you with us tonight. i appreciate your time. >> my measure. >> we'll continue to expose the way they are going after organized labor in this country. they say it's an unfair playing field. not a chance. that's "the ed show." i'm ed schultz. "the rachel maddow show" starts now. good evening, rachel. >> good evening, ed. thanks, my friend. thanks for staying with us for the next hour. we're coming to you live tonight from los angeles, california. i'm out here to do some stuff for my book, for "drift," and also to see my folks. i'll be doing regular shows live from here on the west coast all week long. traveling is always nice. i'm from california originally and the weather is awesome. one of the sad things about leaving our office back in new york, whenever i have to leave the office is i don't like to be away from my wood-burned veto paddle. the office of montana governor brian schweitzer last year mailed us this block of wood into which the governor had burned the word "veto" with a cattle brand.

we promptly put it up in our bull pen. they mailed it to us after we reported on governor schweitzer's particular montana spin on making a really big deal out of votes he chooses to veto as governor. governor schweitzer from time to time will gather a big crowd outside the montana state capitol and quite literally burn the word "veto" right through bills that were sent to his desk from the republican led state legislature. even though he is maybe doing it with the most style of anyone, montana governor brian schweitzer is not the only governor or even the only democratic governor who has had some fun making a big fiery symbolic deal out of the process of saying no. today, for example, in minnesota, that state's democratic governor mark dayton held a press conference for him to symbolically but not really, but symbolically veto a bill that would make it harder to vote. a bill that was passed by republicans in the state legislature there. governor dayton had to fake veto this bill instead of actually vetoing it because minnesota

republicans voted to put this measure on the ballot in november. they're putting it on a ballot as a constitutional amendment. in minnesota, that sort of thing does go through the legislative process, but the governor doesn't have any way to block it. instead it goes right up for a vote by the people in november. even though he could not veto this legislation, governor dayton symbolically vetoed it today calling the measure unwise and unnecessary. this is not the first time that governor dayton has done this sort of thing. also on the ballot in november in minnesota is going to be a measure to doubly tripley extra pinky swear ban gay marriage again in the state. governor dayton fake vetoed that bill last may. to be clear, same-sex marriage is already illegal in minnesota. it's already banned. minnesota republicans having solved all the other pressing problems in their state have decided to go through the process of putting an extra redundant ban before the voters

this november. again, it would have no e effect on current state law. same-sex marriage is already banned in minnesota, but presumably i'm guessing maybe in their estimation maybe they think it will have the effect of driving up the turnout of very conservative voters in minnesota who really care and really want to vote on a symbolic strike against the gay this way. there was an interesting and somewhat unexpected development on that little bit of minnesota uselessness today. one president obama's re-election campaign decided to weigh in on the issue, the obama campaign officially came out today in opposition to minnesota's anti-gay ballot initiative, the one that governor dayton fake vetoed. the obama campaign released a statement that said in part, quote, while the president does not weigh in on every single ballot measure in every state, the record is clear that the president has long opposed divisive and discriminatory efforts to deny rights and benefits to same-sex couples.

"metro weekly" pointed out today, that language from the obama campaign is essentially identical to the language the campaign used when it came out against another anti-gay measure that will be on the ballot next month in north carolina. because this has now happened in a couple of states, which i guess means it's something approaching a pattern from the obama campaign, we probably should not be surprised if this happens again. given that the president is on the record as still being personally opposed to gay people having the right to get married, even as his administration have pursued a number of gay right measures including don't ask, don't tell. benefits for federal employees who are gay. even though they have done all of those things and more, the president's personal stance on the issue of gay marriage rights does make this campaign move, like the one he made in minnesota, does make these moves politically noticeable. interestingly, though, there was no immediate response to this

today from the minnesota republican party. there had been no response from them until we called them for a start. then they e-mailed over a statement that read in part, quote, while it's flattering that president obama thinks so highly of minnesota to weigh in on our ballot initiatives when we has so much else on his plate, i'm pretty sure we can decide these questions for ourselves. you know what, that itself is sort of worthy of congratulations to the minnesota republican party. congratulations. it is good to know you guys still have phones. you still have your phones up and running. you still have e-mail accounts. that did not seem like a foregone conclusion. after politico said the state republican party is now carrying over a million dollars in debt. at the state level they are in the red big time. they may be the worst off of all state republican parties and a lot of them are bad off. quoting politico -- the minnesota gop is so deep in debt it has stopped paying the lease on its headquarters. just seven months from what republicans like to call the

biggest elections in our lifetimes, the minnesota republican party is apparently having a little problem with insolvency. now, we saw this sort of thing back in nevada back in 2010 in the last election cycle after the big john ensign scandal, and various other statewide battles. it was in shambles. we traveled to nevada right before the big harry reid senate race in november 2010. we found a state republican party that was essentially unable to perform the basic tasks a party needs to perform in order to win a senate race. at that late date, it was getting out the vote. sharron angle was ahead in the polls heading into election day in nevada but she ultimately lost that race in part because the nevada republican party was a hot mess. they could not get it together enough to figure out how to do basic turnout earths for their own voters. on election day, they lost.

fast forward two years now and it's now the republican party of minnesota that is a nationally reportable hot mess. according to republican party of minnesota, we're not paying our office lease rent payment currently and have not yet negotiated long-term payment schedules and/or negotiated settlements relating to most of the offenders on the accounts pay bl aging. it's not even just minnesota. politico also reporting today on a number of so-called orphan state republican parties in serious trouble. these are state parties mostly in blue states where republicans don't compete well. therefore they have not developed the ability to compete well. places like california and illinois and new york. the national republican party reportedly now setting aside millions and millions of dollars to essentially bail those relatively lame state parties out. the states that politico documented as having their state parties in trouble are not all orphan states. they're not all liberal states. a lot of them are swing states

or something close to swing states. again, minnesota, where republicans can't even pay the rent. one local republican telling the paper, quote, i don't know how the party is going to be at all capable of doing anything this cycle. politico noting the trouble in the state of ohio where quote republicans have been in a state of open warfare for months. the brand new just installed ohio party chairman noting he's going to have to rely on county organization to get out the vote as opposed to state organization. there's also more trouble brewing in nevada which saw its state chairman depart after a disastrous republican presidential caucus in nevada. one former nevada republican party official telling politico, quote, underprepared would be generous as a description of his state's gop. quote, they just don't seem to be prepared at all. then there's the republican party up in new hampshire which saw its own state chairman up and quit amid serious fund raising problems in new hampshire.

in iowa, remember iowa? you recall the state chairman in iowa was forced to resign there after the party botched the iowa republican presidential caucus this year. under the state party chairman's leadership, remember mitt romney won on election day, oh, no, no, then it was a tie, no, actually, turns out rick santorum won. no, i'm sorry, i quit. the new iowa state chairman is known for being a vociferous reporter of ron paul. one iowa republican telling politico, quote, he's not a guy you have a lot of confidence in. we spoke to a veteran iowa observer today who confirmed to us there's considerable angst in iowa right now among republican party activists and conservative activists about their new chairman's ability to get the job done in iowa. state parties are important. the first thing that we think about are things like getting out the vote and the basic logistics for the presidential race. it's also everything else on the ticket. it's every other race that will be on the ballot in november. every single member of the house

is up for re-election this fall. with redistricting, a lot of those races are way more up in the air than they otherwise would be. so in states like are a total mess at the sate party level, what's plan "b"? if some key state republican parties literally are not able the pay their rent so it does not seem like they will be able to do anything for the elections this fall, what's plan "b?" plan "b" as it turns out is this guy. "the new york times" front paging a story today about how the $200 million war chest that karl rove has already committed to this year's elections is going to start producing anti-obama campaign ads this month. if your state republican party is bankrupt like minnesota or otherwise in the state of disarray like ohio, say, don't worry. karl rove and his millions are on the way. politico reporting today, quote, just as american cross roads st stepped in to help with senate turnout two years ago to compensate for the underfunded rnc, some new super pacs will

help where the state parties need assistance. should be noted though, take a critical eye of what happened in 2010. what we saw back in 2010 is karl rove and karl rove's endless supply of corporate cash can do a lot but can't do everything. it won't, for example, fill the entire organizational void left behind by a hollowed out atrophied state republican party in chaos. as much money as he has to throw around, there's certain party functions that take humans, local grassroots humans and that can't actually be replicated by a flown in campaign full of money from somewhere else. what's the sharron angle turnout infrastructure, if the republican party isn't all that here, what is she relying on for turning out votes? >> karl rove. >> what? >> american crossroads announced a few weeks ago that they were going to dump a bunch of money into nevada to help them with

get out the vote. and so they have poured some money, my understanding, into the nevada republican party which essentially is a shell corporation. there's nothing there. >> can you really fly in a get out the vote infrastructure? doesn't it have to be based here? doesn't it have to be organic? >> not only does it have to be organic to be effective, but it can't be done in just a few weeks. >> john ralston was right there. the death of the republican party in nevada seems to have doomed sharron angle's chances at winning a senate seat that year. despite her standing in the polls heading into that election. now, this is not to put republicans down. this does not represent anything morally qualitative about republicans, but it's a really important organizational fact about how different the two parties are. it doesn't factor, i think enough into the way we think about partisan contests. the republican party, at this moment, is not a very strong party. just organizationally speaking, they don't seem to have it together. the republican party exists alongside a very strong, very

rich conservative movement. very strong, very rich conservative movement that can give unlimited money anonymously even from corporate sources thanks to the conservative decisions on the supreme court that have endone campaign finance law. the imbalance between the republican party conservative movement is not matched by anything on the democratic side. it is the thing that makes republican politics so fascinating and so different to watch than democratic politics. that imbalance between the conservative movement and the republican party, the conservative movement having its act together so much more than the party has seemed to be basically true since the end of the george w. bush presidency, but it's never seemed more true than it does right now with the state parties just falling apart. watching partisan politics in 2012 means trying to understand the republican party's strategic assets and weaknesses, essentially post-republican party as an institution.

joining us now is john ralston, columnist with "the las vegas sun" and host of "face to face." john, great to see you again. thanks for being here. >> hi, rachel. love those memories of standing out in the desert with you a couple years ago here in las vegas. >> tell me, heading into this election cycle, whether or not things have changed, john? is the nevada republican party back on its feet? does it exist as more than a shell corporation, as you put it back then? >> let me tell you how bad it is, rachel. the john ensign days, you mentioned, jim gibbons, out scandal plagued governor back in 2010, those are the glory days compared to what's going on right now with the republican party. no chairman. no money. no credibility. you used the right adjective, disastrous caucus. they had only 33,000 republicans turn out. that's 8% of registered republicans turn out for that caucus. as you may know, it took them forever to count the very few

votes. they had a special caucus just were sheldon adelson, essentially. the party is about to elect, it looks like, as its state chairman, a former las vegas city councilman, i'm not making this up, who was found guilty by two ethics tribunals, was investigated by at least a couple of federal agencies and ousted from office in disgrace. he also, by the way, was a lobbyist while in office for a couple of different strip club owners. yeah. the republican party is back here, rachel. >> if mitt romney goes on to be the republican party's presidential nominee, a lot of republicans talk about nevada as a state republicans might be able to win. they think the demographics are good for mitt romney. they think the politics blow his way in some parts of the state. how do you think what you're describing about the state of the republican party infrastructure in nevada affects the republican nominees' chances in november? >> well, i was getting e-mails and phone calls even while the

caucus disastrous caucus was going on from representatives of the presidential campaigns. and from other prominent campaigns including we have the big senate race here between dean heller and shelley berkley saying we're going to avoid the party, won't have anything to do with it. we'll raise money outside. you mentioned the karl rove, we talked about him last time, crossroads will pour a lot of money in here. the rnc will pour money in here to try to make up for the lack of a state republican party. as i said to you back then and i believe it now, you can't just erect those things overnight or in one election cycle. the democrats here spent two or three election cycles building up the formidable organization they have now that helped save harry reid back in 2010 and helped barack obama win this state by 12 points in 2008. the republicans are just trying to put stuff together on the fly. that's not going to work in a big presidential year here. it's going to be an impediment

for them especially compared to the democratic party here. i bet nevada is not alone. >> briefly, john, do you see the, i guess, what all that external republican money can be spent on as essentially ads that that money can be spent on, ads, and that's something that's easy to organize even if you've never stepped foot in nevada but the more organizational stuff, shoe leather stuff, is something that can't be done with a fly-in operation? is that essentially the bottom line? >> i think that's right. the democrats have an inherent advantage. at the grassroots level. they can tap into a lot more shoe leather than the republicans can. they have the unions, for example. the republicans need to have the infrastructure set up to identify voters to get out to the polls. and to register voters. the republicans here have no voter registration apparatus that's been detective yet. they're not registering a ton of voters. in fact, the numbers that just came out showed democratic outregistered them last month. that's the kind of thing you need a sophisticated operation to do.

there's no sign it exists. >> john ralston. "las vegas sun" columnist and host of "face to face" with john ralston. it's great to talk to you as always. thank s for being here. >> you, too, rachel. thanks. first the chairman of the republican party said there's no war on women. think war on caterpillars instead. that did not go over very well. then the party spokesman decl e declared war on declaring anything a war. that also did not go over well. now the top republican in the senate, mitch mcconnell, is taking his own stab at it. it's also not going well. unfortunately for mitch mcconnell it was all on tape today. that's coming up. it's very important to understand how math and science kind of makes the world work. in high school, i had a physics teacher by the name of mr. davies. he made physics more than theoretical, he made it real for me. we built a guitar, we did things with electronics and mother boards. that's where the interest in engineering came from.

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are all on one customizable page. see the all-new 360 investing dashboard at e-trade. this is ban ki-moon. general of the united nations. he's the top guy. this is the previous top guy. as they get dispatched by their country to do important things. after their terms in office are over. guys that used to head up the united nations also get tapped for missions impossible. in kofi annan's case he's most recently be tapped to try to stop this. the horrible con fill grace in syria where the assad regime responded to protests and calls for reform by turning syria's military might against its on civilian population. as a special envoy for the region from, kofi ananna worked

on a deadline, tomorrow, supposed to be the deadline for syrian troops to pull out of the major cities and thursday would be the day that all sides all over the country would stop fighting and try to talk out their differences instead. today, that fell apart. a to turkish official said even though they agreed to the deal, they now consider it void. the fighting is spilling over borders. in lebanon, one cameraman was shot to death by syrian soldiers while the cameraman stood on the lebanese side of the border filming in to syria. the camera man was killed and another employee of the tv station was wounded. and it gets worse. it's estimated that a total of about 9,000 people have been killed in syria since fighting broke out a year ago. when that many people, that many civilians are being killed, other civilians in the country naturally try to get the heck out of there. so you get lots of refugees. you get people fleeing their home country in order to try to stay alive.

more than 24,000 people in that situation have fled from syria over the border into the neighboring nation of turkey. today syrian soldiers shot into turkey over the border to kill syrian refugees on the turkish side. the turks and the united nations and us, the united states, are all expressing outrage over this. and everything is connected. everybody else in the world may be outraged at what syria is doing but their one friend in the world is iran. talks are due to restart at the end of this week over rain's contested nuclear program. but those talks are scheduled on what's supposed to be neutral ground. they are scheduled to take place in part in turkey. for a moment iran balked saying turkey is not neutral ground since turkey is so mad at syria and syria is iran's only friend. now they say they are back on board as long as there can be a second round of talks in baghdad. did i mention that everything's connected?

the context of all of this happening this week is north korea is about to launch a missile and they've let some western reporters into the country to show off about that. among them, nbc's richard engel. watch richard here. watch him zoom in on what the west sees as the problem with this north korean launch. watch. >> reporter: the journey began with a bus ride through pyongyag, a view of the world's most closed capital. the streets are wide and spotless. there are so few cars every one seems to walk. most buildings are austere, soviet style. apartments are provided by the self-described socialist state. then we move to a v.i.p. train. accompanied by teams of government minders. >> one person here. one person in this cabin. >> reporter: the train will take us to a military base to see the rocket and satellite north korea will soon try to blast into orbit. seldom are outsiders given a chance to see the countryside

where food is scarce. the farms are collective, centrally planned but up here poorly funded. we don't see many tractors, few machines at all. mostly farmers with hand tools. the village houses all look the same. after five hours, we arrive at the sohay satellite launch station. we brought nbc analyst jim oburg, a rocket expert, with two decades at nasa's houston space center. >> we'll guide you through the launch facilities. >> reporter: he'll help us verify what the north koreans are showing. after security checks, we enter a test facility. in the middle of the room, there it is. this is the satellite north korea will launch into orbit. it's relatively small. we're told it weighs ar s aroun pounds. it looks about 3 1/2 feet tall.

officials here say it is fitted with solar panels and high definition camera to take images of the earth from orbit. the shiny satellite isn't sparking international condemnation. instead, this is. north cree korea calls this a t stage rocket, with enough liquid force to carry a thousand-pound payload. this is what u.s. officials are concerned about. north korea says this rocket is strictly for scientific purposes but u.s. officials worry it could be converted into an intercontinental ballistic missile. the little bit of math that richard sets us up to do there. they have a satellite that weighs 220 pounds. they're launching it on a rocket that appears to be able to handle something that weighs a thousand pounds. and to be able to hurl something that weighs a thousand pounds really, really far. north korcrekorea tested these 6 and 2009. the united states is worried about north korea developing missiles powerful enough to fly between continents.

there's this missile launch. and south korea, they say they think the north might be ready for their third nuclear blast as well as this rocket. in international news, in international war and weapons news, on days like this, it sometimes feels like everything is connected. and, therefore, everything is complicated. until all of a sudden you get a message like south korea is sending out internationally right now. which essentially we should prepare shortly for another nuclear explosion. then suddenly things are not complicated at all. they are suddenly as simple as they possibly can be. wake up!

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[ female announcer ] fresh milk and real cream makes philadelphia and the moment a little richer. last week the republican party chairman, prebeis, went on bloomberg television and called the idea of a republican war on women fiction. he said the idea of a republican war on women was analogous to a republican war on caterpillars so he made an analogy in which women are caterpillars. caterpillars are bugs that have lots and lots and lots of really short legs. in addition to the women are bugs thing, the republican party spokesman inveighed not against the use of word of war on women, the spokesman decided to be upset about the first word. he decided to be upset about the word war.

he called the use of that word war bordering on unpatriotic, which is amazing since the party he is the spokesman for has accused president obama from waging war on everything from coal to an laich sha, to mexico and naturally to women. the campaign for the party's likely presidential nominee mitt romney is constantly accusing president obama of waging war on everything from carbon dioxide to preenterprise to the catholic church. the national republican party has decided using the word war in a political metaphor is offensive to them all of a sudden. today the republican's bad messaging on the whole war on women thing got even worse. today the top republican in the united states senate, minority leader mitch mcconnell addressed the war on women charge in an appearance on a local tv show in his home state of kentucky. listen. >> talk about a manufactured issue. there is no issue.

senator kay bailey hutchison and kelly ayotte from new hampshire and olympia snowe from maine and lisa murkowski from alaska, we don't see any evidence of this. >> mitch mcconnell calling the republican war on women a manufactured issue and if you don't believe him, ask a lady republican. ask senator kay bailey hutchison about this, this supposed war on women. ask her. >> planned parenthood does mammograms. they do so much of the health care, the preventive health care. if they are doing that, then we need to provide those services. absolutely. >> senator kay bailey hutchison speaking out against her own party's attacks on planned parenthood. a big part of the reason people say the republicans are waging a war on women. those attacks on planned parenthood. in that statement, at least. she was not exactly backing up

mitch mcconnell's point there. how about olympia snowe. she was on senator mcconnell's list of lady republic chance who say will debunk this war on women myth. last month olympia snowe voted with the democrats against the blunt amendment to roll back access to contraception and just last week at a women's campaign fund event in new york, she said this about the birth control battle waged by her party. she said i feel like it's a retro debate that comes from the 1950s. it's sort of back to the future. isn't it? okay. moving on down mitch mcconnell's ladies who will back me up list. what about list is murkowski, the republican senator from alaska? senator murkowski you may remember voted for the anti-contraception blunt amendment. she was with mcconnell on that but then she admitted publicly she regretted the vote, she would like to take that vote back if she could. still, her colleague and minority leader in the senate, if we were to ask her about this supposed republican war on women, she would say she sees no evidence of any such thing. this is not a hypothetical.

turns out somebody did ask senator lisa murkowski about the republican war on women just a few days ago and this is what she said about it. >> this is not only discussion in congress but you've got presidential wannabes that are talking about whether or not contraception is good, bad, indifferent, wrong. women feeling that the party that i've chosen to affiliate myself with, the republican party is ignoring their concerns, is causing them to feel like the rights that they believe were settled a long time ago are now being threatened, possibly eroded. >> let me ask you this from a strategic and tactical side of thinking. aren't the republicans maybe stepping into a trap? do they really -- i guess the question i'm trying to ask is what are they thinking?

alienating so many women? >> i asked the same question to my colleagues. i said, it makes no sense to go down this road. it makes no sense to attack women, and if you don't view this as an attack on women, then you need to go home and talk to your wives. you need to talk to your daughters. ask them if they feel this is an attack? >> if you don't view this as an take on women, go home and talk to your wives. talk to your daughters. that is what senator lisa murkowski thinks about the war on women. senator mcconnell. >> talk about a manufactured issue. there is no issue. senator kay bailey hutchison and kelly ayotte from new hampshire and susan collins and olympia snowe from maine i think would be the first to say, lisa murkowski from alaska, we don't see any evidence of this. >> actually, they don't say that. they do not seem to think it's a manufactured issue when people do ask them what they think

about this. maybe you should ask them, too. modest proposal. next time you want to rattle off a list of republican women who totally agree with you on women's issues, senator mcconnell, maybe ask those republican women if that's okay first. if it turns out they don't agree with you, maybe you could even ask them why. joining us now is senior political writer for salon.com, steve kornacki, and msnbc political analyst. steve, it's good to see you. thanks for being here. >> good to see you, rachel. >> what does it say to you that a number of republican women, republican senators, are speaking out against their party's line on this issue, and further, what does it mean that the party's leadership does not appear to be noticing it's happening? >> it says a couple of things. one, it says to me they can read the polls. the woman that are speaking out can read the polls better than mitch mcconnell can because what we've seen in the last few weeks here as a result of the emphasis the republican party has placed on contraception the last few months, the way they've

conducted the debate over contraception. we've seen in polling women leaving the republican party, leaving mitt romney, the presumptive presidential nominee in droves. there was a poll that was limited to 12 swing states that came out last week that showed obama's edge over romney among women no those swing states where this election will be decided this fall exploding to nearly 20 points. at the same time he's only ahead among men by a single point. same poll showed among independent voters just a few months ago romney was ahead five points among independent women. he's now trailing by 14. it's really hard to connect this to anything except the way the republicans have handled themselves in this debate. i think lisa murkowski and olympia snowe are probably sensitive to that. the other thing i note, though, look at the women who are speaking up. kay bailey hutchison is basically leaving politics this year. not running for re-election of the senate. olympia snowe is not running for re-election in the senate. lisa murkowski is in the senate because she ran as an

independent last year. she lost the republican primary to a conservative republican challenger. these are women that are liberated a bit from the political games that the rest of the republicans in washington are playing and have to play. >> i think that's so smart in looking at the individual circumstance of these women that feel like they can speak out. that goes right to, i guess, the most important pragmatic at least political question here which is whether or not this shift in position by the republican party, whether it's going to hurt them among republican women or whether this is only something that hurts them among independent women, potential crossover voters and potentially even some men who see themselves as being alienated by these issues and otherwise seeing themselves as in the center. is this something that's really only for independent voters? is it possible to be to the right of the republican electorate on an issue like this? >> it ties into the fate in general. the republican party for decades liked to sell itself as the big

tent party. we've talked about republicans north of the mason-dixon line. republicans on the west coast no longer feeling at home in the party. this is part of that. the pro-choice woman. when olympia snowe was elected senate just two decades ago in the mid 1990s, kay bailey hutchison had just been elected the year before. there were many prominent pro-choice women in national republican politics. you look at the party now and you see fewer and fewer of them and you do see prominent women but they are much more likely to be from some of the more conservative areas of the country, more likely to be evangelical christians or from the south and much more conservative on social issues, conservative on abortion. the question of pro-choice women is the question of moderate republicans in general. this is not a party that's heart and soul is in the northeast. it's on the west coast. anywhere but in the south and very red areas anymore. >> it's remarkable to think the republican party is setting up a decision point for pro-choice

women of every ideological stripe in the country to tell them there's no home for you in the republican party. there are no pro-choice people left in the republican party. if you're pro-choice and care about this issue, the democrats are all that you have. it's amazing to me. when i find the republican who can explain to me why they decided to do this, i will have hit gold. steve kornacki, senior political writer for salon.com, msnbc political analyst. steve, thanks again for joining us tonight. i appreciate it. >> sure, happy to do it. >> all right. we'll be right back. i get my cas through the mail. now washington, they're looking at shutting down post offices coast to coast. closing plants is not the answer. they want to cut 100,000 jobs. it's gonna cost us more, and the service is gonna be less. we could lose clientele because of increased mailing times. the ripple effect is going to be devastating. congress created the problem. and if our legislators get on the ball, they can make the right decisions.

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news tonight in the great state of michigan where the state appeals court has blocked a lower court ruling that's part of a remarkable fight playing out between michigan's republicans and michigan's democrats. this is a fascinating story in michigan politics. since we have been reporting on it, frankly, feels like we hit about a thousand nerves on both sides. here is the basics. in the 2010 election, things went about as well as you can imagine for michigan republicans. republican rick snyder won the governorship and michigan republicans won big majorities in both houses of the state legislature. they won majorities. they won really big majorities but did not win quite big enough majorities. thanks to a change in the state constitution back in the 1960s, yes, that mr. romney's dad, there on the left, george

romney. since they last tweaked their constitution about 50 years ago, if you have a two-thirds majority vote in the legislature, you do not have to wait for the end of the session for past bills to become law. with a two-thirds vote, supermajority vote, have the laws become law immediately. they go into immediate effect. michigan republicans have that two-thirds supermajority in the senate. but they don't have it in the house. and even though they don't have that two-thirds supermajority in the house, which they would need to put their laws into immediate effect, they have been acting like they do have that majority. here's what that looks like. what you're going to see here is the republican speaker of the house, making the decision that two-thirds of the legislature, that's 73 people, are voting that this law that just passed should go into immediate effect. watch him count to 73. >> speaker recognizes majority floor leader. >> thank you, mr. speaker. >> speaker, the majority -- the

speaker -- the majority floor leader has requested a record roll call vote. all those in favor please rise. i'm sorry. the majority floor leader has requested immediate effect. all those in favor, please rise. immediate effect is ordered. >> what the house speaker is purporting to do there is count, i think, in about three seconds, to 73. to count at least 73 supporters standing up in that giant chamber on a measure that he knows just passed with only 62 votes. one, two, three, 73, done. now, michigan republicans responded angrily to our reporting on this last week with a statement from the republican speaker of the house accusing me of whining. and of having liberal sour grapes. i think the house speaker is making a vineyard joke there. like the grapes are sour, but nevertheless being furmented into delicious wine. w-i-n-e which sounds like whine,

w-h-i-n-e, so it's a homophone joke which is excellent. as impressed as i am by the sounds alike wine related insult the leader of the michigan has has thrown my way, i concede his point which i should have made clear in our initial reporting that both democrats and republicans in michigan have passed lots of legislation by immediate effect. republicans are not going this more frequently than democrats did when the legislature was under democratic control. both sides have done this. but what's different now is this. this is democrats trying to get an actual count and republicans not letting them. it's one thing to glance around the room, assume you've got your supermajority, and, bang, gavel it through. it's another thing to refuse to check your count when the minority side calls you out for the fact that you seem to be lying about that count. republicans say they used to get ignored, too, when they were in the minority but they say they didn't think it was any big deal, they didn't much care about it. the state's democrats have gone

so far as to sue in state court to try to get that count. to try to get the immediate effect of several new laws overturned. because they say they were passed without a real count. they were passed illegally. it was that lawsuit that last week convinced a michigan state judge to issue a stay to block the implementation of several new laws that would otherwise have gone into immediate effect in michigan. a state appeals court today overturned that saying two of those laws can go into effect after all. republicans in the legislature have the republican state attorney general arguing this case on their side. and the court that sided with them today says that it is the court that gets to hear all further proceedings on this issue. and so as this fight unfurls, michigan is left with some questions. can a court step in if a legislature is operating contrary to the constitution in not allowing voting where there should be voting? should the court intervene if operating contrary to the constitution and not allowing voting is something everybody's

been comfortable with for a long time? and, more importantly, as michigan rolls into its second year of expanded emergency manager powers, overruling local voting rights, the emergency manager law, remember, not just passed but also put into immediate effect even though it appears republicans did not have the votes to do that. as cities like benton harbor and pontiac and flint and very nearly detroit, itself, are having their citizens stripped of their right to vote at the local level in michigan, the question remains, what's going on in michigan? and why is it first recourse in michigan now to put a halt to all the pesky voting, to solve the state's problems by stopping the voting process that is otherwise known as democracy? who, if thianyone, is going to change that in the state of michigan? on a personal note, i have to say i'm more inclined than ever to stay on this story. one, because it keeps getting more and more interesting and more and more fraught all the time. i think something is going on in

michigan that's going on nowhere else in the country and deserves a lot more attention than it's getting. the more rocks you overturn, the more you learn. but also, turns out your insults make me stronger. bring it on. keep shooting the messenger. ♪ [ male announcer ] want your weeds to hit the road? hit 'em, with roundup extended control.

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he would never give up on any of us. the calcium they take because they don't take it with food. switch to citracal maximum plus d. it's the only calcium supplement that can be taken with or without food. that's why my doctor recommends citracal maximum. it's all about absorption. this is sort of the best new thing in the world today. but i only didn't call it that because instead i really wanted to call it that. when you wish upon the chair of the relevant subcommittee. all right? here it goes. this is a supernova. specifically that white arrow on the top right corner of the screen pointing to a white circle, that white circle is a supernova. it is the explosive death of a star, which unleashes a big burst of light. these violent big bright deaths occur about once a century in a

typical spiral galaxy like our milky way. that's a supernova. and this is u.s. senator barbara mikulski from maryland. the longest serving woman in congress. and as of a few days ago she's also a supernova. supernova mikulski. the space institute named a supernova after barbara mikulski. the white box is the location of supernova mikulski's home galaxy. her supernova discovered on january 25th. it's huge. it's the explosive death of a star that's eight times as big as our sun. it's also really really far away. 7.5 billion light years away. it seems miraculous we have images of it at all, but there it is. that green dot on this very grainy picture is what counts as a close-up of supernova mikulski. as taken by the hubbell telescope. scientists are hoping that studying supernova mikulski will help them understand star formation in the