ring to them, don't you think? pain, punishment, misery, sometimes death. often the same approach to people republicans don't like. not just the condemned but border crossers coming here to find work. of all kinds. terrorist suspects. gay people. all propose the very worst on those they don't like accompanied by a sheer totality of glee, joy at the misery of others. they suffer and die, we survive and get on. fa, la, la, la, la, la, la, la. that's "hardball." "the ed show" with ed schultz begins right now. breaking news, jerry sandusky is talking and defending himself. the disgraced former penn state football coach granted his first interview to bob costas. the full interview airs tonight on nbc's rock center. we will play you a portion of the interview shortly. this is "the ed show" let's get to work.

>> how did it all start? >> basically because i'm a frustrated play ground director, i guess. >> explosive revelations about the judge who granted jerry sandusky's bail. and another alleged victim of sexual abuse has come forward. john fine steen of the "washington post" and ring of fire radio host and attorney are here with the latest. >> you are embarrassed. >> why don't you get up before you make a bigger fool of yourself. >> that embarrassment is leading in the polls. joe walsh is here on the rebirth of newt. >> you are the first domino. >> yep. >> tonight, wisconsin voters get their moment. we have a count down to the walker recall effort. >> i'm teed off the public school system doesn't teach history anymore. >> bill o'reilly has his story as teed off.

it appears his new book on lincoln has some problems with the facts i want to make sure you don't make statements you i can't back up on this network. >> jerry sandusky is defending himself claiming he is not a pedophile and mike mcqueary, the assistant football coach at penn state that may have stopped the 2002 incident now claims that he did. in an interview i with bob costas for rock center, sandusky defended himself, i'm not a pedophile, he said. i'm innocent of these charges. i could say that i have done some of those things. i have horsed around with the kids. i have showered after workouts. i have hugged them and touched their legs without intent of sexual contact, sandusky said. when costas asked if he had done anything wrong. sandusky said i shouldn't have showered with those kids. another huge development tonight, an e-mail obtained by

nbc news. mike mcqueary who is on administrative leave wrote to friends and former teammates. i did the right thing. you guys know me. the truth is not out there fully. i didn't just turn and run. i made sure it stopped. i had to make quick, tough decisions. and there's more. today the judge in the case is coming under big-time scrutiny. the judge has done volunteer work for the second mime mile charity, the kids organization founded by sandusky. charity work is common for judges but the appearance of a possible conflict of interest is a problem and it doesn't end there. the judge and her husband donated money to the second mile charity in 2009. in 2007, the board chairman of second mile, roger stone hosted

a fund-raiser for dutchcot for her campaign for district judge according to records of the committee to elect leslie dutchcot. state representative mike verb of pennsylvania said i am sending a letter to the chief justice of the supreme court of pennsylvania to look at the reports that are out there and if, in fact, this judge has a conflict of interest. when jerry sandusky was brought before the judge dutchcot on 40 counts related to sexual abuse of children, prosecutors requested $500,000 bail and electronic leg monitoring system but judge dutchcot freed sandusky on $100,000 unsecured bail. no leg monitor. sandusky's preliminary hearing is december 7th. attorney general linda kelly said more charges are possible. in an interview from 1987, sandusky talked about the second mile charity he founded. >> how did it all start? >> basically because i'm a

frustrated playground director, i guess. i enjoy being around children. i enjoy their enthusiasm. i just have a good time with them. i really enjoy the personal contact. i get a lot of personal contact in my life through my family, through our athletes. everybody needs people to care for them. sometimes they don't want it. sometimes they don't understand what you are trying to do but they want to be disciplined. one of the biggest things would be the trust that would be developed. what we are trying to be is a true friend. >> a ninth victim has come forward according to the lieutenant who heads the criminal investigation. the man is now in his 20s and knew sandusky through the second mile charity. the long list of people who might have stopped jerry sandusky keeps growing. the ceo of the second mile charity, jack raykovitz has resigned. he was head of the charity the past 28 years. second mile was notified by penn

state officials in 2002 after a horrifying shower incident. raykovitz says he was only told an employee was uncomfortable seeing sandusky in the shower with a boy. raykovitz did not notify police. in 2005 or 2006, according to the grand jury report, another victim met sandusky through the second mile charity. sandusky continued to have access to children from the second mile until 2008 when he notified the board he was being investigated. this fits the same unforgiveable pattern we have seen in this case. time the and time, people in position of authority and leadership had an opportunity to do more. they didn't, and more children were allegedly victimized. over the weekend, president obama gave his opinion on the scandal. >> what happened at penn state indicates that at a certain point folks start to think of systems and institutions and

don't think of individuals. when you think of how vulnerable kids are, for the alleged facts of that case to have taken place, for folks not to immediately say nothing else matters except making sure those kids are protected, that's a problem. >> get your cell phones out. i want to know what you think. should the judge have rekuzed herself from sandusky's case. a for y and b for no and you can go to our new blog at ed@msnbc.com. i will have the result is later in the show. let's bring in the host of ring of fire. good to have you with us tonight. your response to those comments by sandusky in the interview. he's defending himself saying he's not a pedophile. what do you make of it?

>> he is looking at 400 years, ed. he is building his case in the media. we see it time and time again these days. look, this is the problem with people doing nothing. had they done what they were supposed to do, there would be evidence. you have you have a whole procedure that you use in a rape case. now it comes down to his word against any children who might come forward. some children may decide they don't want to come forward. they are 23, 24 years old and may say i don't want to do this. he is building his case because he is looking at 400 years and his game is to say there's really no physical evidence. there's some eyewitness testimony. i can overcome the eyewitness testimony. he's fighting for his life because right now he knows if he goes to prison for 400 years he's going to be the victim in a sexual encounter. i have to tell you something, as this thing builds you will continue to see him spinning his case in the media. >> mike mcqueary, the assistant football coach is saying he

stopped the shower incident in an e-mail to his friends. what about that? does that conflict with the grand jury report? >> completely. it completely conflicts with the grand jury report and you will see these fine changes taking place right now. look, at the end of the process, he didn't call the police. that's what any responsible adult would have done. he didn't do. that the grand jury looked at this. they questioned him. they had all of the facts. they never said that he tried to interrupt this encounter. they never said he did anything honorable. called his daddy and talked to joe paterno. what we are going to see, ed, we will see fine spins to all of this. as you see the fine spin what you are seeing is something that will be presented in a defense. >> mike, let's talk about the judge. does the judge, in your opinion, have a conflict of interest? and have you ever seen anything like this? such a close association. we are talking about political fund-raiser, someone who has worked for the charity.

obviously she must know sandusky. what's your take on this? have you ever seen anything like this? >> it is not even a close call, ed. she had the duty to rekuz herself. urn the law there is a concept that says if there is even the appearance of the judge doing something wrong, the appearance of impro pryty she has a duty to say there are a half dozen other judges that can hear this. let me bring them in here and be the trier of fact. >> what do you make of the fact he is free and unmonitored on 40 felony accounts. >> what she did is she freed -- right now all we know back to 1998 is we have a sexual predator. in her mind, she thought it was more important to do whatever is going to please her personally rather than even doing something as simple as putting a gps monitor on. this man lives right next to an elementary school. his backyard backs up to an elementary school playground. she knows those facts.

the prosecutors told us those facts. the prosecutors went through everything. they did what they were supposed to do. they fought for the right thing. that is to put him in jail, $500,000, certainly secured and at the very least put a gps monitor on the man. >> should there be bail guidelines as there are often sentencing guidelines? >> they could have a uniform act, ed, that protects children. the uniform act says that under no circumstances can you let a guy like this out. the federal government has the right to come up with some uniform rules and it's time they do that. as a matter of fact, it's a shame pennsylvania didn't have some uniform rules like some states do. >> mike, good to have you with us. mike papantonio host of the ring of fire radio show. the fallout continues. six advertisers pulled their ads from the game. one media buyer told the "wall street journal" i'm advising my

clients to move out of the the games for the short term. the big ten is removing joe paterno's name from the trophy given to the winner of the conference championship game. the victims themselves are reportedly torn over the effect their courage is having on penn state's football program. now let's turn to sports commentator and writer john fine steen. good to have you with us. and author of the upcoming book, one on one behind the scenes with the greats in the game. what do you make of sandusky's denial so early in all of this? >> i don't look at it from a legal standpoint, ed, the way that mike does, but i think he is 100% right that he is obviously going to try to spin as much as he can. what does he have to lose at this point? in the minds of the public, he's guilty. it has nothing -- there's a difference between innocent until proven guilty in a court and innocent until proven guilty in a court of public opinion. in the court of public opinion he is already guilty.

so he might as well go on with bob costas and say i was just horsing around. anyone who buys that story, honestly, i know legally she innocent until proven guilty but anyone who buys that story, ed, i have ocean front land in nebraska i'd like to show them tomorrow morn sdplg what's your reaction from the e-mail from mike mcqueary. e-mails get out. he should have known they would get out. is this a strategy or do you expect him or others to try to defend their actions. >> i don't know mike mcqueary personally. but we all know that e-mails get out. when you put something in writing now days it is not going to be secret. maybe he didn't want to to be secret. i'm sure he has heard and read people saying why didn't he do something why did he run out hoff the building the way the grand jury testimony would indicate that he did and now he

is trying to say it is not the way it sounds. i did more than the grand jury report says i did. as mike said, it is he said/he said so we don't know and i'm not sure we ever will know what happened in that building that night. >> mike, the -- your reaction to the game being played on saturday, money, over $300,000 has been raised for children who have experienced child abuse. penn state seems to be doing the right thing. now the game is played, do you still think it was the right thing to do? >> i'm sorry, you said mike, i am sorry. i think that, yes. as i said last week, i think playing the game, trying to raise money and using some of the money that came in to the school for the game for kids who have been sexually abused is the right thing to do. they weren't going to call the game off realistically.

i thought the way the penn state players handled themselves when they came out of that tunnel hit the right note. what i mean by that is if they were coming out to win one for coach joe they would have come charging out of the tunnel. they didn't do that. they understood this was not your typical football saturday. that a tragedy occurred here and i think they were respectful of that even though this clearly has affected their lives, too. and i think if they can use the money for a charity group. if they can raise awareness and if penn state can begin to say, we know this was wrong, rather than the reaction we saw last wednesday night on campus, then that is progress. >> john feinstein, thank you. >> my pleasure. >> we have a clip of bob costas interview. it is about a minute long. you don't want to miss it. that's next. ♪ round, round, get around, i get around ♪

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coming up jerry sandusky first interview. bob costas interviewed the disgraced coach for rock center tonight. the full interview airs on that show at 10:00 p.m. we will have an exclusive preview next. stay with us. ke, keepeovhei "loan t iedhecht ♪

men.an ke t iedhecht breaking news tonight on the penn state child sexual abuse case. nbc's "rock center" obtained an interview with jerry sandusky and his lawyer just a short time ago. we now have an excerpt of the interview that was conducted by bob costas. >> mr. sandusky, there's a 40-count indictment, the grand jury report contains specific detail. there are multiple accusers. multiple eyewitnesss to various aspects of the abuse. a reasonable person says where there's this much smoke, there must be plenty of fire. what do you say? >> i say that i am innocent of those charges. >> innocent?

completely innocent and falsely accused in every aspect? >> well, i could say that, you know, i have done some of those things. i have horsed around with kids. i have showered after workouts. i have hugged them and i have touched their leg. without intent of sexual contact. >> the entire interview can be seen on "rock center" with brian williams tonight at 10:00 p.m. eastern and pacific and 9:00 p.m. central. let's bring back mike papantonio. mike, is jerry sandusky hurting himself by doing an interview like this? >> it's the only thing he can do. he's not going to take the stand, anyway, ed, when it comes down to it, so he has nothing to lose. looking at 400 years. costas was smart going back to the essence of where this all started and that's the grand jury report. this isn't speculation, ed. these are grand jurors who heard testimony.

they had whatever physical evidence there was which was probably very, very little at best. the point is, they heard testimony. they had witnesses. so at this point, to believe him based on the fact that you've got all of this time that's passed with a grand jury looking at the fact and making these conclusions. they are very specific, ed. the first page of it talks about witness testimony where he performed oral sex on victim number one. the next page talks about witness testimony, witness testimony on almost every page here. he has a big thing to overcome. to answer your question, he has everything to lose, and at this point we know in a trial he will never take the stand. impossible. so why not go ahead and play it out in the media? that's the best he's going to be able to do. >> he says that he's done some things without intent of sexual contact. how is that going to play for his defense? you of course just held up the testimony there that certainly conflicts with what he is saying in the bob costas interview.

>> intent comes up, ed, when there is a questionable issue. when it is a close call. there's to close call when you have eyewitnesss saying there was oral sex taking place or he was fondling the child. that intent issue comes up with there's a close call with evidence that's not clear. again, like costas focused on, this grand jury statement of facts is compelling. it's almost difficult to read, ed. it's so compelling. because of the fact -- >> is jerry sandusky trying to win over the crowd, so to speak? i mean, there's a tremendous amount of love from fans toward the penn state football program. this guy's been around that community for a long, long time. is this about winning in the public arena as much as anything else? >> ed, he can win in the public arena. at best what sandusky is going to be able to accomplish is maybe do something for penn state and make it not look so bad for penn state. when it comes down to that courtroom, when the jury sits and listen to the facts, all this spin doesn't do him a bit

of good. it might say, in the long run, i guess it could maybe save penn state money over the millions of dollars they're going to have to pay. the truth is, this is all about his last-ditch effort to save his legacy, which is at this point not existent. >> costas asked the lawyer why he came out today. he said it was important that sandusky get his side of the story out and they're just trying to play this out in the court of public opinion. obviously that's what's happening. that's my opinion. if you were defending sandusky, is this a move you would have made? >> no. not at all. there's no reason to do this. all he can do right now is this. he can count on the fact that sandusky's best shot here is to say there's no physical evidence, because the people that should have reported him were cowards and had they done what they should have done, we would have physical evidence. it's very easy to find physical evidence in a rape case. >> doesn't he somewhat run a risk? the victims are going to hear and see this interview. this could motivate them to

really come forward. i mean, other victims that are out there. what about that? >> that's right. every time he's in the public domain talking about this, i remember last week, ed, you asked me what should paterno do? i said paterno should keep his mouth shut. because every time these people make a statement, they make the victims that much angrier. they look at what's happened. they know the lie. they become angry. they may say at one point i'm going to pass on this because i don't want to go through it. when they hear this guy standing up there, sitting up there lying, it does motivate them to take action. >> mike papantonio, thank you your staying with us tonight. we want to remind you to watch the entire interview with jerry sandusky and his attorney conducted by bob costas coming up on nbc's "rock center" with brian williams at 10:00 p.m. eastern and pacific and 9:00 p.m. central. michele bachmann is bellyaching about airtime during the debate. the minnesota congresswoman gets equal time in "psycho talk" next. in less than four hours, the

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and in "psycho talk" tonight, congresswoman michele bachmann is accusing cbs move of media bias for not asking her enough questions during the gop debate over the weekend. but just a couple of months ago, bachmann was preaching about the free market determining who gets to speak. >> whether it's net neutrality, or whether it's the fairness doctrine, are we really going to

go down the road where the federal government will decide who gets speech and who doesn't? >> so michele bachmann wants the marketplace to decide. in this case, the marketplace has decided. she's at 5% in the polls. it seems to me cbs was exercising the free market. making a decision that maybe people didn't want to hear her answers seeing that she's so low rated in the polls. even the south carolina republican party who hosted the debate disagrees with bachmann on this one. a spokesman said, "congresswoman michele bachmann seemed to receive a fair number of questions and had ample opportunities to answer." furthermore, the marketplace helped bachmann during a debate in august. just before she won the iowa straw poll. bachmann got the most questions out of any candidate. i didn't hear her complain about 2% tim pawlenty not getting enough time. bachmann was more than happy to take full advantage of her status as a rising star at the time. >> i was at the tip of the spear

fighting against the implementation of obama-care. a one-term president. unconstitutional individual mandate. i introduced the light bulb freedom of choice act. i like sarah palin a lot. i sit on the house select committee on intelligence. the congress gave barack obama a blank check for $2.4 trillion. >> well, since august, the tables have turned and the marketplace has determined bachmann belongs in single digits. so for michele bachmann to blame media bias for not getting enough questions is whiney "psycho talk." the cain train, i tell you what, it goes off the tracks. the pizza man is asked about some place called libya. he can't give a straight answer. we've got the unbelievable video next. bill o'reilly's book gets banned at a historical museum. this is a dandy. you're not going to want to miss this one. lemeyot very im me.

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i am for 100%. i think this idea of 99% and 1% is grotesque, european, socialist class warfare baloney. >> there's red meat and there's the new leader in the republican clubhouse for 2012. a fresh poll today shows newt gingrich sitting at the front at 28%. how did that happen? since october, gingrich has surged 13 points while cain is down five points. romney has dropped four. perry is down 8%. it's been a long, very strange trip for newt and the gop. the former speaker announced he was running for president back on may 11th of this year. a few days later, newt was on "meet the press" and referred to congressman paul ryan's plan to privatize medicare as right wing social engineering. charles krauthammer called it a capital offense and declared gingrich's candidacy over. less than a month in to his

campaign, gingrich blew off a faith and freedom conference to take his third wife on a luxury cruise which prompted his staff to quit. aechb and go running to rick perry. since then republicans have been trying other presidential candidates as well only to decide newt's the best they have got. newt gingrich is all about more money for millionaires and he's a cheap labor conservative. but he is red meat to the tea party and has enough political moxie to work his way through a debate without shooting himself in the foot. joining me now are e.j. dionne, senior fellow of the brookings institute and columnist for the "washington post" and joan walsh, editor at large, salon.com. great to have both of you with us. i want to play this. here's a voter's reaction to newt trashing paul ryan's plan when he was in iowa. >> what you just did to paul ryan is unforgivable.

>> i didn't do anything to paul ryan. >> yes, you did. you undercut him and his allies in the house. you're an embarrassment to our party. >> i'm sorry you feel that way. >> get out before you make a bigger fool of yourself. >> joan walsh, how did that turnaround take place? look where newt is today. what do you make of it? >> i think the republican primary is wonderful. it's kind of like a children's t-ball game where everybody gets a chance to win. everybody gets a chance to be in first place for a little while, ed, and it's very nice for all of their egos. you know, newt has not gotten any attention because he's been so far behind in the polls and came out so terribly. if he's going to be the front runner, newt's bag age -- he has so much baggage, his bag age has baggage. he's not going to survive a close primary where he's suddenly going to get the full focus, the full spotlight on him. it's not going to happen. >> e.j., what do you make of newt gingrich's surge in the polls? to 28%. who would have thought this was going to happen? >> who thought the republicans

would be so egalitarian, giving absolutely everybody a chance at first place? i mean, what you're seeing is a big chunk of the republican party that just can't get to mitt romney. and they keep looking for someone else. and i was struck in the cbs poll last week that if you put together the 17% undecided and the 14% who said they wanted somebody else, that's 31% for none of these guys. now, cbs doesn't press people, so you get a bigger undecided although i think that's more accurate. but what it says to me is there's still an opening for someone. and i have this odd idea, i know, that there may be room for draft movement. there have been draft write-ins, particularly in new hampshire, a state that's friendly to write-ins and that counts them. and i wrote this in a blog and a prominent conservative wrote me and, believe me, this person doesn't agree with me very much,

he said, that's a great idea and started talking about a draft write-in for jeb bush. so i think there are still a lot of republicans out there looking for somebody. in the meantime, they park with the alternatives to mitt romney and newt's the one right now. >> newt gingrich is benefiting from his competitors making mistakes. he's getting help like this gaffe that was produced by herman cain at an interview on foreign policy. here it is. >> so you agree with president obama on libya, or not? >> okay. libya. president obama supported the uprising, correct? president obama called for the removal of gadhafi. just want to make sure we're talking at the same thing before i say yes, i agree, or no i didn't agree. i do not agree with the way he

handled it for the following reason. no, that's a different one. i got to go back. got all this stuff twirling around in my head. >> the guy has no game. he's not ready for primetime. he doesn't know. if you'd have asked newt gingrich that question, he'd have reeled it off, although he's changed his position on it. the guy, it's like he's afraid to make a mistake. i have to ask you, joan, what's worse, that or the perry gaffe in the gop debate last week? what do you think? >> oh, quite honestly, that is worse. i mean, that is ridiculous. and it's about, you know, crucial foreign policy issue and, i mean, it's just horrifying. >> it's almost as if he wasn't watching the news. >> yeah. it's as though he didn't have a clue and he was rifling through notes in his head and he was really stuck.

i mean, that, you know, he's tanking in the polls, ed. he's really falling fast. and that will be another rock around his neck. i mean, he can't survive that. >> in the same interview, cain says he supports collective bargaining, then he was asked a follow-up question. here it is. >> would you favor collective bargaining for federal employees? >> they already have it, don't they? yeah. they already have -- >> no, they don't. >> they have unions. >> they have unions. >> they have unions. okay. >> they don't have the same bargaining -- >> they don't have the same bargaining powers. here, again, collective bargaining, i support, as long as it doesn't create an undue burden on the state, the government, the taxpayer. that's the issue. >> that interview today was conducted with the editorial board of the "milwaukee journal sentinel." how unprepared, e.j., is this guy? >> i was thinking when i heard

that today that in a republican primary you might survive for a while sexual harassment charges. you cannot survive supporting public employee unions. i mean, that was just extraordinary. and it's painful to watch. and i think, you know, watching that footage that you just showed of cain, and watching the footage over and over again of rick perry not being able to remember the third agency he wants to abolish, when people start feeling sorry for you watching the video, that's when you know they're not going to vote for you for president. >> not presidential. >> after ten debates and we still have a bunch more to go, joan walsh, your assessment of the gop field. >> oh, it's just terrible. it's an abomination. it would be very hard to be a republican right now. and, you know, newt, we've got a man who's most famous for serving his wife with divorce papers when she's recovering from cancer surgery. we've got the only speaker in history who's ever been disciplined by congress on an

ethics charge. you know, it's just -- if this is the best -- if this is now the best they can do against mitt romney, that's pathetic. >> e.j., what do you think? >> i think republicans, themselves, aren't happy with this field. i mean, romney keeps surviving because relative to all these other guys, he's competent and knows what he thinks. he may change his mind about it fairly often, but he knows what he wants to say in a debate. and that's why the conventional wisdom is eventually people will have to get to him by default. but i'm still waiting for him to take a big lead in the polls. there is this big resistance to him in the primaries and i wonder what that will say about enthusiasm in the fall if he does get the nomination. >> all i can say is there has to be a lot of iowa farmers out there who are republican scratching their head trying to figure out how's this all going to work out? >> maybe you should enter the republican primary, ed. why not? >> really, ed. >> me? yeah, right.

e.j. dionne, joan walsh, always a pleasure. good to have you with us. scott walker is pulling out all stops to save his job, and the recall hasn't even started yet. john nichols coming up with the latest, and it is interesting.

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welcome back to "the ed show." can wisconsin pull an ohio? well, when the clock strikes midnight in wisconsin tonight, thousands will begin a campaign to recall union busting governor scott walker from office. more than 20,000 people have trained to kick off a petition drive asking for walker's removal. organizers have 60 days to get 540,000 valid signatures in order to force a special election. sdot walker has already started a defense. the walker campaign is running

$300,000 in television ads throughout the state of the wisconsin. no one should be surprised at walker's aggressive stance. earlier this year, he spoke to a prank caller, pretending to be tea party billionaire david koch. walker said republican governors like himself and john kasich needed to stick to their plan. >> i talk to kasich every day. john's got to stand firm in ohio. i think we do the same thing with rick scott in florida. i think snyder who got a little more support probably could do that in michigan. when you start going down the list, there's a lot of us new governors who got elected to do something big. >> you're the first domino. >> yep. this is our moment. >> joining me now is washington correspondent for "the nation" magazine, john nichols. why do i feel like an old-time deejay spinning the hits on these tapes that are so priceless? john, great to have you with us tonight. >> it's good to be with you, ed. >> you know, last week's result in ohio, i mean, does that

motivate the folks of wisconsin that there's light at the end of the tunnel, that this stuff can actually happen? what impact is that going to have on the wisconsin recall campaign? >> it has a huge impact, ed. in fact, i was at an interfaith dinner up in appleton, wisconsin, last night and just mentioned the word ohio and everybody started applauding. so people here followed the ohio fight very closely, and it's notable that the governor did as well. governor walker was out the night of the ohio vote claiming that the ohio law was very, very different from wisconsin's. that he is very, very different that john kasich. but the bottom line is, that koch brothers tape you just played reveals that governor walker saw himself really as the quarterback for a nationwide push on this issue and he spoke of talking to governor kasich on a daily basis. so people see the connection. >> we're talking about possibly $70 million coming into the state of wisconsin to help protect walker's job.

how was walker able to fund raise against the recall campaign before it even started? >> well, they kick started the campaign, themselves. hilariously enough, a donor to governor walker filed a bogus recall petition, or recall certification, about a week ago, and that allowed the governor to start collecting unlimited amounts of money. there's a quirk in the law that says if you're targeted for recall, all of the campaign finance limits go up. so the koch brothers could write governor walker a $1 million check or even a $10 million check and the governor is putting the money he's raised already to use. he didn't -- he's not just buying ads. he bought a primetime spot in the middle of the packers/vikings game tonight. that's the most expensive bit of television turf you can buy. >> it certainly is. he has 60 days to get it done. wisconsinites, are they going to pull an ohio? and get 1.3 million?

how tough will it be? >> >> ed, i want to remind you, ohio has twice as many people. so getting to 1.3 million would be pretty tough. there are many wisconsinites who talk about getting to 700,000, 800,000, even 1 million signatures. that's a big deal. when the ohioans filed the 1.3 million, that's when everybody knew they had to take that fight seriously. it will be similar in wisconsin. >> and the polls are showing that people do want this recall effort to move forward.

packer parties, others in pajamas, folks having rallies. there's a great energy out there, and people seem to be incredibly excited. i think that excitement's been underestimated by the governor and a lot of his donors. it's definitely there. >> going to be a great story to follow. do the math. 540,000 signatures. 60 days to get it done. it's going to take an intense effort. john nichols of "the nation."

always a pleasure. first it was michele bachmann, then it was rick perry. now the republican party's grasp of american history hits a new low. bill o'reilly gets a history lesson. next on "the ed show." [ fema le announcer ] introducing crest complete whitening plus deep clean. you feel it working, so you know it's working. and that means you're good to go, for whatever the day brings. new crest complete. unlike ordinary toothpaste, you feel a deeper clean.

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and finally tonight, if you want a history lesson, bill o'reilly probably isn't the best guy to ask. o'reilly is the co-author, we think, of the new book "killing lincoln." he says he wrote it because he's looking out for the kids. >> i wrote the book for two reasons. number one, i'm really t'd off that the public school system doesn't teach history anymore and the kids don't know what they're doing. >> makes sense, they don't teach anymore, huh? o'reilly was a high school history teacher 30 years ago. reports by historical groups says the book is filled with factual errors. the book says general lee and grant met only once. it provides the wrong date for a fire at ford's theater. it refers to the oval office before it was built, along with many other errors. the national park service

refuses to carry the book in the ford's theater museum bookstore because of the mistakes. it doesn't sound like the book lives up to the high standards of the accuracy of fox news, does it? >> i want to remind you not to make statements you can't back up on this network. we don't do that on this network. other networks do. we don't. >> but i guess it's okay to write them. but o'reilly isn't backing down. today he told "politico" his book is being attacked by enemies. i'm joined tonight by eric boehlert, senior fellow, "media matters." are you surprised o'reilly is defending inaccuraies rather than correcting them? good to have you with us tonight, eric. >> this is the fox news version of u.s. history. safe to say this book will not be used in any schools this year, next year, or 20 years from now. as you mentioned, the parks service looked at it, said it doesn't pass their test. too many errors. not enough documentation. if that reminds you of a certain

show at 8:00 on fox news. it wasn't just the park service, a leading civil war magazine came out with a review and referred to the book as strange fiction. of course, the enemies are after bill o'reilly. apparently enemies are any historians who pick up the book and look at it. >> the civil war society magazine "north and south," the word they used is unreliable. i guess is bill o'reilly saying these historians, these experts, are enemies? >> that's right. anyone who picks up the book is an enemy. again, look, this passes along sort of the fox news approach to world history. to current events. it's whatever bill o'reilly wants it to be, whoever, you know, is behind the chair. he told "newsweek" last month this book took six months to write. he co-wrote it with someone over the phone and e-mails. now it's pretty obvious that's the problem. the book is riddled with errors. he's saying there's only four mistakes, the park service woman wrote a memo four pages long and

says she didn't look at the whole book, there's probably more. again, this is unfortunately, this is what fox news looks like when they expand beyond current events and try to look at u.s. history. >> so how does he correct it? >> how does he correct it? he doubles down. what do they always do at fox news? there's nothing wrong, there's nothing wrong. the problem is he's threatening to write more of these books. he said if this history book is successful, he's going to do more like this. i mean, please, bill, do not write a book about the kennedy assassination. whatever you do. >> well, the ford theater gift shop is going to carry the book. so i guess it's all about promotion. but for him to write this book saying because high school history teachers are not teaching the kids, and he has to just come in and set the record straight, i'll tell you what, that is delusional. great to have you with us tonight, eric. appreciate your time. that's "the ed show." i'm ed schultz. listen to me on sirius xm radio channel 127 monday through friday. noon to 3:00 p.m.