portion of the global economy in some way can suddenly crater the entire operation and then you blame greece for it and you're the one that built this idiotic system. >> but dylan, you know the single currency would collapse if the greeks were forced out. >> fair enough, but why is that the children in kansas' fault that can't eat because of the lack of jobs as a result of the -- >> absolutely, but dylan, you know it's nothing to do with the children in kansas, it's to do with a bunch of super-powerful bankers that decided to create a bunch of cdos. and you know what they did, and you blame them outright. but blaming people isn't going to work anymore. it has to be resolved. >> president obama says he's going to resolve it by making the greeks suspend their democracy and do what they're told. i thought resolution was the administration of justice by revealing the fact that we have a corrupt global financial system that is eating countries and people. >> sure, but dylan, we are now at the precipice --

>> all right. >> i mean, things like democracy are considered luxuries now. >> so i've noticed. it's a good thing we've got those platinum citizens running the place. >> exactly. >> thank you, martin. >> thank you, dylan. >> the show starts right now. so the big story today, let's fix it. good thursday afternoon to you. i am dylan ratigan and we are seeing an escalating debate and more and more evidence that our political system is broken and we are hearing from many sides that it is time to structurally address the system, not the people, necessarily. although i'm sure they would change, but address the system of money in politics in order to even begin to fix the mess in washington. as you know, we launched our get money out campaign and our get money out amendment to stop the auction-based prowrestling ways of buying politicians.

was begin with a call from behind the line. seven democratic senators taking aim at the supreme court citizens united ruling which opened the floodgates of secret cash by saying corporate political spending is free speech protected by the first amendment. and we start with senator tom udall, democrat from new mexico, who introduced the amendment this week. and senator, educate us, what is that it you are working on? >> well, what we're trying to do is exactly what you were talking about, dylan. citizens united has unleashed a flood of special interests money, of corporate money. the decision itself allows corporate treasuries to now be a part of the campaign system. take, for example, exxon, with a corporate treasury of $80 billion. they can go out and flood the electoral system with that money. and what we're saying and we've had enough of that. we need a constitutional amendment so that congress can take back the authority to legislate on campaign finance

reform. the supreme court has taken it away from us, they've taken it away from states, they've taken it away from cities. we want it back and we want to put some reasonable limits on so that the place isn't just flooded with this special interest and corporate money. >> 94% of the time, the candidate who raises the most money wins. that's not an election, senator, that's an auction. >> i think you're absolutely right. and i think what a democracy is supposed to be about is about good ideas and the person with the best ideas stepping forward and winning over the electorate, and then getting a chance to put those ideas into practice. and now our system is more like an auction than it is like the spirit of democracy that i talked about, a marketplace of ideas. >> the amendment that you propose puts congress in charge of setting rules and regulations, if i understand it correctly, for how much money

can be spent. you're probably familiar with the amendment that jimmy williams has put forward, uses what i call ncaa rules, which says not only does the congress not get to decide that private money cannot affect private political offices, why did you stop by putting the congress in charge? and how do you expect america to trust the congress when congress is the one that's depending upon the very money they're now theoretically regulating? >> well, we're not only talking about congress, we're talking about state legislatures. because many of the rempform effort across the country have been at the state level, they've been at the city level. and those pieces of legislation have been dragged into federal court and declared unconstitutional under these series of cases starting back in the 1970s. so i think the root cause here is that the courts have taken this over. we have to take it back. we've done reasonable things in the past, but many of them have

been declared unconstitutional by the courts. and that appears to be a continuing trend here. so i know there isn't trust out there, but, boy, the way the court's going, they've opened this up to the special interests. there's no transparency, there's a lot of secret money, these super pacs are running ads, and nobody knows who is behind them. and that's a big problem. >> why stop short, though, of saying money is not speech in the constitutional amendment, for instance? why not break that? >> well, you can phrase it a bunch of different ways. you can also say that money is property. and i thought the most straightforward way and the way that we had a shot in terms of bipartisanship would be to pick an amendment, i've sponsored this in the last congress with chris dodd. in the past, it's had senate republicans on this amendment to try to find something that had bipartisan support, so i could appeal to both republicans and

democrats to move forward with this. >> understood. >> but there's a lot of ways to do it. i think this is the best way. >> yeah. last thing i'll leave you, and you probably already know this, but since we've launched the petition here, now we have in excess of 235, 240,000 signatures at this point at getmoneyout.com. there are multiple other organizations that have nothing to do with this particular undertaking who are all seeing significant traction in their own undertakings. and i'm interested in how you interpret the obvious traction from our effort and the traction you're seeing in a lot of other efforts. >> oh, i don't think there's any doubt that the public, for a long time, just watched this and was complacent. now people are mad. and they're out there. and a lot of them are on your show, you're covering many of these movements and they're saying, we've had enough of this, we want the money out.

we want to try to get back to what a democracy is about. that's a marketplace of ideas with the best ideas winning. not the guy with the biggest checkbook. that's what we have right now. >> what i found is the most effective number, when people argue with me about it, senator, is 94%. i say, listen, that's all i needed, herman cain's got 9-9-9, i've got 94% for the auction. senator, thank you so much for engaging the fight and for escalating the debate. obviously, it's one that myself and many, many others are desperate to see addressed. so thank you. >> thank you. thank you. >> tom i do want bring in jimmy williams, the executive director of the get money out foundation and author of the get money out amendment, which has, what i would argue, still some of the most aggressive language in really carving out money's role in the political system, making money, not speech. and really using that ncaa construct. jimmy, at the same time, you have to be encouraged to see senator udall step forward, and

with the escalating nature of the debate around passing a constitutional amendment to get money out, this has to be encouraging. >> it's very encouraging. listen, tom udall is one of the -- and i'm not saying this because he's a democrat, he's one of the most thoughtful members of the senate, and he was in the house. he's a pretty smart guy. and the good news is that he has an amendment. he said something very interesting, which is that the american people, and you said this as well, don't trust the courts. if that's the case, then i would suggest that we have to go all the way back to the basics, which is, money cannot be speech, under the constitution. >> yeah, but let's talk about that for a second. senator udall had a very interesting answer when i asked him about that, jimmy. and what he argued was that, listen, obviously, you can get to money is property or money is property episode money is speech, right? corporate personhood. senator withdrew daudall's argut this language is the one he

perceives as having the best political chance of winning bipartisan support. and his concern was that an amendment with the sort of language that is more principled, if you will, which i believe is reflected in your amendment, is simply not something that has as much political viability. i'm interested in your thoughts on that characterization? >> well, listen, i think what he's -- the construct he has is great. my concern is is, a, i don't trust the supreme court of the united states under its current construct of appointed and confirmed justices to agree with him on that issue. secondly, i don't trust the congress with backroom deals of which i have been in many, as both a staffer and a lobbyist, to do, quote, do the right thing. and frankly with congress sitting at a 9% approval rating, not this senator, but with congress as a whole sitting at a 9% approval rating, i don't think that the american people trust these people behind me to do the, quote, right thing. so, whether it's politically expedient or not is probably not the best way to go.

what is the best way to go in my opinion. and again, i like what he's written. i think it's fantastic. >> let me phrase the question this way, it's my last question to you. how would you help senator udall both advocate and further bolster the bulletproof nature of the language in his amendment? >> evening i would take exactly what he has and i would add to it that money or financial expenditures, we could come up with the language, money is not speech, as interpreted by the u.s. constitution or any amendment to the constitution. notwithstanding any other provision of law. if you add that to it, there is nowhere that the supreme court could go for precedent, for case law, for any other interpretation to strike down any campaign finance reforms that are in his amendment. if you put that in, the court can't touch what they do. >> well, i feel fantastic, just insofar as i feel like the effort and energy and debate for a constitutional amendment to get money out is only

increasing. i know that there are more and more people who are coming to partner with you and collaborate with you. and senator udall is inspiring to me as well. >> me too. >> more people stepping into the fight is exactly what we need. and jimmy, we look forward talking to you sooner rather than later about this. jimmy sticks for the mega panel. by the way. we have the latest developments out of greece as the birthplace of democracy, what the heck. who needs to vote on it, especially if they're going to vote no. somewhat ironic. plus, money talks and he walked. the congressional candidate who quit the race because he couldn't afford the price tag. and cartman is the one 1%. "south park's" take on the occupy movement, all ahead. [ male announcer ] this is lois.

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all right. we're back now with a referendum not only on democracy, but a global financial system that is so unstable, so fragile, so uniquely vulnerable that the actions of a country the size of louisiana can collapse everything from frankfort to hong kong. jimmy williams is back, along with the rest of our thursday mega panel, karen and susan. is it a good opportunity here, jimmy, to offer a praise to a resolution? they managed to get the greeks to do what was needed to be done, so to speak, needed in quotes. we are still trapped three years after 2008 in a financial system, with subprime borrowers

not able to pay back in '08 is capable of taking down the western financial system. i feel like we've lost our minds. >> we haven't lost our minds. we just decided to merge our minds. that is why everybody is so interconnected. it's almost like incest. the banks with so incestuously combined with each other that no matter what you do, under the -- once we got rid of glass-steagall, everything changed. and i helped get rid of glass-steagall. i was proud to help get rid of glass-steagall. but when you do that and you go to a worldwide international banking system, that is layer upon layer upon layer, based on each other, and each other's assets or fake assets, which is the problem, then you're going to have systemic risk. if you don't are skin in the game, it doesn't matter, you're going to screw over somebody else. and that's what's happened here. listen, the greek people, they ought to have their own autonomy, absolutely, without a doubt. they are a nation by themselves. but they are a part of the eurozone. i've said it before, i'll say it

again. the eurozone is going to cease to exist within the next year, i guarantee it. >> and at the end of the day, susan, if you look at the political debate, it's still not where we are. it's still not where this conversation is. it's still on, how could greece do this to the world, and isn't it good we're able to get in there and get them to do -- and this is the short-term thinking -- and that analysis is correct in that it does postpone major disruptions for the next month or to. >> it is so short-term when you think one week ago, we were all celebrating that they had come to a deal and all the markets had went through the roof. so in one week's time, it just goes to show you that this is just nothing but fluff and until we really focus on the big problem and break it out and say, this is what we're going to do, we're just going to see those rise. >> i wonder if there's a political opportunity here, karen, for the more hawkish in the democratic party. i think about people like senator cantwell, who is really offended by what happened with

enron, and really was pushing for derivative regulation, going back years, or even sherrod brown, obviously, bernie sanders, obviously, senator kaufman is no longer there. but i guess it was senator brown that partnered with him on that. i wonder if some of the more hawkish senators, karen, can exploit these events, if you will, as evidence of the failure to rectify the financial system. paul volcker even saying, listen, that volcker rule, that shouldn't have my name on it. do you get any sense that there's even a kabul on either party that's saying, listen, as i know that there are people that are in our government who understand what we're talking about. >> yeah. you know, more of what you're hearing, i think, at this point, because the problem is so acute. i mean, i take jimmy's point, it's incestuous, but look at what happened last week. an agreement was reached, the market went up. part of the reason why we've had quite a bit of uncertainty over the past several weeks was whether or not they could reach a deal. obviously part of the key

message here at the g-20 is to get this resolved. so most of them, from the political context, i think the concern is, we've got to get this straightened out and get on sound footing, at least with regard to this issue, and then we can go back and sort of make those arguments. but i think there's a real sensitivity to how sensitive, frankly, the markets have been reacting reacting to these various decisions. i was frankly surprised, though, to see papandreou -- i mean, you can't say you're going to call for a referendum after you said you just cut a deal with all these other nations. politically speaking, that seemed to be bad politics and a bad organization of events, frankly. >> yeah. well, at the same time, when the -- the interesting thing, jimmy, when you're in the room, is that the bankers' leverage is to big, because they have this $600 trillion swaps market, nobody knows where the risk is. some of the things in there are very important, most of it's completely idle, what really should be online gaming, and you

get in the room with the head of state and say, listen, you can either do the democratic thing and what your people want, or you can go with us, and if you do what you want, we're going to disrupt the flow of employment, the flow of lending, the flow of energy and food in your country, and really around the world on a level you can't imagine, which goes to show that the too big to fail financial institutions are still too big to fail, and still have the leverage. fair? >> i think it's fair. perhaps the greek prime minister needs to become the president or the chair or whatever it's called of the eurozone, of the european nations, or what have you. because at the end of the day, if they're going to bail him out, he gets to go lead them through the bailout. >> yeah. well, what's idiotic is that we're sitting here in new york, worried about whether greece can pay its bills, whether it has some bearing on the future of the largest economy in the world! and that is what is most offensive, quite honestly. >> you know, dylan, here's a question for you. i'll tell you that the perspective that i have heard

articulated here in washington is that what we've seen happening in europe, and i'm not saying this is my position, i'm just putting it out there, i would love to get your thoughts, is this -- you see he trying to protect -- >> i get it. i've got it under control. >> okay. well, the point being, is this an example of whether you like the dole that was done with the banks or not, like, put that aside, a deal was cut and done quickly when or banking system was in trouble. again, you may disagree with how it was done, there are a lot of problems with it -- >> well, it's called the cover-up, yes. >> action was quick -- >> and they covered it up well for a couple of years. >> but what we're seeing in europe is this drip, drip, drip. it's taking theme long time to get decisions made, for them to move on those decisions, and that's part of what is so destabilizing in the markets. so in some ways, while you may not agree with the decisions made in the united states, is

there a positive to the fact that at least a decision was made quickly? is that part of the problem of what's happening in europe? >> very quickly, let me answer that. i can see -- the argument is, at least there was quick resolution in the united states, we were able to get the money printers fired up, we were able to provide the bond insurance for all the major financial institutions and avoid further disruption, which is a totally understandable argument. it just presumes that there's no need to restructure anything. it's basically saying, we're just in this sort of cyclical thing and if you just throw a lot of money, and what i'm saying and a lot of other folks are saying, you have a financial system that's so fraudulent on an accounting level and its lack of any capital requirements in this $600 trillion swaps market that you have created something so fragile that if one -- somebody sticks a pebble in your shoe, everybody on the block falls down. and the real issue is the interconnectedness, where if one person screws up, let alone, quite honestly, financially irrelevant. let me be very clear. greece is economically

irrelevant. stunningly and startling irrelevant. and yet because it was used as a debt gambling chip by western banks and politicians in greece were more than happy to take that money, we've put ourselves in this position, and that just strikes me as insane. i think it strikes everybody as insane. i don't know if i answered your question or not, karen, and i can understand the perspective. i guess it goes o as to whether you see this as a cyclical or structural problem. but if you look at the unemployment and look at the structure, that's certainly a good argument for the structural issues at this point. the panel stays. next, our specialist could not get money out, so he got out. the political candidate who dropped his bid for congress because he says the price was too damned high, when we come back. e the best toffee in the world.

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it's no longer a secret that we've got an auction when you look at that 94% number. he or she who raises the most money wins. that's not a democracy, that's an auction. and just how much money are we talking about in this auction? well, in 2010, candidates running for a house seat spent on average over $1 million in pursuit of the holy grail. and for our specialist today, the price was simply too high. mike williams, a former candidate for congress in connecticut, who this week decided to drop out of the race in large part because he did not have the campaign cash and the fund-raising to keep up. here's what he wrote to supporter. he said, "although we raised over $130,000 in our first quarter and a half, i am substantially behind my three democratic competitors who have raised over $500,000 each at this point in time. to stay in the race, i would need to invest more of my own.

unfortunately, i do not have the financial resources to do so. i am one of the 99%, not the 1%, that can self-finance a campaign." so i welcome you. i'm going to play the other side to start this off and say, well, perhaps the reason you didn't have as much money, despite all my 94% rhetoric, was because the other candidates were simply more desirable in the district and the money was symptomatic. >> well, we had a lot of support and had a lot of donations, but they don't add up as quickly. when you come from the position of a young candidate, you're going to bring in a smaller base. but what aggravated the discussion was never about the ideas or the substantiate, it was only about the money. "the hartford courant" called me the candidate with ideas and substance. yet i couldn't get any traction to get money in the state, despite i raised out of the f r four, i was the most -- >> because you're probably the

perfect candidate, because if nobody wants to give you money, it actually means you might be do something useful. i can go both ways with this, susan. >> that's what we were trying to do. what i found, basically, what it comes down to qub if you're in office and run for another local office and a federal office, everyone knows you and they're willing to give you the money because you're part of the system. if you come from outside the system, you're just a threat to it. so you have to be independently wealthy or you have to already be in politics to get the money. no one who has another career -- >> or now one who would be disruptive to the process. go ahead, susan. >> we talk a lot about corporations disrupting the process. but people go and say, this guy's going to be good -- >> it's like going to the nfl combine. and they're like, who can raise some money out there. get on the phone, give me $20. >> and they're selfish, it's not only can you raise money for yourself, but can you raise money for them. in your situation, did you feel

like you had the political forces against you as well? and how much of that played into your final decision? >> there is a bit of that, whereby the party seemed to be really contented or unwilling to go against the front-runner for political reasons. and a lot of people will say, that, look, this is probably not going to stay if that guy wins. and i'm going to support whoever our nominee is. but there's a lot of baggage there. i think what it came down to, it's not about who's the best candidate, it was just about the money. i had tons of feedback and support from people who were really upset. but i don't have enough money. i put $10,000 in to get it running. for a professor who's salary is $50,000 a year, that's a lot of money. >> that's a big risk. >> what happened, i was at an awareness event for the connecticut food bank. one in every six americans goes to bed hungry at night and here we are, trying to raise $150,000, $250,000, $500,000, when the food bank feeds people every night. my race was going to cost

upwards of $3 million for the general election. i thought, i can't wake up every morning and look myself in the mirror and be comfortable -- >> and burning that cash while people don't eat. >> i just wasn't comfortable. i'm not condemning anyone else, but it didn't work for me. when you read that the president will have to raise and spend $1 billion, which the economist newspaper says would fund 20 british general elections, that's a century of elections, we're going to spend it on one candidate. >> and that's just one candidate. only half. >> you wonder why nothing gets done in washington, because you're owned by the people who are giving you that money. >> what they pay for, jimmy, as we've pointed out so well, both with the $600 million in financial reform and the $600 million in health care reform, what they're paying for is for things not to happen. i'm interested in how -- which they've done pretty well with those things. interested in your thoughts on what you've heard so far from former candidate williams? >> welcome to the real world, man. look it, i mean, not to be -- not to be a jerk, but, listen,

hartford, i mean, connecticut, is the insurance capital of the world. if you can't raise money in connecticut, you can't raise money anywhere, for god's sakes. it's almost embarrassing. i'm not calling you embarrassing. but here's my question for you. and i want you to take this from a political perspective, not from a personal perspective. do you feel dirty? do you feel grimy? do you feel slimy for what you had to go through? i mean, do you feel violated, like you got kind of raped by the political system? >> wow. >> can i be a little bit clear about that? >> look, you're not wrong. the political money in connecticut is going to the established candidate who is the speaker of the general assembly of connecticut, who everyone knows in the party and all the lobbyists know. and "the hartford courant" documented that he went around hartford, basically strong arming all the lobbyists, saying if you don't support me, your legislation will die in the general assembly. and i don't like to be negative, but that's the reality. do i feel slimed by what i had to do, you bet you. and do you think there are a lot of better things i would advise

my students at wesleyan than to run for public office? yes. i would never encourage anyone smart young person to run for office right now, unless it's a federally funded receipt -- >> and that's the tragedy. >> that's the reality of the situation. most of the people when i said, i'm getting out, most people said, we understand and you're too good. and most people say $150,000 in your first go at public office is not impressive, it's not enough, wait your turn. you just becoming part of the system that perpetuates the inability to get anything done in washington. end of story. >> jimmy said it, karen, but that really -- i can't think of anything more tragic for the future of this country than a professor at wesleyan running for congress and then going back to his students and saying, trust me, ladies and gentlemen, find something else to do with your time, because this is such a screwed up system that even if you are brilliant and well intentioned, it is, at this point, designed to not function.

and as such will simply frustrate you. >> yeah. you know, i would actually want to challenge that and say to mr. williams, i really hope you rethink that. because we need people like you to actually be encouraging young people to get involved, because just from a political context, i know it takes a lot of money, i know it's disgusting. at the same time, if you don't try, then nobody's going to try. and it doesn't always happen the way it happened for you. there are -- we have plenty of examples of people who are talented and smart and have a great message, who are outsiders, who, you know, ran their race, and were able to get elected. and i think, you know, we have to kind of say to ourselves, yes, we have to push for change, but at the same time, we have to be a part of the system to help make sure that the change happens. so i would ask you to rethink your position on that, because i really think it's a shame if we're going to lose the best and brightest in this country from running for office. then, you know what, then we

have on only ourselves to blame. >> what if we redirect the best and brightest from running for office to fixing the system so they would want to run for office by addressing the 94% problem. would you have an interest in joining somebody like jimmy williams, not that i'm authorized to offer you work, and i recognize you're a professor at wesleyan, but if you have this passion for america, maybe the thing to do with it is to direct it at the 94% problem, such that you and your students and many other students could then have the opportunity to win the honor and the confidence of the american people to engage in debate. >> well, look, i am a big believer in public service. i still want to do public service. and what i said to folks when i was getting out was, there are many ways to do public service. you can volunteer on boards, get out and raise money for charities, be part of the 94% issues you're talking about, and that's what i'm going to do. and that's what i encourage my students to do. i agree that you need to get in to change the system, but what happens is, and i was told, well, once you're elected,

you're not going to want to support campaign finance reform, because you have the advantage as the incumbent. and all you have to do is look at what happened with our president, who i admire greatly. as soon as he was out-fund-raising mccain, he was like -- it can't be about what's in your best interest. people said, you should bargain -- i was like, i don't want anything. >> was there anything positive, just to end on like a half-full note. was there anything positive about your run for office? >> thank you, susan! >> i met a ton of amazing people who believe that america is the best place in the planet, who are going to fight every day to make it a better place, recognizing that, and that democracy isn't just existing. you have to create it and perpetuate it every day. >> and being will to actually admit the problem, as you have, is the first step to solving the problem. >> call a spade a spade. >> and you have to challenge the system. >> and everybody loves the auction when they're winning. also, president obama's winning the auction, he's like, yeah, who doesn't love a auction?

anyway, we'll take a break. and again, i don't indict the president uniquely in that, at all. in fact, that's the evidence of how powerful the auction is, because he was so honorable, i think, and so well-intended, you can see how forceful the machine is. a pleasure to meet you. >> thank you very much. appreciate it. >> and i hope your students aren't too demoralized by this experience. >> no. they'll recover. >> they'll pick themselves up. straight ahead -- good night to the panel, thank you, jimmy, karen, and susan. "south park" had an occupation, complete with a michael moore spoof. >> i look at the faces of you and i see the future of america. we are the 99%! the employee of the month is...

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well, it's business as usual today at the port of oakland. a far cry from less than 24 hours ago, when a crowd of nearly 3,000 protesters shut down our nation's fifth largest shipping terminal. you might remember from our steel on wheels tour, we were there. i believe it was in february of this year. the protests from the occupation

began peacefully and then this last night. violence on the downtown streets of oakland after protesters took over an abandoned building, lit fires at a bank. police in riot gear once again resorted to tear gas and flash bangs to disperse people. which i always find questionable when folks are unarmed, but that's my own point of view. and while tensions continue to rise in oakland, there is no question that this has become a global occupation and a global news event. now even the creators of "south park" have gotten in on the ordeal. >> as you can see from this aerial photograph, the protest now covers almost two square miles. we have riot officers here, here, and here. the media has been contained to this area. >> and where are the actual protesters? >> oh, these two people right here. >> how are we going to contain this thing?! >> from the evening news to twitter, now even to comedy central, if there's one way to

describe the occupation movement, it is truly become occupy everywhere. and soon, hopefully, washington will no longer be laughing it off. coming up, big bank fraudclosure. one of the issues that the 99% rail against. and next here, nevada attorney general kathericatheri cortez masto who is suing bank of america for its role in the mess and as one of the most aggressive ags in america on the issue of housing. [ groans ] [ marge ] psst.

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well, there's new movement today on the foreclosure mess. wisconsin congresswoman tammy baldwin is introducing a congressional resolution, calling on the obama administration and state attorneys general to investigate the banks, which is different from settling with the banks, i might add, to investigate the banks over their so-called robo signing scandal. state attorneys general and the obama administration have been negotiating with the banks over a settlement. bear in mind, there never has been an investigation, which has always been peculiar. anyway, a settlement of claims arising from improper filing of court documents and foreclosures. some state attorneys like beau biden and eric schneiderman and others are resisting the push for a settlement, because they have the peculiar desire to investigate banking practices prior to settling with the banks, which some people think is unusual. with us, one of the toughest law

enforcement officials in the country, nevada attorney general catherine cortez masto, who is actually suing bank of america for a whole range of voilsiolat. she's also backed a tough new law in arizona making robo signing a federal crime. catherine, where do you go next and how do you interpret the increasing momentum, i think, that really is advocating your point of view, which is this is a crime, crimes have been committed, or at least crimes need to be investigated, and people like you need to be supported. >> well, dylan, you just said it. thanks for having me on your show. you know, the investigation is going to dictate where we go next. we have not stopped our investigations. we're going to continue in all aspects of the fraud that's impacting nevada. and the investigation will tell us in what area we are going. as you know, you just said, robo signing is an issue that we have here in nevada. we are investigating both on the civil and criminal side. and you just talked about the

fact that we were successful last legislative session in passing legislation to address the robo signing that we were seeing. >> so educate us a little bit. the law on robo signing in nevada went into effect on october 1st. now if you are found guilty of robo signing, you face up to ten years in jail per offense, as a felony, up to $10,000 per offense. have you seen a change in the number of foreclosures in nevada, which might indicate, obviously, whether robo signing has continued, does continue in nevada? >> well, that's a great question. and yes, we have. actually, as soon as it became effective in october, notice of defaults have stopped. i think a lot of the third parties, the people involved in processing these documents are trying to figure out what the new law means and what are they required to do. they're working with our office, and we're dictating to them, really, what you need to do is just follow the law. make sure you have personal knowledge of all the documents

that you are filing on behalf of the servicer to foreclose on those documents. now, you're right, there are both criminal and civil implications involved if you do not follow the law. that's all we're asking, is to make sure you just follow the law and file the appropriate documents that are required. >> but at the same time, if you've seen a significant falloff in foreclosure activity after the law went into effect, does it not suggest -- and it's speculative on my part -- that there was still robo signing, at least as a potential optionalty for the financial institutions before the law went into effect? >> correct. i would say it's a combination. there's no doubt there's robo signing occurring, because that's what we're investigating and that's what we're uncovering, but i think there are some legitimate folks out there, third party servicers, who are out there, who are trying to do -- make sure they are following the law, they understand the new implications, and they are just really working to -- right now, one of the things we're requiring them is to put together an affidavit that they have personal

knowledge of the documents that they are utilizing to foreclose on these homes. so they want to make sure they are utilizing the correct affidavit terms and we're working with them. so there's some legitimate player outs there, who just want to understand the new law. but you're right, i think there are many out there who were violating the law and now they're trying to figure out what to do. >> and from a journalistic standpoint, i find perplexing to see there's a so-called 50-state settlement talk to settle something that not only hasn't been investigated, but in the case of robo signing, in the state of nevada, may well have been still occurring up until october 1st. and we don't know whether it's occurring in florida or southern california or in michigan and some of the other sort of hotbeds of foreclosure. >> you're right. there is talk, the multi-state is involved with the robo signing and servicing issue. don't forget. that's an important component of this. but from my perspective, as you know, nevada has been so hard hit. i mean, it is incredible, the number of foreclosures we're seeing out here. and so my concern is not just

making sure that they're following the law when they're foreclosed, so that the homeowner's rights are being followed, when they lose their home. but at the same time, keep in mind, there's a cloud on title. if they are foreclosing on these properties without the proper documentation, now there's a cloud on that chain of title. and that is not good for our state or the economy, in general. >> and to that end, attorney general beau biden from delaware has gone directly at the chain of title issue that is in the so-called mers system. i want to play, if i could, a sound bite of him on the show, i guess it was last week. >> so what we're trying to do in delaware, and this is a very delaware-specific thing, although i predict to you that other states will follow suit, because they have similar statutes, and trying to hold those responsible accountable. in this man-made disaster, as you have covered better than anyone else, dylan, no man has been held responsible. >> i pulled the part of the sound bite where he told me i did a good job just as a self-esteem boost for the day. but your thoughts on mers and his actions?

>> i agree with beau. i applaud what he is doing. i think there are various ags, we're trying to figure out in our state, strategically, where our laws can take us to hold those individuals accountable. some of us are attacking in different areas. that doesn't necessarily mean we won't all get to the same litigation, but our investigations is going to dictate where we go. but i applaud beau. i think he's doing a fantastic job. and i agree with him. that's what we do as ags. we hold individuals accountable, we look for the restitution, and ensure that any damages that any of our constituents have incurred because of some sort of fraud that we're holding people accountable, but we're bringing restitution to them. and that's what i've always done. >> and we are grateful to you, as we are to the others, who have the privilege and recognize the position that each of you hold in each state of this country, as really one of the administrators, or key

administrators of justice, and not politics. and i think all of us are grateful to you for your pursuit of that position in that regard. so thank you. >> thank you, dylan. and thank you for all of your work covering this issue. >> thank you. i'm going to play a sound bite of you saying that later when you're not here on a day i'm not feeling that go. catherine cortez masto. coming up on "hardball," gop blame game. the cain campaign points to perry's people while perry's people suggests the romney campaign may have had a role in the leak. but first, imogen lloyd webber with the daily rant. would she accept your friend request on facebook? what's better than gold ? free gold ! we call that hertz gold plus rewards. you earn free days, free weeks and more fast. that's a plus. upgrade your ride. that's a plus. rewards with no blackout dates so you can redeem anytime. and it's easy to redeem your points online. already a gold member ? just select gold plus rewards in your profile

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time for a rant from our regular, imogen lloyd webber. hello, imogen. >> hello. belonging to social networking sites no longer seems to be a choice. 91% of online american adults access them every month. we are all under relentless pressure to join and maintain our presence on them. now, obviously, there are huge merits to this technology. movements such as the arab spring, get money out, and we'd all rather live in a country that allows social networking and not in places like china and iran where facebook is banned. however, there are downsides here. peer pressure has been around since society began. but social networking the most you ubiquitous site has 800 million users worldwide.

it is peer pressure in the extreme, how many friends do you have? how big is your house? been on vacation lately? given birth? your child can talk at two? oh, the love of your life is engaged -- to someone else. i've grown to resent facebook. like many, i've just been coerced into having a visible presence on the site. someone set up a fake profile of me and being on it is the best anecdote. i struggled to make the real me interesting. why anyone would want to pretend to be me is even beyond me. deep down, we all know you cannot measure friendship by facebook page. i have a theory with the most picture-perfect facebook lives will end up broke and/or divorced. but it's hard not to get caught up in it. facebook makes me feel inadequate. i get stressed about friend requests from people who bullied me at school and people i've never met. meanwhile, linked in tries to make it mission impossible not to join. if i get one more invite, i will

throw my crackberry off the top of 30 rock. enough of bud. let's talk about my new love, twitter. i'm more in control of it. twitter is an invaluable work tool. i follow news organizations and close friends who i enjoy hearing from. i've managed to keep it an ex-boyfriend-free zone. but even twitter can bring out our worst. you're on it, you've compared follow accounts with your peers. cue ego inflation or deflation. now, social networking is here to stay. firms like facebook are spending record amounts on political lobbying to keep them the cultural norm. we must be wary as we are cyb cyberbullied into these sites. they may be inavoidable, but what truly matters is our real world, not our virtual one, and i for one want to make sure i know there is a difference in the two and which is which. >> i'm interested in your theory of those who have elaborate digital profiles being the ones who would -