tv NOW With Alex Wagner MSNBC June 13, 2012 9:00am-10:00am PDT
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joining me today, msnbc political analyst, richard wolffe. nicolle wallace, former communications director for president george w. bush, senior advisor for the mccain campaign and author of "it's classified." patricia murphy of citizen jane politics and a contributor to the daily beast. and mr. sunday morning himself, the "new york times" magazine's hugo lindgren. ronald reagan's legacy is causing a bit of fracture in the gop as party leaders debate what role the herolded republican president would play today. jeb bush is taking flack for saying republicans today have moved too far right for reagan to be accepted in the party. meanwhile, this morning, tim pawlenty said mitt romney embodies reagan's principles. >> say the republican party currently wouldn't endorse ronald reagan or something like that, we just nominated mitt romney or presumptively nominated mitt romney, who is in the reagan tradition, a
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conservative with a conservative record, governed effectively in a blue state, working across the aisle, somebody who has produced results. >> but as republicans make comparisons to reagan, the one glaring difference is ronald reagan raised taxes 11 times, in fact. the tax equity and fiscal responsibility act of 1982. the highway revenue act of 1982. the social security amendments of 1983. the railroad retirement revenue act of 1983. the deficit reduction act of 1984. the consolidated omnibus budget reconciliation act of 1985. the omnibus budget reconciliation act of 1986. the superfund amendments and reauthorization act of 1986. the continuing resolution for 1987. the omnibus budget reconciliation act of 1987 and the continuing resolution for 1988. that was the longest intro i have had since this show began. nicolle, it gave you plenty of time to think perhaps of the
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answer to this question, which is if mitt romney is a republican in the model of ronald reagan, do you think he will raise taxes? >> i want to go back to what you said about jeb bush, because what jeb bush was saying wasn't that reagan was too moderate to be a republican by today's standard. it was that he was too productive. what reagan did, and that list was a list of legislative accomplishments and that's what's missing. republicans are now i think what jeb was trying to say was that they're too devoted to adhering to an ideology, to adhering to a pledge they made to grover norquist to govern and that's the paralysis that jeb said would put people like his father and reagan, who valued the governing, the governing that needs to take place, to move the country forward, to get a deal done. that used to be an accomplishment. now it's a sign of weakness. >> inherent in that, getting things done, making deals, is playing ball and coming to some sort of compromise. >> now no one will even sit at
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the table. i worked for jeb bush's first term as governor and everyone came to the table because everything was on the table. he had one of the most conservative records as a governor but everything was always on the table and that's how he was able to bring people together and govern a state. >> richard, i was at breakfast with the governor this week at bloomberg and the word that stuck out was orthodoxy. jeb bush clarified or walk-back or whatever you want to say, he added to his initial remarks perhaps trying to sort of ameliorate some of the damage. at the end of the day, what he was focusing on was this idea of rigidity within the republican party. you look at that, 11 acts where taxes were raised by ronald reagan. >> look, you remember the 60 minute interview with john boehner when he couldn't bring himself to say the word compromise. that's the state that politics are in right now. we're not, you know, it's easy for us to say that both sides don't want to compromise but
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actually, the real movement here has come on the republican side and the bush family represents i think all through the different characters in the bush family a desire to find some kind of middle ground. that's hard for people to understand now about your old boss, president bush, but one of his domestic signature pieces of legislation was working with ted kennedy. by the way, president bush's education secretary has just left the romney campaign because she doesn't like romney's approach to having a strong federal role in raising educational standards. we have to admit that the republican party has shifted to the right, it's not interested in finding common ground and that's why mitt romney finds it so hard to talk about his massachusetts record now. >> you guys are both raising your hands. >> you go first. >> thank you. so polite. >> so polite. >> i'm mr. sunday morning. >> we'll talk to you sunday. >> one quick thing about reagan, getting back to what nicolle was saying in terms of productivity, reagan did raise taxes.
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he also cut taxes enormously. if you look at what he did in the '86 tax reform act, he gave democrats things that they wanted. he eliminated taxes for the lowest income americans. that was reagan's idea so he could get democrats to the table. the moment in that entire cycle that you will never see today, reagan went on tv, had an oval office address that i am going to cut your taxes, it's going to be more fair, everyone is going to see a change in their taxes. then the democrat came out to give his response and said mr. president, we're with you. that will never happen. >> that will never, ever happen. exactly. >> there's an important -- ronald reagan is a very difficult symbol for the republican party, in part because he's this kind of like symbol of all that's great. he's like norman rockwell, and people forget a lot of the sort of nastier bits of the history. i think importantly, what we're talking about, is he was able to stand for the idea of having principles but being able to make deals. while not abandoning your
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principles. and you know, it's actually kind of interesting, when you did the list of the taxes, the tax increases, it was funny how small the numbers looked. there was one like .6 billion. >> 57.3 billion. >> we're in the trillion dollar area. >> but you know, the idea that, you know, you're talking about reagan having core convictions but at the same time -- >> allegedly. >> reagan also led his party. he had the moral authority to tell the people follow behind me. there's nobody in the republican party right now to tell the freshmen to zip it and follow me and i'm taking you where we all want to go. >> certainly not mitt romney. he has been offered time and time again a chance to plant a flag in the ground and say look, this is what i believe in and this is a nonnegotiable. >> he just took the two fractious elements of the party, the social conservatives and fiscal conservatives and got them behind one cause. bill clinton went on to say
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something similar within the democratic party. that's the big problem i think both obama and romney have this time, neither one of them is really able to do the same kind of thing. >> i want to pivot a little bit to another president we haven't talked about in the last five minutes which is to say george w. bush. we know the president is going to be making a speech on thursday in which presumably, according to the white house, he's going to be making the case that he needs more time to fix the damage done by president bush and he's saying romney will bring back the bush policies of yore and it will be effectively a repeat, a three-peat of what happened under george w. bush. richard, i wonder how effective you think this is as a sort of line of reasoning, recalling the specter of george w. bush. does the american public buy that? >> well, if you just ask on the polls, yes, they blame two factors above all in terms of the state of the economy which is wall street and the bush administration. but if this is focused just on president bush, if it's that
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personal, i don't think it takes them far enough. just to come back to reagan again, the best framing of this question is are you better off now than you were four years ago. the only way you can really answer that in any honest way, people may not feel good right now, but the question are you better off is premised on the fact that people would remember accurately what things were like at the end of 2008 and the start of the obama presidency and the truth is if you actually ask people, they don't remember or they choose not to remember. so this is where the difficult messaging comes in among many other things for this president, which is you've got to take people back to that point where we were falling off a cliff, where we didn't know where the bottom -- >> you think that's what obama should do? >> saying if you're going to get people to answer the question are you better off now than you were four years ago, you have to remind them we were losing 800,000 jobs a month, the stock market was heading towards 6,900. it's now at 12,000 something. you know, that's part of the
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narrative. the turnaround story, because you're running against a guy who says he's a turnaround guy, part of the turnaround story is what we have seen in manufacturing and specifically the auto industry. you have to tell that story and that's not obvious. >> i will say this. manufacturing has lost two million jobs since the recession, they gained back about a quarter of them. you can't just go in and say oh, my god, look, there's a story in the "times" yesterday about a pottery plant in east liverpool, ohio, so starbucks is deciding they are going to manufacture some of their mugs in the united states. it saved four jobs and added eight. that's a very nice thing for a town that's basically been hemorrhaging jobs for a generation, but the gains in manufacturing are pretty small and it's a tough thing to build a hey, we're on the right track message. >> this president came in when the economy was -- that is a change. it may not be a big change but it is a change. >> it's a delicate dance to remind people of really bad
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stuff when fundamentally, you want to sort of forward looking and forward leaning and forward moving message, then at the same time, if you over sort of celebrate the accomplishments or incremental measures that pushed the economy forward, you run the risk of looking sort of insensitive which is what james carville said criticizing the president, saying effectively i'm worried when the campaign talks about the progress being made, people take that as a signal they think things are fine and people don't believe that. >> the private sector doing just fine, that's why it blew up in the president's face, because the private sector is not doing fine and anybody who once worked in the private sector and is now unemployed knows that. it's very difficult to say don't you remember how awful it was, don't you feel you're just a little bit less awful right now. he does have other things that he has not dealt with because he's been in a total crisis but the deficit has exploded. i think people are very worried about that. social security, nothing's been done. medicare, nothing's been done. we have huge systemic problems
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and nothing has been taken care of. >> the way-back machine is a fickle mistress. got to be careful when you pull the levers. coming up, the battle over reproductive rights and fears that roev wade could be in jeopardy. women could hold the keys to november. cecile richards will join the panel next. yoo-hoo. hello. it's water from the drinking fountain at the mall. [ male announcer ] great tasting tap water can come from any faucet anywhere. the brita bottle with the filter inside.
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republicans are shifting their attack strategy on the president's health care law. politico reported on a private meeting in which speaker john boehner told his party that framing the law as quote, job killing, isn't polling well. the new attack may suggest the affordable care act is driving up costs and hurting small businesses.
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meanwhile, at the state level, republicans are waging health care battles that could mean ending health coverage for tens of thousands of women. joining the panel now is president of planned parenthood and the planned parenthood action fund, cecile, a pleasure. >> nice to be here. >> pleasure to have you. let's talk about what's happening at the state level. i want to focus on texas first. in terms of there is an appeals court in new orleans that on thursday, heard arguments over the ban, the state's planned ban to end funding for planned parenthood which would affect i think 103,000 or half of the 103,000 texas women who are receiving health care using planned parenthood. >> it's more dramatic than that. governor perry is trying to end the entire women's health program in texas that affects women who come to planned parenthood and other places.
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what's most alarming is it means women won't have access to cancer screens, to basic well women checkups. we have seen more than 100,000 women in texas lose access to basic preventive care. this would be another 100,000 women. so we're hopeful in courts but we shouldn't have to be going to court to protect women's basic access to health care in this country. >> that's the thing. it's not just in texas. you have similar legislation in arizona. the courts have blocked efforts in indiana, kansas, north carolina and wisconsin. you talk about this, nicolle, i mean, women's health care is a -- should have bipartisan support and yet, not only are you seeing a real push-back from republicans on planned parenthood but these efforts are being duplicated in states across the country. speaking from the conservative point of view -- >> what's up? >> what is the logic on it? >> let me just say, at a policy level and political level it's a huge loser and i think the fact
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that planned parenthood has become so politicized is a bad sign for the women who rely on planned parenthood for their health care and says something pretty ugly about our politics. there are plenty of places to have a legitimate discussion about abortion rights. you can debate at a state level, parental notification. you can debate policy. but attacking an organization that does a tremendous amount of good to the exact group of women who don't have any other choice is a political loser. i think part of that, it doesn't center around the debate and it always gets reduced down to a debate over life and choice. that's really not real. that's really not what's happening. it's a matter of a woman who can't otherwise afford it having access to health care. >> i agree. >> what she said. >> i think it actually is fundamental and why texas is so important is that actually, what governor perry is doing in texas is exactly what mitt romney has promised to do if elected president for the entire country, which is end, as he said get rid of planned
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parenthood first and foremost but end the entire women's family planning program that serves five million women who have often no other access to care, with basic preventive care, birth control, cancer screenings and the like. i think that is -- i really enjoyed your segment earlier because i think this is fundamentally not where the republican party has been. it was a conservative position to believe in family planning. many of the chapters were started by republicans. in arizona, in fact, peggy goldwater was one of the co-founders of planned parenthood. that's where i feel the republican leadership, not the members of the republican party but the leadership has just gone so far -- >> that's the question, where the voters really are on this, where the republican voters are. they must be making a calculated choice that they're not going to lose those voters, those female voters on the right. it's confusing to me personally but i don't -- >> you know, it's interesting, i was just looking, we had obviously a congressional race in arizona last night to replace the giffords seat.
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the exit polling isn't done yet or we don't know exactly, but the polling right before that election was more than a 20 point gender gap in that race. i think that's what we've been seeing. theres a gender gap, it's real and based on women's health care issues. >> i want to play a little sound. mitt romney in a primary debate january 7th of this year. let's take a listen to what he said about planned parenthood and roe v wade. >> in my view it was based upon that same principle and in my view, if we had justices like roberts, alito, thomas and scalia and more justices like that, they might well decide to return this issue to states as opposed to saying it's in the federal constitution. i believe the supreme court -- do i believe supreme court should overturn roe v wade? yes, i do. >> we were listening to that earlier. i don't know if you read it but there was a profile on mitt romney and his mother being a real advocate of women's choice
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and women's reproductive rights. it's breathtaking, especially given where the governor was as governor of massachusetts on a lot of these issues. the pivot that he has made to the very far right on a lot of these issues. >> it's been a dramatic shift. i think looking at that, it's really stunning because i don't care who you talk to in this country, people in america believe that roe versus wade is settled law, that was a decision. what they really want government to focus on is reducing unintended pregnancy, teen pregnancy, making sure that women have access to birth control and that young people have information that will help them prevent becoming parents before they're ready. that's what planned parenthood does. more than 90% of our services are preventive care. unfortunately, that's exactly what mr. romney now seems to be going after. >> the question is how that plays out with women. you hear that and in combination with what's happening at the state level, it just seems like misguided political calculation. >> we have seen mitt romney's numbers go up in the last six
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weeks when all the state legislatures have been out of session. they have not been making the kind of noise they were making in january and february. decisions that were so alarming to especially young women, young independent women, just getting initiated into politics have no idea that the idea of access to contraception was even on the table. for it to be brought up again and again and again in the state legislatures was so alarming, is really the only word you can say. we saw this huge shift to president obama. now some of those voters are going back to romney because he hasn't made this a centerpiece of his campaign but i think republicans in congress continue to go after certainly planned parenthood and other organizations. i guess my one question for you is that i don't think it's possible to take the abortion issue out of the equation entirely. republicans have i think very clumsily lumped it all together and said we want to defund you completely despite the wonderful work you do. is there an effort to -- i don't know, i don't know if there's a way to decouple the issues or if you want to not decouple the
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issues, but i do feel like the access to other kinds of health care and the abortion question have gotten so wrapped up together that women almost don't know how to make sense of the debate. >> i think what we're seeing consistently is what women resent is people playing politics with their health care. i think again, we're the largest family planning provider in the country. we see three million patients a year. we do more to prevent unintended pregnancy and the need for abortion than any organization in the country. so the very policies that mr. romney in particular is going after, these are programs that actually help women prevent unintended pregnancy. i think for women, the only other thing i would say, i know this election is going to be about the economy. for women, access to health care is an economic issue. it's an affordability issue and a matter of being able to plan their families, stay in school, be a productive member of society as employees and so i think you are going to see these issues actually blend into this
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election in a fundamental way. >> i think absolutely these issues will be raised come september and october, if not throughout the summer. cecile richards, a pleasant pleasure to have you. >> thanks a lot. good to see you. after the break, as atrocities mount in syria, the obama administration is sharpening its rhetoric. we get a live report, next. do you see it ? there it is ! there it is ! where ? where ? it's getting away ! where is it ? it's gone. we'll find it. any day can be an adventure. that's why we got a subaru.
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shipping attack helicopters to syria. she also calls russia's assertion that their weapons shipments are unrelated to the fighting quote, patently untrue. nbc's richard engel joins us live from cairo. what is the latest? >> reporter: we're hearing more statements from other countries, in particular france, the foreign minister suggesting that a new no-fly zone for syria is a possible consideration. also, the british foreign minister saying that syria is certainly on the verge of an all-out civil war, and russia is denying those accusations from the united states. russia says that its shipments to syria do not break any international laws. >> russia would seem to be the linchpin in this situation. what kind of pressure can the u.s. and its allies exert on the russians at this point? >> reporter: i think at this stage, the united states can try and embarrass russia to try and show russia that it is becoming a pariah just like syria and that it has more to lose by
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holding on to its long time ally than it does to gain by keeping its friend, its last friend in the middle east. when you look at russia, you have to also consider what happened in libya. russia had close ties with libya and the u.s. told russia that the libyan intervention would be strictly a humanitarian mission and then it turned into a full-on war. russia doesn't want to see that happen again, where a slippery slope begins with u.n. actions, then suddenly there is yet another middle east war. that's the balance that russia is trying to manage and the united states wants to convince russia it has more to lose by staying with syria. >> certainly a dire situation. i think estimates by the u.n., 9,000 people killed, mostly civilians, since march of last year. thank you, nbc's richard engel, for giving us the latest on the situation over there. coming up, the great voter purge. florida's push to remove voters from the rolls could just be the tip of a larger
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disenfranchisement iceberg. we will examine the facts next. eggland's best eggs. the best in nutrition... just got better. now with even more of the vitamins your body needs. like vitamin d. plus omega 3's. there's one important ingredient that hasn't changed: better taste. [ female announcer ] eggland's best. better taste. better nutrition. the better egg.
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what a strange place. geico®. fifteen minutes could save you fifteen percent or more on car insurance. sacrificing 20% of new voter participation is nothing compared to the horrors of voter fraud, which according to the berlin center for justice, happens at a terrifying rate of .0004%. look, the detected voter fraud you prosecute and put people in jail for may be one number, but there's a lot of voter fraud out there you can never catch because it's so easy to do. >> so voter fraud statistics are limited only as much as your imagination. >> that was a clip from last night's "daily show" making the point that voter fraud is largely in the minds of republicans but the consequences of what they're doing to stop it are very real. the justice department is now suing florida over the state's plan to purge voter rolls. here is how governor rick scott
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responded. >> this isn't a partisan issue. this isn't a democrat issue, republican issue, independent issue. i've not talked to one person in our state that says they think that noncitizens should be able to illegally vote in our races. >> but according to the miami herald, 58% of those on the purge list are hispanic and 48% democrats. just 20% are republicans. richard, there are so many amazing things about what rick scott is trying to do but i have to highlight the fact the thickness of the irony cannot be overstated. rick scott ran a hospital company that was involved in the biggest medicare fraud in u.s. history. >> he knows something about it. >> exactly. if anybody knows about fraudulent practices, it is rick scott. in all seriousness, not that that wasn't serious, the efforts here seem to be these sort of incredibly contentious and probably unfair solutions to a problem that doesn't actually
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exist. >> right. nobody's arguing with the premise that fraud should be stopped, right? we don't want people voting who shouldn't have a right to vote. but the justice department lawsuit is based on two pretty important things. one, you cross-check things against a good data base. in this case, using driver licenses. secondly, that you don't do it within 90 days of an election. he says it's not partisan but if you're within 90 days of an election, i'm afraid you're being partisan. whether or not that's your intention or that's just the appearance, you don't mess around with elections like this. if you really think it's a serious problem, do it well before an election, in a serious way. maybe set up an independent panel to do it, get a good data base. he's gone about it all the wrong way, even if you thought the problem exists and as the data point out, it's really a very small problem if it's there at all. >> it doesn't matter the size of the problem. this is a very legitimate thing to believe, as most people do, that if you need some sort of i.d. to rent a dvd, you should
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need the same sort of i.d. to cast a vote and help determine the outcome of a national election. >> but the question is when you're going to do it. that's what richard was talking about. >> not just when. i think you have to look at the sort of sum total of the effects. if you're disenfranchising huge portions of the population, disproportionately affecting minorities -- >> it's irrelevant who the fraud makers are going to vote for. that is political. >> low income americans. >> we should be blind to race and color and ethnicity. >> but it's not. >> anybody who is -- former president carter and james baker, who are well regarded on both sides of the aisle, took a look at voter fraud and laid out some very legitimate and not scary or alarming practices that just having a photo i.d., those things were accepted, it happened in a time period that may have been less anxiety-inducing for some, but it's ridiculous to say that you don't have any standard for
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voting. >> i don't think anyone is saying there is no standard for voting. i think in some states the question is is the standard too high. having the photo i.d. if you go through statistics, who is least likely to have a photo i.d., older people, minorities -- >> it could be a costco card. >> the bigger question is it being used as a tactical move in the election. there's good reason to say that it is. >> you listen to rick scott's language, what i was hearing him say, he said when there are noncitizens voting illegally. it's very clear who he's talking about. >> let's be clear, too. how many deportation is such a threat in this country at this point. how many citizens who are here illegally, how many illegal immigrants -- >> it would take a lot of courage. >> if you want the 50% of latinos who are legal and not registered to vote, this is a great way to drive up voter turnout and registration because they could say i wasn't registered, now i'm annoyed by you. >> this is on the heels of rick scott also ending or trying to
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curb early voter registration, early voting, doing a host of things that discourage people from going to the polls which seems counterintuitive. to the timing, i will read from the miami herald. they said purges of voter rolls on nothing new. local supervisors purge often, removing those who have died or move out of state. timing becomes suspect because florida is a swing state and this is a presidential election year and the governor has a long list of lawsuits and legal challenges to federal law starting with the federal health care law. there's no way to remove politics from this fight over voter rolls. >> timing might be one of them. >> timing, it being in florida obviously gives democrats palpitations thinking about very tight races and recounts and other things. >> hanging chads. but you know, one good turn deserves another. rick scott is suing the department of homeland security now because they did not give
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him access to the data base that he would have liked. which perhaps would have perhaps resulted in more accurate, more of an accurate purge. but homeland security says its job is to monitor border security, not to assist voter registration. >> if you think florida has a particular problem with its voter rolls, then set up a system for doing it with enough time before the election. it's not like we don't know when elections are. or if he thinks there's some kind of endemic problem, he could have done it as opposed to just being another governor who is in a deep hole, who is running for election and maybe wants a way out of his particular problems. you want to be above the law, that's a problem for everyone, but he's got to be above politics, if you're going to mess around with election law. >> it's worth noting, recent polls show that last week, rick scott's approval rating was 31%. >> that might be a clue. >> he'll have to get a lot of people off the rolls. >> yes, he is, hugo. good luck to you, rick scott. after the break, king murdoch versus the world. we'll discuss the latest in the hacking scandal that has
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a former top aide to rupert murdoch appeared briefly in a london court today. rebecca brooks is charged with impeding an investigation into widespread hacking scandal at news corps' london newspapers. joining the panel is sarah ellison. she has written extensively about the murdoch family. her story is called "murdoch's civil war." we were talking before the segment started about the magnitude of this scandal. i think especially for a u.s. audience, the fact that -- i'll read an excerpt from john major's testimony in the "new york times." he wished me to change our european policies. this is speaking of rupert murdoch. he wished me to change our european policies. if we couldn't change our european policies, his papers could not, would not support our conservative government.
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it's not very often someone sits in front of a prime minister and says to a prime minister, i would like you to change your policy, and if you don't change your policy, my organization cannot support you. just shocking the amount of power rupert murdoch has, slash had. >> when you look at the uk, the entire media elite, political elite, evidently the police and all other sorts of public officials, were completely captive by his empire and the kind of intimidation. we talked about this as sort of an ongoing sense of being blackmailed because people were worried about the kind of coverage they were going to get. people are always worried about bad coverage but they were actually listening in to people's conversations and hearing their voice mails. the question now i think, you have all these -- there's a police investigation, there's this ongoing judicial inquiry, is what's really the political
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will to address the kind of political captivity that everyone was in. obviously you have david cameron, the prime minister of the country, who is going to appear tomorrow and be questioned about his relationship. you can't imagine the equivalent in this country, really. barack obama talking about -- >> that's a question i have that's harder to tell from here, where is the british public exactly? there's a kind of media fixation in the united states and rupert is not a comical figure but is definitely a figure of curiosity, a character, rebecca brooks, amazing character. there's a kind of circus feel to it viewed here from the united states but in england, this is the real -- >> it's a certain kind of institutional failure. you're talking about a time when unemployment is really high, the european economy, the british economy are in certain dire straits. for this to happen and for it to engulf the government, the media institutions, the power elite, it's fairly dramatic. >> if people can remember back almost a year ago last summer, the moment this broke through,
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of course, was the millie dowler story, she was kidnapped and later found to have been murdered and they had been hacking into her phone. that was the thing that broke it out, it was a media fixation, into something where the british people really felt like they had been completely had by the entire elite. it wasn't just anger at the media. it was everyone had been in this sort of together. i think that there is a sense, people aren't paying attention in the uk to every single small development. it's been a long time this thing has been going on. there's a certain fatigue to it. i do think there's a general mistrust and the economy doesn't help. it's sort of this general feeling like they have been had by their elite. >> richard, our resident brit, although we know you carry an american passport and we're very happy about that. >> not in florida. >> the fact that david cameron,
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gordon brown, john major, these are the country's leaders. the weakness, i'm using that word, the idea that they would have been in any way beholden to rupert murdoch and his newspapers, i think the repercussions in terms of how the brits see their government, their institutions, have got to be powerful. >> well, beholden, terrified, bullied, terrorized, complicit, corrupted, all of those things are true. john major was talking in a way that his government was brought down because he refused to bend to what rupert murdoch wanted. remember as well, look, david cameron came in as a new figure. his director of communications, a job an equivalent nicolle once held, director of communications was the former editor of the worst of rupert, most salacious of rupert murdoch's tabloids who is now facing his own charges for perjury, no less. >> he lost that job. >> right. because of the scandal. on top of that, the police, the
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police investigating this stuff have also been corrupted. they have been taking money directly from these newspapers. it goes all the way through. ultimately, the british public themselves are complicit, too. these newspapers are powerful because people buy them. they buy them in extraordinary numbers. so the "wall street journal" here, one of the top two selling newspapers in this country, a country of 300 million people, sells about a million copies every day, "the sun" sells about a million copies. you multiply that through all, in a country with 50 million people, so you multiply that number through the different media properties rupert murdoch has and you see why it's so enormous. newspapers are consumed, they dominate the conversation. rupert murdoch has terrorized a very weak and compliant bunch of politicians and police officers. so the whole thing's corrupt. it's rotten right at the heart. >> to your larger point, who's going to lead this sort of clean sweep to ensure this sort of thing doesn't ever happen again.
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if i'm an american perspective, i don't think we can envision anything like that happening over here although there are plenty of conspiracy theories about how interlinked all those worlds are. we have to go but sarah, i want to ask you in terms of the future of rupert murdoch and his media empire, one of the points you make in your article is he's sort of boxed in at the top because there's sort of no one else who can do the job he's doing, and his secession plan is basically a handful of tnt has been thrown on it. >> right. he is sort of stuck for now in the ceo position partly because his children have all been knocked out of the running for now. people have short memories and so i'm sure there is some idea he can hang on long enough for one of them to eventually succeed him. but what he's done very effectively is save himself and his company for his children for now. we'll see where this goes in the u.s. we'll see exactly where this ends up leading. but he has been incredibly, after years of denial, he's been
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incredibly adept at actually quarantining this, basically throwing the entire uk under the bus and saying you guys deal with it, take out the prime minister, that's fine. a new one will rise in his place. but we'll keep this company, we have the votes for it -- >> does that mean he will sell more of his uk properties? what exactly do you mean? >> what i mean is he's willing to let anyone be arrested who worked for him in the uk and basically say that that -- even if you came to the conclusion that was an entirely toxic operation, he could sell that and there have been discussions about them selling that and looking at it. i think what he's doing is really trying to, again, protect himself and his family. >> only rupert murdoch could think prime minister, no problem, get rid of him, a new one will rise in his place. we'll follow this story. sarah ellison, thanks for joining us. coming up, a startling number of teens can't find a summer job.
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she said to me, you know, she said the job situation is so bad, that when i went to see a friend of mine who runs one of these fast food place tos to tro get my son a job for the summer, she said we're hiring adults because there are so many adults out of work, we don't have space to hire teenagers. >> time for "what now." that was newt gingrich describing a meeting with a mother in atlanta. a new report by the labor department reveals that fewer than a third of teenagers have summer jobs. hugo, always interesting to get newt gingrich's comments -- >> i thought he made a very salient, strong point. >> everybody was expecting something about children being janitors. >> they don't have teenagers at tiffany's anymore. >> they should apply at television stations in ohio and
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virginia and get jobs as part of the super pac stimulus package. i'm just trying to think. >> interesting thing to note, the trend lines for kids being employed, 16 to 19 year olds being employed in the summer. year 2000, 50% of them had jobs. in 2011, only 30% of them had jobs. young liam may not have a summer job by the time he's 16. >> you know what would be interesting to know, and obviously this doesn't solve the problem or scratch the itch for these families, but are they getting internships, apprenticeships. there is another, a third way and i think the real dire situation is that we're not training the next work force, not training the work force of tomorrow. >> there are a lot of internships anecdotally in the media. >> they also don't pay any money. >> that's right. >> speaking of that, we have to get this in here because this is
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a dark day. the end of an era for the times-picayune, the only daily newspaper in new orleans. the 175-year-old paper is moving online and as a result, 201 employees got pink slips yesterday. patricia? >> i hate it. i hate it. i hate it so much. the only silver lining i think about is they did their very best work during hurricane katrina and they of course were online only when they did that and when they won their pulitzer. it's possible to do great journalism online only but it's just a sad way to see it go, especially to see 200 people lose their jobs. >> see half the work force go. it is a sad day down in new orleans. thanks to richard, nicolle, patricia and hugo. that is all for now. see you back here tomorrow at noon eastern when i'm not coughing. follow us on twitter. "andrea mitchell reports" is next.
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right now on "andrea mitchell reports" risky business. protests on the hill at the nation's leading banker blames overconfidence and faulty controls for jpmorgan chase's $2 billion trading losses. >> this portfolio morphed into something that created new and potentially larger risks. as a result, we let a lot of people down and we are very sorry for it. >> money, money, money. president obama and mitt romney clash over who can save the middle class as they both dash for campaign cash. he said a few days ago the private sector is doing fine. but the incredulity that came screaming back from the american people has caused him to rethink that. >> he seems to think if ceos and wealthy investors like him are doing well, the rest of us automatically do well. civir
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