good morning from new york. i'm chris hayes. new jersey governor chris christie has vetoed the newly passed bill that would legalize same-sex marriage in that state. the new york knicks suffered their first defeat of jeremy lin last night at madison square garden. they lost to the lowly new orleans hornets. and whitney houston's funeral is at 12:00 p.m. today at new hope baptist church in newark, new jersey, where she grew up. 1500 people are expected to attend by invitation. the closest the public will be able to get is a staging area two blocks away. right now i am joined by editorial collect e. director of col colorlines.com and nancy cohen,

author of "delirium". welcoming back to the table co-anchor of pbs "need to know" and, of course, an "up" regular columnist for "the daily." great to have you all here. all right. so we've got to start with the iconic image that came out of the week on thursday. house republicans convened a hearing on the affordable care act requirement that insurance companies cover birth control for free as part of preventive care. but political language is all about setting the terms on the debate so they are most favorable to you. birth control it tushs out is pretty popular. so for the last few weeks conservatives have been how muching their arguments against that mandate as a defense of religious freedom. when committee chairman darrell issa was confronted with the fact that there was not a single woman called to testify at the hearing he explained women weren't necessary because it was, after all, a hearing on religious freedom. see how that works.

or, in other words, a hearing without birth control without one person who can actually give birth. when you have men talking about birth control you are libel to get sound bites like this one which came later in the day from rick santorum's money man foster freeze. >> this contraceptive thing, my gosh, it's such inexpensive. back in my days they used bayer aspirin. the gals pull it between their knees and it wasn't that costly. >> i've been trying to get the phrase bayer aspirin out of my mind all week. we just played the clip. he has since apologized for his comment. i want to begin by asking about what you made of this week in terms of just -- surely this kind of politics and optics of it, what is striking to me was republicans seem to have stumbled into a situation in which a set of different plot points throughout the week can be plausible strung together to

make a case that they are not particularly friendly to the issues -- women's issues and also women's perspective. i wonder how that comes along politically or whether you think this is going to blow away a week from now. >> i think a lot of it is your networks. when you look at rank in file conservatives in the united states there is somewhat greater representation in women in the elite echelons. when you think about these conversations how you structure and frame these strategies what, kind of is reflective is who gives you the gut check that that doesn't make a lot of sense. >> who is in the room to say, by the way, i couldn't help but look at the hearing -- >> there was an op-ed in the "wall street journal," very well regarded on the right, who argued that, look, the way to talk about this is to talk more broadly about insurance mandates, who owns insurance, what do we think is appropriate to include in insurance. not just to talk about birth control but rather to move the conversation to this larger conversation about choice in insurance.

>> we should say roy blunt has proposed this amendment that does that because it would allow employers to be able to evade whichever parts of the mandate covering whatever they don't want to cover. right? for any reason. it's both moral and religious object i. >> it should be controlled by individuals. but fair enough. >> moving the conversation is what we are seeing. i think actually part of the reason that they picked this particular fight, which i think is interesting, is because the original fight they picked, which is on the original affordable care act mandate to cover bilt control without a co-pay, right, religious institutions would have to purchase insurance that did that, nicely united two constituencies. it got the libertarians and economic conservatives who hate the affordable care act and hate the notion of telling employer what's to do and it got religious folks because it was defensive of religious freedom. they got into it, perhaps not wrongly, this was a good issue for that. >> the most precisive quote came

from nancy pelosi, duh. all of that is true but i think it complicates the issue a little much. if you are going to have a conversation about women's health care of any sort and involve no women, it is just a home run for your opposition. you know, and i -- it is just so striking to me how out of touch you can get, that you would think you can do this. >> that, to me, the story, of course, is the gender battle right now, that is front and center. i agree with you. this notion that somehow you are talking about women's issues and not have to hear just intensifies, okay, i just came back from central america. a trip where we were looking precisely of issues of violence against women. mexico, guatemala, honduras. these are countries where these gender battles are on the front lines. women are being killed across the board. this is not what we're living

here. but it is this confrontation of, you know, man versus woman. otherwi otherwise, why would they do this. >> i want you to complicate that because your book does a good job of complicate that. >> it's certainly the results are against the interests of women and the consequences effect women much more. but men care about birth control also. i don't think men want to see birth control outlawed. they don't want to see it treated as something shameful and outrageous. and what you see in the republican party, as ryan says, is that a lot of the activists are women and the women are the ones who are, in many ways, pushing this agenda of sexual fundmentalism that says that we need to go back to a time when we preserve the traditional family and we're back in their roles and sex is destroying america. there is an article today about, you know, the increase in single

motherhood and that this is, you know, an issue of marriage. so these republican women are in some ways pushing the politicians to enact this agenda. and i think in some ways -- >> some women. >> they are -- >> michele bachmann. >> michele bachmann, sarah palin. >> i think it's important to note here that this -- the neat gender divided of this being a gender battle that there are men and women on two sides of the divide and then that's layered on a polarization of the two party. it never breaks that down neatly. that's what makes the issue complicated. i jokingly tweeted this week, republicans do remember that women vote, right? what are you doing. on the back wall you liberals realize there are conservative women, right? the question is, at what voters are watching this who are sort of maybe not particularly encamped in either part of this and they're hearing this at the

watercooler? >> one thing i found fascinating is partly it's the sensibility that she's describing, this sensibility that has resulted in actually relative dirth of these women in prominent roles. a lot of social conservatives see that as a serious problem. again, people who embrace this traditional role oftentimes will kind of remove themselves from public life before they get to the point where they're actually making this case, which is part of why -- >> definitional. >> a numb oer of other figures >> became so galvanized. we have a republican woman we want to weigh in on this after the break.

where are the women? when i look at this panel, i don't see one single woman

representing the tens of millions of women across the country who want and need insurance coverage for basic preventive health care service, including family planning. where are the women? don't we owe it to the tens of millions of american women whose lives will be effected to let just one, just one woman speak on their behalf today on this panel? >> new york congresswoman carolyn maloney has sat at this table a number of times, at the hearing. good morning. thanks for joining us. >> good morning. >> national chairwoman for republican for choice sounds like a joke about rolling a rock up a hill or something. i'm asking this in genuine earnestness and good faith. do you feel like you're losing your -- the battle that you are

waging to internal to the republican party on this issue and set of issues? >> well, i'll say this, that no matter what you think about the issue of abortion within the party and even though our polling shows when you ask the question who should decide, even among republicans, majority are pro-choice on that issue. when it comes to contraception, it's even more overwhelmingly pro contraception. i mean, to be caught in this kind of web of, you know, being portrayed as being anti-contraception is just insane for the party. it's not where the rank in file republicans are. >> how do you think it came to this point? i mean, explain to me, a, how we ended up in this situation in which that's a plausible argument to make about where the republican party stands and how that hearing happened with all the men sitting there and not a single women testifying? >> i have to tell you, i know a lot of the leadership, i know a lot of the men in leadership. they're not terrible guys. i would like to think they're

just gender blind. but i tell you, after this hearing you have to think they're gender stupid. and part of it is they just don't get it, that republican women feel very strongly about these issues because we don't speak up about it often enough. but further, women in general, they don't understand us and it's really interesting. when i talk to them on a wide range of issues and point out to them women have a very different life perspective than men, and it's important to have us as part of the conversation on a whole host of issues, not because our opinion is better but because it's different. and if you're doing legislation that effects everybody, and in this case, disproportionately women, have us there, listen to us, hear our perspective. it's very simple. >> i'm curious, when the original issue started around the exemption or lack of exemption for religious affiliated employers to this specific part of the affordable care act, i'm curious just where you came down on that issue and the point i made earlier about

it kind of marrying economic libertarian concerns with social conservative concerns, where you placed yourself on the issue and whether you think that was -- it was a good issue for them to pursue in the beginning. >> well, initially you're right. i come from more libertarian side of the party. and, in fact, we could understand that it was a religious, you know, first amendment sort of issue. but it really got off-course. it easily got off-course again because they don't take time and think from a woman's perspective. they don't have enough women they're calling upon in the party to give perspective. even some of the people you mentioned earlier, they're not anti-contraception. independent women's forum doesn't take a position on these kinds of issues. and some of the of women you mentioned, if you asked them, even sarah palin i would bet you she said, yeah, contraception should be allowed. they aren't the rick santorum is extreme because contraception is

not good. when you get to that position, what our standard there is caught on tape saying things like that, it's surreal. it's insane. i'm hope that the voters are going to, you know, show him just how insane it is in the upcoming contest. >> ann -- >> maria is here to ask you something. >> hi, ann, it's fascinating to hear you use the term gender stupid. so where do the women fall into? i see it more of a gender battle. you are saying they are gender stupid. are the women within the republican party who are on opposite sides of this issue, are you saying they are, too, gender stupid? >> no, they're not speaking up because they don't disagree or they do disagree. you haven't really seen people from susan b. anthony or any of the others that are prominent rate now speaking out on behalf, quote, unquote, women on the republican party because i don't think they do side with where

santorum is, for example, on this issue. and you're going to see them be quiet rather than oppose. >> hi, ann. this is nancy cohen here. what i see looking at focus on the family, concerned women for america, a number of other group where's right wing women are organizing is that they may not be with santorum against consensual sex and contraception for married couples, but they do define the pill and tirhe ied a board, and i see these as conservative women in some ways driving politicians to a place that's very dangerous for them. and i know that you've struggled within the party to preserve a place for fiscally conservative and small government women against this religious fundamentalism in the party. so what i'm wondering is, you know, is there an active debate

among the women in the party where women more like you are trying to push back against this fundamental lymph? >> there certainly is. and, again, we don't make it as public as we used to. perhaps that's a mistake and it should change. certainly cwa, which would not tell you they are a republican organization although they do have a great deal of influence with certain members on the hill, not all of them. they tend to be much more right of center -- not even right of center, it's just far right, than some of the other groups that were mentioned earlier. and there is, and i think you will see over this issue, you will see a stepped up discussion because this is really taking us over the cliff. and this is beyond the pale now. >> ann, i would like you to stick around, if you don't mind. we're going to talk more about this after the break.

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clinton signed the violence against women act. introduced a kraer earlier by then senator joe biden who explained the bill's necessity and importantly its intended cultural effect this way. >> there's still men in this country who think they have a right to take the back of their hand to a woman. no woman, no woman, no woman, your wife, your lover, your co-worker, no woman should be able to be touched for any reason without her permission. period! >> bill provided more than a billion dollars to investigate crimes against women and rape crisis centers and hot lines. the bill has been reauthorized twice, once in 2000 and again in 2005, both times with huge bipartisan support.

it has bipartisan support this time if senate jude dish share committee voted it without of the committee without a single republican vote in they favor. republicans objected to some documented immigrants of victims of domestic violence. ann stone, head of republicans for choice, we have you on the line. i want to get your reaction to this other piece of news because there was a cascade of things this week because the hearing with all men, the bill that came out of virginia mandating a trans vaginal ultrasound, another phrase i was not ban difficulting around much before this week but now i am, for women who are seeking an abortion. and then this happened two weeks ago in which the violence against women act reauthorization passed without of committee without a single republican vote. i want to get you reaction to that last issue. >> well, again, on the last issue, those in the party that are more libertarian would take

some offense at it. any time anything extends the reach of government makes us nervous. but clearly, the message that is sent is quite different, and that is that we're intolerant of anybody who is not like us. >> right. >> what do you make of the violence against women act coming out of the committee this time because of objections over protection -- extending protections of lgbt and visas for women who are abused and seeking safe harbor in the united states? is this sort of par for the course in a polarized political environment? is this surprising to you? >> that's a very good way of putting it. it was helpful to the viewers you provided this broader history in part because there was an objection to the violence against women act for those who thought this was not appropriate under the u.s. constitution. it was legislation stretching the boundaries of the commerce law. >> part of the it was struck down by the supreme court. >> yeah. and that's an objection that would be true regardless of who is protected under the provision of the violence against women's

act. but now when you're saying that, well, we're going to extend it, we believe it's appropriate under the constitution for the federal government to intervene in this way, but we're going to object on the grounds of how you expand it, that obviously introduces some interesting complications. i think you could say that, rook, having agreed to this one expansion we don't agree to any further expansions. i think that certainly i imagine there are all kinds of objections sort of regarding how that money is being deployed, et cetera, but i think it's problematiced a ann suggests. >> there's -- it's a reflection of where republican party is at on anything involving immigration. in the migration that there's been in the last ten years, you can't do anything that looks like you're okay with immigrants coming into the country and supporting them, even -- even say, well, you know, if a woman is being abused, with want to add 5,000 visas to protect them. >> currently 10,000. the bill proposes.

>> during a recent debate they agreed they wanted to increase the number of skilled immigrants in the united states. at least in that sense to say that any direction, any positive message about immigrants is rejected by republicans, is not true. i take your point. >> i don't know. i actually -- i mean, i think that that's one of the surprising things. will there be an ookt surprise in terms of republicans and who is going to step up in terms of immigration to be somewhat of a game changer. will there be somebody like a newt gingrich who is a game changer. ultimately to me it ends lunder underscores this point, if you are not born in this country you will by law treated differently. you are. even if you have a green card, the game has changed for you. and people do -- this is not a conversation that is being had on a national scale. this kind of opens the door to it. we don't realize it but that's ultimately what's going on. >> clearly a big difference between high skilled immigrants and the conversation we're

willing to have around people getting those kind of visas and the majority of them. >> i was just reacting to the larger theme that there's no sense in which republicans, you know -- >> but i think we in our political conversation around immigration and certainly in the party have agreed to separate them. >> no, there's definitely a distinction and political distinction in terms of who people think of when they imagine those things. >> i think skilled h eed immigr are a big part of the immigration issue. >> ann stone, national chairperson for republicans for choice. great have to have you on. we'll have you back. >> thank you. rick santorum speaking in 2008 talking about mainline partisanism falling out of the family of christianity. pretty remarkable quote, right after this. [ male announcer ] wouldn't it be cool

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they put up clips of things that conservatives have said in various venues and which you

wouldn't necessarily get a lot of attention for them. they put up a clip on the speech that rick santorum gave in 2008 at i'ave maria college in flori, started by tom donahue, multimillionaire conservative catholic who founded domino's pizza. in it, he talks about the way that satan has attacked various institutions in american life as a way of furthering american decline. and he says this about where mainline protestantism falls in. >> we all know that this country was founded on a judeo-christian ethic but it was a protestant judeo-christian ethic. sure, the catholics had some influence, but this was a protestant country and the protestant ethic, mainstream, mainline protestantism, and of

course we look at the shape of the mine lane protestantism in this country and it is a shambles, it is gone from the world of christianity as i see it. >> i imagine this clip is going to get a lot of attention because that's a pretty remarkable thing to say, mainline protestantism has fallen out of the family of christianity as i see it. there's a lot of mainline protestants in this country and i really -- no, i'm serious. i try to imagine if mitt romney had said that given what his religious faith background is or, god forbid, if barack obama had said mainline protestantism has fallen out of christianity as i see it, it seems to me that would be a huge, huge, huge political liability. >> i don't know. we've established that rick santorum is an evangelical. >> he's not evangelical. he's a catholic, conservative catholic who is very aligned with evangelical protestantism. >> correct. there are evangelical@licks.

it's a world view that we are familiar with rick santorum having. i think it will shock some folks but he's -- the people who are lining up behind him already know that this is what he believes. and another thing about it is, if you read the whole speech, it's -- this is what is striking to me, is how genuinely felt it is. it is unique in that setting aside the content of it, the fact that he is -- is expressing something that he believes in such a deep way and so unapologetically, i think that's part of the draw to rick santorum. >> there's an authenticity there in terms of his totality on the sources of the american decline. >> it's still a very extreme position. >> absolutely. >> and the fact that santorum is now the front-runner in the republican party says a lot about the extremism that's taken over the gop base.

i mean, this ideal that satan has taken over the country is something shared by a lot of right wing evangelical protestants, as well. so there is kind of an alliance between them that we need to have a holy war as the president. and i think they're making themselves very unelect i believe in november by doing this. >> that's the point. i just want to know the numbers. are the numbers of these voters who identify with rick santorum and his perspectives, are they growing? are those numbers on the increase? is he -- does this work if him electorally or as she said, are these deep felt opinions he wants to share. >> when he says mainline protestants is in shambles, he is correct about the trajectory of participation in mainline protestantism. the old branch mainline protestantism is on a steep and steady decline where evangelical phase in american is growing and mormonism is growing.

>> evangelicals are growing less than they were. >> yes. >> mainline protestants left the republican party in large numbers since 1992 when the evangelicals took it over. they thought that the party had become too extreme on these religious issues and they've become centrist voters voting for democrats. >> and within the protestant denomination the most notable of which it was fight within the especialpiscopalian church. so you see that with presbyterianism. >> this is the ordination of openly gay -- >> absolutely. there is a sense of people who wanted to hold together the historical churches deciding it was no longer possible. i would say that initially upon hearing this, i thought this will be interesting and potentially very useful for santorum's rivals but then the fact that he's talking about sort of the mainline churches, as you say are institutions that

are really desiccated compared to what they had been, struggling to stay relevant, the question is whether l. people notice that subtle additidistin or will it be associated with a broader attack on broader christianity that may or may not resonate of people suspicious of santorum's religious views. >> that's the piece that's settled, i guess. the people who are suspicious of santorum's religious views are already there. you know, and i think the folks who have left the mainline protestant churches feel this way. >> the point is, even within the context of the republican primary voters, if an store rum is going to be the nominee, and that's a crazy sentence to utter several weeks ago but now seems not totally implausible, right the there? there are essentially centrist republican primary voters who he is going to have to win at a certain point. my story of the week right after this. [ woman ] we take it a day at a time.

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my sorry of the week. what prohibition costs. a new national poll shows santorum leading romney nationally and state oel l polls in michigan that will vote in a week from now shows santorum leading romney there, too. santorum appeared to capture the severe anti-romney sentiment of the gop base, which if you take a step back is a fantastically ironic situation. we all knew the base was suspicious of the moderate who signed into law a universal health care bill. but after two years of tea party rhetoric, live free or die, what we're seeing now is the base of the gop rallying around a candidate with powerful impulses. a man who thinks states should be able to outlaw birth control, a moon who iks plegs italy views his own world view as a rebuke or antidote to libertarianism. >> i am not a libertarian. and i -- and i fight very

strongly against libertarian influence within the republican party and the conservative movement. i don't think the libertarians have it right when it comes to what the constitution is all about. i don't think they are have it t as to what our history is. we are not a group of people who believes in no government. >> we're seeing something similar across the country as republicans and conservatives from virginia to texas attempt to marshall the state to regulate prior behavior including a bill that would require many women to have a transvaginal ultrasound when seeking an abortion in virginia. the bill passed both the state, senate, and house is expected to be signed by virginia's. governor bob mcdonnell. all of this lays bare something obvious lu often ignored. the central access of our politics is not about the size and role of government. it just isn't. sure, there are tiny number of folks around "reason" magazine who are fully consistent with their view of exercise of state power but for most of us it's

driven by what kind of world we want to see, moral commitments, cultural affiliations, upbringing and personality type. there are all kinds of place where the left wants less government, smaller military, viewer prisons and less onerous intellectual property regime for pharmaceuticals and others want bigger armies and more prisons. the intervention of the state is a means to an end and politics is about those ends. american dominance or american cooperation are w. the world law and order, treatment and rehabilitation. how and why the state can productively intervene in pursuing our ends is often a question of efficacy, cost and benefits. most importantly, who a policy costs and who it benefits. and there is no single piece of domestic policy whose costs seem more obscure to those in power than the war our government has declared on our fellow citizens who use drugs. here's none other than rick

santorum in new hampshire just last month being asked a question by students about sensible drug policy. >> wow. federal government doesn't do that. >> federal government doesn't do that, except it does. in the 40 years since the war on drugs debegan the government spent $121 billion to arrest more than 37 million nonviolent drug offenders, 10 million of them for possession of marijuana. just because no one in rick santorum's circle has not been on the wrong side of the article tellry doesn't mean there aren't civilian casualties. the war is monumentally expensive, cruel failure. it chews through our fellow citizens and spits them out. half of federal inmates in 2010 was spent time for drug offenses and studies show that jail time tends to increase drug abuse. along with immigration, drug policies seem to marshall our most authoritarian impulses. can you imagine us declaring a

war on speeding or a war on tax evasion? absu absurd, of course. but when it comes to drugs no, mamt of enforcement or regulation is too high, no imposition too great to bear. santorum voted to increase federal penalties for cocaine and methamphetamine offenses. this is largely a bipartisan consensus. while blenpledging to take a ne approach on the war on drugs, barack obama has largely continued the tra jejectory. what's most remarkable, decriminalize drugs. portugal did it in 2001 and ten years later drug abuse was down by half. we don't have to look over seas for a precedent. we have lived through this before. we have tried prohibition of alcohol for 14 years and it was one of the single greatest legal failures in the history of the public. people found ways to get around

the law. drugstores became liquor stores because they could dispense medicinal alcohol. historian michael learner notes, the growth of the illegal liquor trade under prohibition made criminals of millions of americans. as the decades progressed, the courtrooms and jails aoverflowed and the legal system failed to keep up. the greatest unintended consequences of prohibition however was the plainest to see, the solution the united states had revised to address the problem of alcohol abuse had instead made the problem even worse. live free or die, indeed. i want to bring in peter, author of a fantastic book that i read about a year ago. it took with me ever sense, called "cop in the hood" former baltimore police officer. great to have you here. >> thanks for having me on. >> i think we sort of set up this idea of enforcement and what we enforce and how we choose to enforce what we

enforce and what can be eradicated through enforcement and what cannot be. i want you to talk about what your experience on the front lines was of the plausibility or possibility of enforcement as a means of actually coming to some point in which we have declared victory or won the war on drugs. >> it's simply not going to happen. everyone involved in this knows we can't win. we can sort of the maintain the violence status quo that involves lots of incarceration but it doesn't reduce the violence. just in the last 16 hours there were three shootings and a double stack. you're probably not going to hear about that, probably not going to make the papers. this just goes on day after day in very isolated, very poor, deprived communities. they're deprived partly because of the war on drugs. we have to understand there are drug problems but that's separate from prohibition problems. we can solve the prohibition problem. >> how separatable are they? we were debating a little bit about where the audience is

watchi watching us right now is going to be on this issue. if you're watching at home or you're with us on, yes, decriminalize drugs and how much are folks, i don't know about that how that sounds, and i think one of the reason it is you're on the fence or it sounds terrifying to you that suddenly overnight we would do that, is the idea that prohibition problems and drug problems can't be separated. what are prohibition problems and what are drug problems? >> the prohibition problems, as a former police officer, the prohibition problems involve the distribution of drugs. i don't know what the answer is for heroin addiction. it's a horrible problem. we do have a solution for young people shooting each other on the corner. this is about trade. the point of getting soft on drugs is not so have a drug free for all. that's what we have now. the point is to regulate and control the drugs and to regulate and control the trade just the way that the state took over from al capone, basically, when we ended alcohol prohibition in 1933.

that should be a model. >> i know, but you know that right when you hear -- when anybody hears you saying the state is going to be regulating and you're like, so now the state is going to be regulating marijuana, the state is going to be regulating cocaine? i'm sure that a lot of viewers out there are saying, then they're also like, oh, god, how do i even conceive that? and then trust the state as well that immediately comes? >> no matter what people think about the state, i hope they distrust criminals more. that's who is doing it now. it's not perfect but it works well. we've accepted that there are still alcohol problems but the states and cities can control how control is sold and to whom it's sold. this is control we don't now have over drug use. >> your essay early on i want to note that chris christie, the governor of new jersey has called for no longer sending nonviolent drug offenders to prison. the rape act was championed by a lot of conservatives,

evangelicals in states like texas many republicans have been leading the charge to reform the prison system. and fortunately you have some folks in new york who under the previous governor reformed the rockefeller drug laws. i think there is some modest progress but i think when you're looking at the politics of the prison issue, it's not republicans and democrats. it's a lot of people with anxiety about being accused about being soft on crime who are all very fearful and fortunately some people who on moral grounds are saying this is an outrage. and chris christie said in the state of the state address we're wasting a huge amount of human potential with these policies. >> it's also, this is a really -- we have to look at this in the minute bubble. so first off, we're calling eight war on drugs. it's not. it's a war in black neighborhoods. you know, the vast majority of these nonviolent people are people who have been arrested for marijuana possession. they're not drug dealers. they are black men arrested for marijuana. the war is a policing tool in neighborhoods like mine in

brooklyn that, yes, are deprived in some ways but also just a place where police are looking for as much power as they can get to harass people on the street. and from the cop level on up to the prosecutor, what it really is about empowering police. >> that's a little cynical. >> i want you to respond to that because you were a police officer but i want to take a break first. >> all right. [ tom ] we invented the turbine business right here in schenectady. without the stuff that we make here, you wouldn't be able to walk in your house and flip on your lights. [ brad ] at ge we build turbines that power the world. they go into power plants which take some form of energy, harness it, and turn it into more efficient electricity. [ ron ] when i was a kid i wanted to work with my hands, that was my thing. i really enjoy building turbines. it's nice to know that what you're building is gonna do something for the world. when people think of ge, they typically don't think about beer. a lot of people may not realize that the power needed to keep their budweiser cold and even to make their beer comes from turbines made right here. wait, so you guys make the beer?

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this drug thing, this ain't police work. no. it ain't. i mean, i can send any fool with a badge and gun on the corner. but policing, i mean, you call some a war. and pretty soon everybody is going to be running around acting like warriors. they're going to be running around on the damn crusade, storm the corner, slapping on cuffs, racking up body counts. and when you have war, you need

a [ bleep ] enemy. and pretty soon, damn near everybody on every corner is a [ bleep ] enemy. and soon the neighbor you're supposed to be policing, that's just occupied territory. >> amazing line from buddy coleman from "the wire." >> great show. >> amazing show and probably the most notorious fictional experimentation for decriminalization in the history of american pop culture. the amsterdam that they took. they say they're not going to do the bust on. ki just said something provocative. the war on drugs and way it evolves discretion and power down to officers on the streets and they just want more power. they want the ability to enforce and harass young black men in neighborhoods. you wand to respond to that. >> police do respond to where the violence is. that's why police are in certain neighborhoods. that's where the drug is and violence on drug prohibition is.

is question is, what do cops do once they're there? it's not easy. it's not an easy job. this is where you need the most experienced cops, the cops who know the neighbor hoods, who can stay there and separate the criminals from the noncriminals. in this is a problem. just stick a bunch of inexperienced rookie cops to learn somewhere, they're going to make mistakes. >> you add to that the question of numbers or quotas, then you have this whole problem with stopping because every time you do stop and frisk in one of these communities you're able to actually categorize that to what you did in that day. >> it's an important piece when it looks at how this happens, right? >> money. >> there's been a lot of great reporting from the new york media on discovering the quotas for the number of stops that you have to have in neighborhoods like that and given precincts. and, yes, there are places where, in fact, local heards have said, give us more cops. but it marries up with this national money stream for the

war on drugs that if you can -- if you can prosecute aggressively in your neighborhood, you can get all kinds of tools. >> i would say it's not good for the police. and i think that the way to think about this is the level of anxiety sort of the -- with the ways in which it shifts your mission in terms of policing sort of away from actually kind of containing and preventing violence, i think the problem that we have over the last 30 years is with the rise of that, we have been investing resources in deterrence. we've been undermining deterrence. one thing you do when you encars rate huge numbers of people is you undermine the stigma with being incarcerated. that is the most effective tool in order to prevent criminal activity. i think that's -- the way to think about this in my view is help the police do their job as effectively and well as they canned as they want to do it. >> i did a piece in early 1990s presis lie about jail is a right of passage. early 1990s and here we are and it still is a celebrated thing. >> i want to talk about this issue about how the war on drugs

has change policing and police around how we can reconstitute a healthier relationship on that front. right after this we take this break. we know a place where tossing and turning have given way to sleeping. where sleepless nights yield to restful sleep. and lunesta can help you get there, like it has for so many people before. when taking lunesta, don't drive or operate machinery until you feel fully awake. walking, eating, driving, or engaging in other activities while asleep, without remembering it the next day, have been reported. abnormal behaviors may include aggressiveness, agitation, hallucinations or confusion.

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[ male announcer ] fiber beyond recognition. fiber one. hey, i love your cereal there-- it's got that sweet honey taste. but no way it's 80 calories, right? no way. lady, i just drive the truck. right, there's no way right, right? have a nice day. [ male announcer ] 80 delicious calories. fiber one. good morning from new york. i'm chris hayes. immersed in our conversation during the break here. here with kai wright, peter moskos, author of the book "cop in the hood." maria, anchor of pbs' "need to know" and lead blocker of national reviews. we're talking at the war on drugs, enforcement, decriminalization, and what the war on drugs looks like at the street level. and the question i want to ask you is, how has the war on drugs changed policing? what has it done to what

blissing is at the street level? >> it's created a lot of division between the police and the community, which is not good for policing. non-criminals need to if not like at least respect the pol e police. >> and trust. >> trust the police and tell police things. that's why crimes get solved. part of the fallacy of it is there's a believe if we just got tough we would win this. we have gotten tough. we still have a drug problem in prison. if we can't get drugs of the of prison, how are we going to get drugs out of a free throw society. how do we control it and minimize arms. police can play an important role by getting public drug dealers off the street which is one of the reasons why crimes have gone down so much in new york city. that's a huge victory. the streets are a lot safer now and we've done it in new york city and the state by incarcerated fewer people. >> right. there are a number of prominent people, norm sampler, comes to

mind who used to be a police officer in seattle, quite high up. maybe head of the seattle police. >> chief. >> chief of the seattle police, prominent supporter of decriminalization and ending the war on drugs. there's law enforcement against the war on drugs. there's a -- >> lawsuit against prohibition. >> law enforcement against prohibition. thank you for correcting me. how much of their -- is that a minority view? my sense is it's quite small. how broadly shared is that sense among police officers? >> in other words, do they talk about it publicly like when they're changing their clothes? gee, i kind of wish we need to talk about the legalization thing? >> it's becoming bigger and bigger. i wouldn't say it's certainly not the majority of police officers but police know what they're doing in the grand scheme isn't working. day after day it works. it seems to work. you think you go there, you put up little brush fires. you arrest a few criminals. but in the long run it's not improving things. law enforcement against prohibition is a good group because it is people who have firsthand experience with the drug wars. if nothing else it gets along

from the stereotype. there are thousands of supporters now. >> just to be cynical, one thing that the war on drugs is actually a huge driver of the expansion of the state. if you look at three strike laws in california they were advocating by the correctional union, people who work in the prison system. when you expand the prison system it creates dmik opportunity. if you look at new york state there are seven neighbored hoods in new york city that sort of, you know, generate the vast majority of prisoners. these prisons are located in rural districts in upstate and those are counted when you can draw the constituency boundaries in terms of increasing -- that's cynical i'm not saying there's a deliberate strategy to empty out new york neighborhoods. but i think that on the other hand if you're looking at a police force, for example, when you're talking about the budget, when you're talking about expanding the resources that you have access to, you know, i think that's why, you have to think about the crowding out effect. how many resources do we have to

do other things for this and as kai was suggesting before, when it's federal money for the war on drugs and then you can deploy those resources to buy high-tech goods and then you can use to fight your own battles. that's, i think, that shapes this larger environment. >> let me give a quick shoutout to peter who has singlehandedly brought this issue into light about the ways in which these mass transfer of populations from inner city places to rural upstate, particularly new york, excuse the representational dynamic. >> working on it. this is an important point. i have to say, i have to bring it backsh and this is why race matters to this conversation, is because -- >> it does. >> a lot of people -- there are a lot of institutions that benefit through the expansion of this. >> prisons are jobs to some people. >> yeah. >> it doesn't make those individuals racist or crazy. there's a lot of -- ranging from the precinct chief on down to people getting jobs in small

tow towns. it is possible to do that because the people who suffer from it in young black men who are not represented in the public conscience -- >> people aren't talking about it. they're a forgotten population. you don't see them. if you see them they're always in prison uniforms and they then become this massive -- >> prisons need to be more than make wot job problems for poor unemployed white people. economic policy is not a good moral policy. there's a better way to spend our money. >> let's show that stat again of drug use. i think this is important. this is a basic fact about the racial dynamics at play. studies show 14% of the nation's drug user, equal. they don't use drugs at higher rates than white people. 37% of drug arrests. this is the social distance point that i think you made is a profound one. i remember, you know, i went to high school in new york. people did drugs at my high school. i went to a very good university, brown university.

let me tell you, there were drug dealers at brown university. there were a lot of drugs at brown university. there are a lot of drugs at harvard and yale and at a lot of places with privileged white folks and the fact of the matter is, you know, we just do not deploy the kind of resources, we don't have the same kind of posture for it. >> i want to stress that there are many people who really believe that prison works. to some extent, i certainly don't think anyone is going to say you shouldn't incourse rate violent offenders. but i think that the argument has to proceed in a way you're assuming good faith on the part of your interlockers. and i think that it's very valuable for folks like peter who are saying, look, i'm not untag nisic against the police and crime is an enormous plague. the explosion in violent crime in this country over the last 40 years now that has tapered off. but it's still -- kai, it's also radically higher than it was in 1900. i do not believe it's fair to say -- >> 1900?

>> yes. >> we don't have stats in 1900. >> there was a crime explosion in the 1960s and '70s. decline in '90s. there was a distinction between violent crime and nonviolent crime, et cetera. crime is much higher than it should be. there are many neighborhoods in this country where it is still very physically unsafe. >> good point. even with crime down. >> yes. exactly. and that's why i think that's the way this conversation has to proceed. crime is a problem but that incarceration is not the most effective way. >> sure. but the point about trust is an important one. spending time in chicago. chicago has incredibly high murder rate and had a high murder rate and that murder rate is much more stubborn than the murder rate in new york city. the massive amount of unsolved murders in chicago is gang violence and the reason they go unsolved is because there is zero communication between the community and cops. and the reason there's zero communication between the community and cops because the community views the cops as fundamental enemy.

there is a connection between the two. >> the point that i'm making here is that the reason you can't solve it is because we are not acknowledging the fact that it's so much about race. >> right. >> you know, it's not -- everyone agrees violent crime is bad. you know, and that we should be addressing it. but we address it in such a wild and out of control way because the people who are harmed by it working in -- people who are not represented. >> hey, wasn't "weeds" a terribly popular show on show time? >> sure. >> they're dealing drugs right there. >> you always have to -- >> crime is the problem. >> we do know things that work. we need the political will to do them. >> looerd ship. >> we need leadership. >> what are things that work? >> better re-entry programs, we have seven times as many prisoners in this country than we did in 1970. that's the war on drugs. we don't have seven times as many criminals. these are choices we make. this incarceration is not reduce

the crime rate. as new york has shown, we can reduce incarceration and reduce crime. good starting point. >> the conversation has to start with crime is the problem. we are not solving the crime problem with these tactics. and the war on drugs is not helping the problem. >> you're saying that as, i want to ask you why you're saying that right after we take a break. we'll be back in a second. for fn emily skinner, each day was fueled by thorough preparation for events to come. well somewhere along the way, emily went right on living. but you see, with the help of her raymond james financial advisor, she had planned for every eventuality. ...which meant she continued to have the means to live on... ...even at the ripe old age of 187. life well planned. see what a raymond james advisor can do for you. mushroom smothered beef burgers. hearty chicken and noodle casserole. so easy, you just need campbell's cream of mushroom soup

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continuing our conversations that we've been trying to do here on "up" on things that are not being discussed on the campaign, talking about the war on drugs. and this sort of massive amount of social havoc it has wreaked in america. and you're talking about making sure the conversation starts with a place of -- the crime is

the problem. how do we address it adds pras m pragmatic matter. it's counterproductive, it's harmful. it diverts, resources, et cetera. kai, you made the point if you start that way you condition seed the point that people being arrested are criminals and the point is they are not criminals, right? the consensual bed rock of this is to radically reor writ ent people. i want to weigh in on the side of kai briefly here. i think stigma is a part of this. i even have it in myself. i think of someone using cocaine very differently than i do of someone drinking. i just do, right? part of that is because of what's illegal and what's legal. part of it is because of socially, right, who in my network, i go home and have a glass of bourbon like i did last night, right? part of it is also pop culture images, right? the hardest bridge to cross -- and i want to play this from steve jobs because i thought this was such an amazing moment. we're talking about

decriminalization but also a question of what is what are drugs, right, and what makes something illicit and what makes something licit. this is steve jobs praising his own drug use. take a look. >> the time we grew up in was a magical time. it was also a very, you know, spiritual time in my life. definitely taking lsd is one of the most important things in my life and not the most important but right up there. >> i thought that was such an amazing quote. here's this hero of american engiingenuity and entrepreneurs saying explicitly, my experience taking an illegal drug, right, was the most important thing i did. i'm not sitting here urging -- >> what do you want to say? where is this going? >> i actually think this is a huge part of it because the social stigma is profound and huge part of politics are. >> i don't know. there's something -- to me there's a big leap between somebody smoking a joint and somebody taking lsd. and i say that as a mom and as

something who, again, in my high school, lots of drugs. and this is, you know, 1970s. and you know, kind of losing a friend who did lsd just one too many times. the fact that there's no -- there's really no education. who is really talking about this? at home, who are the parents that are of this generation who are actually talking about this with their kids? >> do you think that's true though? i think there was such a concerted effort growing up to have this -- >> i think there's a lot of denial of a generation who is not actively engaging with their kids about this so they actually think that they're getting partnership of drug-free america and letting it happen there. i'm not sure that you're having a really intense conversation with your kids because what i'm hearing from my son who is high school is that it's happening a lot. it's happening a lot and they're not talking about it with their parents. >> part of the problem with the drug wars is this idea that you say all drugs are bad. some drugs are very bad, some not so bad. it discredits the idea of what really are dangerous drugs.

one of the things i would like to present, you mentioned portugal and netherlands, far more liberal drug policies have lower drug use. if we can decriminalize drugs and have lower drugs use, would that be a good trade? a lot of people would say no. it's a moral issue, behave to criminalize it because it's bad. that's short sighted. the goal is to reduce the harms of bad drugs. >> the affirmative case is when you think of md in,a, ecstasy, this is a grug that had tremendous therapeutic trouble and uses and you see a variety -- >> there is an article in "the times" about this. >> absolutely. people are profoundly depressed and have other mall difficults. the fear surrounding these drugs, the fear that, you know, surrounding the notion that anyone might derive any pleasure from the use of these drugs and the kind of panic that that kind of has given rise to i think has been a real problem. >> there is a prohibition movement that started with alcohol and still goes today.

they are against pleasure. that's part of the problem. they want to prohibit. that's what they like doing. >> you talk about prescription drugs, too? that's like the whole other thing that's going on that we -- it's absolutely legal. that that is not a part of the conversation. >> we actually had this thought experiment, talking about cindy mccain who battled aed a dikds to prescription drugs. what it would be like if the wife or spouse of a candidate had openly battled cocaine addiction, right, or hheroin prescription. i think that gets to this, the way in which a what is legal and what's illegal deeply embeds itself in just our own conception of the badness of the thing, right? brett favre had an addiction to prescription drugs, we don't think of brett favre as -- >> alcohol is not a drug, has the most pervasive toxic effects

on our society in fueling violence. >> one thing about the documentary on pro his r hibiti about the alcohol. it wasn't invented that pubs were coming into neighborhoods and there was a lot of bad stuff resulting from a lot of people getting drunk all the time. the point is that the solution wasn't up to the public but alcohol is a pretty rough drug when you come to think about it. >> it's dangerous and needs to be controlled or regulated. >> prohibition as partly result of -- that was why we had the creation of the income tax, because actually alcohol generated a tremendous amount of excise tax on alcohol but many of the prohibitionist said, we need to create this income tax. >> ended upcoming and going progressive on the taxation. or got the income tax and prohibition was repealed. peter, thanks so much for joining us this morning.

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another healthful, flavorful beneful. nancy cohen is back with us at the table now. in his state of the union speech last month president obama was remarkably trans part regarding his immigration strategy. >> i believe as strongly as ever that we should take on illegal immigration. that's why my madministration hs put more boots on the border as ever before, that's why there are fewer illegal crossings than when i took office. the opponents of action are out of excuses. we should be working on comprehensive immigration reform right now. >> that's explicitly the strategy here, ramp up enforcement to make the politics of immigration reform look better to create space for comp preensive bill. but here's what ramped up

enforcement means to the families of the people being deported. between january and june of 2011 more than 46,000 parents of children who are u.s. citizens were deported. according to investigation by the applied research center, more than 5,000 kids are in foster care now. 5,000, separated from a mother or father who has been detained or deported. immigration enforcement is breaking families apart. philfillipe is one such father separated from his three sons, deported in 2010. his children, all u.s. is it septemb citizens were placed in foster care, taken from their mother. later this month his former north carolina home planned to ask the judge to allow fillipe's children to be adopted by their faster family severing all legal ties with their father. the interview is in spanish but we provided a translation.

>> that's just one of many stories. and kai and maria, you guys have both done a lot of tremendous reporting on this. i want to talk about the trajectory of where we are in this because what happened was the administration came in, ramped up enforcement and deportation. there was a lot of pushback. and i want you to sort of talk us through where we are now, what happens next, how do we sort of unbind ourselves from this? >> i think with trajectory is that we're at a breaking point. fillipe's story is a good example. his attorney told us yesterday that it looks like his court

date has been postponed. they're going to look at his case in more detail and see if there's a way to reunite the family. that came because there was a huge outcry. once people started hearing about this stocksry, because it so counter to american values. that's the thing. because we are -- our immigration enforcement system has been -- we are deporting at a record pace. >> we have the numbers here dp you can put them on the screen. >> at a record pace. and that 46,000 of you, that's a quarter of all deportations now are parents. that's twice as many as they were before the obama administration. it's -- so this is -- we are in -- the system we have s of s core american values because families are getting split up. i think the more people hear about that the more it changes the discussion about immigration. >> the more -- there's a sense that this is happening over there, to those people over there and they are the invisible

people. the reality is one in four latinos knows someone or knows of someone who knows of someone who has been deported or detained. so this is not a small sector of the american -- you know, like off in theis dan idistance in i happening among us, in every single state. the obama administration has talked a lot about new tactics, judicial discretion, prosecutorial discretion, judicial review. i spent a year working on the front line on pbs documentary on this and we went into three detention centers. it took a lot of time and effort to get there. i have to tell you that i am pretty sure that the conditions within these detention centers, regardless of what the president has said, the actual day-to-day, the churning of the wheels of the deportations of the detentionses has not changed. there is -- there is no one inside those detention centers

with a little sign that says, i am here to help you. i am here to help you understand your due process. i am here to -- no, if you're an immigrant detained you don't have access to a lawyer and you don't really have anyone who is there who is now saying i'm here, the president has made some changes in words, i'm here to help you. >> let me color on the facts. tremendous backlash, partly because of the fine journalism both of you have done, about the effects of this ramped up enforcement and those numbers that we showed, 400,000 a year and shooting up every year. record speaks that every year. and there are two things the administration done. there was a memo issued from the top of i.c.e. which over sees enforcement about prosecutorial discretion saying these are priorities of who we deport and detain and these are not our priorities and basically saying we want to go after gang member, threats to the security of u.s., felony convictions and people who have strong ties to the community, you know, let them be. and then in january they announce what was a fairly

significant tweak in the policy. right now it is a matter of law if you are -- the immediate family member of a u.s. citizen but you yourself are illegal and you are here, right? you have to go back to your home country to apply for the green card that you are entitled to. not it into med to but you have every right to, right? once you go back there's a bar on re-entering the country. so essentially this catch-22 and they've now -- >> and a fine. >> and a fine. fillipe is actually in that position. his wife is an american citizen, we should note. the administration has now said, no, we're going to begin this process but you can get a pre. waiver and stay in the country. these are two very significant changes. the question is are they being implemented on the ground? >> different perspective on this, slightly different perspective. last year there are about 14 million people who applied for the diversity of visa lottery and lot of these people are in extreme distress, people for whom the university to live and work in the yates is extraordinary. many of these people are among the 40 or 50 poorest countries

in the world. poorer than virtually any country in the western help sphere other than haiti. for those people the chains of remittances that they can provide for their families in bangladesh would make a tremendous difference. one argument that some moeks are making are that, look, absolutely, humanitarian case for immigration. also there's language immigration in the united states can help many parts of the world. but the question is, how do you distribute that. if we're going to assume that dls going to be limited number, i think that as long as we accept that there's going to be limited number of people permitted to enter the country, which, by the way, is a fair open argument we could have. if there's going to be a limit there are going to be tragedies necessarily because when you say that once you enter the country rather than going through the process that the 14 many people, africa and elsewhere in areas under tremendous distress who have not first arrived in the country and kind of get to experience -- >> quickly. two questions.

future flow question which is how people get in and what do you do with the 7 million people who are here illegally. >> those questions are related. >> but they're the same . >> for example, right now, if you are detained there is no requirement of any officer in the process of detaining any immigrant, with a green card or without, by the way. there is no requirement for this person to say -- to ask the detainee do, you have children born in the united states? and i can tell you that being in those detention centers and every single person who i asked except for one said, no, i was never asked that question. so talk to me about where the discretion is going to come in, where there is no procedure where they're even going to ask the question of the you have american citizen children. and frankly, the stories have gotten out if you're going to fight your detention, you're going fight your deportation, one of the conditions inside these detention centers which are privately run so they're making a profit and so where do you skimp? you skimp on the food, you skimp on the health care.

there are no legally binding standards, so what we uncovered on the front line is the sexual assault against men and women in these detention centers is on the rise by the guards because there are no legally binding standards for these detention centers that are privately run. >> and there are -- so that's one of many consequences to the system. so, yes, you know, getting back to the point that there's going to be tragedies if we're going to have a deportation system. the core question for us is what tragedies are we willing to accept? 22% of the people we've deported are parents of u.s. citizen children. and that is a rapidly rising number. is that an acceptable thing? as americans -- they're your neighbors. >> exactly. >> the parents of your frids friends, of your kids' friends. >> look, we -- this country looked the other way while, what, are we 7 million undocumented workers came in now. americans had in the past been tolerant of immigrants. these people are here. they have families. i live in california.

my children are in the public schools there. i have many friends and many people i work with who probably have undocumented members in their family. probably a lot of my children's friends are american citizens. you know, in california, this is a no-brainer. and i would recommend to obama that he look at the politics of this and remember what happened in 1996 when california passed prop 187. california is now two-thirds democratic state because it woke up latinos who had got gotten their citizenship yet -- had not registered to vote yet and it also woke up the rest of us who have immigrant great grandparents. i don't see it any difference. >> my mother and sister became -- >> applying for -- >> moral obligation to the 7 million people citizens. >> as a result of prop 187. they hadn't up -- been in this country over 20 years and because of prop 187 both my moth mother and sister, citizen.

>> like colin powell with wars, if you brauk ieak it, fis ix it. we allowed this. >> but the argument is right, that's the point, right? the point is that the -- yes, like we did allow this to happen and now we're fixing it through mass deportation. >> that's not a solution. >> it didn't allow it to happen in many cases. they were actively recruiting who went down and found cheap labor to clean up nola of new orleans, after katrina? it didn't just happen. they were actively recruiting labor. >> kai, i want you to respond to that right after this break. chase scene, netflix coming soon extra butter tickets, swoon penguin journey junior mints moviefone evil prince bollywood 3-d shark attack ned the head 5% cashback right now, get 5% cashback on movies. it pays to discover. gomery and abigail higgins had... ...a tree that bore the most rare and magical fruit. which provided for their every financial need.

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kai wright, you were going to fill news on where the trajectory policy is because one of the things i wanted to say here is that there is, in both drug enforcement and in

immigration enforcement, which are two things we've been talking about, there's been sort of ebbs and flows in how the obama administration, as a singular entity, approached it. one of the things i've been learning in my reporting on this and talking to folks yesterday there is no -- a source said this to me, there is no obama administration, sflith. >> there is no approach. >> policy people in the white house, political people in the white house, and people in the agencies. in the agencies there's people around the cabinet member who is a political appointee and people, front line, civil servants doing the work, who with f. you are a front line civil servant in i.c.e., what you do is you deport people. that's what you do. >> this is the problem. it is similar to the drug war in a sense that you have -- you set up institutions to do a certain thing. >> yes. >> and so what the president recognizes, it seems to me, the bind that they're in. democratic party's position on this as exactly what he

articulated in the state of the union. ramp up enforcement, steal that from the republicans and then we'll move to a comprehensive bill. the problem is that the republican party has change sod dramatically they can't get anybody to be on a comprehensive bill with them. so all that's happened is the ramping up of the enforcement. and in that process they've said, okay, well, how we'll try to get our hands around this is we will only focus on criminals. the hardened criminals. that's who we're going to deport. is problem is that doesn't connect with reality. it sounds good. it feels good to say. but half of the people -- the system they set up to do that is -- rounds up everybody. half of the people they deported have no criminal record at all. >> is it not the case in the wake of this prosecutorial memo issued in june, they did pilot programs in baltimore and denver and reviewed the case using the bullet points and they, you know 20,% of the cases or something were dispensed. there were some implementation that is happening. some change in policy?

>> something that just happened in the last three weeks. there was a young woman in ohio. she's 22 years old. she had come basically brought by her parents when she was 12, 13 years old. wanted to go to school. was working to raise money to go to school. she gets stopped in a traffic stop and she suffers from depression which is the untold story of what's happening to latinos and latin thaas. went in detention. tries to commit suicide again. there is a whole social media movement, stop the deportation of her. she's not a criminal. i'm talking about, you know, a social movement, viral. they deported her. they deported her. so this is somebody who, again, had a movement behind her that is basically saying she's not a criminal, she doesn't fit in. and when i called the white house and said, what is your statement? they said, well, we don't comment on particular cases. >> shouldn't that be the case? here's my point, isn't that right, if the bush administration because of the bush administration had -- if a phone call had been placed in

the white house to the bush administration into the bows of the civil servants to dictate a dispen says of that case, we would saw say oh we. >> the obama administration could have said, you know, we have put out these memos for prosecutorial discretion and judicial review and it concerns us in the white house that we continue to see people who don't fall into the categories being deported. that's all they needed to say. we have a concern. the obama administration says nothing and what that translates to the latino voter is, they don't care. they are silent. there is no leadership. >> incapable of being discreet. that's the point. it cannot function with the discretion. it's incapable of it because it has been built, again, by empowering local level police, being a criminal means coming in contact with the criminal justice system. >> you've got to keep -- >> paying parking tickets when he was deported. >> what do we know now that we didn't know last week? my answers after this. [ leanne ] appliance park has been here since the early 50s.

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a quick update on something i promised on last sunday's show. while discussing how republicans will explain away improving an economy in election year, congressman sarbanes invoethed a columnist saying -- >> i tried to bury john maynard krams and freddy krueger. >> we will have our graphic shop come up with a freddy krueger, john maynard match-up. >> ask and you shall receive. ladies and gentlemen, john maynard krueger. totally terrifying. in just a second i'll tell you what i didn't know when the week began but right now it is my very, very special privilege to rs for the first time, ask for a preview of "melissa harris-perry" with melissa harri

harris-perry. >> i so excited about my first show. i'm a little nervous. we have the first guest, george romney. we're looking at how his legacy relates to mi s tto hit thmi tt. i found myself dusting off a lot of history books and reviewing case law to prepare for today's show. it's definitely nerve land on the eighth floor. >> we're extremely excited. we will be watching it. the premier of "melissa harris-perry" coming up next. what do we know now that we didn't know last week. republicans define women's health as a religious freedom issue and don't see why people who give birth should be on a panel about birth control. five men to testify about women's access to contraception in the first round of hearings prompting democratic congresswoman carolyn maloney to ask, where are the women? we know her question went unanswered. we now know that rick santorum's

multimillion their faster freeze has. >> contraceptive thing, my gosh, it's such inexpensive. back in my days, they use bayer aspirin for contraception. the gals pull it between their knees and it wasn't that costly. >> we know that phrase later sort of apologized for the joke. and we don't know but we suspect the santorum camp is trying to figure out just to to keep their multimillionaire sponsor off camera for the duration of the primary battle without conflicting the law against coordination. we now know that in michigan the state of mitt romney eats eirth, rick santorum is the voters shows that 37% are backing santorum, 32% are supporting mitt romney and 15% are supporting ron paul. we now know that republicans think it's now good politics to refuse to reauthorize the violence against women's act to protect women against violence and abuse. they voted to approve the renewal and that's the first

time this legislation has not received bipartisan backing out of committee. me we now know a little more about the pointless cruelty of america's drug war thanks to an amazing report from chicago's public media "this american life." a bunch of young uncovered police officers befending friending and flirting with the opportunities as called "operation d minus." one of the students justin fell in love with one of the undercover cops who tested him every couple of days to ask him to get marijuana. he said he didn't smoke pot himself but wanted to please her, she tried to pay him $25 for the drugs. soon after they arrested 31 students including justin who spent a week in jail and pleaded guilty to the felony charge. justin wanted to do to the air force after high school but all those dreams are gone right now like so many young people who get caught up in drugs. nancy pelosi recently att d attended a phone razor. you know that heather includes

brookfield asset management. real estate company that zones zukoti park and allowed the nypd to evict the protesters. pelosi supports message to the establishment whether it's wall street or the political establishment and the rest. that change has to happen and we know we like our politicians to be the change they would like to see in the world. finally, we know that we've lost one of the greatest foreign correspondents of his generation. "new york times" reporter an than any died on thursday while on assignment in syria although he was or allergic to horses he tried to go with the group that included horses and suffered a severe asthma attack. they carried his body back across the border. she e-mailed her staff, quote, anthony died as he lived, determined to bear witness to the transformation sweeping the middle east and to testify to the suffering of people caught between government oppression and opposition forces. he was a hero of democracy, we

dodd ied what reporting at its best is meant to be, what it is meant to do to us when we read it. he was 43. we'll be right back. ♪ [ woman ] i was ready for my trip, but my smile wasn't. [ female announcer ] new crest 3d white intensive professional effects whitestrips. it goes below the enamel surface to whiten as well as a five-hundred dollar professional treatment for a transformation that's hard to believe. ♪ wow, that's you? [ female announcer ] new intensive professional effects whitestrips. and try 3d white toothpaste and rinse. from crest. life opens up when you do.

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>r i wanp >> guesp guests know that they beginnibeginning withp bbe wright. >> i know two things, good and bad. one, the bad. we know that the robe bow signing was just the tip of the iceberg for the fraud that was taking place when they were foreclosing on folks, the san francisco county assessor released his audit this week of foreclosures in the county. 84% had some sort of illegality, 84% violated california law. tip of the iceberg. the good news i know is that it's time for me to start watching basketball. you know, i am lin-sane. >> can't win them all.

the corn cover of "new york post," can't win them all. have you been watching? >> i have been watching via youtube. >> have are you not noshlly a basketball began? >> i'm not. >> i'm a die-hard basketball fan. i've been tweeting about the games and i think people on twitter are shocked i'm a basketball fan, played high school varsity basketball, love the game. >> it's a great story. >> it is. we haven't talked about it at all on the show. but i'm totally in it. >> nancy kohn, what do you know? >> now we know chris christy is a captive of the rjts extremist in the republican base. yesterday he vetoed the gay marriage in new jersey. there's something i think chris christie should know, the pew center released a poll about opinion on interracial marriage. and 20 years after the supreme court ruled that interracial marriage -- laws against interracial marriage were

unconstitutional, only a third of americans thought it was acceptable for people across race to intermarry. >> at the time, you're saying. >> no, no, no. so as late as 1986, only one-third of americans thought it was okay. >> that's fascinating. >> so christie says, take it to the people. that's democracy. that's what i want him to know, and i want us to know that this republican savior is just like the rest of them. >> what's interesting, there's a debate about how to go forward, whether they should put it up to a vote. there's some marriage sad row cassie think they'll win. >> it's winning by eye wide margin. >> we may see it be a big win. >> i want to know more about that shooting in i.c.e. out in california with these i.c.e. age agents. as we've been talking, this is a whole part of the corrections in our society, immigration enforcement doing this kind of work. there's a lot of tension within the ranks of i.c.e. i think what happened outside of

los angeles, shooting, is something i want to know more about, i'm very interested. one thing that i am interested in is this movement called libro traffice. it's not arms or dealers. they are preparing to smuggle in banned books into arizona, one of them being -- who wrote 40 years ago in 1972. we're supposed to be celebrating him as the godfather of chicano literature. his books are banned in arizona and will be smuggled in. >> what do you know now? >> i know thanks to parry anderson of ucla the chinese invasion of vietnam in 1979 was an absolutely pivotal event in the history of the world and history of u.s./chinese relations. i also know i had the great pleasure of reading a book by arthur eckstein called mediterranean anarchy and interstate war. it gave a huge a. of insight into the current conflict between the united states and

iran and various other states in the gulf. is it a truly wonderful book about the rise of the roman empire and how it's understood. i strongly recommend you take a look at it. >> mediterranean anarchy and interstate war. >> a>> my thanks to kai wright, nancy cohen, maria of npr and need to know on pbs and rye hawn sa lawn from the daily. thank you for being here. coming up next is the new program hosted by my friend and "up" veteran melissa harris-perry. i will be watching. i recommend you do as well. you don't want to miss it. join us tomorrow morning at 8:00 where i'll have wally shawn and veteran political analyst jeff greenfield. until then, you can find us at

up.msnbc.com. see you tomorrow. thanks for getting up. i want to run a marathon. i'm going to own my own restaurant. when i grow up, i'm going to start a band. [ female announcer ] at aarp we believe you're never done growing. thanks, mom. i just want to get my car back. [ female announcer ] discover what's next in your life. get this free travel bag when you join at aarp.org/jointoday.

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