm to privatize the texas state lottery just a few years later so it didn't seem to have much of a long-term impact on his political career at all but still a remarkably morbid scheme for taxpayers to be sort of playing bookie here for wall street gamblers going after you know dead teachers. >> zach, address the cronyism. if you given direct perry's campaign, are you going to get a deal in the end somewhere? >> well, it depends. but generally in politics, you're much more likely to get the ear of lawmakers and elected officials if you spend a lot of money on campaign contributions. now phil gramm certainly spent a

lot of money on campaign contributi contributions. he gave hundreds and thousands of dollars to rick perry's gubernatorial campaign but rick perry and phil gramm go way back. perry was a student at phil gramm's texas a&m university who was an economic student for him and a sourcer for the story who said he literally worships at phil gramm's feet economically. so this goes very, have been far back. they're very close. but of course there's an awful lot of money involved in it as well. >> so the underlying message, i think, in this story is in the big picture, wall street is really going to like rick perry. can we draw that conclusion? i mean this guy's willing to do deals so big financial firms and banks can haul in a ton of dough. that's what i'm taking from your story. in guy will be wall street friendly if he's ever given the opportunity. fair enough? >> just about the only thing that's clear from this deal that phil gramm concocts is that he and ubs will make a lot of money very quickly. it's not really clear people who actually buy these bonds are going to do and it's really not

clear how texas' going do. it's certainly clear that retired teachers and working people will not see a dime there this, but it's obvious that right up front, immediately, a giant wall street bank and one of its top operatives is going to make quite a bit of money. >> and we urge our viewers on "the ed show" tonight to go to "the huffington post" and see the excellent post by zach carter and learn more about rick perry. we'll have you back no doubt. turn to jim moore, "the huffington post" contributor and author of the upcoming book "adios mofo: why rick perry will make america miss george w. bush." i think we just pointed to a story that will be in your book. >> first example. >> unbelievable. what do you make of this story? and how did it fizzle out? what happened here from what you know, jim? >> well, it's very much like what happens down here all of the time is it gets a little bit of attention, and then everybody goes, well, this is just the way texas government runs. it's pay for play. plast night you had on your show a teacher talking about the tens of thousands of teachers who are

going to lose their jobs. and if people will just pay a little bit of attention for just a few minutes to a number of stories that are coming out on your program and others about the way this guy uses the government like an atm, at the same time that he's getting rid of tens of thousands of teachers, he's approached by a guy named red mccombs a former automobile dealer from san antonio on the spurs. a big-time business guy. who wants to bring formula 1 racing to austin. we're cutting $4 billion out of the budget to get i received teachers and cutbacks at schools, but at the same time perry gets the state to commit to $10 million a year -- $25 million a year over the next ten years. my math isn't very good but i think that's about $48,000 a year for 500 teachers but instead we'll end up with a formula 1 track because of an influential supporter of rick perry, who's given him hundreds of thousands of dollars through the years. this is how he runs government.

>> and can our viewers tonight visualize this formula 1 track, maybe casting a shadow when the sun is going down over schools in the neighborhood that are rundown that are underresourced? i mean, that's basically the picture i'm taking from what you're saying tonight on that story tonight, jim. excellent reporting. also, how do you -- do you think that this story that's in "the huffington post" could haunt him in his run for the nomination? i mean, why wouldn't the other candidates jump all over this if they're trying to defeat rick perry? now he survived it in re-election bid obviously for the governor's chair in texas, but do you think that this will have a national impact? >> i think people have to look at these things and then project forward, as you're suggesting, ed, how will he run the united states government? you know, he says he wants government to be as inconsequential as possible in our lives, but if you're a big business, it is not

inconsequential. now i'm going to speculate here that what he does when he becomes president, he's looking that the big pot of money that's sitting over there that's social security, and just as karl rove began to suggest, maybe take a piece of that money and give it to wall street and say, oh, let wall street grow this fund, let wall street make this bigger, instead of just letting it accumulate its annual growth. these are the kinds of things that you can expect under rick perry. big business is going to have a fren and he's going to write every check that they want and little guys are going to have a very difficult time getting from day to day. >> what do you make of him jumping out in all of the polls that we've quoted at the top of this broadcast tonight? i mean, he has just -- >> yeah. >> -- thrust himself now the front now the double digits ahead of mitt romney and michele bachmann and a critical look at bachmann's campaign ever since perry's jumped in this could be the beginning of the end of bachmann. what do you make of the polling? >> well, two things. number one, as you know, american politics, ed account

are very verseral and it's how you look and sound. rick is obviously a guy that looks very good to camera. he's very poised on the podium, and he communicates well. the trouble is when he communicates honestly about things that does him some harm. the other issue here is the animating forces, as i've suggested before, within the primary process. and rick -- rick is communicating to right wingers, fundamentals, evangelicals, people who really believe in these radical concepts that he has and the more he communicates with them the better he does in that nominating process. let's hope that this doesn't transfer into a general election. >> jim moore, great to have you with us. thanks so much for joining us tonight. i appreciate it. >> my pleasure, ed. >> remember to answer tonight's question there at the about screen. we want to know what you think. did dick cheney tell-all book, got it coming out, no retreat, no regrets. i mean he's just digging in. and the east coast is preparing for a major storm, hurricane irene is coming. we'll bring you the latest. stay with us. we're right back.

good job, man. nice! okay, halftime. now, this is my favorite play. oh! i'm wide open. oh, fumble. fumble. don't want to fumble any of these. [ male announcer ] share what you love, with who you love. kellogg's frosted flakes. it's up... and it's good! good?! they're grrreat!

morning i picked up an

article entitled "house gop lawmakers worried voters anger over an economy could sting them." a comment which was made by republican congressman tim johnson of illinois really jumped out at me in this article when he said, "i've never seen people as angry as they are right now. being an incumbent in either chamber, in either party is an unpopular brand. i'm trying to show people that i'm different, that i listen, and they don't engage in a lot of partisan. huh-uh, folks when i read that i was jumping up for joy. when i read johnson's statement i had the producers of this show "the ed show" get ahold of him right away, because i wanted to speak to a republican who isn't interested in playing partisan games and is about his own party's plan to create jobs you know what i mean? i wanted to talk to somebody who wanted to do something to create jobs. and to his credit, johnson agreed to come on this program. i mean, we booked the studio. we were ready to rock and roll,

he was all locked up and then he must have talked to somebody and then johnson chickened out. congressm congressman, the invitation remains on the table. i want to be having an honest discussion with you about john boehner's plan for helping president obama create jobs, because i know that's what everybody in this country's talking about, jobs. i want to know what the republicans will do to help the unemployed, to fund schools, and encourage big business to maybe reinvest in american workers. i mean, i'd like to know. congressman johnson, if you want to have a nonpartisan conversation, buddy, i'll give you the whole program. congressman, those things i just mentioned are just -- just i think, i'm guessing, just a few things that maybe your constituents are probably concerned about. next up, dick cheney says he has no regrets about his time as

vice president. i'll talk to mike papantonio and lizz winstead about cheney's tell-all. and later even after an earthquake rocked his home state of virginia and the east coast prepares for hurricane irene, eric cantor says disaster aid should be offset by spending cuts. stay with us. new citracal slow release... continuously releases calcium plus d for the efficient absorption my body needs. citracal. they can end up with shaving irritation. ♪ get gillette irritation defense shave gel and gillette fusion proglide razor to help defend against five signs of shaving irritation. ♪ try gillette fusion proglide and the irritation defense line. help defend your skin. ♪

try smart balance buttery spread. it's heart-healthier than butter. with omega-3s. 64% less saturated fat. and clinically proven to help support healthy cholesterol. ♪ put a little love in your heart ♪ welcome back to "the ed show." former vice president dick cheney is singing like a canary about his time in office. he's written a tell-all book in which he expresses no regrets. >> in your view, we should still be using enhanced interrogation?

>> yes. >> no regrets? >> no regrets. >> should we still be waterboarding terror suspects? >> i would strongly support using it again if circumstances arose where we had a high-valued detainee. that was the only way that we could get him to talk. >> even though so many people have condemned it, people call it torture, you think it should still be a tool? >> yes. >> in the book, cheney's highly crit calf many form bush administration officials including colin powell, condoleezza rice, and george tenet. but cheney knew that he was an objective controversy and he offered his resignation several times prior to bush's re-election. but he writes that after a few day's consideration, bush said that he wanted him to stay. in june of 2007, if cheney's view had prevailed, the united states would have bombed a suspected nuclear reactor in syria. the president asked, "does anyone here agree with the vice president?" not a single hand went up around

the room. let's bring in the host of the ring of fire radio show, mike papantonio. and "the dailily show" co-creat lizz winstead with us as well. mike, with you first. what strikes you about what's coming out of the cheney book, the tell-all, what do you take from it? >> what strikes me, ed is sometimes a shady character like dick cheney, he can clear his conscience by writing this confessional opus but he'll never clear his idea. never be able to clear this idea that 18% -- he's a meager 18% approval rating in the united states. but here's what i would like to see. most of us would like to see an apology book, an apology that tells the wives and the husbands and the childrens and the brothers and the sisters who were killed in iraq because of his lie. i'd like to see an apology for that. that's what most of us are waiting for is an apology. i bet valerie plame and i bet joe wilson are waiting for an apology where he tells this story, and he finally admits that he engaged in pathetic

conduct that exposed valerie plame, the cia agent, and put her context at risk. their lives at risk. or maybe an apology to scooter libby who he hung up to dry for doing all of that. we're awaiting for an apology. i doubt it will ever come from this cynical old man. >> lizz winstead, it just seems to me that this is vintage dick cheney. he has no regrets. he wouldn't turn anything around even on torture. what do you make of that? >> well, you know, mike talks about clearing his name, he couldn't clear customs. he would be arrested immediately by many international courts. but you know, look at this guy. honestly, i think peace might be his kryptonite. never met a warrior to never get into. he's never met a person who he doesn't want to make ooingry and to continue saying waterboarding is fine, continue waterboarding suspects. sometimes i think that dick cheney wrote this book because there was still a couple of people that weren't sure that they're still on the fence of

hating dick cheney and he wanted to make sure that he got everybody on board and i think that he did that. mission accomplished. >> mike, what about president bush? president bush could have accepted dick cheney's resignation. he decided to keep him on even though there were a number of people in the administration that didn't agree with him. what does it say about bush that he kept cheney around? who was running the white house? >> well, he felt like he needed dick cheney. he felt like without dick cheney, he wouldn't be able -- he wouldn't have cover for a lot of the decisions that george bush was making. understand, george bush comes out of there -- out of this with dick cheney really taking most of the heat for a lot of decisions that george bush made. it was comfortable to have dick cheney around and it make good sense to keep him there because he was kind of the lightning rod for all of the bad decisions that all of the republican administration made during those years. so i guess in a sense it was pretty clever. i think the problem dick cheney -- excuse me, lizz, go aed. >> no, go ahead, mike. >> well, what i wanted to say, i think what the truth here is the

legacy that dick cheney's family has to live with. can you imagine being the children, the grandchildren, the family of dick cheney, and you have to live with that legacy. you have to live with the legacy of lies that actually ended up in the death of thousands of human beings for no good reason. you have to end up with lies that will never be answered where he will never apologize. i promise you. this man will never apologize. >> and having dick cheney as your security blanket is like one of the most frightening things that i've ever heard because you're exactly right, mike, that's exactly right, he needed him, and yet he was his comfort. when dick cheney's your comfort, i mean this is a guy in part of the nbc interview that you didn't air, ed, when he's asked about the book, he says, yeah, a lot of heads are going to blow up all over washington, d.c. and i'm like, dude, you shut your friend in the face. you really want to take it to the next level that way? it's amazing. >> what i think in this erav tea party politics and all of the

radical stuff that's being said out there, lizz, i think this is somewhat of a message from cheney to this crowd, stoic your guns, don't back down, and no matter how bad it gets don't retreat from the excerpts of the book and the interview, i think this is basically his message. what do you think? >> well, i think that you might be right. i think it's always been his message. if dick cheney could, he would emit a time machine to go back in time and be responsible for every war that has happened since the planet started existing. so, yeah, i think that's right, don't back down and just invade. he wanted to go blow up syria, seriously, dude? wow, take a break. >> is there -- mike, is there any doubt who the most powerful man was during those years? >> no, there's no question at all. and as a matter of fact, you have -- that kind of power left a horrible stained political life for dick cheney. it's a horribly stained political life. and you know what, one thing for sure legacies are permanent and no matter how good his ghost

writer is he can't turn that around and the sad thing is for the people who have to live with that, the legacy that he lives for his entire family forever. >> yeah. >> history cannot change the damage that dick cheney did to this country. >> you're a man your own ghost writer policy, i just want to point that out. >> there you are. . mike papantonio, lizz winstead, thanks so much. rick perry might be the worst political prognosticator in the history of america. i'll show you what he had to say about his buddy scott walker in the wisconsin 14 next. stay with us. and republicans continue theirsulate programs like social security. tea party senator marco rubio of florida says entitlements make us weak? rubio, he's going in "the zone."

every time a local business opens its doors or creates another laptop bag or hires another employee, it's not just good for business -- it's good for the entire community. at bank of america, we know the impact that local businesses have on communities, so we're helping them with advice from local business experts

and extending $18 billion in credit last year. that's how we're helping set opportunity in motion. living with the pain of moderate to severe rheumatoid arthritis... could mean living with joint damage. help stop the damage before it stops you with humira. for many adults with moderate to severe ra, humira's proven to help relieve pain and stop joint damage. humira can lower your ability to fight infections, including tuberculosis. serious, sometimes fatal events can occur, such as infections, lymphoma, or other types of cancer, blood, liver, and nervous system problems, serious allergic reactions, and new or worsening heart failure. before starting humira, your doctor should test you for tb. ask your doctor if you live or have been to a region where certain fungal infections are common. tell your doctor if you have had tb, hepatitis b, are prone to infections, or have symptoms such as fever, fatigue, cough, or sores. you should not start humira if you have any kind of infection.

ask your rheumatologist how you can defend against and help stop further joint damage with humira.

welcome back to "the ed show." more insight rick perry. he's good buddies with fellow anti-union governor from wisconsin, scott walker. check this out, back in february perry cut a youtube video supporting radical agenda in attack of work men and women in wisconsin. take a look at how bad a political prognosticator rick perry is. >> you've got 13, 14 senators who instead of reporting the democratic process, they run off and somehow or another think that's going to be a productive. i don't think it is. i think that people -- they look at this like you know like the

kid who takes his ball and goes home. i can't win. i can't play. then you know nobody else is going to. that is immature, it's juvenile, and at the end of the day, i'll bet you the folks of wisconsin, they punish those senators rather than heralding them as heroes. >> really? perry cropped out on that bet big time, didn't he? not a single member of the wisconsin 14 team was recalled this summer. still employed by the people and the only senators p s punished two republicans. if perry paid attention to anything but fox news, he would know the wisconsin 14 were heralded as heroes. take a look at how wisconsin voters reacted to the 14 on "the ed show" earlier this month. >> these are the americans that made it happen. these folks will go down in the history books. these 14 americans.

>> governor perry, i invite you to join me in madison or any other city in wisconsin and learn a little bit about the badger state. so wisconsin voters, if you can look them in the eye and tell them that you would be scott walker's best friend in the white house, what kind of reaction do you think you'd get? i think the folks at the dairy state understand that you are all hat and no cattle. hurricane irene is threatening much of the atlantic coast. there are extraordinary preparations under way from north carolina to new york city. that's next. and if you're among the tens of millions of folks potentially affected by the storm, the house majority leader, well, he has a plan. no disaster relief unless there are spending cuts. the remarkable hypocrisy of eric cantor coming up. [ male announcer ] get ready for the left lane. the volkswagen autobahn for all event is back.

right now, get a great deal on new volkswagen models, including the cc. and every volkswagen includes scheduled carefree maintenance. that's the power of german engineering. right now lease the volkswagen cc sport for just $289 a month. ♪ visit vwdealer.com today. is best absorbed in small continuous amounts. only one calcium supplement does that in one daily dose. new citracal slow release... continuously releases calcium plus d for the efficient absorption my body needs.

citracal. whether it can be done safely and responsibly. at exxonmobil we know the answer is yes. when we design any well, the groundwater's protected by multiple layers of steel and cement. most wells are over a mile and a half deep so there's a tremendous amount of protective rock between the fracking operation and the groundwater. natural gas is critical to our future. at exxonmobil we recognize the challenges and how important it is to do this right. aflac! oh, i've just got major medical... major medical. ...but it helps pay the doctors. pays the doctors, boyyy! [ quack ] oh yeah? what about your family? ♪ we added aflac, so we get cash! it's like our safety net... ♪ to help with the mortgage or whatever we need! so my family doesn't feel the pain too. ha! [ male announcer ] help protect your family at aflac.com. [ pigeons ] heyyy! hooo!!!

[ male announcer ] help protect your family at aflac.com. welcome back to "the ed show" and thanks for watching tonight. the storm is coming. the east coast is getting ready for hurricane irene.

the hurricane packed 115-mile-per-hour winds as it slammed the bahamas last night and tonight. and it offers a preview of what may number store for much the atlantic coast. the hurricane is a category 3 storm with tropical winds, force winds extending 225 miles. hurricane watches have been issued for north carolina to new jersey, and evacuations are already under way. the first warnings were issued today for the entire north carolina coast. today the governor of maryland declared a state of emergency, and president obama signed an emergency declaration for the state of north carolina. for the latest let's turn now to the weather channel meteorologist paul goodloe. paul, good to have you with us tonight. what is the latest? what can you tell us? >> we can tell you right now again, hurricane irene is holding steady as a category 3 hurricane. as you mentioned 115-mile-per-hour winds. pressure is at 946. typically the pressure and the wind speed, inverse

relationship, a seesaw event. the pressure goes down, the wind speed goes up and the pressure's slowly going down in the last 24 hours or so, so the wind speed has not gone up that much but now as it moves away from the bahamas, it has a chance of actually strengthening somewhat. perhaps 120, maybe 125 before it slowly weakens before it approaches the rest of the u.s. and here's another outlook of where this hurricane is. in fact, the center is about 170 miles or so off of the florida coast. the good news is, florida will not have a direct impact but we've been getting strength out of outer rain bands from hurricane irene all day long. still seeing the outer rain bands coming from vero beach/melbourne area from the space coast. but again that's florida. no direct hits. strong surf and heavy waves across the florida coastline. georgia coastline as well. but cape hatteras, the eye is about 500 miles south-southwest of there right now. and that could be the potential bull's eye of a landfall but after that we will open up the entire mid-atlantic, the entire

northeast, evening new england for impacts with this hurricane. right now a major category 3 hurricane. so we want to know, where is this thing going? here's our computer models, and as we head throughout the night and into your saturday, we start pushing this on towards perhaps landfall somewhere in north carolina. as you mentioned tropical form-force winds extend 200 miles, so charlotte we could be dealing with tropical-force winds up to the new england coastline and up into the new england in the northeast and remember the strongest sight of the hurricane is the east side. that's where the wind's coming in and the waves are coming in as well so really concerned about long island and argument sounds here into the chesapeake/delaware bay as well and our official track has it making landfall sometime on saturday, perhaps saturday afternoon, saturday evening and then it could perhaps make another landfall, jersey shore, maybe even into long island as we head into some time on sunday. maybe weakening as a category 1. there's also models saying strong upper level winds which could keep this hurricane even stronger than a category 1 or

maybe a strong category one. but also right now the big concern is what's happening in the ocean here. again the east side, the strongest one, already recording 41-plus-foot waves here off of the coast of florida. >> wow! >> all of that could be heading onto the carolina coastline, mid-atlantic maybe the east coast coming into this upcoming weekend. irene means big-time devastation particularly across the east coast of the u.s. >> paul, what are the chances of it developing into a category 4? what are the percentages? can you tell us that? >> well, i guess there's good news and bad news about that is the track forecast right now are pretty accurate. talking easily 70% or higher than that. the intensity forecast, not accurate. but everything we know about the atmosphere and the models that we're running right now, we pretty much think that chance's getting slimmer. it's not zero but definitely slimmer than, say, a couple of days ago. but bottom line is even if it does or doesn't, if it stays a three, still major impacts right

now. it's like taking your foot off of the gas. you're not hitting the brakes. just coasting as it comes into landfall. so major impacts are expected with irene. >> no doubt. meteorologist paul goodloe, thanks for joining us tonight. now let's go to new york city and bring in weather channel meter omgs jim cantore. jim, great to have you on with us tonight. mayor bloomberg and emergency services are taking this storm very seriously. what can you tell us? >> reporter: yeah the conference this afternoon, of course very enlightening. the mayor as he always is invicting a little confidence into all of us. look we'll get through this together. we're going to go through something awful here and get through together but what they're planning on, obviously, is taking a strong look at saturday morning and saying, look, as of 8:00 a.m., you will know if you live in zone "a" includes here where i am at, battery park, if you're going to leave or not. because back in 1960s a hurricane named donna that put water up 11 feet which is well over my head and would obviously cause a tremendous amount of flooding right in through here. so they don't want people in the flood zone and i think they're

going to have -- you know the weather right now and the track of this thing is going to force your hand. you saw that wave that paul showed you there. all of those waves are going to be brought off of the eastern seaboard. there's just no getting around it. nair not going to be 40 feet at the coastline, but when you think about the nact we're going to have a high tide as well, we're going to have issues in through here. again, saturday 8:00 a.m., zone "a" coney island, battery park, staten island, through the governor's island, five hospitals and nursing homes hope to have their evacuations of people done by 8:00 tomorrow night. and of course, if people are in low-lying areas, there are about five hospitals that are in those areas they'll need get those people in here in a hurry. this is just a mind-boggling situation, ed. it's one that we haven't seen in decades and all of us haven't really experienced. because it's not only just the coastal affects it's a multihazard. you've got the waves, you've got the inland flooding with rainfall. it's so saturated from philadelphia right up through vermont with the kind of rain, 6 to 12 to 15 inches that we're

expecting in through here. we're going to have massive amounts of flooding, and lots of property and potential loves life. even well inland from this hurricane. and the west side of it, it'll still have wind. winds potentially 65, 80 miles per hour. they're going to knock down a ton of trees because of these pre-existing wet soils so it just boggles the mind that we'll not only shutdown major cities in the northeast, but we will also cause extensive damage. this really has all of the makings of being our tenth billion-dollar disaster at that. and it may, this may be a stretch here, this may be something that rivals the dollars of katrina, if this current track and intensity holds. >> weather channel's jim cantore, you have our attention tonight. thanks so much for joining us here on "the ed show." it looks like it's going to be a barn burner, no doubt. florida senator marco rubio got some good press this week for saving nancy reagan from a fall at a reagan library event but when it comes to the rest of

the american senior citizens, rubio wants to leave them high and dry. he's coming up in "psycho talk." stay with us. versus the ford explorer. two titans of the s.u.v. world. which has the strength? which has the power? which has the ability to... oh, geez. [ screeching ] the s.u.v. is back. right now, get $2,000 cash allowance or 0% apr financing on the 2011 dodge durango. erase boundaries, it can earn cash and start a movement. -it can... -[ beatboxing ] [ male announcer ] it can buy time and tell time. -shhh. -[ baby giggles ] [ male announcer ] we use our mouths in so many ways to open up to the world. so make sure your mouth is at its best. crest and oral-b. life opens up when you do.

tell us your story at lifeopensupproject.com. florida senator marco rubio is attacking programs that significantly reduce the property rate in this country. "psycho talk" is next. in here, the planned combination of at&t and t-mobile would deliver our next generation mobile broadband experience to 55 million more americans, many in small towns and rural communities, giving them a new choice. we'll deliver better service, with thousands of new cell sites... for greater access to all the things you want, whenever you want them. it's the at&t network... and what's possible in here is almost impossible to say. it's the at&t network... we share. shop from anywhere. and are always connected. we live in a social world. isn't it time we had a social currency to match?

membership rewards points from american express. use them to get the things you love from amazon.com, ticketmaster.com, and more unexpected places. they're a social currency with endless possibilities.

and in "psycho talk" tonight, florida senator marco rubio, he's on the attack against the big three. now rubio is an early favorite to take the number two spot on the republican presidential ticket next year. thanks to his tea party ideology and his pretty boy look, but his policies are downright ugly. during a speech at the reagan library this week, rubio had this to say about programs like social security and medicare. >> these programs actually weakened us as a people. you see, almost forever it was

institutions and society that assume the role of taking care of one another. if someone was sick in your family, you took care of them. if a neighbor met misfortune, you took care of them. you save for your retirement and your future because you had to. but all of that changed when the government began to assume those responsibilities. and as government crowded out the institutions in our society that did these things traditionally, it weakened our people. >> i will tell you what's weakening our people, political hacks like marco rubio, who want to get i received social safety nets. before medicare, check this out, half of american seniors didn't have hospital insurance. almost one-third of the americans lived in poverty. but after medicare was signed into law, the poverty rate among senior citizens plummeted from 30% to 10%. and it's the same story with social security according to the census bureau data, 20 million more americans would live below

the poverty line if social security did not exist. 45% of senior citizens would be pour and in rubio's state of florida alone, social security lifts more than, count it, a million people out of poverty. but these right wingers remain determined to dismantle the big three. no matter how many americans suffer. for marco rubio to say programs like medicare and social security weaken americans is flat out "psycho talk." a secret stash of porn and playboys. see wa else was found inside moammar gadhafi's compound. that's next.

diabetes testing? it's all the same. nothing changes. then try this. freestyle lite® blood glucose test strip. sure, but it's not gonna-- [beep] wow. yep, that's the patented freestyle zipwik™ design. did it just-- [both] target the blood? yeah, drew it right in. the test starts fast. you need just a third the blood of one touch.® that is different. so freestyle lite test strips make testing... easy? easy. great. call or click-- we'll send you strips and a meter, free.

free is good. freestyle lite test strips. call or click today.

and creepy. while condoleezza rice herself has had no comment. maybe next time, moammar. next is as hurricane irene heads for the east coast house majority leader eric cantor says disaster relief must be offset by spending cuts. did he feel the same way about the bush tax cuts? michael eric dyson will join me on that conversation. stay with us.

if house majority leader eric cantor gets his way, there will be no federal disaster relief to help in the irene aftermath. not unless there are spending cuts, as talking point memo reports, kantor will extend his requirement that federal disaster relief be paid for cutting spending elsewhere. kantor spokesman added, we are going to speculate on damage before it happens, period. but as you know, eric has consistently said that conditional funds for federal disaster relief ought to be offset with spending cuts. really in that seems to be at odds with kantor's previous fiscal positions in his political career. he's given approval to some our country's biggest debt drivers.

take, for instance, kantor vote for the bush tax cuts without spending cuts. he vote for the wars in iraq and afghanistan without spending cuts. he voted for the bush's unprecedented expansion of medicare without spending cuts. so why the twist? well, you've got to make it tough on the american people in barack obama. the majority leader has proven time and time again that he is all about helping party not people. joining me tonight is michael eric dyson, political analyst, professor at georgetown university, and author of the book, "can you hear me now?" good to have you with us tonight, michael. >> always good to be here, ed. >> we had a report earlier tonight from two weather channel meteorologists painting a very grim picture of what people along the east coast in this country. there's going to be millions of people who are going to be affected by this and we have a political leader in washington saying, hey, wait a minute, we're not sure if queer going to

be help to help you. what do you make of this, this. >> that's just the cras refusal to do the business of the people. you're a politician. put in office to address the critical needs of people. politics, after all is not simply about the art of the possible, it's about directing critical resources to vulnerable populations in a time of crisis. and you are talking about playing political football here and playing politics with the resources of the people. if they need it, then fund them. they are disaster stricken, then they must be relieved. ed, this is a rejection and repudiation of basic decency much less good politics. >> is this the beginning of a lousy response to this hurricane? i mean, we've been down this road before with hurricane katrina. and here are the republicans, it's almost as if they didn't learn a damn thing about how to do and serve the people when something like this hits. >> not at palm don't play politics. you don't wait for five days to get down to new orleans. up don't wait and say we're going to tie spending cuts to the delivery of resources for those who've been struck by

disaster. i'm in washington, d.c., i can tell you it's not a pretty picture. the rains are coming. the winds are howling and if this thing hits anywhere here in the cast in they're projecting, ed, it's going to be a tremendous disaster. a once in a century kind of thing. we need our government to step up. we need our politicians to not play politics with the delivery of resources, and eric cantor ought to be ashamed of himself. >> what should the house majority leader be saying to the american people about this? what should he be saying? >> he should be saying, we are here, we are with you. do what lbj did in a time of crisis. he showed up with a bullhorn and he barked out his compassion and his identification with the vulnerable of this nation. eric cantor should be saying, we will do everything that we can to leverage the resources that you, the people, have invested in us by paying your taxes and we'll turn to those service to you without playing politics. that's what a great leader, that's where a visionary leader, that's what a responsible leader would do. >> even in the time of potential absolute disast