>> dennis rodman ends up in north korea. >> apparently he was a big basketball fan. >> is that it? i thought he was a huge double team fan with jean-claude van damme. we know m.j. and pippen won't go, are you telling me he wouldn't get grant out of clemson? benny the bull wouldn't go? >> all right. at the top of the show we asked why you are awake? producer john towers is the man with the answers. john? >> j.r. tells us i'm awake because the sequester cut my sleep by 42%. phillip writes beating the d.c. snowquester, heading down to florida. >> i don't like to bash d.c., but i will do one of those, only in d.c. could they make light of the sequester. >> a tweet from lazy gal who says she's lazy and a librarian. i'm up "way too early" to get in a workout before to get

in a workout before my 90 minute commute. you don't sound so lazy. "morning joe" starts right now." as bob rueben says, you never know when a bond crisis is going to come. it's not like you get a warning. you're going to wake up one day and suddenly there's going to be a crisis. when is that going to happen? i don't know. >> all kinds of things can happen. >> all kinds of things. you've been predicting this for 20 years. >> it's such a tired argument to search for quotes i said once upon a time. >> you said this for 15 years. then you woke up one day and said, i was wrong. you said we needed to create housing bubble to replace a nasdaq bubble. >> come on. you know i was joking when i said that. >> you were joking? >> yes, of course. in is so disappointing.

is all you can do is ad homonym? >> i'm quoting back what you say. >> we're trying to have a serious discussion here. what is it in the next ten years that's going to force us to do something? >> we don't know. as richard hoss said, you're right until the day you're wrong. then that's a very bad day indeed. >> good morning. it's tuesday, march 5th. welcome to "morning joe." with us, we have msnbc analyst mark halperin and steve schmidt. good to have you on board. we're going to have more on the face-off between charlie rose and joe -- >> i like that background. >> yeah, i just -- it was a good

debate. >> good conversation last night. >> yeah, it was good. . >> on the way there, lewis is like, hey s this a good idea? didn't he win the nobel prize? >> i said, thanks for bringing that up right now. >> jeff thought maybe it's not. >> i said considering i dropped out of econ 1 to study sports history. >> it was good. it was intense from beginning to end. i don't know if they kept that really, really tough part at the end. we'll see. >> i don't know. i was just tired. i mean, i wake up at 3:00 in the morning. >> let's get to the news. >> it was tension city, man. >> it was. all right. we're going to have highlights. >> you remember that quote, halperin? it was a great quote. like joe kennedy swam out and saved some kids. they said, what was it like out there? he goes, it was tension city, man. >> but you know what? it was a real conversation looking at how -- i mean, quite

frankly vehemently the two of you disagree. >> i'm fascinated by the man. >> it was fascinating. it really was. >> you know what else is fascinating? steve schmidt. >> he is. >> good to see you. >> it's good to have you here instead of you broadcasting from your lair in california. >> he's got it figured out, man. bring the studio to you. >> smokes his cigarette, walks downstairs. all right. let's get to the news. i want to get to the highlights. governor chris christie is slamming leaders in washington for failing to find better solutions to last week's across the board spending cuts. the new jersey republican called out praesident obama and congress. >> the worst thing about sequester in my view is they're not spending any time talking about entitlement spending, which is where we really need to focus on over the long haul to make a big difference in terms of our long-term fiscal health as a country. i'm disappointed in that, but,

you know, if you stacked up all the things that disappoint me about washington, d.c., it would be pretty tall. if anybody in this room thinks they understand washington, d.c., please come up, stand behind the podium and give the answers because i don't have the first damn idea what they're doing down there. i don't understand it. i don't understand why they haven't fixed it already. seems to me it should be pretty easy to fix. real leadership would get this fixed. get everybody in the room and you fix it and you don't let them leave until you fix it. that's what real leadership is, not calling a meeting two hours before the thing is going to hit to have a photo op in it the driveway of the white house. that's not real leadership. fix it. >> yeah, i mean, it is easy for him to say, but i did wonder why everyone didn't just get in the room and not leave or the president go to capitol hill and say, here i am. >> look what the guy has done in new jersey. look what he's done in new jersey. steve schmidt, that sure looks like a guy who is talking for

74% of new jersey. also, it's not a bad position to launch a 2016 campaign. >> no doubt. and if you look ahead to 2016, the congressional brand of the republican party is so deeply unpopular. he's someone who's clearly comfortable triangulating against it. he'll run against the democrats as much as he would against the congressional brand. every day we see this dysfunctional washington making a compelling case for a christie candidacy. i think any republican that comes out of the congressional wing of the party who's in congress right now is going to have a really difficult time. >> going to have problems. >> no doubt about it. >> mark? he looked like if you had those little frank lutz meters, every word would be going like this. the guy has hit the sweet spot. this is his time to say washington doesn't work, look what i'm doing up here with a bunch of union members and union bosses and democrats.

i'm working with them. i'm beating them and working with them. why can't washington get anything done? why can't republicans in washington get anything done? why can't the president lead? it's a compelling message. >> once you're willing to unshackle yourself from the party, once you're willing to step out from the orthodoxy of the party and be unafraid of criticizing your own party, you got a lot of running room. given the conditions in washington and christie's record of getting things done, he's in a great position. president hits will keep on coming. he can keep up a running dialogue like that all the way through as he chooses to. >> by the way, when you get outside the beltway bubble, some people in washington will hear that, the white house will hear that and say that's not a very sophisticated view. it's not just about leadership. there's more to it. but when you talk to people in the world, they say exactly what he just said. how hard is it? get in a room and figure it out. so he's giving voice to the majority of the country, not just the beltway.

>> the overwhelming majority. mika, a lot of times bloggers will mock that type of talk, that centrist talk saying, well, that's just -- there's nothing to it. that's where most americans, at least most americans i've talked to over the past, you know, 400, 500 speeches on college campuses and rotary clubs and all the other places we go over the past four, five years, we're hearing the same thing everywhere we go. >> also, just sort of big picture looking down at chris christie's career. i don't get the republican party. i don't get c-pac. this is a guy who can embrace the president when he's doing a good job for his state and also cult him down when he thinks he's not doing a good job without blinking an eye, without feeling shackled to anyone. isn't that ultimately someone who's grounded and with a sense of leadership? >> i don't know. >> doesn't get it.

education secretary arne duncan says he misspoke when he said the sequester was already costing teachers their jobs because of the sequester. in fact, it will be several more months. a new poll shows 38% of americans blame congressional republicans for failing to reach an agreement to avert those cuts. 33% hold president obama and democrats accountable. >> hey, look at those number, steve schmidt. these days, if republicans aren't losing a poll like this by about 80 points, we're doing well. >> it's a win. >> all relative, i guess. >> president obama is so much higher in his generic approval numbers. in is goi this is going to take a big impact on him. >> he overreached. we said it last week. this whole thing, planes falling out of the skies, children being kicked out of classes, leeches

being put on senior citizens instead of hospital services. i think they said everything but that, that they're going to have to resort to leeches. >> toads in the street. >> it's like the finale of magnolia, raining frog. they oversold it. we're supposed to do that. >> right. that's true. and we're good at it. >> the republicans are supposed to do that. >> no, actually, the media is really good at overselling stuff. no, i think it was oversold in terms of everything will happen at midnight when the clock strikes 12:00. having said that, let's not overcorrect here in our criticism and pretend that nothing is going to happen as a result of the sequester. it's a mess. the cuts are completely stupid, and they bear no resemblance to anything the republican party would want and certainly not what the president was putting on the table as well. it's just dumb. >> and unfortunately members of congress now are beginning to

work to make the cuts a little less stupid. >> a bipartisan plan to curb gun trafficking is taking part. straw purchasers could face up to two decades in jail, and the dealers who sell the guns could face heavy penalties as well. introduced by senator patrick lahey of vermont. republican senator tom coburn is key on any senate deal on expanding background checks, but he's highly skeptical of requiring private sellers to keep records. his blessing, though, could carry with it widespread republican support in the senate. without t even some democrats may defect. meanwhile, a new 60 minutes/vanity fair poll reveals 80% of people think gun violence and video games have some or a lot of impact on society.

yeah. the obama administration is fighting back against charges that access to the president is being sold to the highest bidders by a new advocacy organization with close ties to the white house. "the new york times" first reported that people who donated at least half a million dollars to the nonprofit group organizing for action, the direct offspring of president obama's outfit, obama for america, would be granted quarterly meeting with the president. yesterday -- and watch this. white house press secretary jay carney disputed the allegation and defended the white house's involvement with the group. >> any notion that there's a set price for a meeting with the president of the united states is just wrong. as you know, organizing for action was set up to promote the president's public policy agenda. therefore, as anyone would expect, the president would likely meet with their representatives to discuss his agenda. again, any notion there's a price for meeting with the president is simply wrong. the bottom line here is this is a separate organization, as we've noted. the existence of which is a

perfectly appropriate and the white house will engage with it consistent with the way we engage with a whole host of outside constituencieconstituen. >> that's fascinating. he was reading the whole thing. you think they're a little lawyered up on the whole thing? >> i think it needs to be looked at more. >> steve, what's going on there? as reported by "the new york times," it's cash for access. >> look at the dna of the embryonic obama movement was the notion we're going to do things different in washington. listening to it, it remind me of earlier in my career. we had all manner of organizations like this fronted by tom delay where we would sell access, where people would come in, have an opportunity, meet the congressional leadership. it's absolutely no different. but it's totally disdent from what the president said he was going to do when he ran for

office. >> politicians have been doing this for years. >> jay carney also tried to put a little daylight between the white house and organizing for america, which is not the way it was conceived originally. yesterday he tried to say there was some separation there and there was no direct link, but it was supposed to be a place where policy was developed and the message was delivered to the white house. >> history of the obama operation is if they have the financial advantage, they take advantage of it. >> regardless. >> regardless. one of the things about this group, besides the question of access, is they're taking corporate contributions. that's a big change. >> why are they doing this? why would the president -- it just seems like he's making his life more complicated politically. why would he do this? >> i think they want to take the strength of their grassroots operation, their access to money, and try to marry them up so he can succeed in the

midterms. so he can do in the last two years of his second term what he did in the first two years of his first term. they think the only way to do that is fight the chamber of commerce, fight corporate money. >> i'm not shocked by it. it's just pretty -- not shocked by the practice because it's how washington's run forever. i'm just very surprised, as you pointed out. even taking corporate money to do this. we're a long, long way -- >> okay. i want to get to the thriller in bloomberg. that doesn't work. last night in his debate with "new york times" columnist, joe raised some concerns about spending and long-term debt, particularly with an ageing population, reaching retirement age. take a look. >> we should have used the '90s. we should have used the bush years to pay down debt so we would have come into the era of

a baby boomers retiring with very little debt. we didn't do that, and that is not the choice right now. >> what's changed since 1997 -- >> the world. the worst economic crisis in three generations. >> what has not changed is the fact that baby boomers -- you predicted they'd be moving towards retirement. you said specifically, why worry about deficits, there's a huge army on the march. baby boomers are getting older. the enormous generation is going to be turning 65 in 2010. their ranks will swell. the ageing population will create huge, foreseeable budget problems. you predicted that in '97. >> everybody knew that was coming. that was a reason to pay down debt back then. now the urgent problem is the highest long-term unemployment since the 1930s, right? a deeply depressed economy. >> but in this problem you predicted, it's still with us. >> but the opportunity to pay down some debt in advance, we

missed that. now we need to run budget deficits and the difficulty we're having is that 2 1/2 years ago, the conversation in washington totally turned away from creating jobs to deficit issues as if the deficit, which is a problem for 10 years, 15 years, 20 years out, as if that were the crucial issue we needed to deal with now, and it is not. so i've also learned a few things, you know, in the last 15 years. so using things i said in 1997 is not actually the best way to analyze my views now. but the main thing is -- >> this is what you said in 2 0 2005. medicare and medicare will greatly increase the deficit. that will make argentina look like a model of responsibility. >> well, things have changed since then too. >> since 2005? >> got a little mad there.

it got really intense. we're going to to show more. >> didn't like me quoting him, actually. it's a real question right now, mark. this debate does matter because it's always been understood that this president -- i've been assured by david axelrod going back to 2008. you've been assured that the president understands this entitlement crisis, understands it's a generational theft we're engaging in, that we're stealing money from our children, from our grandchildren. as i said last night and as bob rueben has said, you never know when the bond crisis is going to hit. you don't see it coming like a hurricane. it comes immediately like an earthquake. then are you ready for it or not? so i guess this debate matters so much right now because there is a question as to whether the president has changed his position on entitlement reform. do you still believe he thinks

that we need to protect social security, medicare, medicaid by reforming it now? >> i think he does, but i think he'd like to do it when the economy is better so these choices are less difficult to make. in the short term, he wants stimulus. he can't always say that, but that's what he wants. in the long term, he does want to put the programs on better footing. i think where he differs from you is the medium term and the question of do you really need to do things in the ten-year space, tinkering with entitlements, tinkering with defense spending, discretionary spending in a way that makes people feel better about the next ten years. not so much because the balance sheet requires it, but that the markets react to it. >> we're talking, though, about medica medicare, medicaid. >> but if he doesn't do that in his term, the programs are not going to be insolvent when he leaves office.

he doesn't want to make a deal when the economy is bad because the deal has to be much more draconian with low growth rates. >> but steve, every year that goes by is another year we add more debt. when barack obama came in off, we were at $11.5 trillion. now we're at $16.5 trillion. every year gone by is an opportunity lost. >> if you look at a second-term presidency, typically there's 18, 19 months to get something done on the domestic front. then your administration becomes. the province of foreign policies, where you look to build your legacy. on all this fiscal issues, it looks like it will be the work of the next president because there's not going to be a deal done. >> all right. joe also challenged krugman's ideas about government spending. >> basically, any kind of spending cut right now is going to hurt the economy. >> entitlements or not? >> whether it's entitlements or

not. even if it's wasteful defense spending it's going to hurt the economy if you cut it right now, which doesn't mean we shouldn't be looking for ways to cure waste. right now, spending is spending. if we -- so do the kind of entitlement reform i want and stop overpaying for medicare, stop paying for unnecessary treatments. that's clearly something we want to do in the long run. right now it's going to mean less income for hospitals. it's going to be a problem for the economy. >> i don't think spending is spending. not all dollars -- not all investments are created equally. >> then you just don't understand what it means to be a depressed economy. how did we end the great depression? >> you just throw money at the problem? >> all right. >> and the answer was, yes. that was his answer. >> we have much more of this ahead. it got incredibly heated and intense at times and went on for

a full hour. it was exhausting to watch. >> but in a good way. >> in a good way. it was really enlightening. still ahead, former governor jeb bush will be onset. >> boy, he made some news yesterday. >> real big news. also, economist jeffrey sachs, retired supreme court justice sandra day o'connor. and "the washington post" eugene robinson. first, here's bill karins with a check on the forecast. >> well, we have this winter storm bearing down on chicago. shortly it'll move into the ohio valley and the east coast tomorrow. let me show you the latest totals for your area. right now the snow is flying from minneapolis to rochester, cedar rapids, the quad cities. it's not yet in chicago. i think you got another two hours before the snow begins there. as far as the snow today, during the daylight hours, full-fledged snowstorm for chicago, northern

indiana. eventually that light snow will go into areas of ohio and southern michigan. mostly a wintry mix near the ohio river. minneapolis, 6 to 10. chicago, 4 to 8. madison, about 4 to 8. a little less around indiana and iowa. indianapolis, you miss out on a lot of the heavy snow. it'll stay to your north. by wednesday, the storm comes off the east coast, especially wednesday afternoon. it looks like coastal areas on i- 95 will be rain during the morning and afternoon, including new york city, philadelphia, and washington, d.c. it'll go rain to snow late in the day on wednesday. it's going to be a heavy, wet snow. it's going to be windy. i am concerned about power outages, especially if we get more heavy, wet snow than i'm calling for here. this is kind of my first forecast. we're looking at about 3 to 6 for d.c. baltimore baltimore, 3 to 6. areas of southern new england t looks very messy and sloppy. if you're at higher elevations,

you'll be getting more snow. bottom line, chicago, already 1,000 flights canceled for today. tomorrow, areas like reagan national and bwi in baltimore, you're going to have a lot of flight troubles tomorrow. make your plans accordingly. what a beautiful start to what will be a messy period of weather. i know what you're thinking... transit fares! as in the 37 billion transit fares we help collect each year. no? oh, right. you're thinking of the 1.6 million daily customer care interactions xerox handles. or the 900 million health insurance claims we process. so, it's no surprise to you that companies depend on today's xerox for services that simplify how work gets done. which is...pretty much what we've always stood for. with xerox, you're ready for real business. [ sneezing ]

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you know how fast our home wifi is? yeah. this is basically just as fast. oh. and verizon's got more fast lte coverage than all other networks combined. so it's better. yes. oh, why didn't you just say that? huh-- what is he doing? welcome back to "morning joe." 26 past the hour. time to take a look at the morning papers. "the new york times," oberlin college canceled classes yesterday after experiencing yet another surprising hate crime. oberlin students have seen a number of racist, antisemetic

and anti-gay messages in the recent weeks. the dallas morning news, despite growing pressure, texas governor rick perry says he has no intention of accepting federal funds from the affordable care act, even though texas has the highest rate of uninsured residents in the nation. "usa today," according to a recent study injuries and deaths from gun violence cost americans at least $12 billion a year. those costs come from court proceedings, insurance and hospitalization subsidized by government programs. the total bill amounts to a direct societal coast of $32 per gun. "the washington post," president obama's newest c esest includes two women, quelling a talk of a lack of diversity.

gina mccarthy is his choice to head up the epa. also nominated yesterday, a physicist for energy secretary. "the wall street journal," despite warnings that the sequestration would cause massive flight delays, airports reported they ran as usual. >> but did the planes run into each other on the runway? >> this finding is in direct contrast with janet napolitano's claim that miami international airport and jfk had waits 150 to 200% longer than normal. okay. that's a look at the headlines. >> wow, willie. we dodged that bullet pep red sky more than over washington national, flyer's warning. look at that plane just flying into the friendly skies. you know, willie, they say a nor'easter is coming to

washington. >> it is. whipping its way up. >> i don't think it's nor'easter. i think it's a south to wester. anyway, it's coming up. >> can we do politico? >> i think there's a lot of snow coming into washington. wintry days. you guys noticed it's colder in march? freezing. middle of february, i said, okay, i'm a florida guy, but i'm okay with with the changes of the seasons. turns march and i expect to be on the beach. it is cold out there. >> march is the cruellest month here. i'm telling you, man. you think you're in spring, you're not. >> you know what i've always said. beware. >> can we do politico? >> with us now, the chief white house correspondent for politico, mike allen, with a look at his playbook. good morning. >> good morning. >> we still have some postgame analysis about what went wrong for republicans in 2012. still the consensus among many

top leaders in the republican party, a lot of people with a lot of different ideas about what went wrong and how to fix it going forward. what are they? >> this is a new sign of how it's hurting republicans that they don't have any clear leader. ever since the election, which is now four months past, republicans on the hill have been involved in the budget fights. nobody's really figured out what happened. it'll be very interesting to hear governor bush on this one when he's on. what politico found in the story is that republicans are divided. some of them argue that the problem is cosmetic, that they need new and better candidates, younger, more diverse. some people are arguing it's dated. that this democratic advantage will continue to be decisive. others are saying it's ideological and policy. no one can agree on what the problem is let alone a solution. in the next couple weeks, the republican national committee will be coming out with its

findings and its autopsy. but the parties are so much weakened now that there are these outside groups. so maggie has people saying they really miss a haley barber like figure, somebody who can knock some heads in the party and get hem all moving in one direction. >> steve schmidt, isn't it the answer that it's sort of all of these things? you have karl rove saying it's candidate quality. that's true in some cases. it's true they didn't connect with minority voters. also that they were outrun by the obama campaign in terms of grassroots organization and technology. isn't it all those things put together? >> we have many problems, and they're deep problems. one of the things that's a big problem for republicans is this notion that we lost the election because the obama administration, the president gave stuff away to people. there's a part of the electorate like children looking for free stuff. you win elections because you can make a case to people that you have a plan to make their

lives better. you have a vision for the future of the country. you have a plan to move the country forward. we're just totally deficient in this space. not to mention, and it's no small thing, the cast of characters and loons who dominated that primary stage. from michele bachman talking about immunizations to the dozens of others we could throw out. i think part of our problem that's fixed is our leaders and responsible people get more forward on the stage. >> 9-9-9. >> exactly. >> that's all i got to say, man. people come out and say, we have to change our belief systems, change our values. that's not the case. i think we have to be able to

articulate how what we believe is relevant to more than just ageing white guys who make over $100,000. as you know, the republicans who win campaigns and are dangerous -- everybody, when i ran, no republican had won in my district. working class voters all voted for me. you go through working class neighborhoods and every pickup truck wasn't the democrats. it's so funny. you go around the bayou and where the doctors live, not there. you get to where the country was, all those people voted for me. that's what we've lost, that ronald reagan populist appeal. >> absolutely. if you look at new jersey, for example, chris christie, he's put the state's fiscal house into order. he's taken on the teachers

unions. he's taken on the excesses of public employee unions. he straightened the state out. he has record number of support with hispanics in new jersey. republicans can advance conservative agenda and get the support of minorities and women and democrats. >> okay. >> when we were in tampa, we were walking down that street. i wish i knew what was street was. there were a bunch of little ranch houses. every time i saw a ranch house of about 200 square feet, i go, they're voting for me. the bigger the house got, i go, probably voting for my opponent. so there were these ranch houses lined up. i said, look at these houses. there were people out in the yard. i said, how many people here do you think are going to vote for mitt romney? we looked and said, some, but not enough. >> yeah.

>> you know what? it's my ranch house theory. you can look at a ranch house that's maybe 20, 25 years old. if you're not winning that house as a republican, you're not winning the election. we have lost middle class, working class voters. we're not going to win again until we can explain why conservatism makes their lives better. and we haven't done that in a while. we need to get back to it. >> okay. >> and jeb bush has answers on that. he's going to be on in a couple minutes. >> by the way, all those people in tampa voted for jeb bush. >> mike allen, thanks for a look at the playbook. >> the playbook on the smackdown on charlie rose, scarborough schools krugman. >> are you serious? that's kind of cool. coming up next, a fight breaks out on the court during an nba game last night. >> i thought you were talking about spring court. >> let me check out that headline. z sas i said, joining us in

couple minutes, jeb bush. >> he played power forward. >> can we get to a break? >> his new book on immigration in america when "morning joe" comes back.

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all right. let's do some sports now. the miami heat taking a 14-game winning streak on the road against the timberwolves. minnesota a good place to take your winning streak. things get a little physical in the fourth quarter. j.j. berea gets pushed by ray allen. he's about 5'7". he was charged with a flagrant foul. heat go on to win their franchise best 15th straight game 97-81. they have not lost since february 1st. running away with the east right now. san antonio is great in the west. could be a good final. women's college hoops now. top-ranked baylor playing kansas state. brittney griner, a huge game. here she is in the half court throwing down a one-handed dunk. going baseline for the throwdown. the 14th of her college career. she scores a career high 50 points.

5-0. that's her last home game at baylor. baylor wins the game. bayl >> you know, steve, that willie can dunk. >> with one hand? >> sort of a dr. j. thing. >> i used to be able to do it routinely. if you put a gun to my head, i could still get it down. >> it would require a gun? >> yeah, the stakes would have to be really high. >> you know, i can jump as well. >> trampoline? >> right into the coffee. boom. >> by the way, we married the top sports story today. >> what's that? >> "the view" for sports. >> a lot of notre dame stories. >> all right. that's great news. coming up next, former governor jeb bush enters the conversation. you're watching "morning joe" brewed by starbucks.

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now you can. with stayfree ultra thins. flexible layers move with your body while thermocontrol wicks moisture away. keep moving. stayfree. all right. 45 past the hour. a live look at the white house. beautiful day. everybody should be wake up now. here with us now, former republican governor of florida, jeb bush. good to see you again. he's the co-author of the new book "immigration wars: forging an american solution." >> really quickly, we were just talking, your dad is doing a lot better. >> he is. >> and your brother's library is opening up soon. >> yeah, in april. everybody is excited about that in dallas, including my brother. >> well, i was just going to ask -- >> and you lost weight.

>> does your brother even care? >> i'm on the scarborough diet. >> that's in the going to help you at all. you might want to rethink that. all right. i want to start with what was in "the miami herald" and launch into the conversation here. there's a former rom nromney ad who takes a shot at you. they argued, where the hell was this jeb bush during the campaign? he spent all this time criticizing mitt romney and it turns out he basically has the same position. so he wants people to go back to their country and apply for citizenship? well, that's self-deportation. we got creamed for talking about that. >> okay. let's back up. first of all -- >> do i have to talk about unnamed advisers as part of the rule here? >> let's set the table. talk about the book first of all. >> the book has six points to

it. it's comprehensive immigration reform, different than what was advocated in the campaign by either candidate, frankly, a year ago. thankfully now there's a consensus brewing amongst democrats and republicans that there needs to be a consensus. we wrote this book last year, not this year. and we proposed a path to legalization. so anybody that had come illegally would have immediately a path to legalization. >> what's the difference between a path to legalization and a path to citizenship and why is that so important? >> the principle underlying what we've proposed is that if you don't have a difference between a path to citizenship or a path to legalization, you're going to create a magnet going forward for more illegal immigrants. >> you're going to repeat what happened. >> yeah, so going forward, we broke this last year -- going forward, if there is a difference, if you can craft

that in law where you can have a path to citizenship where there isn't an incentive for people to come illegally, i'm all for it. i don't see how you do it, but i'm not smart enough to figure out every aspect of a really complex law. but i think the premise should be -- this should be a forward leaning immigration reform. what's it going to look like five years after you pass the law? you want aspiring immigrants to come to rebuild our demographic base. you want people to come that have skills that can make a difference to jump start our economy. and you don't want a repeat of the last 30 years where you have people coming in illegally or waiting in line. >> you talk about this -- we started campaigning together in 1994. you started warning republicans back in 1994 of the growing number of hispanics that were going to get out there. >> a good thing, by the way.

>> yeah, a very good thing. but my gosh, 16, 17, 18 years later after you were issuing those warnings we got beaten because we did so poorly with hispanic voters. and this was a big part of the issue. >> i would say the best indicator of the canary in the coal mine, if you will, is asian american voters, where you have higher incomes, more intact families, higher levels of education, more entrepreneurship. according to the exit polls, president obama won 75-24. bigger numbers than the hispanic margins, which is an ipd kandic of not just tone. it's an indication of a stiff arm people feel. whether it's fair or not is not

relevant. >> if you look at this moment and sort of do the diagnostics or postmortem on the romney campaign, what are some of the other things that our republican party needs to stand for to appeal to more people? >> first of all, i wish mitt romney was president right now because i think we'd have someone who would be in the midst of trying to form a consensus. it breaks my heart he's not there. his campaign wasn't the best, but he would have been a really fine president. i think going forward, we have to deal with our structural problems. the biggest one, as far as i'm concerned, is we're no longer socially mobile as a country. you have people that are born poor, and there's a higher and higher probability they're going to stay poor. you have people born rich. there's a greater possibility they'll stay rich. it is so un-american. yet, none of the conversation and the debates are really about this. upward mobility is the chance to solve a lot of problems because then people don't default to --

out of fear or exacerbation, you know, get in line basically. if they feel like life isn't fair to them, they can't succeed. it's only the big interests that can succeed, you know, big government, big business and all that. then they default to something that looks a little more like europe than historically -- >> how do we get the upper hand on that issue? >> immigration is a core issue. i'm pleased people have thembrad this idea to come up with a consensus. marco rubio has done great work with that. but education reform. if people don't have the skills to succeed, no matter how many they dream, it's not going to work. i think tax reform is something that would make this possible as well. there are a whole lot of people in our country today that don't see the benefits of deferral of

gratification or risk taking to be successful. so there's a lot of things we can do. regulatory reform. rules are created for the 1970s. we're living in a completely different world. embrace innovation. embrace the dynamic interaction of people rather than having a government response to every problem we face and persuade people that's the better path. >> we only have a minute left. we have three questions. lightning round. steve? >> rapid fire. you got one? >> yes. >> steve, make sure you don't take up the first 20 seconds. go. >> governor, when you look at education, and the education reform that has to take place and the upward mobility you talk about, can you flush that out a bit more? what should the republican message be to minority communities in that space? >> high standards for everybody, not lower standards for one group. more school choice, more compensation for teachers tied

to student improvement, a demand that we have equality of education because we don't today. that we spend the money on reforms to assure every child has a chance to learn. we don't have that today in america. too many places there's just pockets of ill literaclliteracy. >> we're now going to the game change 2016 camera. >> just to clarify, if there was a piece of legislation that had a pathway to citizenship, people came here legally, eligible to become citizens without touching back in their home countries, would you support that? >> i would support it if it didn't create an incentive for people to come illegally at the expense of coming legally. today, mark, if you -- there is no path to citizenship for a majority of the people that are trying to come to the country. if you say get in line, there is no line, or the line is so large it's a mythical line. 160 years for lines in philippines.

so if you change the system so that there is a legal path and you have a different term for people that are, you know, here already illegally so that the incentive isn't to continue to have that processed, then i would support that for sure. the book doesn't propose that because this is a clearer way to create that delineation. >> before you go, i'm curious of what you think of chris christie as a leader. >> i love the guy. >> and whether or not the republican party and conservative organizations are making proper use of his popularity. >> we had that one the other day. >> his mother was all upset. >> are they not taking advantage of his popularity and his ability to breakthrough with the leader? >> they took advantage of it last year. i'm sure they'll take advantage of it this year. they have low lives like me. >> oh, i don't think so. >> i love chris christie. i think he's been an incredible leader and role model for a lot of people about how to lead and

govern. >> there's something about leadership. i've always said it about you. >> you were thinking christie when you looked at me. >> you know, i actually am thinking about who could be in the next round. >> you're looking at him. and chris. >> and health-wise, i have noticed that you've lost weight. that's good. we should be able to talk about that. >> all right. thank you so much. the book is "immigration wars." if you'll just stop now, he may come back if he runs for president. >> he's fine with me. >> i'm good with you. >> thanks so much, jeb. greatly appreciated. you can read an excerpt on our blog mojo.msnbc.com. thanks, jeb. on tomorrow's show, jon huntsman is going to be here. he's going to be running in 2016. we'll be right back with more "morning joe."

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coming up next, economist dr. jeffrey sachs joins the table. also, mike barnicle finally showed up. seriously? what is wrong with you? yeah, overslept. we'll be right back. [ female announcer ] born from the sweet monk fruit,

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so now you're telling me that, oh, yes, but something could happen terribly, even though the numbers say that nothing should happen for the next ten years, and i should be afraid of that phantom. >> afraid of the phantom? again, it's not an ad homonym attack. you used the words that erskine and simpson used. >> that's disappointing. >> it's disappointing to you because you act as if all these people warning about the deficit and debt have been wrong for decades. >> no, they've been wrong in

this crisis. >> over the past two, three, four years you've changed your tone. and that's fine. >> because the world changed. this is the worst depression since the '30s. >> and the world can change again. >> welcome back to "morning joe." mark halperin is still with us. joining us onset, mike barnicle. and economist dr. jeffrey sachs. wow. so did you watch the entire -- >> i did. the whole country stayed up late for this great macroeconomics boxing match. >> it was fascinating. what struck you? you heard your name mentioned in this. they certainly didn't end up agreeing on a lot. >> yeah, i think there is a little bit of a problem here to say that that doesn't matter, or it doesn't matter for the next ten years. the problem with debt is that when you run it up, you have to pay it back. even in what the congressional

budget office has said recently, which krugman cited, we show already that within the next few years, the interest payments on the public debt are going to rise so much that they're going to squeeze out a lot of valuable government services or force further tax increases that people don't want. that's why debt really matters, not that there's necessarily a calamity of a market crisis, but because when you borrow today, you have to pay it back in the future. that's painful. it's painful for young people. it's painful for taxes that have to go up or spending that has to go down. it's painful for the country as a whole to the extent we're borrowing from abroad. i found the debate wonderful. can you imagine late-night tv dominated by macroeconomics? >> it was fantastic. it was great of these guys to get together and do this.

joe also challenged krugman's ideas on government spending. >> basically, any kind of spending cut right now is going to hurt the economy. now -- >> whether it's quientitlements not? >> even if it's wasteful defense spending, it's going to hurt the economy if you cut it right now, which doesn't mean we shouldn't be looking for ways to cure waste. right now, to a large extent, spending is spending. do the kind of entitlement reform i want, and stop overpaying for medicare, stop paying for unnecessary treatments. that's clearly something we want to do in the long run, but right now it's going to mean less income for hospitals. it's going to be a problem for the economy. >> i don't think spending is spending. not all dollars, not all investments are created equally. >> well, then you just don't understand what it means to be a depress eed economy. how did we end the great depression? >> you just throw money at the problem? >> that's a fundamental

difference of opinion there. >> look, i'm on the side that government needs to do things, needs to help educate our young people, needs to help train our young people, needs to build infrastructure that is safe and resilient so hurricane sandys and other superstorms don't wipe us out. but to say that government should do something also puts an extra obligation that taxpayer money is going to be handled carefully. to say, oh, we're just going to throw money, it doesn't matter what it's for, completely undermines, in my view, the legitimacy of all the government programs we really need. so i really resent that approach completely to say spending doesn't matter. wasteful military spending, doesn't matter. if you want government to be able to carry out its function, you have the responsibility that

tax dollars are well spent. that's an irresponsible position, in my view. >> you're the world famous economist, not me. isn't that a crude approach? isn't that reductionism? he didn't say that in his writings, did he, that all dollars are created equal? >> even in the great depression in the '30s, in 1937, he said, we reached the limit of what can be done just by general spending. if we want to do more, we have to target it. so the idea that you just put money out there wasn't even his idea. of course, anybody with the sense about the need for government services should care that they're done properly, that they're done carefully. also, what paul assumes -- it's a very kind of basic idea, but a very simplistic one, is that there's an automatic translation.

you put a dollar of public spending of any kind, wasteful or not, and you get $1.50 back in the economy. he said that. yet, when actually that stimulus was done and the congressional budget office ran it through their model, they overpredicted the benefits that would come, and people, like paul, should look back and say, why didn't the economy respond as was predicted? he said, we should have done more. the fact that the cbo, which is kind of our scorekeeper, predicted what would happen and gnp growth fell far short and deployment growth fell far short of what was predicted on the basis of the 2009 stimulus. we need to ask, what's happening with our economy? the problem is you can't just throw money at jobs. you can't just throw money at transfer payments and so forth and expect that there's an automatic 1.5-times return in growth and employment.

that's a little too simple. >> i brought up last night, jeffrey, you know, from january 2009, you and i were concerned about the stimulus package. not even the size as much as the targeting. we said that in realtime -- >> and the lack of targeting and six weeks you're going to spend nearly $1 trillion and know what you're doing. >> we also said it was going to create a bubble. what i thought was so fascinating and he was offended by me bringing up the quote, but, you know, back in 2002 -- 2001 and 2002, but he wrote it in an op ed in 2002. he said we need a housing bubble to replace the nasdaq bubble. >> we got it. >> he was right. it did snap us out of the recession, and it grew the economy until that bubble blew up. the second that bubble blew up, he and others wanted to create, as you said in 2009, yet another bubble. >> well, their dream was to go

back to 2007. in other words, they looked at 2009, they said the housing market's collapsed, the market for consumer goods has collapsed. we just need to boost back where we were. it was kind of unimaginative to say that let's just to back as opposed to saying that didn't work, we need something longer term, more serious, something that's going to take us out of these cycles. the truth is, they haven't recreated the bubble, at least yet. it didn't work. they couldn't recreate it. young people are saying, we don't want to get into debt the same way anymore. people don't want to spend that way. they gave the money or but saved it or paid down credit card debt. the public was scared by that point. we need a new approach that's longer term. we need to think ahead. to say, just throw money at the problem, doesn't work, builds up debt, doesn't solve long-term

problems. >> and takes away, as you said before, investments in other programs we need. we've got structural problems, mike, that we've been talking about on this show all the time. you look at effects of globalization, at the effects of increased american productivity, the fact that wall street is making record profits while americans continue to lose. >> totally jobless recovery. >> jobless recovery. their net worth continues to go down. it's been going down for four years. poverty at an all-time high. we've got structural problems that aren't going to be taken care of by throwing cash out. if we were running surpluses, then, yeah, let's just throw cash at the problem and see what happens. but that's not the case. we're $16.5 trillion in debt. >> so help me out here. off of that. as i listen to professor krugman's monstrous brain at work, and it's way above my pay scale -- >> it's a big one. >> i think i heard him say that

you continue to throw bad money at programs in a depressed economy, that that's what you have to do. that's what we're doing. we're going to continue to do that. doesn't it make more sense to take a scalpel and cut programs that aren't working and build up head start or public works projects. it seems to me he's saying the status quo is fine. >> he doesn't take care of getting some return on our money. that's the problem. for him, as he said, spending is spending. who could think this way? >> but is that because he lives in a classroom and not a real world environment? where does that come from? >> it comes from a kind of abstract thinking called keynesian economics. it doesn't have different

categories of spending in the theory. it has one kind of spending. it's called gnp. you add it up. it's more or less. there's no detail of what's happening in the deep structure of the economy. are children trained? are they educated? are young people trained? what's happening to the structure of the economy? what should public investments be? that's why in 2009 when they were in a few weeks proposing to spend $1 trillion, i said, slow down, let's take a look. we need a ten-year program of how to build infrastructure. shovel-ready projects, are you kidding? this is the 21st century. there are no decent shovel-ready projects for the 21st century. we're beyond shovels if we want to live in a modern economy. but no, they to hurry. for them, spending is spending. obviously it doesn't work. >> again, that's something we brought up in realtime. it's not like we're looking back now that they came up so short on the stimulus spending and the investment. like you said, the cbo numbers

show that they didn't hit their targets. but we said at the time it's not the size of it, it's the investment. what are you investing in? we saw it around the table here. we had every congressman and senator that came on this show we asked them if they knew the specifics of the bill. no. we asked one on a friday, why don't you just wait until monday to vote on the bill? >> and one said it's always like that. that's absurd. if it's always like that, we're doomed. >> is it like that when you were the largest spending bill in american history and you have more americans that are in more need of smart, wise investment? you know, i don't think you just throw caution to the wind like that. >> the other thing that surprised me was paul said, look, we have no debt problem, look at the budget numbers. the debt as a share of national income is flat, but that's because the numbers he's looking at don't do what he says to do.

if you do what he says to do, the numbers aren't flat at all. the congressional budget office says the debt would rise from today's 72% of gnp up to 87%. if we did what he did, no, they're not flat. he's looking at numbers that contradict his own idea. >> let's show a little more. joe debated krugman's assertion that the country won't have a spending problem until the year 2025. >> joe said first nobody agrees with me then maybe three or four people. >> i said paul krugman versus the world. i meant it as a compliment. i really did. i sat there and was like, wow, he doesn't think we need to address that until 2025? >> that's not what i said. >> what did you say? >> i said we have a problem in 2025. we don't have a problem this year or next year. if it wasn't for a me and a few people loudly saying the deficit is not a problem without qualifying first that longer

term it is a problem, i don't think this message of spending cuts -- >> well, by the way, paul just agreed that only three people agree with him. >> i said only three people are saying it without prefacing it with the obligatory three paragraphs. ben bernanke gave a speech last week that was for all practical purposes saying the same thing i'm saying. he said, you know, the debt outlook looks relatively okay for the next ten years. we would like it to be lower, but it's relatively okay. spending cuts right now are a really bad thing. it was essentially indistinguishable on the substance, not the style. i got a different style, but the substance -- >> yes, you do. >> but the substance is no different at all. >> the problem with not focusing on the long-term debt now is it is a generational problem. again, i'm not playing go ining but going back to what paul wrote and has been writing until the crash, you've got to plan

ahead. it's uncon shenable not to plan ahead. for my 4-year-old child, for my 9-year-old child. at some point, we're going to have to tell beneficiaries whether you cut it off at 50 or earlier or whether it's 55 or earlier. we're going to have to say, the rules of the game are going to change for medicare recipients at some point. i don't think we can wait. you say you didn't say wait until 2025, but i don't think we can wait another decade before we start addressing medicare. >> jeffrey sachs, does ben bernanke support what he's saying? >> the funny thing is we all went to school together, harvard, m.i.t., same years. >> barnicle and i went to harvard. we got the t-shirts. >> we invite this idea that we don't care what the spending is on, don't need to look beyond

the short term. most people went away from that over time realizing that's not such a good idea. what's surprising is there is a basic point that if you borrow, you have to repay. the congressional budget office really an important document, of course, a kind of nerdy one, says that right now this year we'll spend 1.4% of our national income on servicing the public debt. by 2023, before krugman says we have a problem, they estimate it will be 3.3%. in other words, two percentage points more just to pay interest on the debt. where is that going to come from? it's squeezing things we care about. if you don't think ahead, you take up debt. then when you have to pay it back or service it, you don't have money for the roads, you don't have money for education. >> programs for the poor. >> that's exactly what's happening. that's why it's important, not

because it'll be calamity and over the cliff necessarily. just because debt has a trade-off. >> all right. still ahead on "morning joe," the first woman to ever sit on the supreme court, retired justice sandra day o'connor is here with her new book. up next, chuck todd and joe klein on the saddle. you're watching "morning joe" brewed by starbucks. i've discovered gold.

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all right. a live look at capitol hill at 23 past the hour. joining us now, nbc news chief white house correspondent and political director, chuck todd. and political columnist for "time" magazine, joe klein. and in washington, pulitzer prize winner eugene robinson. we were just jabbering away on the break. this conversation is so fascinating on so many levels. >> it is.

in the grossest possible form, krugman is right. when you have a recession, government spending is a way to get out of it. but our government has become so complicated and so inefficient that if you're going to do that, why not just lower people's taxes? mike was saying before that we should spend it on things that work like head start. well, guess what? head start doesn't work. there has been one serious evaluation of the head start program by the government, which runs it, which showed head start makes absolutely no difference. and we're spending $1 billion a year on it. problem is democrats just want to pass new things but they don't want to manage them. republicans just want to cut things. in the old days, republicans wanted to manage things. what you need now is a republican party and centrist, smart democrats who agree we have to start managing the government again. >> yeah, and, you know, one of the things, chuck, that is so --

makes me despondent is we have these debates and we're talking about debt and you have people that say let's throw money at the problem. again, one of the things that shocked all of us is when he said last night even spending on wasteful defense programs are okay for now. but nobody in washington seems able to address the underlying structural problems. corporations making more money than ever before. the stock market being higher than ever before. poverty being higher than ever before. jeffrey sachs wrote in his last book, since 1973, average wages for males in america have been going down. this isn't a problem that started with barack obama. this isn't a problem that started with george w. bush. this isn't a problem that started with bill clinton. it started the year richard

nixon was sworn in for his second term. but nobody in washington seems capable of getting together, republicans and democrats, to fix this structural problem or at least address it. >> the frustrating thing is that the government is -- i feel like both parties are trying too hard to protect the legacy economy. so there's this issue of -- what is the real crisis in america? that is the small towns, small city, large towns that have been gutted. they've got no economic base. there's no manufacturing base. the idea that a small manufacturing company can prop up a town and create an economy. so that's missing. that is something we haven't figured out how to replace. that's the crisis in the country. we're in this, shifting from the industrial economy to this service/global technology economy. we haven't figured it out.

the hardest hit are these folks did -- by the way, this is who the tea party appeals to. it's like, geez, we wish it could be like the way it was, when levi strauss could come in here and start up a jean company. the democrats say we just need to get everybody and education and it'll solve itself. we haven't figured out out how to build this new economy. >> i think you had the right word, very much legacy. it's not only the legacy of small towns and industrialization. it's the legacy of an economy built in the '60s and '70s that's built around oil. it's built around overpriced health care. it's build around phenomenal tuitions much too high for higher education. now we have an i.t. revolution, we have a globalization revolution. there's renewable energy that's safer and competitive. there are much better ways to

educate. there are much better ways to run the health system. nobody wants to change anybody because the interest groups are so powerful everything -- >> based on the old ways of doing. >> exactly. both parties. >> eugene robinson, do you want to jump in on this and the conuc conundrum we face? what will recharge this economy would running into the problems that either paul krugman is worried about or joe is worried about. >> another scarborough/krugman debate. i think we should take this on the road. jeff sachs makes a really good point about how things are different now. technology is different and needs are different. and the need for a much more fundamental rethinking and restructuring of our economy, which itself is going to have costs. i mean, there are those cities that chuck was talking about

where the manufacturing base is hollowed out. they're now trying to survive on what they call eds and meds, the big educational institutions and hospitals who are often the biggest employers in these cities left after manufacturing has dried up and gone away. and those institutions now holding up the cities are themselves inefficient and need to be reformed because there are cheaper ways of doing it and better ways of doing it. that's going to be more dislocation, but it needs to be tackled. >> the problem is, these manufacturing jobs that have gone overseas, they're going to come back. they're starting to come back. the problem is -- >> there aren't going to be as many. >> the jobs that were going were paying $35 an hour. the jobs coming are paying $15, $16 an hour. >> and they require a higher level of technical education. the problem at the heart of this is for the last 40 years from

nixon's inauguration, there have been greater awards for our smartest young people to go into casino gambling on wall street than for them to run refrigerator factories or come up with new products. in part, that's because of the way taxes are structured, but it's also because of the way, you know, globalization and computerization and technology have developed the economy. we've got to get smart, young people into inventing new things and make things. >> we had jeb bush on. i know you -- >> i did 20 minutes with him yesterday. >> you interviewed him yesterday, made some news. sounds like in this book, it sounds like he may be running for president. >> may be? this was the most significant -- >> when i read the news of your interview, i said, oh, my gosh. jeb has always done exactly what jeb believes. i don't want to ascribe --

>> i think he's fully -- >> i think he's going to run. >> that's the point. this, to me, just by him saying i'm not ruling it out is something we've never heard from jeb bush before. he has, for a decade, in some form or another, been recruited by some in the party. big donors, whoever you want to say. raise your hand, be the leader of this party. he's always attacked back for reasons, maybe they were personal. this time he's saying no, i'm in. i want to have the conversation. he's using the book. what i think is interesting, he's not shying away going, no, no, no, i want to talk about my book or immigration. he wants to use the immigration debate to say this republican party is a mess, i want to see the party stop being against things, i want to start seeing -- my point, this is big news. he is much further along to 2016 in his head than hillary clinton for sure. i would say if you're thinking about running for president as a republican, you suddenly now are dealing with there's an establishment front runner.

you have to get through jeb. every donor now sits on the sideline of a big, major fundraiser is going, okay. >> so eugene robinson, hillary clinton is taking up the democratic space, jeb bush taking up the republican space. 24 years later it's bush versus clinton. this time it's personal, baby. >> it will be like terminator eight. >> we never had the sequel. that's the point. we never got it. >> we just have bushes and clintons. it's fascinating. although, you know, you would say that on the republican side there is some new talent. there's some new names out there. but again, jeb bush is in their way. on the democratic side, boy, obama and clinton have just sucked all the air -- all the oxygen out of the air. it's unclear who is going to

come up, if not hillary. >> yeah, we got to go really quickly. eugene, you write about the sequester, a stupid idea whose time has not come. >> i hate it. i hate the name. i hate the way everybody has handled it. i hate the way it bolsters the stupid both sides are at fault argument. that's rarely the case. it drive mess ks me crazy. in this case, the both siders point. >> we're going to take a quick sequester here. chuck todd, thank you. we'll see you on "t he daily rundown." joe klein, thank you as well. eugene, your column online on "the washington post."

up next, leadership from governor chris christie, who has something to say about washington's failure to solve the sequestration. that's coming up. more "morning joe" when we come back. ever.

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we've been talking this morning about joe and economist paul krugman's debate last night with charlie rose. at issue, can congress grow the economy and deal with the debt all at the same time? >> he has said that washington, d.c. cannot deal with short-term fiscal issues and growth and cutting the deficit at the same time. is he right in that? >> no. >> that's the basic difference. >> here's the problem. washington can't do either. if you look at the sequester and see how that happened, that train wreck -- >> but does it have to be either/or as far as joe scarborough is concerned? >> it doesn't have to be either/or. i'm not going to look at the reaction that larry summers got from an op-ed and make my decision based on that. what i'm saying is you have no choice. you have got to grow the economy now. you also have to start planning ahead for what's coming in 2020.

>> when you say that, if you got to grow the economy now, do you have to say to yourself, we cannot deal with the deficit in the next several years until we grow the economy to a level that unemployment comes down? >> you're talking about the deficit. i'm talking about the debt. i'm talking about long-term debt. i'm talking about the entitlement crisis. i just don't know many people, other than paul, that are saying we can wait another 10, 15 years to worry about medicare. >> you say we cannot wait ten years. we can't wait ten years because this will happen. go ahead. >> again, you've got 10,000 baby boomers retiring every day. you can look at the projections for the cost of medicare and medicaid in particular. and you can't wait for that to go up. >> the congressional budget office says debt is stable for the next ten years. >> as a percentage of gdp. >> right.

now, you can say it would be desirable to do something in the next ten years what will happen later on, but what's the desire to do this? where's the evidence we have to do something, that we have to be focused on this as opposed to the clear and present problem of high unemployment? you know, where is this coming from? bowles and simpson said -- i mean, i like this because they gave us a date. they said two years we'll have a fiscal crisis unless we deal with this. that was two years ago. >> you've made some projections yourself in the past that have been wrong. >> that's the point. if you want to tell me this is urgent, tell me what's going to happen if we don't deal with this right now. why is it that five years from now, according to the cbo, debt being a little lower relative to gdp than it is now, something will happen if we don't address those long-term issues. >> the thing is, though, we don't know. as bob rueben says, you never know when a bond crisis is going to come. it's not like we're going to get

warning. you're going to wake up one day and suddenly there's going to be a crisis. when is that going to happen? i don't know. >> all kinds of things can happen, right? i mean, spain -- >> what do you mean all kinds of things? you've been predicting this for 20 years. >> that's such a tired argument to go and search for things i said once upon a time. >> once upon a time? you said this for 15 years. then you woke up one day and said, i was wrong. you said we needed to create a housing bubble to replace the nasdaq bubble. >> come on. you know i was joking when i said that. >> you were joking? >> yes, of course. this is so disappointing. so disappointing. >> it is disappointing. >> is all you can do is ad homonym and say you said this. >> anybody that knows me knows i don't engage in ad homonym attacks. i'm quoting back what you say. >> we're trying to have a serious discussion here. what is it in the next ten years that is going to force us to do something? >> we don't know.

as richard hoss said, you're right until the day you're wrong. the day you're wrong, that's a very bad day, indeed. what do you want me to do? to tell you the markets are going to turn on us on january 27th, 2014? >> no, i don't want you to tell us the markets are going to turn on us at all. there's a record here of the last few years that the deficit hawks have been predicting imminent disaster again and again. they told us interest rates were going to soar in 2009 and 2010. they told us inflation was going to rise. they said we're going to turn into greece any day now. they keep on being wrong, whereas people who have this analytical framework, and i'm not just making numbers up. i'm taking a very basic analysis and saying it's not a problem. that framework has led to the correct prediction that interest rates will stay low as long as the economy is depressed. that countries that borrow in their own currency are not at

all like greece. in fact, every country that borrows in its own currency, including japan with its 200% debt to gdp ratio, continue to have low interest rates. so now you're telling me, oh, yes, but something could happen terribly even though the numbers say that nothing should happen for the next ten years, and i should be afraid of that phantom. >> afraid of the phantom? again, it's not an ad homonym attack. it's not an ad homonym attack to look back at what you've said for the past 15 years. you're talking about from 2009. >> that's very disappointing. >> it's disappointing to you because you act as if all of these people that have been w warning about the deficit and debt have been wrong for decades. >> a crisis is a very different -- >> over the past two, three, four years you've changed your tone and that's fine. >> because the world changed. this is the worst depression since the '30s.

>> and the world can change again. up next on "morning joe" republicans in the house step up, offering a bill to avoid the next government shutdown while softening the impact of the sequester cuts. house gop conference chair cathy mcmorris rodgers joins us when we come back. cold feels nice on sore muscles, huh?

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[ robert ] we created legalzoom to help people start their business and launch their dreams. go to legalzoom.com today and make your business dream a reality. at legalzoom.com we put the law on your side. what a great song. >> all right. before we get to our next guest, jeffrey sachs -- or mike. >> jeffrey, i just heard paul krugman say in that clip we played that the debt will remain stable for the next ten years. but interest rates right now are

at historic lows. what happens to the debt even if it remains stable over the next ten years if interest rates creep back up to normal percentages? >> what's so odd about what paul said is he cites the congressional budget office and the document by the cbo, this one, shows exactly what's going to happen in terms of if they go back to normal. right now we're spending 1.4% of national income to service the debt. ten years from now, paul said, what could possibly go wrong? well, the cbo shows it will be 3.3% of national income, two percentage points, squeezing out the rest of government. that's the problem. and the document shows it. what's also odd is he says the debt is flat, but that's because as a share of national income, that's because they're not doing his policy. there's another part of this document that says, well, what if we did essentially what paul says?

the debt would soar. 87% of national income by 2023. what he doesn't say is if you do what he wants, take off these spending caps and so farther, the debt absolutely starts soaring again. >> all right. joining us now from washington, republican representative and chair of the house republican conference, congresswoman cathy mcmorris rodgers. >> great to have you here. obviously, we're talking about sequester. it seems like a bad idea, whose time should have never come. >> and a weird name. >> tell us what's happening on the hill right now. i heard that committee chairman and chair women are starting to work to try to fix some of the bluntness of those cuts. >> well, we didn't have to get to this place. we knew for a year and a half that sequester was going to hit the president's across the board cuts that unfortunately disproportionately impact the military. that's why the republicans why

republicans, nearly 300 days ago had passed a replacement bill. and so today we find ourselves continuing to need the senate to take action. i'm hopeful that we will start getting those serious discussions to cut spending. americans recognize that we need to cut spending, that washington is -- spending is out of control, that this is not sustainable, and that now is the time to act because it does impact our economy. >> when do we start focusing though on the real issue at hand, and that's long-term entitlements and not discretionary domestic spending which only takes up 9, 10, 11% of the budget? >> over the next couple of weeks the republicans from the house will be introducing our budget. again, we need the senate to pass a budget. this is the fourth year now that the senate has not even proposed a budget, not introduced a

budget. the president hasn't introduced a budget. it's pretty fundamental to governoring that you need a budget in place especially during difficult times. families recognize that, businesses recognize that. and yet the federal government is operating without a budget. >> actually, the president did actually send budgets to the hill. up may not have noticed it. >> not this year. >> not this year, right. >> that's true. >> mark. >> congresswoman, i want to ask you on budgeting, would you like to see medicare change, become like a voucher program or stay the way it is with just some cuts on some funding levels? >> i would like to see us take action to save medicare. we need to be honest that the current path is on a path to bankruptcy, and we have 10,000 seniors signing up for medicare every day. >> i'm sorry to interrupt, but to save it, do you need to fundamentally change the nature

of the program or not? >> well, we need to have a conversation about how we save medicare, and recognize that the current path is not going to work. so that is -- so the republicans have been putting different proposals on the table. i hope that the democrats will join us in this effort so that our seniors have the confidence moving forward that medicare's going to be available to them. >> what are some of the fundamental changes that have to be made in order to save it? >> right now, what has been happening is that we have been cutting medicare in the president's healthcare plan, we cut, or i didn't, but medicare was cut $600 billion in order to fund the president's healthcare plan. so what we're seeing is that providers, doctors, hospitals, home healthcare agencies, medical device companies, they're seeing their reimbursements from medicare cut, and it's getting harder and harder to find a provider who

will take medicare. so our seniors are out there unable to find providers who will take medicare, so that means there's going to be longer lines, and that's where we need to start making sure that we have medicare and that it is -- that we are taking steps now to make sure that it is available to our seniors, that promise that we've made to our seniors, that we can keep it. >> congresswoman kathy mcmorris rogers, thank you. >> you're watching "morning joe," brewed by starbucks. [ female announcer ] going to sleep may be easy, but when you wake up

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never know when a bond crisis is going to come. it's not like we're going to get warning. you're going to wake up one day and suddenly there's going to be a crisis. >> all kinds of things can happen. >> what do you mean all kinds of things? paul, you've been predicting this for 20 years. >> that's such a tired argument, to search for quotes i said once upon a time instead of dealing with the issue. >> we're talking you said this for 15 years, and then you woke up and said, i was wrong. you said we needed to create a housing bubble to replace the nasdaq bubble. >> i was joking? >> you were joking? >> yes, of course. this is so disappointing, all you can do is say you said this. >> anybody who knows me knows i don't engage in those kind of attacks. >> we're trying to have to serious discussion. what is it in the next ten years

that is going to force us to do something? >> we don't know. as richard haass said, you're right until the day you're wrong, and then the day you're wrong, it's a very bad day indeed. >> good morning, it's 8 a.m. on the east coast, 5 a.m. on the west kose. it is time to wake up. >> wake up, everybody. >> yes, take a live look at new york city. back with us on set, we have mark halperin and steve schmidt. let's get to the news because i want to get to the highlights from charlie rose. governor chris christie is slamming leaders in washington for failing to find better solutions to last week's across the board spending kuts. the new jersey republican called out president obama and congress. >> the worst thing about sequester in my view is they're not spending any time talking about entitlement spending which is where we need to really focus over the long haul to make a big difference in terms of our long-term fiscal health as a country. i'm disappointed in that, but you know, if you stacked up all

the things that disappoint me about washington, d.c., it would be pretty tall. if anybody in this room thinks they understand washington, d.c., please come on up and you give the answers because i don't have the first damn idea of what you're doing down there. seems to me it should be pretty easy to fix. real leadership would get this fixed. you get everybody in the room and you fix it and you don't let them leave until you fix it. that's what real leadership is, not calling a meeting two fours before to have a photo-op in the driveway of the white house. that's not leadership. fix it. >> yeah, it is easy for him to say, but i did wonder why everyone in the room didn't just leave and go to capitol hill. >> look what the guy's done in new jersey, look what he's done in new jersey, and steve sh submit, that sure looks like a guy who is talking for 74% of new jerseyans, and also, it's

not a bad position to launch a 2016 campaign. >> no doubt, and if you look ahead to 2016, the congressional brand of the republican party is so deeply unpopular, he's smnl who's clearly comfortable triangulating against it. he'll run against the democrats as he would the unpopular brand. and every day we see washington make such a compelling case for a christie candidacy. he's in a good position. and i think any republican who comes out of the congressional wing of the party who's in congress right now is going to have a difficult time. >> mark, he looked like, i mean, if you had those little frank luntz meters, every word he said would be going -- because the guy has hit the sweet spot. this is his time to say washington doesn't work. look what i'm doing up here with a bunch of union members and union bosses, i'm working with

them. why can't washington get anything done? why can't republicans in washington get anything done? why can't the president lead? it's a compelling message for him. >> once you're willing to unshackle yourself from the party, once you're willing to step out from the orthodocksy of the party and be unafraid of criticizing your own party, you've got a lot of running room. given governor christie's record of getting things done, as steve said, he's in a great position, and the hits will keep on coming. he can keep up a running monologue like that all the way as he chooses to. >> when you get outside the beltway bubble, some people will hear that, the white house will hear that and say that's not a sophisticated view. but if you go out to dinner with people, they say exactly what he just said. get in a room, figure it out. so he's giving voice to the majority of the country. >> the overwhelming majority, you know, mika, a lot of times

bloggers will mock that type of centrist talk, saying that's just -- there's nothing to it. that's where -- that is where most americans, at least most americans i've talked to over the past 400, 500 speeches on college campuses at rotary clubs and all the other places we go over the past four, five years, we're hearing the same thing everywhere we go. >> and also just sort of big picture looking down at chris christie's career, i don't get the republican party, i don't get cpac. this is a guy who can cut him down when he's not doing a good job, without feeling shackled to anyone. isn't that ultimately someone who's grounded with a sense of leadership? >> i don't know, mrs. cardnis, i love your son. >> the obama administration is fighting back. that assess to the president is

being sold to the highest bidders by a new advocacy group with close ties to the white house. the direct offspring of president obama's outfit, obama for america, would be granted quarterly meetings with the president, yesterday. and watch this. whout press secretary jay carney disputed the allegation and defended the white house's involvement with the group. >> as you know, arguing for action was set up to promote the president's public policy agenda, therefore, as anyone would expect, the president would likely meet with the representatives to discuss his agenda. but again, any notion that there's a price for meeting with the president is simply wrong. the bottom line here is that this is a separate organization, the existence of which is perfectly appropriate, and the white house will engage with it consistent with the way we engage with a whole host of

other outdoors constituencies. >> he was reading the whole thing. >> right. do you think they're a little lawyered up on that one? what's going on there? as reported by the "new york times," it's cash for access. >> the dna of the embryonic movement was we're going to do things differently in washington, and listening to it, it reminds me of earlier in my career i was communications director at the national committee, and we had all matter of organizations like this fronted by tom delay, where we would sell access, where people would come in, have an opportunity, meet the congressional leadership. it's absolutely no different, but it's totally dissonant from what the president said he was going to do when he ran for office. >> politicians have been doing this for years. >> jay carney also tried to put

a little daylight between them and the white house. he said there was no direct link, but when it was conceived of and announced it was supposed to be a place where the message was delivered to the public separately and transparent from the public. >> the history of the obama app racing is if they have the financial advantage, they take advantage of it. >> regardless. >> and one of the things about this group besides the question of access is they're taking corporate contributions. that's a big change. >> and why are they doing this. why would the president -- it just seems like he's making his life more complicated politically. >> i think they want to take the strength of their grassroots operation and their money and try to marry them up so he can do what he did in the first two years of his first term, which is have an all-democratic

controlled congress. so they can fight groups that are going to come after them to keep them winning back the house. >> i'm in and out shocked by it, i'm not shocked by the practice because it's how washington's run forever. i'm just very surprised, as you pointed out, even taking corporate money to do this, we're a long, long way. >> yes. >> i want to get to the thriller in bloomberg. >> the thriller in bloomberg. >> that doesn't work. >> last night in his debate with paul krugman, joe raised some concerns about spending and long-term debt, particularly with an aging population reaching retirement age. take a look. >> we should have used the 90s, we should have used the bush years to pay down debt so we would have come into an era of baby boomers retiring with little debt. >> what's changed since 1997 --

>> the worst economic crisis in three generations. >> okay, but what has not changed is the fact that baby boomers, as you predicted, they would be moving towards retirement, in 1997, you said specifically, why worry about deficits? there's a huge army on the march. baby boomers are getting older. they're going to be turning 65 in 2010, the ranks will swell. it will create huge foreseeable problems. you predicted that in '97. that was a reason to pay down debt back then. now the urgent problem is the highest long-term employment since the 1930s. a deeply depressed economy. in this economy -- >> you predicted that you saw coming is still with us, is it not? >> yeah, but the opportunity to pay down some debt in advance, we missed that. now we need to run budget deficits, and the difficulty that we're having is that 2 1/2

years ago the conversation in washington totally turned away from creating jobs to deficit issues as if the deficit, which is a problem for 10 years, 15 years, 20 years out, as if that were the crucial issue we needed to deal with now, and it is not. i've also learned a few things in the last 15 years, so using things i said inform 1997 is not the best way to analyze my views now, but the main thing -- >> this is what you said in 2005. medicare and medicaid are going to sharply increase the deficit. the deficit might well exceed 8% of gdp. that's a deficit that will make argentina look like a model of responsibility. >> i've learned things since then. >> you've been wrong for 15 years? >> oh, you want to go that way. >> oh, right. he got a little mad there. it got really intense. >> he didn't like me quoting him, actually. but it's a real question right now, mark, and this debate does

matter, because it's always been understood that this president, i've been assured by david axelrod, going back to 2008, you've been assured that this president understands the seriousness of the entitlement crisis, understands that it's a generational theft that we're engaging in, that we're stealing money from our children, from our grandchildren, and as i said last night and as bob reuben has said, you never know when the bond crisis is going to hit. you don't see it coming like a hurricane. it comes immediately like an earthquake, and then, are you ready for it or not? so i guess this debate matters so much right now because there is a question as to whether the president has changed his position on entitlement reform. do you still believe he thinks that we need to protect social security, medicare, medicaid by reforming it now? >> i think he does, but i think

he'd like to do it when the economy is better so these choices are less difficult to make. in the short-term, he wants stimulus. he can't always say that. in long-term he does want to put the programs on a better footing. i think where he differs from you is the median term and the question of do you really need to do things in the ten-year space, tinkering with discretionary spending in a way that makes people feel better in the next ten years, because markets might react well to it. >> no, we're talking, though, about medicare, medicaid. we're not talking about -- >> but you don't need to change -- >> -- short-term. >> if he doesn't do that in his term, the programs are not going to be insolvent when he leaves office. he doesn't want to make a deal when the economy's bad because the deal has to be much more draconian with low growth rates. >> but, steve, every year that

goes by is a year where we have more debt, where it's $16.5 trillion now. when barack obama came in office, we were at $11.5 trillion. every year that goes by is a year that -- it's an opportunity lost. >> soon we'll be over $20 trillion. if you look at a second-term presidency, typically there's 18, 19 months to get something done on the domestic front and then your administration becomes the province of foreign policies. it looks like this will be the work of the next president because there's not going to be a deal done. >> coming up on "morning joe," she was mentored by great authors such as tony morrison, and now tiasalasi is out with her new book, ghana must go. and next, former supreme court justice, sandra day o'connor, called the most powerful woman

in america. we sit down with the first woman to be sworn in on the supreme court. and from that we go to bill karins with a check on the forecast. >> crash at the end. well, good morning, everyone. our winter storm is now hitting chicago, just beginning to move into the windy city. shouldn't be too bad until a little later today when the heavy snow moves in. the white on the map shows you it's been snowing pretty good around the quad cities of iowa, now pushing into northern illinois. soon indiana, the snow will fly your way, even southern michigan. so here's your travel forecast. the white shows you where the snow's going to be from northern illinois to indiana. wintry mix southern indiana. kind of a mess for you in indianapolis. tomorrow's totals, still looking 4 to 8 for chicago, quad cities, 3 to 6. almost done in indianapolis.

end up with 6 to 8 inches. overnight it's going to snow in portions of ohio, west virginia, especially in the mountains, and then during the day tomorrow, tricky forecast, not quite as cold as it is in the great lakes. later in the day, after the sunset, we'll break out in wet snow. windy at the coast. heavy wet snow on trees and windy conditions could cause power outages. these snow totals, a lot of will be a heavy wet slush. the city totals are definitely on the lower side, d.c. 3 to 6, about how many times, 3 to 6. we could have some snow totals nth poconos, catskills, down through northern portions of virginia and west virginia, approaching one foot of snow. so significant snowstorm outside the big cities. i'll watch that storm throughout

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i'm pleased to announce that upon completion of all the necessary checks by the federal bureau of investigation, i will send to the senate a nomination of judge sandra day o'connor of arizona court of appeals for

confirmation as an associate justice of the united states supreme court. she is truly a person for all seasons, possessing those unique qualities of temperament, fairness, intellectual capacity and devotion to the public good, which have characterized the brothers who have preceded her. so as soon as possible she may take her seat on the court and her place in history. >> what a day it's been here on "morning joe," and it continues. you watch that excerpt months later on september 25th, 1981, sandra day o'connor did take her place in history when she became the first woman to be sworn in as a supreme court justice. and here with us now, former associate justice of the u.s. supreme court, sandra day o'connor. she's out now with the new book,

"out of order, stories from the history of the supreme court." and you, sir, are out of order. it is such an honor. >> thank you. >> it's fascinating, listening to ronald reagan, mike, you remember when that happened, it was such a great day, but what was even more remarkable about your career is it wasn't just because you were a woman that you made history. you were once called the most powerful woman in america because you were such a -- >> that's an exaggeration. >> you were a crucial swing vote on the court. >> not really. >> come on. >> there are only nine, you know. so you've got to have five. >> right, and a lot of times you were the fifth. >> or maybe i was the first. i don't know how you count them. >> do you think joe is exaggerating by saying you were one of the most powerful women? >> well -- >> jeffrey rosen said it.

i didn't make it up. a lot of other people said that. >> the supreme court is important in american life, and it has to decide a lot of critical issues that affect all of us. i agree that the supreme court counts, it matters. >> yeah. i want to talk about "out of order" in a minute, but before i do, i want to talk about your website -- >> good. that is important for me. >> for my 9-year-old daughter -- >> she will love it. >> she will absolutely love it. >> games. >> talk about i civics, because it addresses two things that mike and i always talk about, the fact that younger people don't know their history and don't know how to write. >> icivics.org. >> i felt we had a serious gap in young people. i felt we could start a website to teach about the judicial branch, that was my branch.

and no sooner has we done that then i felt we had to address all three branches of government. it's not enough to talk about the judicial. and over the intervening years we've developed that on this website, and it's really terrific, because we have i think 19 games on it now, and we have an advisory group of teachers that tell us what the next substantive message should be incorporated in a game, and we've tried to follow that advice in a game so that at the end of the day, the young people show what they should know about our government. >> i will tell you why younger kids, my 4-year-old boy and my 9-year-old girl, they go to the computer and they want to play games on the computer. >> that's right. >> that's where you get them. >> that's what i'm doing, and we have about 30,000 young people a day now using it.

i have a chairperson, at least one, in all 50 states, and it's doing well. and it should, because the gap on knowledge is scary. it's really deficient. so i'm very pleased to be active in this effort. and our most recent effort is to try to teach them how to write better. that's hard to do, but we have a new, game for that that i think's going to be very helpful. >> that's something we talk about when we talk to young people all the time, how do we make it in this business, it looks so glamorous, and the first thing joe says is usually it's college kids or teenagers, learn to write. >> mike, you'll appreciate this, and mark, there's so many different formats now and we don't know the future, i say yeah, whatever that format is, it's going to require that you tell the story right, and require that you write a sentence. >> look at that most recent game that's posted to teach them how

to write, see what you think. evaluate it. let me know. >> i will do that. >> you're being put to the test. >> it's so important because we've gotten so far from the basics in education, and we're not dumping this on teachers, but i mean, writing, diagramming a sentence, noun, verb, object, tell a story net beginning and end. punctuation. >> so i'm enthused about what i'm trying to get accomplished and i think we'll make real progress with it. >> can i ask you something? >> sure. >> your book, in the time that you were on the court, do you think that cases arrived at the supreme court level because numerous state legislatures, numerous politicians refused to address the issue and bumped it up to the supreme court? >> no, i don't think so. i think they got there in the normal course of events because

typically there was a law or case at the state level that dealt with some critical issue, and it was a holding that was controversial in some way, and we had applications from various people saying please take this case, it's trouble and we need to consider this issue at the supreme court level. and often it was on an issue where the courts had reached conflicting holdings on the same question, and that's what typically leads to a supreme court decision. >> so the makeup of the current court, there are more women than when you were there. >> oh, my goodness. it was incredible, because i was it for a while and before i go there, no women. >> so what do you hear about the impact it has on the deliberations? >> i don't think it has an impact on the deliberations that you have women there. >> you don't think women have a different approach to solving problems?

>> they might, but you hear those different approaches in the briefs that are filed in the court and the arguments that are made. it's not that the court wasn't hearing that viewpoint. they were. but you have a makeup of the court that now includes three women, and that's a huge change. not that it necessarily changes the outcome of cases, but i just think we feel better as a nation when the court is a little more representative of what we have out there. i mean, half of us are female. >> that's right. >> so it's kind of nice to see at least three up there. >> and we're more sensible, really. can we just be honest? >> i'm not going to say that, but you can. >> i will. >> and she does every day. so let's talk about "out of order," and start with a case that has to be one of the most important if not the most important case in the history of this country, "brown v board." you talk about the importance of

saying less is more, and marshall understood that. >> well, sometimes that's right. and you have to -- when you're a member of the court, you want to be very careful about how much is said and what is said because it's going to be out there as doctrine for all the country for some time to come, and it matters. so i think we try to be very careful there about what we say and how we say it. >> and you said thirgood marshall's understated method of answering the questions has an influence. >> i think so. he didn't go beyond what was necessary to decide the case, and i think that's a good principle. i'm sorry, go ahead. >> no, i just think that's a smart thing for the court to do. why get expansive when you're deciding a case? go slow. let it develop slowly.

>> court watch has always talked about justice marshall's sense of humor. >> he did have a good sense of humor. >> talked about justice scalia's sense of humor, but you say william rinquist had a sense of humor. >> he and i were classmates at stanford, and i thought that he had such a clear understanding of what the professors were saying. he got it immediately, and it was fun to watch him in law school. >> isn't it remarkable, you saw the arc of his career, you saw when he was the lone dissenter, you saw when nixon appointed him and he was on the wrong side of 8 to 1 decisions. >> on the minority side. not necessarily the wrong side. >> i prefer to win, but the minority side, 8 to 1. >> right.

>> what was it like seeing through the years he go to a position where he led the court? >> well, he did. to become chief justice was quite something. and he was a good chief justice, and he handled things well, and he handled people nicely. so that was quite interesting to watch. >> i want to ask one more question about court decisions, and then i'll let you say terrible things about men, mika. >> no. >> and i know i'm probably note going to get an answer to this, so i'll just say, i was fascinated by john roberts' decision in the obamacare case. absolutely fascinated. >> mm-hmm. >> i'm trying to ask a question that she'll answer. i just don't think there's one there. >> what do you think his question is? >> but i did think, though,

roberts looked at himself as the head of that court and made a decision that he may not have agreed with ideologically. >> i'm not going to comment on some opinion that he wrote, but it's a very sensitive position to be the chief justice, and it can be even more difficult when you as chief justice may be concerned about the outcome and you don't want it to go beyond what's necessary to decide the bare bones of the case. >> and sometimes you have to worry about the legacy of the court. >> yes, you do. you have to worry about that all the time. >> you wrote about that in some cases yourself, worrying about the legacy of the court as well as the law that's in front of you. >> that's right, because when the court speaks, it's binding on all the lower courts and the public bodies in the country, so that's quite a concern. >> see, a perfect example of how sometimes saying less is just perfect, something you could learn, less is more.

>> i couldn't figure out the question to ask. >> and you also can learn from icivi icivics.org. be sure to visit the website, icivics.org, retired supreme court justice sandra day o'connor, thank you, a pleasure to meet you. >> thank you. it was nice to be here. >> great. >> still working. >> all the time. coming up, an update on the markets where the dow jones is within striking distance of an all-time high. business before the bell is next. ♪ ♪

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time for an early look at the markets this morning where gains in u.s. stock are pointed to another positive start on wall street despite the implementation of budget cuts. yesterday the dow jones closed with second highest ever,en ending with 37 points below the all-time ever. >> approval for the new chinese budget. still ahead on "morning joe,"

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do you have a sweatshirt? >> i do. we are live. we are live. we are live with a very alive author, taiye selasi. she's out with her new novel, ghana must go. wes moore also joins the table. he's not part of the incredible talent. mark halperin is here,

marginally talented. this is a stunning piece of work, ghana must go. you have a stunning life story. >> it's all right. >> but the story encompassed in this book, just skimming it, it's a 20th century of roots, taking us with ghana to new england, to the united nations. tell us about the story. >> it's an immigrant story. so at the heart of it, we have a father who was born in ghana in poverty, works his way up to become a successful surgeon. marries a woman, has four kids. the kids go to schools, milton academy, oxford. and when this family thinks it has finally reached the apex of success, a tragic incident turns everything around and the family falls apart. and the father leaves and when we meet them here,th father is dying. and by the end of the novel, the

four children have come to ghana for the funeral, forced to confront the sorrows as well as the triumphs in their family history. >> it's a stunning story on many levels. where does it come from? >> you know -- >> where did this come from? >> i know. the singer-song writer leonard cohen put it best. he said, when asked where do your songs come from, he said, if i knew where they came from, i'd go there more often. and that's how i feel. i genuinely don't know where the material comes from, but i do remember when it arrived. i was on a yoga retreat in sweden in october, freezing, cold, and i went to take a shower, and all of these characters, all six of them, their back stories, past, present, future, just appeared there in the shower. and i ran out into the room, i was sharing with my friend, and i said, i just found my first novel, and she looked at me and asked quite reasonably, where?

i was like, in the shower. and i explained to her that i had just this vision of this family. i wrote the first ten pages then, and then the next 300 over the years to come. >> i tell you, this book is not only frighteningly well written, it's important to the larger dialogue we're having in this country. we had jeb bush talking about immigration, and in many ways, this is the story of the larger contribution of immigrants to this country. what does the immigrant story mean to you? >> it's a wonderful question. >> i wasn't born in this country. i am an american citizen now, and sometimes i think i had the good fortune of becoming a citizen because i was born before 1985. so my parents were born in rural

poverty, but intelligent. but what the immigration laws of their time made possible was that a bright person born outside of the united states without access to the many opportunities that this country affords could, showing enough wherewithal in their home country to get here, stay here and become in many ways what my mother is today, she's a very talented pediatrician. my father's a surgeon. i've gone to some of the most wonderful schools in this country, all because we were allowed to come here and try. so my views on immigration are formed by my own experience of the same, which is that if we allow all immigrants to this country, if we open the pathways to success, if we bring these people who are willing to work and want nothing more than to succeed, we will find that immigrants to the united nation

nations. i think of barack obama's father born like any parent on the continent of africa, who because of programs at the time ended up at the university of hawaii in the say way my father in scotland, and ends up at harvard and ends up giving birth to the current president of the united states, and when i think about my parents, i think about barack obama sr., and i think immigration has to happen and can be an incredible force for good. >> you have some pretty good blurbers here. how did you get those as mentors? >> mentors is a strong way. i'm grateful just to know such luminary and incredible authors. i met professor morrison when i

was finishing my degree. my entire family, they're all doctors, and i thought, okay, i can't add and subtract so i'm not going to become a physician but i'll get a ph.d.. that was for the birds, so i dropped out of my ph.d. program, and right at that moment professor morrison came to get an honorary degree. i ended up sitting next to her. i told her i was leaving grad school to follow my life-long dream of writing. and when i got back to the united states, she kindly invited me to her house in princeton, and we talked about writing. she said send me something by the end of this year. she said i'm going to publishing my next novel, send me something by the end of the year. so what do you do? >> you had a deadline. >> you know what i mean. what do you do? >> two incredible stories here

this morning. taiye selasi personal story, her life story, and a novel, "ghana must go." taiye, thank you very much. it was really, really terrific meeting you. >> my absolute pleasure. >> thank you very much. >> good to see you guys. this day calls you. to fight chronic osteoarthritis pain. to fight chronic low back pain. to take action. to take the next step. today, you will know you did something for your pain. cymbalta can help. cymbalta is a pain reliever fda-approved to manage chronic musculoskeletal pain. one non-narcotic pill a day, every day, can help reduce this pain. tell your doctor right away if your mood worsens, you have unusual changes in mood or behavior or thoughts of suicide. anti-depressants can increase these in children, teens, and young adults. cymbalta is not for children under 18. people taking maois, linezolid or thioridazine or with

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how did rodman, dennis rodman, end up in north korea? >> personally he was a big big basketball fan of the bulls in the 1980s. oh, that's why. i thought he was just a huge fan of "double team." how far down the bulls' roster do you work to get down to the worm? we know m.j. isn't going. you telling me he couldn't get luke longley or kir? benny the bull wouldn't go? rodman says, guess what, a lot. he says it so much that it has inspired us to create a new game. >> someone who hypothetically is a murderer who's your friend is

still a murderer. >> well, you know what, guess what? >> what? >> guess what? >> what? >> what i did was history. >> next time you go back, you should bring in report from the human rights watch with you and maybe ask him questions about that. you might learn a lot more and might press him as well. >> either way, guess what? >> what? >> guess what? >> what? >> the report. guess what? >> what? >> don't hate me. >> all right. well, we could never hate you, dennis. >> matt and craig live next to an open space area. we throw the ball to the dogs. we play sports with the kids. they like kicking balls, hitting baseballs. we do the things that grandparents are expected to do with grandkids. >> do you see now why you lost?

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