rach has the night off but we have a great show tonight, including, i'm excited for this, an epic chart smackdown. y you diagram aficionados should get ready to rumble. before that, i have to begin with a confession. you know mitch mcconnell, kind of a jowly guy. he's my favorite politician by far, and not just because of his good looks or his southern charm. it's because mitch mcconnell is the most honest man in washington. you ask almost anyone else in a position of power on capitol hill why they're doing, what they're doing, and you get spin, spin, and more spin. they're reaching across the

aisle to make the country better, that freedom is the most important freedom, then you think about the children and the freedom, and et cetera, et cetera. meanwhile, they got done ten minutes before that meeting with six mega donors and they're voting on the amendment because they're settling a score they have been nursing since the 2005 budget fight. mitch mcconnell is not really like that. he tells you what's going on. when he speaks i have learned to listen. in fact, of every politician and i am not kidding about this, he's literally the one i listen to the most closely, because his mixture of power and honesty make him the best guy to what is going to happen next in the capitol. in october 2010, major garrett sat down with mcconnell to talk about what republicans would do if they took back congress in the fall. he didn't tell him he wanted compromise or a new tone or a renewed spirit of cooperation and partnership or any of the warm and fluffy things you tend to hear politicians say. he said, quote, the single most

important thing we want to achieve for president obama, to be a one-term president. ouch. so partisan, sure, but honest. if that would have been all you knew about the republican party, you could have predicted the last two years in congress almost perfectly. of course, most people didn't predict the last few years in washington perfectly. they've been puzzled by republicans who seem unwilling to touch anything with a democratic name on it. up to and including bills the republicans have supported and even come up with themselves in the first price. but you know what? mcconnell explains that whole thing to us, too. in january 2011, he gave an interview to the atlantic in which he said we worked very hard to keep our fingerprints off these proposals because we thought that the only way the american people would know a great debate was going on was if the measures were not bipartisan. you know what? mcconnell was correct. i think that's one of the most profound things anyone has said about politics. what he understood is what makes a bill bipartisan is not the ideas in it or the spirit in

which it is offered. it's whether any legislatures from the other party sign on. if they do, by definition, the bill is partisan. so by keeping his members off the democrats' major bills, he made each and every one of those pieces of legislation into a partisan bill and destroyed the president's hope for image as a bipartisan compromiser. this week on fox news, mcconnell gave another remarkably honest interview. they have been saying repeal and replace, repeal and replace, but they haven't come together behind anything that would replace the affordable care act and cover a substantial chunk of the uninsured. chris wallace asked mcconnell why. in fact, he ask him why three times. by the third time, his patience gave out and he got real. >> one of the keys to obamacare is it will extend insurance access to 30 million people who are now uninsured.

in your replacement, how would you provide universal coverage? >> first, let me say the single best thing we can do for the american health care system is to get rid of obamacare. >> you talked about repeal and replace. how would you provide universal coverage? >> i'll get to it in a minute. >> what specifically are you going to do to provide universal coverage to the 30 million people who are uninsured? >> that is not the issue. the question is how can you go step by step to improve the american health care system. it's already the finest health care system in the world. >> that is not the issue. it is already the finest health care system in the world. you listen to that and it's clear there is no replace agenda. not a real one, just repeal. the reason there's just repeal is key republicans don't think the uninsured are the issue. they don't think our health care system is all that broken.

it's the best in the world, remember. this is about tweaks, improvements, not a national crisis of 50 million people who can't get care when they need it. look, you can say, ezra, your love, your adoration of mitch mcconnell is blinding you to the truth. he's an out liar. republicans do want to fix the health care system. to which i say, oh, yeah? here's house majority leader eric cantor on "morning joe" on friday. >> it seems to me that the republican party then has to have some kind of a framework of an alternative to what they're talking about because whatever else we think about health care, everybody knows financially the system is broken. you can still get cured here in ways you can't in others and get treatment, but the cost system is kind of a ponzi scheme. so my question again to you, congressman, is when will we see a republican plan that would replace more maeritoriously the

obamacare plan that you're so unhappy with? >> you knew back in 2009 when the obamacare bill was being considered on the house floor, we put forward our alternative. to say we don't have a replacement is not correct. >> a-ha, so they do have a replace. what he is saying is he has a full plan, like right now, you can read it. it's the same plan they voted on in 2009. it's sitting out there. you can download it on the internet which we did today at "the rachel maddow show." and we went through it, and as it turns out, there's not much to see. there were four main republican bills. one was tort reform, to which, eh, another was allowing insurers to sell across state line. this is a big republican idea. we should go through it. right now, your state regulates the insurance you can buy. if aetna doesn't follow the rules you lay down by the people you elected to represent you, in the legislature and the governor mansion, they can't sell in your state. but that is not how all markets for all products work.

if you ever notice how your credit card bills come from south dakota or delaware, it's because credit card companies can sell across state lines, so they've cut deals with south dakota and delaware in which those states gave them very, very, very lax regulatory environments and the credit card companies put their headquarters there. all aetna would have to do is follow the rules in whichever state they wanted which is whichever state has the fewest rules. it's a classic race to the bottom. a third idea in the republican bill was high-risk pools where sick people can go to get insurance with other sick people. it's a stop gap measure you do if you don't want to end discrimnition of people with pre-existing conditions. and republicans didn't want to do that or at least not in this bill. a fourth idea was branch to states to help them with reforms on their own. whether you like the changes or you hate them, these are not big reforms, they're tweaks, adjustments, small, tiny changes to the existing law and they'd

have a small effect. but the congressional budget office, the numbers cruncher in office ran the numbers and they estimated that by 2019, it would have covered -- wait for it -- 3 million uninsured people. that's compared to the affordable care act's 30-plus million. that's the graph you're seeing here. the blue lines going up are the number of people covered under the affordable care act. the tiny red bars you see at the bottom of the screen, the ones that don't seem to move very much, the number of people covered by the republican alternative. so the republican alternative would cover less than a tenth as many insured people as the president's plan, and that's what eric cantor said is the gop's plan today. which is to say, mcconnell really was, right. the republicans really don't see covering the uninsured as, quote, the issue. they are comfortable with the system in the form it exists today. as i told you earlier, you should always listen to mitch mcconnell. joining us now is steve

kornacki, co-host of a brand new show. good to see you. >> great to be here. >> the thing mcconnell is great at in my view is getting politics right. he tends to see the political calculation correctly. and you wonder if he has it correct here. in some circles, people say the most important fact is not that 15% of people are uninsured, but 85% of people are insured. are the republicans actually right here, that covering the uninsured is not a political winner and it's better to give it lip service and move on to other things in the agenda? >> some people would say part of getting politics right is not admitting to the stuff in public the things mitch mcconnell admitted to. but his analysis is correct. the important thing to keep in mind in terms of how health care politics play out, when health care exists as an abstract campaign idea. think about the 1992 campaign with bill clinton. he made universal health care a

big part of the campaign. everybody should have access to good health insurance. and if you're arrested, you get a lawyer, if you're sick, you get a doctor. that kind of appeal. the same thing for obama in 2008. the tables turned as soon as clinton proposed his plan in '93 and as soon as obama put his plan together in 2009-2010. what you saw happen then was republicans basically looked at that 85%, they looked at the middle class, people who already had insurance, people who conceptually liked the idea of everybody getting covered and made the case, hey, look, if we're going to start covering other people this way, you stand to lose something, you stand to lose maybe the ability to choose your own doctor, the policy you have right now might go away. some kind of security you have, that that 85% has. that's what republicans go after. it's a bind where they don't want to say they're against universal health insurance, but they wait for the moments when it's on the table and they start going after all of the things people are going to lose. >> the one thing you can look at is voters fear change.

when they bring up changes to things that matter in their lives they get scared and back away. another piece of something mcconnell said recently is sort of in the same vein. i have been someone who thinks contrary to conventional wisdom if republicans take the election, they will be able to repeal the affordable care act. they can use 51 votes and get all the money out of it. without the money, it collapses. but mcconnell doesn't think that. i want you to listen to what he said here. >> thought it was a good idea for the federal government to go in this direction? i would say the odds are still on your side because it's a lot harder to undo something than it is to stop it in the first place. >> so is he right? are republicans going to have more trouble repealing the affordable care act than people like to think? >> there's an awareness on the part of most republicans' part that they do need some sort of replace thing if they're going to go forward with repealing it. the minute you repeal it, it goes forward with the dynamic where they like the idea of universal care.

the republicans really have not figured out, even the first phase, what they would honestly do. you laid out the plan from 2009. a little bit of that, a talk of a tax credit. there's a debate about some of the popular provisions of obamacare, 26-year-olds being on their parents' policy. there are some republicans who want that to be part of the law. others who want that out. should there be a law banning coverage to pre-existing conditions, that sort of thing. so they have really not figured this out right now. obama did at the end of the day impose an implement. >> steve kornacki, you can see more of his excellent political analysis on "the cycle," msnbc's new hit show weekdays at 3:00 p.m. thank you for being here. have a great fourth of july. >> you, too. did you hear that the president is spending america's independence day in paris? the french have a word for that

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not in this economy. we also have zero free time, and my dad moving in. so we went to fidelity. we looked at our family's goals and some ways to help us get there. they helped me fix my economy, the one in my house. now they're managing my investments for me. and with fidelity, getting back on track was easier than i thought. call or come in today to take control of your personal economy. get one-on-one help from america's retirement leader. 236 years ago today, on july 3rd, 1776, the soon to be second president of the united states, john adams, wrote a letter to his wife abigail from his post in the great city of philadelphia. he wrote to his wife, quote, the second day of july 1776 will be the most memorable epic in the history of america. i'm apt to believe it will be celebrated by succeeding generations as the great anniversary festival.

it ought to be commemorated as the day of deliverance by god almighty. it ought to be celebrated with sports, games, shows, and illuminations from one end of the continence to the other from this time forward ever more. but that was the second day of july. he was talking about july 2nd. he was two days off. it was the day the second continental congress voted for our independency from the british. but it wasn't until the fourth that it was adopted. from the very beginning, confusion has reigned when it comes to the fourth of july. even though we celebrate the fourth as the day the declaration of independence was signed, for example, most historians believe it wasn't actually signed until august 2nd. but this year, on the eve of this country's 236th birthday,

that confusion has been ratcheted up to a whole new totally paranoid level. did you hear what president obama is going to be celebrating the fourth of july tomorrow? did you hear where he's going to be? ♪ yeah, paris. paris, france. our president, america's president is going to be celebrating the birth of our nation not in america, but overseas and not just overseas but in france? well, okay, that is of course 100% pure unadulterated not happening. but it has become an accepted fact in some corners of the right. it all began with this article in "the hollywood reporter" last week which noted that the european branch of the obama fund-raising effort will kick off next week in paris with an independence day reception. that is to say the folks in the obama campaign charged with raising money from american ex-pats will be holing an event in paris on july 4th. not such a big deal.

but that little piece of reporting through the magic of conservative blog stuff became president obama is going to paris for the fourths of july to raise money. the piece was first picked up by who else, brightbart.com, who noted paris may be the only place obama can still find cheering throngs. then it found its way to the conservative publication, the national review. a contributor there named andrew mccarthy linked to the article with this headline, final jeopardy, category is obama. the answer is fund-raising in paris. the link there noting that is how president obama will be spending july 4th. karl rove then tweeted that link to his hundreds of thousands of followers and from there we were off to the races. joe mathis at "philadelphia" magazine captured a few of these tweets from the right responding. there was this from at fox news mom, fitting, comrade obama campaign to celebrate july in socialist france. here's another, would

reagan/bush/romney go to paris on fourth of july to fund raise? never. obama does, showing his desperation. and then this one, why would anyone vote for a guy who hates the u.s. so much. but it wasn't just folks on twitter who got all worked up. it was also conservative talk show host lars larson who bought into the lie. what would you expect the president to do on our day of independence? perhaps give a speech to wounded warriors? . at least something in america. not this president, not president obama. that's exactly what this president, barack obama, is going to be doing tomorrow. he's not going to be in paris. he's going to be right here in america meeting with active duty u.s. service members who are becoming naturalized u.s. citizens at the white house. that would be 4,000 miles or so away from paris. when it was pointed out to andrew mccarthy he was flat out wrong about this, that president

obama is not in fact going to be in paris on july fourth, he ultimately apologized via twitter saying, quote, lol, okay x okay, i see obama campaign, not obama will be fund-raising in paris on july 4th. i didn't realize there was a difference. so that's kind of an apology, kind of, but fair enough. we all get it wrong sometimes. but this idea is still bouncing around strange corners of the conservative blogosphere and twittersphere, at some point, your crazy uncle might corner you and say, my god, did you hear obama is in paris for independence day? can you believe that? this year, though, you can do him one better. tell him the real independence day was on monday. you'll blow his mind and more importantly, he'll change the topic. joining me now is msnbc contributor and slate.com political reporter, dave weigel. it's good to see you and happy almost july 4th.

>> happy july 4th eve. >> i actually thought france bashing was sort of very 2004. i mean, this year actually romney lived in france, he speaks some french. he's said good things about the french health care system. and i want to be clear. i have no problem with that. the french health care system is actually really good. you think it would make top republicans nervous about throwing around accusations about having loyalties to paris. >> i think quite the opposite. if there is a sophisticated angle from this, it would probably be the one that came from karl rove. when he worked for president bush's campaign in 2004, a member of the team gave a good quote to "the new york times" about how john kerry looked french. there's a record the republicans have of foreignizing democratic candidates, and the incentive to do that if your candidate is on video speaking french as mitt romney is, even if it's silly like for whatever reason the romney campaign decides to engage in, it's something you can at least muddy up, create some confusion out there.

when i see this story, i think of the polls that show 1% of the people think barack obama is mormon. >> this is exactly what i wanted to move the conversation to because i get, i'm sure you get more than i do, but i get a lot of e-mail forwarded with the craziest conspiracies and half truths and total untruths you can think of. you go out there on the trail. how prevalent is this kind of thing in the mind of the voters you talk to? >> i had not heard anything about the french. and if i did, i think most tea partyiers are well schooled enough in the revolution to know that the french were on our side. the first tea party i went to was near the statue of lafayette near the white house. others are urged along. rove was a central player in this, he pushed it around a little bit, but it was karl rove who wrote after the president went to europe, after he went to egypt, wrote he was on an apology tour. and insofar as mitt romney has a

foreign policy argument against the president, it's that he goes around the world and apologizes. he gives up territory. he gives up treaties. he doesn't negotiate. he's letting everyone roll over on this. far apart from conspiracy theories almost, it's the understanding that you hear on the trail about what the president's dong, what his foreign policy is, it's informed by that sense. it's key to let people think he's giving things away when he goes overseas. >> msnbc contributor and slate.c slate.com, dave weigel making the unsophisticated sophisticated. dave, thank you so much for being around tonight. >> have you ever been at the atm and pushed the wrong button? okay, now imagine pushing the wrong button affects everywhere who lives in your state. that happened yesterday, and i'll have all of the gory details next.

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nobody ever promised voting would be easy. remember palm beach county, florida's, confusing butterfly ballots or the state's other flawed paper ballots in the 2000 election. especially the chads that were left hanging or dimpled or i never understood how this could happen, pregnant. if you're a floridian who fears you may have mistakenly voted for the wrong guy in the 2000 election, that's something you have long had to make your peace with, but at least you were able

to bear that burden privately. now imagine lodging the incorrect vote, the deciding vote in another important election and have everyone know that you did it, you were the one that did it. late last night in the north carolina assembly, when most of us had gone home, state lawmakers were voting on whether to override the government's veto of a pro-fracking bill. bev purdue veto ed it, she said no to fracing. on monday, republican lawmakers set about trying to undo her work. in the general assembly, the vote was really, really, really close. now, i should mention in the north carolina general assembly, you vote by pushing a button. it's really important you push the right button. last night, a yes vote meant you wanted to override the fracking veto. if you were voting no, you were voting not to override the

fracking veto. got that? becky carney is a democratic member from charlotte who wanted to vote against the overrided. that meant she needed to push the no button, the red button. late last night, well after 11:00 p.m., becky carnie pushed the green button, the one that says aye. in doing so, she cast a deciding vote to override the veto. she mistakenly voted with the republicans. >> i made a mistake. and i tried to get recognized to change it as people have been doing all night on other bills and it was too late because it changed the outcome of the vote. >> under north carolina house rules, members can change their vote if they have made a mistake, something that apparently happens all the time, but they can't change their vote if that change affects the final outcome. only if your mistake is inconsequential do you get to change it. only when it doesn't count do we care. voting is the most important thing we get to do in this experience called democracy.

the american experiment of democracy will be 236 years old tomorrow. as with any experiment, mistakes will happen. the important thing is to keep trying, to keep learning from our mistakes, which is far from a given in this particular election year. right now, in many places, access to voting is getting really, really difficult. the fight for voting rights, still ahead. ♪ ♪ what started as a whisper every day, millions of people choose to do the right thing. there's an insurance company that does that, too. liberty mutual insurance.

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at one time in this country, as in many, many other countries going back for hundreds of years, people who owed money they could not pay were at risk of being thrown into debtor's prison. this is a debtor's prison in england where they worked away on some kind of internal looking contraption. this old debtor's prison is in prince edward county, virginia. for the most part, the u.s. outlawed debtor's prison back before the civil war. when you see a picture of that same debtor's prison now, it has a county official clowning around out in front. in this country, in the united states of america, we don't do debtor's prison anymore. and yet, in this country, we are still throwing people into prison for owing money and not paying it back. and here's the really perverse part. they owe the money to us.

we grab people for minor misdemeanors, start charging them fees and penalties, and then we throw them in jail when they can't pay the debts we have dropped on them. for instance, richard garrett, he lives in alabama where he spent 24 months in jail over traffic and license violations that now amount to $10,000. the "new york times" in a remarkable article today reports that mr. garrett is sick and out of work, but he can't pay. another defendant from the same part of alabama ended up owing $1,500 for what began as a speeding ticket. she found herself in the tender care of the same private probation company that's been so helpful in reincarcerating mr. garrett. she was tossed into jail where she was billed for every day she stayed there. now her debt has doubled and she's at risk for being re-incarcerated, again, for a speeding ticket. then a 53-year-old veteran who was thrown in jail for public drunkenness.

mcgee who makes $243 a month in veterans benefits was fined $270 by the court and then put on probation. the probation company added a $15 enrollment fee, an enrollment fee for the privilege of being in their program and $39 in monthly fees. mcgee was eventually jailed for falling behind on his payments. there is an entire industry devoted to making money off people like richard garrett and gina ray and mr. mcgee. the company making money off them in these particular cases is judicial correction services incorporated based in georgia with offices in alabama, florida, and mississippi as well. they hire itself out to court systems and makes its money by billing the accused. quote, whether your court is looking for a comprehensive solution to recidivism or a boost in the fine collections, judicial correction services has the experience to create and implement a system of supervision that works for your

court. judicial correction services offers your tracking software to better keep up with offenders, no need to keep the paperwork because they can track the case on their laptops. the video you see here is only play acting. the guy in the hideous hat that does not match his incredibly weird-looking shirt is a guy trying to look like a criminal. just like this jury on the company's website is actually from a stock photo and not a real trial. what is real is the lawsuit against jcs and the alabama officials who brought the company to town. a lawyer for a firm associated with the case told the "new york times," quote, with so many economically strapped, there is growing pressure on the court to grow in money rather than mete out justice. those companies are aggressive. they're not told about the right to congress and not asked if they're indigent or told they have fined in jail. for the record, they said they do try to help people who can't

pay and it's up to the judge to decide. the executives say their company stands to benefit from keeping people out of jail and paying. that's how this works. the states add on all kinds of fees from which the state and private companies benefit. you get richer when people keep paying. happens all across the country. the nonprofit center for justice looked at the 15 states with the largest prison populations and found fees across the board for simply dealing with the court system. they also found hundreds of people locked up for failing to pay. the fees range from paying for a constitutionally mandated public defender to paying $25 for a visitor in prison. you have to pay to see a visitor, a friendly face, when you're locked up. the fees also amount to a kind of penalty for being poor, the defendants who can't pay the money find themselves serving more time. the defendants who can't pay the money don't.

so the people who can't pay the money end up owing more. in illinois, the state adds on 30% if you fall behind in your payments. in new orleans, it costs you $100 to sign up for a payment plan. the brendan center writing, quote, certainly states have a legitimate interest in creating incentives so defendants can pay their debts pay them. but states need to insure they they do not penalize the poor and enriching the private debt collectors at their expense. joining us nous is thomas giovanni. thank you so much for being here tonight. >> thank you for having me. >> i have to ask you, just to start here, what's going to sound like a dumb question. why are we doing this? what purpose in the legal system does it serve to load people up on debt and then throw them back in jail when they can't pay it? it doesn't seem to be keeping people from re-offending. it's not punishing folks just for the crime they did, not rehabilitating them? >> it's a bad idea, as you laid out. but the idea behind it is that courts are cash strapped and legislators are not funding the criminal justice system at the level it

needs to be funded. and they're looking for people to pay. they can't force the legislature, but they have every client in front of them. >> that was what i wanted to ask you about. you have done the work tabulating where these fees are. are we seeing them go up quicker in the states where we have seen deeper cuts in judicial systems? >> there's not a clear relationship in the data and trend, but there is a clear trend upward in terms of the activity. legislatures and court systems are becoming much more active as they feel the pressure whether it's real or imagined. so it's not a one-to-one. there's more activity from the court systems trying to sell the funds. >> there was concern about the overall legality of this. is this constitutional? >> there's two answers. it shouldn't be constitutional to put somebody in a cage for not paying a fee they can't pay. however, there are a lot of work-arounds to the fundamental protection. people are being put in jail for failure to pay the fines in civil cases like a contempt case where you don't have a right to a lawyer.

but it's the same cage. >> but the probation company, they say -- because they're a key actor here, they say what they're doing is helping people to stay current. they're helping prevent recidivism. they're playing a role in the post-jail support network that the courts would be paying if they had the money. is there a reason to believe they're effective? >> that's the first time i have hear the phrase post-jail support network. no, it really doesn't help. it doesn't help somebody on a path to re-entry. it's actually a barrier to re-entry. the more you have to do to get back to a normal state, the worse it is. for instance, if you can't pay a fine, a lot of states will keep you from having a driver's license. you can't drive to work if you don't have a car so you can't pay the fee. this doesn't help anything. it piles up fees on people who are indigent. most people in the criminal justice system, 80% can't afford a lawyer. i don't know why we think they can afford the fees. >> so do the companies help the

court system make more money? is that the key and the relationship? >> that's the goal. i don't see it happening. >> thomas giovanni, attorney at the brennan service for justice. thomas, we appreciate you coming by today. have a great fourth of july. still ahead, the first "rachel maddow show" then diagram smackdown. intersecting circles of doom. i can't tell you how excited i am for this. stick around. over the south pacific in 1943. i got mine in iraq, 2003. usaa auto insurance is often handed down from generation to generation. because it offers a superior level of protection, and because usaa's commitment to serve the military, veterans and their families is without equal. begin your legacy, get an auto insurance quote. usaa. we know what it means to serve.

attention students, senior citizens, minorities, poor people, the republican party figures an easy access to voting is boring so they have decided to make it really, really difficult. no, sorry, not difficult. what's the word? exciting. the word i'm searching for is exciting. they want to make voting exciting for you. that is next. a room. at hotels.com, you'll always find the perfect hotel. because we only do hotels. wow. i like that. nice

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since 2010, we've been seeing the following pattern. republicans win a majority of seats in a state legislature. then in the name of cracking down on voter fraud, republican led legislature crafts laws restricting voting rights in their state. laws that mostly affect constituencies that traditionally vote for democrats. funny how that happens. then the state's governor signs the bill. if he or she is republican or vetoes the bill if he or she is a democrat. that's how it tends to go. for example, in new hampshire, the democratic governor john lynch tried to be a one-man bullwort against the

legislature in his state. that law would require voters to show a photo id or sign a voter affidavit. a form that some election officials fear could take voters a long time to fill out, causing chaos and lines at the heavily affected polling places. last week, new hampshire lawmakers changed that requirement into something simpler and overrode the veto, making new hampshire the latest state to require a photo i.d. they made voting harder. wisconsin republicans also made voting harder last year. it's well into the next step of the process, the inevitable court challenge, which is how we got to know ms. frank. remember her? she's in her mid-80s, a member of the town board where she lives and a lifelong voter. she's also one of many people who would lose their ability to vote under wisconsin's new law. the problem was she does not have a birth certificate or a driver's license. and the state told her she would

have to spend up to $200 getting the right paperwork so she can meet the new requirements to do what she's done all her adult life, going to the polls to vote. she is the plaintiff in a lawsuit against the new wisconsin voter i.d. law, one of three legal challenges against it. and the governor of wisconsin has been defending that law in court. in may, two state lawmakers tried to sign on, too, saying they wanted to defend the law to make voting harder. they personally wanted to join in the pile-on. only these two would not say how they were paying to join the case. they didn't say where the money to pay the attorneys was coming from, which is an ethics problem since state officials can't accept outside help like free legal services. one of the lawmakers said he could not comment because he did not know who was paying for the legal work. you know what? mystery solved, and it wasn't the butler who did it. it was the republican national committee.

a spokesperson admitted that the rnc was footing the bill all along and said the issue was, quote, a way to insure confidence in the voting system. mystery solved in wisconsin. powerful people are involved in an effort to consolidate their power. nothing unusual to see here. human history. but it's happening in pennsylvania, too. they're not even trying to hide what is going on. last week, a republican made a telling admission at a weekend meeting of the republican committee. he said it while listing his party's recent accomplishments. >> pro second amendment, first pro-life legislation, done. voter i.d., which is going to allow governor romney to win the state of pennsylvania, done. >> there it is, all spelled out, making pennsylvania voters show i.d. they never had to show before will allow governor

romney win pennsylvania. i think he meant to say protect the integrity of the vote. dude, you have to keep up appearances on this stuff. but that, that's what we're seeing a lot. that is the trend. this is the red tide elections of 2010, we have seen 180 bills to make voting harder. 16 states have passed laws to do that, including new hampshire. that makes today's news from michigan somewhat startling. michigan's republican governor rick snyder was handed a republican crafted package of election laws and he vetoed it today. at least some of it. today, governor snyder struck down three bills, one requiring voters to check a box affirming they're citizens, one requiring new eligibility, and one requiring absentee voters to show a photo i.d. the governor criticize the laws for creating confusion and declared, quote, voting rights are precious and we need to work

to make it possible people for people vote, which means today in michigan, the normal scripts got flipped. and the happy reaction quotes came from left leaning groups and the disappointed votes came from republican groups. people who believe they're registering to vote should have confidence in the process so they know the registrations are being handled properly. some have prove than pro-tebting the voter registration process is vital if we hope to preserve the integ rit of ballots cast by every registered voter. that is what governor snyder is getting in trouble with his own party for today. the question is how many other gop governors are linked to trouble in their party to protect the essential right that protects democracy? are so ama,

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when a chart is good, it is very, very, very good. oh, so good. when it is bad, it is hilarious. the mitt romney for president campaign is trying to get away from talking about health care and the supreme court and any topic, really, that doesn't begin with "econ" and end with "omy." the campaign strategy for victory in november is to tie the president to bad economic news and sit back and watch those electoral college votes roll in. it is a simple plan and could work very well. this week the message is all

about what the romney campaign claims is a gap between what the president promised to do and what he actually did. it is a powerful political point, and one that can be illustrated a number of ways. for example, the campaign has sent out this press release. why the jobs promise gap? according to romney, the gap is 8 million jobs, because before we knew how deep the recession was, the president's economic advisers predicted unemployment would go down faster than it actually did. okay, it's not exactly a light your hair on fire press release, but it was fine it used the word "gap" in the headline, it was printed on paper. the whole thing was sort of a mission accomplished. it worked out fine. in the audio-visual medium, too, the romney campaign did a fine job with their gap message this week. this ad is called president obama's middle class promise gap. as you can see, it is about health care, the deficit, and unemployment. there is a guy talking and there are graphics. it, too, is fine. not great, but there's nothing embarrassing about it. it's the kind of thing we're going to see a lot of before november.

the romney campaign's gap message was all going okay when they put it in print and in a tv ad. the effort to chart it, however, has been somewhat less successful. now, i know you can chart this. i know you can do it. for an article last year, i did a chart showing the gap between the president's initial projections and the actual unemployment rate. there are lines, one goes in one direction, another in the other, it can be done. but the romney campaign, they tried to get fancy. no simple line graph for them. they went for the beautiful chart art that is the venn diagram. here's an example of a venn diagram from this very show. back when lady gaga was arguing repeal of the stupid don't ask, don't tell policy and rachel was covering the debate of the appeal on this show, the fine folks here made a venn diagram. "the rachel maddow show" is the circle on the left and the lady gaga circle is on the right. and where that overlap, that space of commonality, that is don't ask, don't tell.

that's the thing they both have in common. makes sense, right? that is what a venn diagram is good for. it is for showing the thing the two circles have in common, in common, in common. so what in the name of stat 101 is this? president obama promises to stimulus would lower unemployment. that is the circle on the left. i'm with you so far, romney campaign. and the actual unemployment rate is over 8%. that is the circle on the right. and the thing in the middle, the thing they are supposed to have in common is the gap between them, it is the thing they don't have in common. it's the difference between the number on the left and the number on the right. guys, romney campaign, you're doing it wrong. in fact, you're doing it wrong over and over again. this venn diagram was posted yesterday. it's how much president obama said health reform would lower premiums on the left and how much romney says it didn't lower premiums on the right. and the difference between those

two numbers, that is in the middle. again, the romney campaign appears to think the space in the middle of the two connected circles that make up a venn diagram is where you put the things that the two circles don't have in common. where you put the thing that is not between them. which is why i love, love loved upworthy.com today. so people's who campaigns have raised $122 million and people with surprisingly inept graphics staffs. what fits in between those two circles? mitt romney. people who oppose the individual mandate and people who helped pass the individual mandate. who fits in both categories? mitt romney. that is a venn diagram. these, these are not venn diagrams. and trust me on this, mitt romney campaign, in my day job at "the washington post" wonk blog, i work with charts. i know charts. charts are a friend of mine.