tuesday for coverage of the big vote on issue 2 coming up. the rachel maddow show starts right now and i think it's going to be a little chilly outside, but it's a couple of shows next week, rachel, that i will not miss for sure. >> that's going to be spectacul spectacular. we have a bunch of news on issue 2 on sb-5 coming up this hour, too, ed. we're happy you're going to be there. >> thanks, rachel. have a great weekend. >> you, too. thanks at home for staying with us the next hour as well. i had an a-ha moment about 2012 politics. it is one for which i'm scolding myself i have to tell you. the reason i'm scolding myself is because i should have known at pokamon. i feel like an idiot about this. we noted it when the pokamon thing happened and it seemed like an aberration from normal news and politics and a one-off weird thing. looking back now, now that it is so obvious and finally donned on me, i should have known at

pokeman. we all should have known. it was the first presidential debate back in august before the ames, iowa, straw poll. they have their debate. at the end of the debate the candidates give their closie ii statements. they know from the format they're going to have a chance to give a closing statement. this is one of the things you can prepare for, you write your closing statement ahead of time. herman cain's closing statement that night read in part, "a poet once said --" i could read the rest of it. you're not going to believe me if i just quote it, so let's just play it. >> a poet once said, life can be a challenge, life can seem impossible, but it's never easy when there's so much on the line. >> the poet in question here is pokeman. that is a verse from the theme song from the pokeman movie. quoted by herman cain in a presidential debate as inspirational poetry.

>> life can be a challenge. ♪ life can seem impossible >> life can seem impossible. ♪ it's never easy when so much is on -- ♪ >> it's never easy when there's so much on the line. >> we should have known at pokeman. we should have known. i believe that the artist formally known as herman cain was trying to end the whole thing right there. i think he was begging to be exposed right there. nobody got it. i among them. sure we thought it was a little wacky to put it on the show, but we weren't willing to see the whole thing at that point. we weren't willing to believe this was really happening. then herman cain unveiled his 9-9-9 plan. where did he come up with his 9-9-9 plan? the first official story from the campaign was it was a secret. mr. cain refusing to repeal his advisers. the second answer was the 9-9-9 plan came from a guy who work s

at a local wells fargo place in pepper pike, ohio. chagrin boulevard. the other place in the world where a 9-9-9 already existed is in sim city. in the video game. 9-9-9 is the operating tax structure in sim city which is a fake place. it's -- herman cain angrily denied this and said it was a lie that sim city was where he got his 9-9-9 plan from. come on, it's like he's begging us to get in on the joke. after that herman cain publishes a book. the title of his book, "this is herman cain!" the exclamation point is part of the title. one full chapter of the book is about the good fortune destowed on herman cain by the number 45. that's the title of the chapter, "45 a special number." naturally it's chapter nine. what's 4 plus 5? 9. we should be getting the point

by this time. we're not. around the time the book comes out, herman cain rockets to the top of the polls, polling in first place for the first time both in key early states and nationwide polls. how does herman cain respond to his surge to front-runner status in the polls? he decides he's going to go on a month-long book tour and never bothers to set up full campaign staffs in states like new hampshire or south carolina or iowa. even now weeks into being one of the front-runners in the polls, still no real staff to speak of. asked to respond to the idea he is just the republican flavor of the month, herman cain does not deny that he is the flavor of the month. instead, he picks what flavor he is. according to herman cain, he's black walnut and not just any black walnut. he's haagen-dazs blog walnut which does not exist anymore. >> if you're haagen-dazs black walnut, you don't go away. some of the other flavors of the month have no substance, you know? black walnut has staying power. >> staying power.

it doesn't exist anymore. it is one thing to be a gaffe prone inexperienced candidate, but the gaffes are too perfect. black walnut, noted for its staying power, it doesn't exist anymore. the book chapter on the magic number, the 9-9-9 thing from the video game. the great poet, pokeman, really, a pokeman movie, really? a string of supposed gaffes like that is not found in nature. but at that point in the campaign, nobody's yet figuring out this is not politics. this is art. nobody can quite believe that this is politics, either, but he has now been at the top of the polls long enough despite knowing in your gut that there's something wrong here, the beltway media feels compelled to start asking him policy questions. he's the front-runner, right? >> where do you stand the right of return? >> the right of return? the right of return? >> the palestinian right of return. >> that's something that should be negotiated. that's something that should be negotiated. >> herman cain admitted the next

day that even as he came up with an answer for it, he didn't actually have any idea what chris wallace was talking about with that whole right of return thing. but still, that didn't earn much more than a shrug from most political observers to herman cain trying to let us all in on the joke doubled down. you almost see him thinking now, come on, how can i make this more obvious? >> when they ask me who's the president of ubeki, ubeki, ubeki stan, stan, i'm going to say, i don't know, do you know? >> at this point the question america is confronted with, is this guy pulling our leg? here's the answer. yes,thy guy is pulling our leg. >> i'm confused on what your position is. >> i'm pro life, period. >> if a woman is raped, she should not be allowed to end the pregnancy? >> that's her choice. that is not government's choice. i support life from conception. >> so abortion should be legal? >> no, abortion should not be legal. i believe in the sanctity of

life. >> i'm not getting -- i'm not understanding. >> i believe -- >> if it's her choice, that means it's legal. >> no. i believe -- i don't believe a woman should have an abortion. does that help to clear it up? >> that should have cleared it up. that should have cleared it up. it should have cleared up the fact that we are being punked. ellis henickan at that moment on fox news knew america was being punked. look at the look on his face. i finally figured it out. >> do you describe yourself as a kn neoconservative? >> i'm a conservative, yes. >> you're familiar with the neoconservative movement? >> i'm not familiar with the neoconservative movement. >> after that one, people still not getting it. neo, what, huh? the cain campaign decided to put a big freaking neon arrow on themselves. they add an adviser do an interview explaining mr. cain is boning up on foreign policy. if you've been worried about his answers, don't worry anymore.

here's the interview. "almost every day herman cain is handed a one-page briefing from his chief foreign policy adviser on news from around the world." just making sure we get the math right, one page, almost every day. this was pokeman all over again. pokeman, black walnut, ubeki, ubeki, stan, stan, one page almost every day, the sim city tax plan. this is about politics but this is not politics. this is art about politics. this is an art project. this is a satirical candidacy. like this show, me, doing a story from christ wire as if it were true that one time, or fox news soberly reporting on the latest headline from "the onion," up until today we've been falling for it. and treating it like a real campaign. republicans have been treating this like a real campaign, measured by the money they've been giving him. there's nothing this art project can do now to get herman cain out of the top on the polls at

this point. they're trying. look at the money they've taken in thus far. this was the first big ad. the cain train music video watching mr. cain moving away from the comb ra aamera and the cain logo on railroad cars and this part they turn herman cain into the train. watch this. train. cain. train. cain. oh, god, he's the train, oh. that was the first video. herman cain rockets further up the polls and they release this one. >> america has never seen a candidate like herman cain. we need you to get involved. because together we can do this. we can take this country back. ♪ i am america ♪ one voice united we stand ♪ i am america >> trying to tell us something with the smile. there was also this sort of cryptic video from the cain campaign. a long ornate plot involving a

western. there's some spitting, there's a thing about a bird. there's fake fighting they reveal as fake fighting. it ends with a smile that i used to see as creepy, but now i see as a knowing smile. rom the smile, it rolls right into the end the video. >> nice chicken, honey. >> nice chicken, honey. that video, that supposed campaign video, is called "he carried yellow flowers." although there's no explanation of the flowers. there are lots of odd references to chickens. yeah. this is supposedly a presidential campaign. still, no matter what they do, america is by in large not getting the joke. still treating this like this is politics and not art about politics. but i think this week it is now falling apart. after america spent a week riveted to a spectacle of a fake campaign, the sexual harassment charges, today it seems to have

busted wide open. i mean, here was the politico.com headline on the sexual harassment case today. herman cain sexual abuse settlement date ed 09/09/09. need a bigger hint? after breaking into song, after being questioned. today herman cain gave up the ghost, declaring himself as a performance arts project. herman cain just, just did it. >> i'm proud to know the koch brothers. i'm very proud to know the koch brothers. just so i can clarify this for the media, this may be a breaking news announcement for the media. i am the koch brothers' brother from another mother. yes. i'm their brother from another mother. and proud of it.

>> you have nothing, just like me. >> i wouldn't say nothing. he has me. his brother from another mother. >> we're still waiting for the wig thing to happen. other than that, we're pretty much done. i blame myself. when he quoted the pokeman movie song, as something a great poet once said during a presidential debate, that i think was a challenge to people who have jobs like mine to recognize this has been an arts project, this has been satire. in my defense, these things can go on for a long time before people figure them out. carl paladino, he lost the race by 30 points to andrew cuomo, everybody knew paladino was an art project. he made his campaign slogan the same thing as the bob dob art slogan from the '90s. i'm mad as hell, too, carl, bob,

whatever. by the time people were voting on carl paladino, people figured out carl paladino was satire, performance art. nobody figured that out during the republican primary in new york state. mark lazio was a totally respectable candidate. he was the mitt romney of the republican governors race primary in 2010. he'd run for senate against hillary clinton. like mitt romney, he was sort of a perennial candidate who had been running forever, very well known to voters, very mainstream though he was a little squishy, sort of slightly uncomfortable, off putting guy. carl paladino who was an art project about how nuts you could be while still running for office, carl paladino, the bestiality e-mails guy, who sent out a political mailer spiked with a trash smell, carl paladino beat him in the republican primary by 24 points. new york state did not figure out carl paladino was an art project until they already had him as the republican nominee for governor. now we have herman cain.

polls indicate right now that nothing that herman cain is doing is hurting his poll numbers among republicans at all. the cumulative effect of all of this stuff i think means we are now going to collectively sort of turn the telescope the other way around and recognize what this has all been about. honestly, many liberals are praying republicans don't turn the telescope around and don't figure out this joke, that this art project goes all the way. whether or not that's possible, we leave to the administrations of my friend eugene robinson, pulitzer prize winning columnist for the "washington post" and msnbc political analyst. gene, am i throwing a hot potato into your lap here? >> rach, you figured it out. >> i feel like i did. >> for your whole improv, i've been slapping my forehead. of course we should have known at pokeman. here's my question. first, if we get a mcarthur

grant, do you think he'd go away? hedeserves one. this is art. paladino, i think that was a genuine long running emotional crisis. we kind of witnessed a breakdown over a period of some months. for cain, you're absolutely right. this is some sort of joke that is ultimately on us as his numbers continue to be, you know, have him in the lead. >> the reason that i think that this -- the reason i started feeling differently today than i did about previous gaffes was that i just started connecting -- i started making a list of what the gaffes have been. the notable gaffes have been and realizing they're all, "a," really funny really, they take a lot of creative energy to come up with. they're not standard gaffes at all. they're all sort of comedically perfect, like 9-9-9 being from the sims. the pokeman movie being the

great poet. i mean, ubeki, ubeki, ubeki stan, stan. stan, stan, saying that twice. that's not a joke. that's not a mistake. that's a form of genius. >> that is perfect. and to some extent, he's got to be making this up as he goes along, right? some of these answers seem extemporaneous. yet, they are perfectly formed as performance art. as politics, they are not -- they are utter complete nonsense. this is the weirdest, and i'll put it in quotes, air quotes, campaign i think we've ever seen and certainly the weirdest to get this far. yet, what's going to happen, i mean, what lies ahead? it's clear a whole lot of republicans don't like mitt romney. a whole lot of republicans do like the sort of middle finger aspect of the herman cain campaign. that it is making fun of the traditional ways of doing politics and policy and making

sense. so is that dynamic going to continue or are they going to come to their senses at some point? >> i will say the extent to which political work is entertaining people, he is entertaining people, and i mean, look, i went back and looked at the rick lazio carl paladino stuff again today and was shocked to remember, though i reported it at the time that rick lazio lost by 24 points and did not commit a major gaffe during the campaign. people were amazed by paladino. when we see cain's numbers not going down after the week of sexual harassment allegations, if it's possible we can actually see this translating. can we see this not ending? >> you know, i just don't -- it's hard to imagine, but it hasn't ended. and i think there's always going to be a not mitt romney in the race who's up there with mitt romney kind of buying for the lead. so we've gotten rid of donald

trump and michele bachmann and rick perry has the money. he's a logical person to rise as cain falls. that's what logically should happen. but, you know, perry has this problem on immigration that a whole lot of the tea party types just will not abide. they will never forgive him for. and herman cain, you know, is so the anti-romney that i think they're going to keep telling pollsters that they like the guy. now, when it comes time to vote, are they going to vote for him? i don't know. i think he could be up there high in the polls until we actually start having caucuses and primaries and then we're just going to have to see what happens. >> oh my god. i'm having so much more fun than i ever thought i would be at this time of year. >> me, too, me, too. i mean, what's he going to do next? what is -- brother from another mother? >> where do you go from there? >> someone was trying to figure out the female equivalent and came up with sister from another

mister. >> i was going to say, that's sister from another mister. let me hook you up, gene. gene robinson, msnbc political analyst, pulitzer prize winning columnist for the "washington post." great to see you. thank you, my friend. gene's latest column, about how mitt romney's campaign is inevitable. genius. joining me next, lemminy snicit. ns t s fo ust obrk

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with just four days to go until election day, the great state of ohio is for the moment a perfect microcosm of conservative politics in 2011. hey, future alien overlords, if you want a snap shot case study to teach your alien children about what happened to republican politics in the obama era, here's your case study. ohio repealed a chunk of union rights in their state, voting yes on the issue 2 referendum on tuesday means you're with the republicans on stripping rights. voting no in ohio next week means you want what the republicans did to be repealed. around this issue 2 referendum on tuesday, you have it all. truck loads of money, spending of murky origins, big name donors and governor john kasich, a millionaire governor who before he was governor was both a vice president at lehman brothers before it went belly-up in the great financial implosion in 2008 and a decade long fox news personality. once elected ohio governor mr.

kasich made it his priority to go after union rights and the people of ohio broadly speaking did not like that at all. the state hated that idea, in fact, again. see, the last time ohio voted on union rights was in 1958. republicans back then wanted to outlaw union shops and proposed a constitutional amendment which they put before the state's voters. ohio voters rejected the republicans' big union busting idea back then hugely and in the process they replaced the republican governor with a democratic governor. they gave democrats both houses of the state legislature and gave democrats every statewide office other than the secretary of state. now, we're looking at a degree of disapproval like that again just 33% of ohioans say they are with kasich and the republicans on stripping union rights. this is 2011, not 1958. we are in the post-citizens united world. where a vulnerable, unpopular republican governor with a vulnerable, unpopular agenda doesn't resign himself to defeat, try to contain his loss, try to work with the other side. he just calls in a little help

from his friends out of state. in rides the calvary. i've been waiting all year to use that. who is this republican calvary rushing in to ohio to slave the governor/fox news celebrity/lehman brothers union busting guy? pause here and think about this for a second. close your eyes -- no, don't close your eyes, squint. who do you see riding in to save the day, save the union busting bill in ohio in this post-citizens united world? oh my god neodness. it's citizens united. as of yesterday, citizens united, the group for whom the supreme court case is named will, quote, begin blasting six figures worth of advertisements throughout ohio. the president of citizen the united said running this anti-union rights ad would cost them at least $100,000. at least. which puts the total amount of money citizens united is spending in ohio somewhere between 100 grand and infinity. beyond the actual group, citizens united, when you think after shady third party out of

state groups driving dump trucks of money into an ideologically charged issue, what do you think of? which individuals come to mind? perhaps the koch brothers? yes, that's right. the koch brothers are not just herman cain's brothers from another mother or sisters from another mister, but the americans behind americans for prosperity. the ohio state chapter hosted 13 town halls in the last 2 1/2 months to convince people to not repeal kasich's union stripping bill. the koch brothers and privately held company are the number one donor for this election cycle, over a million dollars donated so far. in ohio the governors association is putting the koch brothers' money to work funding tv ads, a half million dollars of tv time in ohio's five largest markets. so citizens united, check. koch brothers, check. koch brothers again, check, check. who's missing? when you think about the ragged edge of politics in the 2000s,

what's the first far right republican name that pops to mind? what's the first name that pops into your head? cheney. no, not that cheney. and, no, not that cheney either. this time it's mary cheney, interestingly. and her group, alliance for america's future which is based in cleveland. i'm sorry, based in columbus. i'm sorry, actually based in virginia. not ohio. based in virginia and they don't reveal any of their funders. they do reveal their spending, sort of. they promised to spend over seven figures trying to get ohioens to vote yes on issue 2, vote yes on kasich's union stripping thing. over the next few days, citizens united, americans for process t prosperity and make america great, it's so new it doesn't have a logo, and the mary cheney thing and other conservative groups, like dick armey freedom works group, all of those groups will be spending millions and

millions of dollars in the next four days in ohio to try to flip these numbers. whether or not anonymous money, anonymous out of state money can do that, can actually change ohioans' minds about whether or not they want to preserve union rights in that state, we'll have that answer shortly. we'll have that answer on tuesday night. across our country... ... scientists, technicians, engineers, machinists... ... adding nearly 400 billion dollars to our economy... we're at work providing power to almost a quarter of our homes and businesses... ... and giving us cleaner rides to work and school... and tomorrow, we could do even more. cleaner, domestic, abundant and creating jobs now. we're america's natural gas. the smarter power, today. learn more at anga.us. ♪ if i should fall from grace with god ♪ ♪ where no doctor can relieve me ♪ ♪ if i'm buried 'neath the sod ♪ but the angels won't receive me ♪ ♪ let me go, boys, let me go, boys ♪

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happy friday. this time last week, we are heading into what we knew was going to be a big, early, super cold winter storm on the east coast which new york city celebrated by confiscating the generators from the occupy wall street protest downtown, which they were using to power things like heaters. on the weekend of the big storm, new york dispatched firefighters to take the generatoe erors awa

there would be no further source of heat. occupy wall street not only stuck it out through the storm but fixed the no generator problem in rather spectacular fashion. >> it's a stationary bike with a large flat wheel which spins a motor. that motor goes to a one-way dial which goes to a deep cycle marine battery. i'm powering a battery right now then i can take that battery and plug it in for immediate comfort and power the things we used to power with gas powered generators and the general assembly at occupy wall street gai gave us the money to build enough of these bikes to build enough batteries to power these at occupy wall street. we'll have ten of these set up and be powering the whole park with battery. you have to work at it, but that's a pro being here at occupy wall street. we're living on one square block and need exercise, people need to run off steam. we have a lot of volunteers. we should be able to power these. so the labor, if you will, is

not an issue. we did an energy survey to find out how much energy we were using and how much bikes it would take to power it all time and actually ten will give us twice as much power as we've been using. we're preparing for having heaters for winter. i'm burning up, staying warm just doing this. don't need heaters. >> that was video shot by "new york daily news." at our blog, we have links, the group is called times up. it's a great solution to the problem and also very earnest. i mean that in a good way. even if you're not down with the whole occupy wall street thing, you kind of have to admit this is adorable. ten bikes for twice the power. now that they don't have the generators. come on. plus, it keeps them fit and less crabby. joining us for the interview tonight will be someone who's a bit of a cultural hero of mine. his new work to support the occupy wall street protests is something that i am sure i'm not allowed to call adorable and like all of his work it is

somehow at the same time heartbreakingly earnest and the opposite of earnest. writing at lemony snikket, he made a set of 13 observations made by lemony snicket made by occupy wall street from a full distance. we'll post this on our website. among the highlights, number one, quote, if you work hard and become successful, it does not necessarily mean you are successful because you worked hard. just as you are tall with long hair, it doesn't mean you would be a midget if you were bald. see, they're both neat but not necessarily related. number four, people who say money doesn't matter are like people who say cake doesn't matter. it's because they've had a few slices. number nine, people gathering in the streets tend to be wrong because they're loud. number ten, quote, it is not always the job of people shouting outside impressive buildings to solve problems, it's often the job of the people inside who have paper, pens, desks and an impressive view.

number 11, this is the most widely quoted one this week, quote, historically, a story about people inside impressive buildings ignoring or even taunting people standing outside shouting at them turns out to be a story with an unhappy ending. number 13, 99% is a very large percentage. for instance, easily 99% of people want a roof over their head, food on their tables and the occasional slice of cake for dessert. surely an arrangement can be made with that 1% who disagree. joining us tonight for the interview is daniel handler, known to his readers as lemony snicket, he's a member of occupy writers. mr. handler, thank you to be here. >> miss maddow, it's a pleasure. >> it's embarrassing for me to read my work in front of you. i should have handed it over to you. >> i felt kind of blush sy. >> i hope i didn't screw it up. >> do you have a career in broadcasting? >> ahead of me in some future

life. why did you decide to do the occupy writers thing? >> they asked me to and i said no because i'm, though i support occupy wall street, i wasn't down there and i just felt like i didn't -- i couldn't imagine the story i could tell. i was actually swimming laps because, you know, you don't get a body like mine without working out constantly. i was to share a lap with a guy and he didn't want to share a lap. he said that's because he was a major donor to the building where we were both swimming laps. it suddenly hit me he was the 1% and hadn't thought of anything but his own entitlements and i sat at a bus stop on the way home and wrote 13 observations. >> he was a donor and therefore thought he did not have to share a lane and should not have to. >> yeah, well, he didn't make a convincing case. but he said to me, i'm a major donor so i don't think i have to share a lap. >> wow. >> and i thought, what?

>> wow. >> yeah. >> yeah. see, that makes you all -- >> we're all swimming together, sir. we're all trying to exercise. >> you're in my water, buckco. >> it's everybody's water. there's enough water for everyone to splash around in. >> see, the difference between you and i, among others, is that that makes you go write this brilliant thing, getting quoted all over the country. that would make me want to, like, pinch him. >> i didn't say i didn't want to pinch him. i did not. i try not to pinch men in the pool. creates the wrong impression. >> yeah. >> yeah. >> i'm with you. >> that's something we have in common. it's been a long time, although i'm thinking about starting again. >> everyone experiments when they're young. >> or they're 38. writing is not always an explanatory thing. it's not always expository. i felt like your writing about occupy wall street actually had a very cleansing expository effect. you actually explained sort of

what it's about in some ways. do you feel like the movement needs explaining or do you feel like it's doing all of its own expressing well -- >> well, i wouldn't presume to explain for other people who are doing things like powering their own electricity through bicycles, but i was puzzled by the reaction to occupy wall street. i was puzzled by people's puzzlement over it. because it seemed pretty simple to me that they were talking about a bunch of basic social contracts that have soured and have gone wrong and about an income inequality issue that kind of everybody knows that nobody talks about. >> uh-huh. >> and so i didn't seek to explain people who weren't doing a good job of it, but it just seemed to me like maybe if i said it in the form of many examples using cake, then maybe some people would get more relaxed about it. >> it made me realize that there is a -- that it is one thing to explain what it is that you want and it is another thing to explain why you're there. >> yeah. >> they're not the same thing.

>> not at all. and it just seemed to me, maybe this is because of my sociology professor, rob rosenthal, the general reason of people shouting outside buildings is because their message is not being talked about anywhere else. that makes you take to the streets. i'm grateful for people who have taken the streets over this. it's important and needs to be articulated. >> yeah. the "wall street journal" wrote about you having done this as your effort to explain occupy wall street to young readers. i don't know if that was your intention. >> "the wall street journal" didn't check with me or anything, but i have an 8-year-old son and he was actually -- he saw some pictures, he was curious why people were camping in the city. and i tried to explain it the best i can. i had a very clumsy explanation of why people were upset with financial institutions that might make sense to an 8-year-old. what he said to me was, that makes me so mad, i want to break a window. >> wow. >> it was useful to say, well let me show you a picture of

something that's happening in rome. here are some people so mad that they want to break a window. it just occurred to me it seems like a universal feeling in that there are a lot of families i guess that are successful that maybe talk about it's because they work really hard and work harder than other people and may deserve it. in my household, when we talk about our situation, we use the word luck a lot. we're extremely lucky, lucky to live in a big house, we're lucky that i had a family that helped me study, that let me become a writer, and it was luck. it was luck. it was luck. when i see a lot of right wing reaction to occupy wall street, they seem to think it's more like skill. >> uh-huh. >> that frustrates me. >> we are also -- we're also seeing specific parts of the right trying to make occupy wall street very scary, trying to define it as a scary thing. >> yeah. i mean, i grew up in san francisco and i attended a snooty little arts college, so

i'm not afraid of people holding signs at all. that's just been part of my whole life. i guess other people are scared of it. >> my favorite is the direct mailers when nancy pelosi became house speaker talking about san francisco values. >> yes. terrible. >> tolerate those people. >> what i like, i just saw an article about san francisco that referred to us as latte drinking. i wanted to say, oh, honey, the lattes are everywhere now. with us, it's the filtered coffee. it will come to you soon. >> it takes forever. >> we're so coffee snobby. we're way past snobby. >> daniel handler, known as lemony snicket, i'm dorking out that you're here. >> you're a credit to your profession. >> thank you. i have to go now. no, i have more news. it's not partisan good news where somebody is up or somebody's down, it's not sports good news or anything like that, it's true, true good news from

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flogood news. honestly good news i never expected to report. about caddo parish where shreveport was, the last confederate state capital of louisiana and the last place in america to lower the confederate

flag over land when the south lost the civil war in 1865. less than 40 years after the south surrendered, in 1902, caddo parish gave land to the daughters of the confederacy ths monument. the guys on the corner are confederate general and on the the top an anonymous general holding a rifle and it has the mousse of history and the words lest we forget on the monument n. 1951 to make it clear f it wasn't already, caddo added a big confederate flag. it was added 50 years later. that monument is at the foot of the caddo parish courthouse. when prosecutors, witnesses, potential jurors enter the courthouse they have to walk by the confederate jefls generals and soldier with his gun and under the confederate flag. two and a half years ago, karl

staples was called to duty at the courthouse but he told the clerk he did not feel he could carry out his civic responsibility because he did not want to serve under a confederate flag to do so. he told mr. staples he had to do jury duty. he was put in a jury pool to hear the case of an african-american man accused of killing a white man. at the jury selection he objected to the confederate flag calling it a symbol of one of the most heinous crimes ever committed to another member of the human race. he told the court you are here for justice and you overlook this injustice by continuing to fly this flag. the prosecutor asked to skarl staples from the jury, argue aing he couldn't be impartial in the case. the judge agreed and let him be struck. and he did not participate in the justice system on that day. it struck five more african-american jurors that day and the jury chosen for the case, 11 white people and one

african-american person found the dflt guilty. he was sentenced to die. we reported on this in may when the aclu raised the issue of the flag in an appeal to the louisiana supreme court. louisiana had the highest race of incarceration in the united states and they are adept at locking up african-americans in particular. louisiana has a population that is 32% black but a prison population that is 70% black. at least in caddo parish it is a prerequisite that you do not object serving on the jury under the confederate flag. yesterday the parish commission held a hearing on that confederate flag flying in front of the courthouse. the vast majority of residents said they had come to say they wanted the flag taken down. one of the people who turned out

to speak is carl staples. he made a brief statement without identifying himself as the man who got kicked off the jury for objecting to the flag. one pastor said the building was not just any old place in town. >> our courthouse is especially speak the ideals of justice and they should be, they must be surround ied with symbols that speak of justice and freedom for all people. if we can decide today to remove the confederate flag from the grounds of our courthouse, it will be a step in the direction of living, moving further in to those ideals of freedom and justice. >> after hearing from concerned citizens the caddo commission voted to remove the confederate

flag from in front of the caddo courthouse. >> i see no further request for discussion. at this time we will vote on the motion. that motion passes. >> the commission split down the middle. six pub cab and six democrats. 11 voted to remove it and one voted against. the confederate flag was due to be taken down by 4:00 p.m. today but they report it was gone shortly after the vote. replaced with an american flag. when you enter the caddo courthouse, the parish's most visible symbol of justice and equality under the law. you have to still walk by the confederate soldier and general and the lest we forget sign but the only flags are the louisiana state flag and this one. felennnc ingfos a necey.en -tai

best new thing in the world today is our best new fake thing in the world with. seriously it is really fake. it's the fake end of a totally long, totally fake space odyssey involving six fake astronauts who are also raelt men locked in windowless containers in russia for 520 days pretending to be in a rocket ship fake flying to mars and back. we first reported on this eight months ago. we caught them as they reached their fake goal. they put on real space suit and fake walked around on the fake surface of fake mars collecting fake mineral samples. they trumped around a sandbox in the dark pretending they were on mars. true story. it was eight months ago they were on fake mars but today in russia, the fake marsnauts landed back on fake earth and

released to enjoy human contact with someone other than themselves before three more days of quarantine. the mars 500 project is a joint agency. the russian institute for biomedical problems. yes, the point of this awesomely named institution is to find out what happens when you shut up six people together for a long period of time with no possibility of escape which is what you have to do for the seriously long journey if you were going to mars. they couldn't fake their way out of gravity so they did not experience weightlessness but the yoois isolation and communication delays bad food and cramped quarters that was all real fakery. eight months in the container to preend to fly to mars, then put on the space suits and pretend to walk fake mars and back in the container to pretend to fly back. now they are allowed to acknowledge they are on earth which is where they have been all along but in a weird way.