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something this delicious could only come from nature. new nectresse. the 100% natural no-calorie sweetener made from the goodness of fruit. new nectresse. sweetness naturally. at the top of the show we asked why you are awake. john tower, what are the answers? >> bit of housekeeping here. you have an invitation from joe on linkedin. >> i got one from babarnicle.

>> and this one says a lot of rain and wind. >> it's to rain. but about this time tomorrow morning, you'll see a couple snowflakes. not a huge deal for jersey, but d.c., this is your storm. although they're calling it down there snowquester. that's the best they had. great show, everyone. "morning joe" starts right now. the dow jones industrial average never-before-seen heights. >> all-time high. >> making history today. >> if they tell you everything's awful, tell them no, it's not! ♪ amen the noninflation adjusted values of stocks of 30 companies that sort of tracked the economy 50

years ago are higher than ever! we're back, baby! and the best part is, we never had to fix our systemic issues. >> well, good morning. it's wednesday, march 6th. welcome to "morning joe." with us on set, we have national affairs editor for "new york" magazine and msnbc political analyst, john heilemann. the president of the council on foreign relations, richard haass. and in washington, pulitzer prize-winning editor and msnbc political analyst, eugene robinson. very good day to have you on, eugene, given you were the editor as well. >> it's also important to have gene here to give us some weather. >> right. >> did you have to get your snow dogs and sled to get into the bureau? >> yes, i cross-country skied in. actually, you know, it's snowing. and right now this is

technically classified as a regular snowstorm. however, it's going to get worse, and we're going to have a lot of snow later. >> thank you, gene. okay. >> we play hurt. we do what we need to do. >> yeah, at that point, mika, that's really when you miss great leaders because, of course, a great leader, hugo chavez, passed last night. when that snow comes, that's when you miss great leaders like marion barry running washington. his opinion on snow removal, god brungeth and god takeeth away. wall street is not feeling such pain. yesterday the dow finished at an all-time high, breaking its previous record set in october of 2007. this year alone, the dow is up

8.8%. home depot has benefited most from the dow's recovery. the company's market value has risen by $50 billion. however, not every company trading on the dow has seen the same success. 12 of the 30 stocks traded on the dow are still recovering from the financial crisis. we're going to have the ceo of the nasdaq coming up later on the show, joe. >> so mika, let me ask you, how do your friends feel? did you guys all get on that google chat where you could all have a conference? everybody popped up and talked about, i'm excited because my job has gone up that much more. and i'm excited because my prospects -- i mean -- >> no, because that's not happening. >> there's such a disconnect between main street and wall street because i know a lot of your friends as well as a lot of my friends are hurting. they're hurting because they're falling further behind from where they were four or five years ago. the stats show it that median house income is down over the

past four years. poverty rates are higher than ever before. and these numbers -- >> hunger. >> -- far from exciting me. actually, make me a bit nervous about, again, the long-term structural problems in an economy where the rich keep getting richer. the poor keep getting poorer. >> they make me angry, actually. >> and washington can't do anything to even start addressing those underlying structural problems that are turning us into this divided society. >> yeah. and willie, i don't know what your circles are like, but i know a lot of highly qualified people who are still looking for work who look at these numbers and must feel more angry than we do. it's a really frustrating situation in terms of our economy because it does not seem to be moving forward for the american people. and yet you've got statistics like this and numbers like the dow coming out breaking records. >> unemployment's bad. wages are stagnant. that's another thing. even people who do have jobs aren't getting raises.

they're finding that. but this is a moment, i think, history should give us a little bit. if you look at five years ago when it was at its peak, something terrible happened a year later. so i think you see if you read some of these economists, even people who work on wall street, the enthusiasm is tempered just a little bit. they know it's been helped along by the fed, which has helped pump money into this economy, has propped up this economy, quite frankly, driven some people into the stock market, richard. so maybe we pause here for a moment before we celebrate. >> look, on one hand, it is vulnerable, as you say, to essentially free money, extraordinarily low interest rates promised for a long time. it's also vulnerable to external shocks. something with the eurozone. something with iran. right now, on the other hand, there are real strengths here. this does show the recovery of the american financial sector. it does show something about the underlying strength of many american corporations, greater efficiencies that have been introduced. the one area where a lot of americans do benefit from this is in their retirement plans. 401(k)s and the rest.

this isn't just an elite thing. the question is how many americans got out of the market four or five years ago when they got scared and didn't get back into it? one of the lessons of this, you ought to be very careful about market timing. no one's quite smart enough to pick the lows and then the highs. people who actually stuck it out did okay. what i don't know are the statistics of how many americans actually stayed in. >> joe? >> gene robinson, you have richard haass talking about greater efficiencies. of course, we all want to be as efficient as possible. u.s. workers, more productive than ever. but the down side of that is, of course, manufacturing jobs that used to pay $33 an hour go overseas. they come back. and as we were saying yesterday, they come back in the form of $14, $15, $16 an hour jobs that, again, can't support a family of four the way they did back in the '60s and '70s. >> no. and also, those jobs don't have the benefits and pensions that they used to have. you know, you look at the dow. and you say, you know, what's the basic reason why it's so

high? corporate profits are terrific. so, you know, celebration in the boardrooms. but why are they so high? well, because corporations, like countries, can borrow money at essentially no interest. it's so cheap for them to borrow capital. and also, because labor is cheap. because there's so many people unemployed. so these are great signs for the dow. they're not such great signs for the economy as a whole. and meanwhile, the main source of wealth for most families, the value of their home really hasn't rebounded the way the dow has. so i have a feeling most people are scratching their heads and saying, well, that's awfully nice for mitt romney, but not necessarily for me. >> lots of other news to get to including, joe, jeb bush getting some criticism from republicans in washington. hundreds of venezuelans poured

into the streets of caracas yesterday mourning the death of president hugo chavez who lost his battle with cancer. his body will remain in state for three days. his funeral will be held this friday. venezuela's constitution states elections will be held within the next 30 days. the vice president will serve as an interim head of state. until then, hugo chavez was 58 years old. richard haass, looking ahead, also looking back at his legacy. >> well, chavez was the ultimate populist. and he was literally and figuratively fueled by the increase in oil prices. it gave him the capacity to do what he wanted to do at home. a massive redistribution of wealth inside venezuela. it gave him a chance to run a really active foreign policy. he essentially had his own agency for international development. and he would put billions of dollars through subsidized oil and the rest into places like cuba, nicaragaragua and so fort. his vision for latin america that was extraordinarily radical. he was not democratic, to say

the least. he, again, was an extreme populist. he consolidated power. he hurt institutions within venezuela. my own hunch is he did not put venezuela on anything like a long-term trajectory to sustain his own vision because so much of it, again, was simply because of fuel and higher oil prices. so i think venezuela and the region now faces a long period of uncertainty. my hunch is, though, his own guy will win the election. he does have a lot of popular support. but he didn't, again, economically or politically, put this country on a long-term track that can be sustained. the economy is in a real mess with inflation, with extraordinarily high levels of debt. it's all based upon oil. so big question marks. and i still think the future of this part of the world is likely to look more like the more democratic market-oriented countries, the mexicos, brazils and chiles than it is like cuba or venezuela. that's the good news here. >> joe? >> you know, obviously, he's

been a thorn in the side of the united states for some time. you look at some of the quotes of some people. i have lost a good friend, sean penn, and i mourn a great hero, willie. we'll let you comment on sean penn and oliver stone, if you would like, and the impact of their statements on their friends. "the new york times" has someone writing in today saying that chavez left the country full of decay, dysfunction, blight. "the wall street journal" says it's more impoverished today, more chaotic today than ever before. even a newspaper account that ran in "the new york times" yesterday that seemed to be overly positive about his reign, talked about how dissension in the country was more divided than ever. so it's a mixed legacy.

>> well, as i think a lot of people have pointed out, i think the admiration of some people in hollywood for hugo chavez was much about sticking it to george w. bush as it was celebrating chavez. that said, they do view him as a populist, as somebody improved the plight of the poor. you can go to human rights watch and look at all the abuses under his reign including shutting down the media, packing the supreme court, among many other things, ending term limits. obviously, he was authoritarian and a dictator in some regards. there are people inside that country, many of them, joe, who feel he looked out for their best interests in a way that no one before had. >> well, you know, actually, willie, that's a very good point because for all his anti-democratic leanings and actions and everything that's been said is absolutely true. i mean, you would not want -- i don't think you or i would want to live in a country that hugo chavez was president of. he was elected four times.

and, you know, he gerrymandered. he suppressed the privately owned media. he kind of coerced them into running his long speeches and his sunday television show that would go on for hours and hours and hours. you know, it was horrible for a lot of people. and he kind of wrecked the economy by just spending the royal wealth as if it were coming out of a spigot. production is down. it's a mess. but he's very popular among the poor of venezuela who were ignored for years, for decades by a kind of keleptocratic business elite, and that's barrios were kind of seething with anger and resentment he was able to transform into political support and loyalty. i don't think his successor who

was his hand-picked guy has that sort of charisma, but he'll probably win, as richard haass said. >> we're going to come back to this in just a bit. some other news right now. with more republicans embracing immigration reform, former governor jeb bush is looking to stake out his issue. in the past mr. bush favored a path to citizenship for millions of undocumented workers. but in his new book, he argues those immigrants should be given permanent legal status instead. well, senator lindsey graham who is working to craft legislation on the issue said the proposal outlined in mr. bush's book, quote, undercuts what we're trying to do. but governor bush seemed to change his stance somewhat during a series of recent interviews prompting tough criticism from senate majority leader harry reid. >> let's wait for a few minutes and see how jeb bush changes his mind again. his opinion on immigration is not evolving.

it's devolving. he keeps going backwards. i think he's frankly made a fool of himself the last 24 hours. frankly, on this issue, i don't think jeb bush is a florida leader. i think marco rubio is. bush has been elected to nothing lately. rubio is the leader on immigration. >> okay. joe, a new poll by latino decisions shows immigration reform is by far the most important issue for hispanic voters. that's by the economy and jobs, education and health care. >> john heilemann, let's talk, john heilemann, about your next book. bush -- "game change 2016." i think this may have to be the opening scene of jeb getting out of a cab in the middle of the dark, you know, in a cold march morning and walking into the "today" show when announcing that he's changed his mind. i mean, the second i heard it, i said, the "game change" boys

better get an interview with him, because he's locked and loaded for bear. this, to me, seems to be the greatest sign that jeb bush is looking to run in 2016. what are you thinking? >> well, he is certainly -- it was certainly surprising to hear some of the things he was saying on television yesterday on the "today" show and this show and elsewhere. you know, there's been -- there's a ton of speculation about what he might do in 2016. there's no one as talented as the republican bench is right now and as much as people talk about bobby jindal and chris christie and others that, you know, he is certainly the giant among them. and everyone -- he doesn't have quite the status in the party that hillary clinton does in terms of being a prohibitive front-runner, but there's no question that he's not head and shoulders, at least he's head above everybody else who's thinking about running. it seems he's being a little more calculating on this issue than he has been in the past. i think people who are looking to try to read tea leaves are busy right now trying to figure

out where he's going. >> i can't -- i mean, he's either -- >> mika -- >> yeah? >> mika, the tea leaves that you were reading were around his waist. >> yes. >> you said he lost a lot of weight. you said he is so running. he's losing weight. >> no, it all -- it's he's either highly considering it and testing the waters or he's already made the decision. those are the two options. if anyone's trying to read tea leaves and thinks that he might not, it's only because he might not be able to. but he's definitely getting everything in line. >> yeah, there's really no reason for him to back off his position, richard haass, on the path to citizenship and moving it back now to a path to legal status. as harry reid said, that's a position that's devolving. jeb had been critical of republicans over the primary process for not staking out his position on the path to citizenship. so something's in the works here, and it's very unusual for any leader to take a step back on an issue like this. >> but it also tells you how

fast this issue is moving. we're now at play with the whole immigration debate that six months ago was actually inconceivable. now comprehensive reform, i think, is likely. and there's got to be, quote, unquote, a path to citizenship along with greater amounts of green cards for the highly educated along with the security issue. three years ago you would have thought the entire immigration debate was border security. and now you've got a fundamentally changed debate on path to citizenship and increased numbers of entries and ability to stay for the highly educated. this is, to me, a major shift in american politics. let's try and get a couple more stories in here. a lot going on. sources tell "the new york times" that president obama is planning to visit capitol hill in an effort to jump start negotiations on a series of issues including a longer-term plan to deal with the nation's deficit. those meetings will follow a series of recent phone conversations between the president and rank-and-file republicans. whom the white house believes are open to bipartisan

compromise. meanwhile, congressman paul ryan is finalizing his latest budget proposal which aims to eliminate deficits within a decade. but the blueprint has raised concerns of some centrist republicans after ryan floated the idea of tweaking his pledge to protect people aged 55 and older from any impact of reforming medicare. ryan reportedly fares the idea of raising the age to 56 or higher, but some members of his party in competitive districts are worried about the political fallout. it would take roughly $4 trillion in deficit reductions to balance the budget by 2023. and joe, i just wonder if this reminds you of some of the conversations we've had with some republicans that have come on the show where they still don't want to say where they draw the line when it comes to making adjustments that would make the way our entitlement programs work more responsible. >> well, there's a battle right now, and it's not an angry battle. it's a friendly battle inside

the house republican caucus. and a lot of talking. a lot of debate about what they do moving forward on balancing the budget. and john boehner, john heilemann, john boehner got some breathing room a few months back when he promised conservatives he'd balance the budget in ten years. the problem is if you're sitting with trillion-dollar deficits, and they go down to maybe $700 billion deficits, it's not like us saying we're going to balance the budget in seven years back in the '90s when we had a $300 billion deficit. and there's going to be, man, a wrecking ball going on around there through a lot of budgetary programs if you try to do it in ten years, and if you try to move the medicare age up quickly right now, that's going to be a serious problem. >> well, i think it's not just going to be a serious problem, joe. i think it's impossible. i mean, there's enough -- there's no way to get to the

kind of entitlement reform that i know you believe in and i think that is a gradual -- a more gradual approach that would make fundamental changes in medicare and other entitlement programs but do it over a longer time horizon. that might be politically doable. but given the degree of opposition to making dramatic entitlement reform changes on the democratic side, you can't do this without getting somewhere where you create a coalition in the center of republicans, nonextreme republicans on the right, nonextreme democrats on the left. you've got to get in the center. and that's not a rapid change to medicare. it's not going to be the place where you find the sweet spot on that kind of deal. richard -- go ahead, joe. >> no, i was just going to say to richard, the thing is, the argument that you have to make if you're going to change medicare, if you're going to change social security, you've got to be able to tell seniors and americans approaching retirement, don't worry. you've paid into the system. you've made your plans. we're not going to pull the rug

out from underneath you. now, that's european style austerity. a lot of democrats and liberals accuse us of supporting european style austerity. that's a greek postal worker getting notice in the mail, your benefits will cut by 50% next week. you'll notice your check being cut. but it seems to me for paul ryan and the republican party to succeed, they're going to have to make sure they can tell people if you're 54 or older, this doesn't impact you. and i think those members that are pushing ryan to move faster are making a huge political mistake. >> you're exactly right. i think there was a debate or something about some of these issues recently that you may have participated in. and it's one of the reasons you know you've got to start now simply because of what you're saying. you've got a lag. and the only way this is politically sellable is that you delay the actual implementation, but you can't delay beginning to wire it into the law. the longer we push it off, the longer then, again, we have to delay its impact, and that's the

trouble. but you're exactly right in terms of the timing and the sequencing here. >> and you know, mika, richard is right. i did have a debate, and there's been an ongoing debate about how reform entitlements. i say we need to start reforming now. others say we can wait for quite a long time. a decade, even. we have to have the lead time to be able to tell americans how medicare is going to change, how social security's going to change. we've got to start by telling seniors, you're not going to be impacted. if you were born in the 1960s, you know, then, yes, we're going to have to talk to you about some changes we're going to make. if you were born in the 1970s, your benefits are going to be different from seniors right now. the key political item -- and again, we're worrying about the long term. as i've been saying nonstop for five years, it's the long-term debts that kill us. let's plan for the long term and do it in a way that gives everybody advanced notice so they can prepare for the

changes. and that's the one concern about moving the age of these changes up to people who are 56, 57, 58. that's dangerous politically, and more importantly, it just is not going to work. >> people plan for the future in their households. it seems we should be able to do it as a country as well. >> it's also not that necessary because we actually have five or ten years, a little bit of a respite given the numbers. they don't really get bad for about ten years. we want to wire it for the future, not for the near term. still ahead on "morning joe," former governor jon huntsman will be here, also robert gibbs. buzzfeed's ben smith and star of "psych," dule hill will be here. up next, jim vandehei has the top stories in the "politico playbook." first here's bill karins with a check on the forecast. bill. >> mika, stress. probably not one weather guy in the d.c. area that got any sleep last night. very difficult forecast. if you're traveling in the mid-atlantic into the northeast as we go throughout the next two to three days. currently the heaviest snow on

i-81, hagerstown to charlottesville. we have been seeing snow in the d.c. area, but it's having trouble sticking because we're 34 to 36 degrees. later today this whole area of heavy snow will swing on through and head through baltimore and through the d.c. area. don't be surprised if you don't see any accumulations until at least 10:00 a.m. here's how it looks today. eventually the rain's going to push up through new jersey. you're not going to get snow during the daylight hours, philadelphia, new york city, southern new england. your best chance of seeing snow is tonight through the overnight hours. the full-fledged snowstorm today is down there from d.c. the timing of it, this is 7:00 a.m. the blue, this area in here, shows you the heavy snow. and as we go through 3:00 p.m., it shifts right over the top in the nation's capital. that's when we expect the worst of it out there as we go throughout the day. as far as the forecast is going to go, again, as we go into thursday, the storm is not exactly gone. it still lingers up through new england. i'm still concerned for the potential of heavy snow from boston down through providence.

the worcester area, too, as we go through thursday night into friday. the bottom line on snow totals, d.c., somewhere around six to eight inches. baltimore, up to ten. worcester, about ten possible. then we deal with you in boston later. the two cities that are going to miss out on this storm, it looks like, is philadelphia and new york city. no more than a slushy one to three inches. this is a heavy, pasty, wet, wet snow. power outages going to be a big problem as we go throughout the day today in the mid-atlantic. you're watching "morning joe." we're brewed by starbucks. [ female announcer ] when a woman wears a pad she can't always move the way she wants. now you can. with stayfree ultra thins. flexible layers move with your body while thermocontrol wicks moisture away. keep moving. stayfree. [ babies crying ] surprise --

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banned. flight attendants have voiced their concerns, saying the policy change will put the lives of passengers and crew members in danger. "the los angeles times." jon stewart's now saying he'll take a three-month hiatus from hosting "the daily show" to direct his first feature film. the movie will be an adaptation of "then they came for me," a true story about a journalist who spent 118 days in an iranian prison in 2009. "daily show" correspondent john oliver will host the show during stewart's absence. from the business section in "the wall street journal," the largest railroad in the u.s. will begin testing natural gas as a fuel source for its locomotives. if successful, the company would begin retrofitting its diesel engines to take advantage of the surplus of natural gas here in america. railroads currently consume 6% of all diesel fuel burned in the u.s., richard. >> that's a big deal. if you start seeing diesel

converted to natural gas, then trucks, a relatively small amount of our rail and trucking fleet could have tremendous consequences for the environment. this is actually a big deal. >> the pickens plan. >> there you go. "the new york times," rick scott is facing criticism from some republicans who say he is distancing himself from the conservative platform that got him elected. in addition to endorsing medicaid expansion in florida, governor scott also has proposed a near record budget of over $74 billion that includes a pay raise for teachers. as of january, scott's approval ratings were in the low 30s. that's a look at the papers. time now for "politico." >> joining us now with a look at the "politico playbook," executive editor jim vandehei. good morning. >> morning, willie. how are you? >> doing well. your lead up on the site, president obama reexamining his sequester messaging. some people asking, did he go too far in trying to scare the american public and to force republicans into a deal that they never were going to make. >> yeah, glen thrush has a smart piece up that takes a look at

democrats, governor rendell who's on your show a lot, other democrats on capitol hill who are very concerned about the sequestration strategy coming from the white house, largely from a communications standpoint. all these warnings of the dire consequences once sequestration kicked in. a lot of which haven't happened. and if they do happen, will happen well into the future. people looking at the stock market going up after sequestration. so there's a worry that by overhyping it, the white house has put itself in a tough political situation. you know, done the same thing to democrats on capitol hill, and that's why there's concern. >> by the way, the white house has canceled tours over the cuts. they can't afford to give tours anymore. if you want to tour the white house, you have to go through your lawmaker. you have to go up to the hill. that's how bad it is, joe. >> willie? >> yeah. >> willie, that's horrible. >> it's the people aus house no more. >> they're not letting american citizens in the white house because the cuts are so bad.

>> well, that's what they say. "the wall street journal" wrote this, jim. check this out. about the sequester. "in its bid to make the sequester as painful as possible, the white house announced tuesday that it is canceling all visitor tours of the white house during the popular spring touring season. this fits president obama's political strategy to punish the eighth graders visiting from illinois instead of, say, the employees of the agriculture department who will attend a california conference sipping exceptional local wines and sampling tasty dishes prepared by special guest chefs. conference organizers promised the tasting will be a, quote, mouthwatering event featuring fine wines and exceptional micro-brews paired with seasonally driven culinary delicacies. how do we sign up?" >> one other thing that they're going to do, the white house is going to have cabinet secretaries going out with needles and popping the balloons of young children walking on pennsylvania avenue. >> stop it. >> saying we cannot afford the possibility that these balloons

could go up in the air and cause problems in the airwaves over washington, d.c. yeah, way to punish the little kids. that's going to show republicans. >> and go take it up with your congressmen. >> willie, there's a danger in this. there is a political danger. >> thanks, joe. >> bringing it back. bringing it back for us, jim. >> helping you out. there's a danger in this in that if the public starts to think that the government is exaggerating the consequences or is doing things like canceling white house tours just to make their point, there's going to be a backlash. and i think that's what democrats are concerned about. you've had several cabinet secretaries say things that they've had to walk back about the consequences. we saw this with arne duncan. we saw this with napolitano. if you keep seeing that, people will start to get suspicious. i think whoever just said too late, it probably is too late because we've had several examples of that, and that's where the unease comes from. >> gene, we've said this over the last couple weeks, there are very real impacts of the

sequester. people will lose money, they're going to be furloughed. it has real consequences, just not the ones that were put forth by the white house. >> well, you know, there's a subtle way to do this, right? there's subtlety and then there's what's happening now. i think canceling the tours, you know, they couldn't spare that one person, and the president would have done it himself in his spare time if he had any spare time. it's a little heavy-handed given, you know, if there are real consequences to the sequester. the whole thing is really stupid on everybody's part. but i think this is kind of perhaps overplaying the hand in terms of the public relation s strategy. >> easter eggs. i'd keep your eye on that. >> that's next? >> who can afford eggs? who can afford eggs at this point? if you're the government? come on. >> oh, boy. i want to ask you about another story you've got up, jim.

bob mcdonnell. we talked about chris christie not being invited to cpac. now virginia governor bob mcdonnell, not heading to cpac. how come? >> again, you know, cpac -- i think people forget, it's supposed to be for the real meat eaters in the party. this very conservative conclave. they don't want anybody who they think are squishes on stage. now it looks like mcdonnell who championed a tax increase in virginia. looks like he's not going to be on stage. they'd rather have -- it sounds like donald trump's going to be there. those are the types of figures they want at cpac. people need to remember what it is. it's for real authentic conservatives. they have a right to pick who they want to stage. they feel a christie or mcdonnell, that they don't fit the bill. that goes to the broader question we talk about all the time on the show which is at some point republicans got to bring people into the fold that can attract the meat eaters in the party. christie is doing quite well last time i checked in new

jersey, 74% approval rating in a democratic state, not bad. we see rick scott in florida who's moderating his image. why? duh, that's what you do in politics if you want to win re-election. you can't just appeal to 30%. you have to start doing things like taking the medicaid money, like advocating an increase in teachers' pay like rick scott's doing in florida if you want to win elections. a lot of conservatives don't like that. they don't like the compromise. they want purists. and if they don't get purists, they don't want them on stage, you don't. much want them in office. >> john heilemann, you have an event that i've been at many years. >> yeah. >> always went to cpac that ronald reagan went to every year. you've got an event that of course focuses on the future of the conservative movement. >> question. >> the future of conservativism. let's go down the laundry list. you talk about the future of the republican party. you don't have, you know, chris

christie, but you do have mitt romney, right? >> yep. >> you have bob mcdonnell. but you do have sarah palin and donald trump. i just, you know, with all due respect to al card nas and his mother and all of my friends at the event, it seems like you'd want to strike a balance. you've got conservatives have to win in 2016. we cannot afford to lose another presidential race. and i can understand if chris christie had been governing as a moderate for four years or bob mcdonnell had been governing as a moderate for four years, but they're just talking about one transportation bill out of four years that bob mcdonnell supported, and suddenly that one bill disqualifies him. let's talk about ronald reagan's record. not only over eight years in

washington, but also in california. supporting more spending. supporting, you know, signing an abortion bill. william f. buckley had to go out to california and defend the right-wing zealots against ronald reagan. there's got to be a bit more nuance here if we're going to win again in 2016. when i say "we," i don't mean the republicans, i mean we the conservatives. >> joe, i think you're pointing to an important distinction. there is conservatism and republicanism, and they are different things. conservatism is supposedly an intellectual movement. for the party to be successful, it has to not only include conservatism but also different flavors of conservatism and even some moderates and others who are not strictly meat eating, as jim vandehei said before. but even if you define just cpac itself as representative of the movement, a conservative movement in which trump and

palin are considered authentic and bob mcdonnell and chris christie are not is not an intellectual or ideological movement that is going to have a very long life ahead of it. those people are neither intellectual nor ideological coherent. but they are marquee reality show contestants more than anything else. and i think that both the party and the movement have to start a rethink about what kind of people they want to make up the core of themselves if they're going to be successful going forward. >> all right. jim vandehei with a look at the playbook, thanks so much, jim. coming up next, the big east may be in its waning days, but it's not going out without a fight. notre dame with very unchristian behavior last night. about therz bud with their buddies from st. john's. we'll show you when we come back. joo the patient, presented with

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welcome back to "morning joe." time for a little sports. we start with college basketball. things getting heated last night. notre dame and st. john's. 1:46 left in a blowout. a couple players from opposing sides get tangled up around midcourt. punches are thrown. still not clear exactly what sparked the scuffle.

st. john's frustrated. they lost the game by 26. both players issued technical fouls and ejected. they'll sit out their next game. notre dame won 66-40 on their way, getting ready now for the big east tournament next week. on tomorrow's show, a man we love, espn's great college basketball analyst jay bilas going to break down march madness and also got a new book out. this time tomorrow on "morning joe." >> he's great. >> a gruesome scene in the nhl. marc staal takes a puck to the face. a tip shot hits his right eye in the 4-2 win over the flyers. he spent several minutes face down on the ice before skating off on his own. there's the angle we were waiting for. >> geez! >> he did not, obviously, return to the game. you see him writhing in pain. waiting to hear about some x-rays. that orbital bone took a shot.

college baseball, oregon and cal state-northridge. fields the comebacker, but the ball stuck in his glove. we've seen this before. oh! throws the whole thing to first base. >> the ball and glove separation. love that. look at that. >> first baseman, nice focus there. >> yes. >> brian healy catches the ball, not the glove. 4-1. >> a cal state-northridge clip. next, jon meacham joins us for the "must-read opinion pages" whether we like it or not. you're watching "morning joe" brewed by starbucks. sorry. sore knee.

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okay. it's time now for the "must-read opinion pages." pulitzer prize-winning historian and author of "thomas jefferson: the art of power." jon meacham just walks in. okay, have a seat. >> i was invited. i think. >> i've got one must-read i want to get to that you will roll your eyes at. but we will wait because i would like more insight on the passing of hugo chavez from richard haass. >> one thing. in april 2002, there was a coup that the united states was not behind, but we sort of tolerated for a day or two, hoping he would disappear, and he came back to power. and i was then sent down there in may 2002 by the president and colin powell to have a conversation with him to see if we couldn't get our relationship, if you will, back on track. and it was one of the more extraordinarily unsuccessful three or four hours of my life. he essentially was theater. and there was the two of us in the room and just talked for hours and hours. this was a guy who was larger than life. one of the reasons he could rule the way he did, there was no one

in that country who could begin to compete with him. he was physically and politically larger than life, complete theater, ultimately bad for the country. he was saved, if you will, by the oil windfalls. you just get a sense of a kind of theatricality that you almost never get in politics. seriously anti-american and anti-democratic, just about populism. >> there are a couple terms, tee at rickal, long-winded that remind us of someone else in the region, castro. chavez, in your view, was he the end of something or the beginning, or is he the middle? >> more towards the end. you're right, he was castro with oil. once the cuban revolution ran out of gas, so to speak, you had him continuing it. again, i don't think he put down any foundations for it. so castro has already faded from the scene, now chavez is gone. i think that era of left-wing

c cardelios has essentially run its course. i think they're more about the past than they are about the future, and that's a good thing for us. more importantly, it's a good thing for the people of latin america. >> the must-read i'm bringing to the table is something we haven't talked about much. it's about yahoo! ceo marissa mayer about that e-mail she spent to employees saying come june, come to work. this is at lien parker. "in one is more sympathetic to working mothers than i. my sympathy stems from having decided long ago to work from home upon realizing that my child needed me more than my employer did, but i'm fortunate. mine is the sort of work that can be accomplished from home and most important, i have a husband. it is thus understandable why yahoo! workers are dismayed and why others who hoped for such civilized options for others are disappointed. adding to the insult is that mayer has built a nursery for her own child out of her own pocket next to her office. such tidy solutions obviously

are available to few, and the fear is that all women now will be held to the impossible standard set by mayer." you know, i've been thinking about this. i read the entire e-mail. she hasn't threatened to fire anybody. she had been sending gifts and other things to employees to cajole them to come to work so they can meet people and collaborate with them and understand how to move the company forward. the delay is till june. and it says, come talk to us. you know, if it doesn't work for you. so number one, it reminds me of a place where i used to work where any woman who did anything or got to the top immediately had something revealed to the press or online or whatever that would bring them down. and i suggest that some might even argue that it's women doing that. i'm the only one here, so -- yes, joe? >> i think, mika, as a manager, if you're taking over a company like yahoo! that's been going through -- well, not really growing pains, but just been going through the changes that it's been going through, and

they've not been positive changes, and you go and you're going to manage a company, the first thing i'm going to want to do is i want to know everybody that works for me. i want to know what they do. i want to be able to observe them in work. i want to see if they play well with others. i want to see how they fit into the system. you know, as you know, mika, without going into great details, a lot of times we'll have somebody who's very talented that works for us. but if they don't fit into the culture -- >> right. >> -- if they don't get along with everybody else, if there's any back biting, then they don't stay in our shop. and it seems to me that a ceo has the right to bring everybody in and figure out who is going to fit into the culture that she is trying to promote and is going to go along with a game plan that she has to help yahoo! survive into the middle of the 21st century. right now there's a question whether that happens or not. >> exactly. and the big picture is, gene, i've been looking and writing

about sheryl sandberg's book, criticism of ann marie slaughter and dust-up there. i would argue they've offered valuable advice if they so choose to take it. it seems when they step out and put forth ideas of their own, especially one who's made it to the top, it's immediately pecked away. >> i don't understand that. why can't successful women write a book saying look, this is my experience. this is what i observed. >> sharing. >> this is the way i kind of did it, and this is the way i think others might learn from this or they might not. and you get those individual stories out there, and perhaps you get a fuller picture from, you know, from the total of the stories rather than just picking on this one story and, well, you know, this is not the experience of most women. guess what? most women don't get to run a major company. but there are other stories that should be out there, too. still ahead on "morning

joe," with the dow closing at an all-time high, we'll bring in economist guru miles nadal. first standing by this the green room, former governor jon huntsman and former press secretary robert gibbs. more "morning joe" when we come back. [ male announcer ] when it comes to the financial obstacles military families face, we understand. our financial advice is geared specifically to current and former military members and their families. life brings obstacles. usaa brings retirement advice. bjorn earns unlimited rewards for his small business. take these bags to room 12 please. [ garth ] bjorn's small business earns double miles on every purchase every day. produce delivery. [ bjorn ] just put it on my spark card. [ garth ] why settle for less? ahh, oh! [ garth ] great businesses deserve unlimited rewards. here's your wake up call.

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coming up next, former governor jon huntsman and a jeans-clad robert gibbs. we'll be right back with much more "morning joe." the american dream is of a better future, a confident retirement. those dreams have taken a beating lately. but no way we're going to let them die. ♪

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booking.com booking.yeah! a live look at washington, d.c. wake up, every. it's the top of the hour. welcome back to "morning joe." jon meacham's still with us. and joining the table, we have

former republican governor of utah and former presidential candidate jon huntsman. and also msnbc contributor and former white house press secretary, robert gibbs. joe has brought two of his brothers with him here today. he's one of nine. >> what's his deal? >> check that out. >> we have on the right james -- no, peter. james on the left. >> that's politically where they end up. >> peter has six daughters. >> oh, dear lord. >> to say nothing of the son. >> could you invoke huntsman cloture? >> we have an anti-filibuster rule in our family. >> mika? >> yeah. >> i knew people like this at pensacola public high school, the mothers walked around exhausted all the time. it's unbelievable. you know, jon always brings all of his family members to our show. >> it is amazing. >> you've got a bunch of

huntsman squatters around the studio every time this guy is on. >> it says something about you and mika. imagine this, my brother peter, his birthday this week, a big-time ceo, what was his only desire the week of his birthday? to come and meet you, mika. not you, joe. he doesn't care about you. but mika, on the other hand. >> very nice. >> nothing about me. and of course, willie and i know all along that most of the guys go through the studio to visit are not there to look at our shoes. they're there to look at mika. >> great about being one of nine in his own family, he says you learn to either be a diplomat or an outcast. >> there you go. even in families of five can be outcast. jon, speaking of being an outcast, let's talk about the republican party for a minute. >> exactly. see, he found a way to do both. >> surprise, surprise. >> i do notice, jon, some really positive trends in the republican party. you and i have been very concerned for a long time that this party is becoming less

inclusive, closing its doors to others that may not disagree with them. there's been a lot of focus on cpac. cpac, it's a conservative get-together for conservatives, and they get together and do what they want to do. you look at chris christie and his success, other governors across america, conservative governors like scott walker up in wisconsin. you look at jeb talking about immigration reform. there are a lot of people that are actually upset at jeb because he's moved from a path of citizenship to a path to legalization. but my gosh, compare the conversations that we're having this year about immigration reform to the conversations the republican party was having a year ago when you were running for president, we've come a long way, baby. >> totally different. >> a big change. >> totally different, joe. it's a very healthy tring. i think a few trends will pay out here. one, i think, mika, that the models for 21st century governance are going to come out of the states, out of those incubators of democracy where

governors are trying to figure out how to fix health care, develop the economy, deliver better education. >> actually getting something done. >> getting something done. it's the whole ethos of problem solving we haven't been able to conquer in washington, and that's bad news. i've never been more optimistic about where the economy is going and less optimistic about the divide. >> mixed with unemployment not budging certainly is not room for hope at this point. >> well, this is -- governor, i think you'd agree -- the most troubling line over the last ten years has been the declining household income. it's a big historic shift for the first generation that may actually leave things worse off than we found them. how are you find -- who are the inventive governors who are doing economically creative things to try to move that needle? >> well, all governors are tasked with doing, jon, is to create a marketplace for innovation, entrepreneurship and

vibrancy, and that's good tax policy. it's checking to make sure you're not overly regulating the economy, and it's educating the next generation of doers, thinkers and movers. and you can find some pretty good models of states that are growing and moving things forward economically. that's what a governor does. and that's what this nation needs to do more of. it's amazing to stop to think that our greatest enemy to growth is our own government and the dysfunction that we now see in washington. and for heaven's sake, people are elected to lead. they're not stymieing as a roadblock. housing is showing signs of improvement. we're beginning to think new about education in ways that are truly exciting. we're even inventing, you know, cars that drive by themselves. i mean, you can see our tomorrow. and it's going to be extremely exciting. and all this is happening without any kind of clear road map on taxes or regulation out of washington. and here the market hit an all-time high yesterday. yet you've got to imagine

there's probably a 20% to 30% discount factor in the market in terms of where it otherwise would be if we actually had a government that was functioning. >> joe. >> you know, robert gibbs, i can say for people that know mika, the idea that technology has moved forward enough to have cars that drive themselves, that means a lot of drivers in the tri-state area are going to have a safer commute to work every morning and night. so that's a very positive thing. >> funny. >> but there are also challenges. >> it's a good thing, joe, you can't see off set. >> i know. let's take a step back, robert, and forget for a second who you worked for. forget for a second, you know, what i did. >> okay. >> in congress. there you go. very good. a mind meld or whatever we call it. so here's some realities that we have right now. we've got household incomes going down. they've been going down for four years, five years. but that's part of a much bigger

trend. as we said with jeffrey sachs on set yesterday, male income has been going down since 1973 in real terms. poverty rates are at record highs. the opportunity for investment is challenged because we've got $6 trillion in debt. what hope do you see coming out of washington, basic numbers on a sequester are going to be able to tackle some of these ch challenges that have been brought about by goeblization and the i.t. revolution and all of the challenges that we face in manufacturing and other industries? >> well, look, i think if you were to just focus that on what's happening in washington, you wouldn't find or paint a very optimistic picture. i do think, you know, one of the things that we also have to worry about is all of the statistics that you talked about, particularly income and opportunity statistics, the

disparities between those that have and those that don't are growing wider each and every day. and that creates a society that none of us want to live in. and i think, you know, we've got to figure out how to educate the next set of great innovative thinkers as the governor said. we've got to figure out how to put aside some of these differences and make some genuine and real progress on this. as jon said, we're going to be the nation that -- and the generation that for the first time hands something off to our children not as optimistic or as hopeful as the generation -- the opportunity that the generation that we are inherited from our parents. the problem, too, is none of our problems actually get better with time, right? this isn't like bottled wine, right? these all get worse over time. >> so genuine and real progress, jon huntsman, you had an event yesterday with someone who is probably more disappointed than

most on the fact that we aren't where we need to be in terms of preventing too big to fail. you had an event with sheila bair and senator sherrod brown. what came out of that? why are we still here? >> well, a consensus across political lines, which is always a good thing, and a very, very, i think, helpful discussion about the road ahead on too big to fail. so if you stop to imagine, we need a healthy financial sector in order to get capital. the seed corn of our existence to the innovators and the entrepreneurs of tomorrow. and with six institutions that combined equal about 64%, 65% of our gdp, we have institutions in our banking sector that are, in fact, too big to fail. and because of that, they get a discounted access to capital because they are deemed too big to fail. so a couple of notches up on credit rating which means they have an advantage over our local community banks.

and that's unfair. so the subsidy equals tens of billions of dollars to some of these banks, the taxpayers are standing behind it. we've been through too big to fail. let's not set ourselves up for disaster. let's figure out how to fix the situation and move on so that we do have, in fact, a healthy financial system that prepares us better for the 21st century. >> jon meacham? >> what are the lines now, the quick lines people always say is, well, don't worry, we'll just borrow it from china. the sense that we are so much in debt to your former posting. can you talk about how you see the creditor/debtor relationship going forward? >> well, the chinese have actually throttled back on some of their purchases. the last reporting the japanese had more in the way of our treasury purchases than the chinese. but it's a small percentage of the overall. and it should speak to every american in terms of we have those who are buying our treasuries because we're digging a hole for ourselves.

and the idea that we're passing on $16 trillion, $17 trillion, this is representative of our generation, jon. this is representative of who we are, what we're passing on to the next generation. you know, none of us should stand by idly in thinking about what it is they're about to embrace. it's not worthy of our generation or theirs. so this whole debt issue, i think, is going to drive the younger generation like wars of the past have driven earlier generations. i was on a college campus not far from here recently. and the whole notion of debt and what they're about to be handed i think is a real driver and motivator for the younger generation. and that plays into where republicans have had some real strength. why did we lose the youth 60/40? well, president obama was a darn good candidate, and he had a lot of appeal for the younger generation. i remember when reagan had a lot of appeal back in 1980. we owned the issues that should drive the thinking and the political motivation of the younger generation. so between now and 2016, i think

these years are critically important because if the republicans can't begin to mend some of these demographics, and that's about math, that's not about politics, you lose the youth 60/40. hispanic latinos, 70/30, asian-americans, 75/25, i mean, give me a break. you've got to work pretty hard to lose a demographic that temperamentally and philosophically is so closely aligned with traditional republican principles, you've got to fix some of those. >> jon, you're exactly right. we have so many opportunities, especially toward young voters. i always say when people are talking about demographics breaking away from us, that actually the party that's obsessing on long-term debt, obsessing on trying to protect future generations, a party that's focusing on stopping the generational theft that's been going on now for 30 years, that's a party that's in pretty good shape demographically if it can do the right things. i want to talk about another part of that equation, though, too. if our party is seen just trying to defend hedge fund brokers in

manhattan or in greenwich, we're going to be in trouble. i'm just wondering why more republicans didn't step forward and support your plan during the campaign to break up the banks. and why we shouldn't, as a part of a big global deal that tackles entitlements, not go after loopholes that allow millionaires and billionaires to pay 16% in taxes while the rest of us are paying 28% or 35% or 39% in taxes. that is an idea that would not offend 95% of the republican base. because i can tell you, the republicans that i not only talked to today, but the republicans who elected me are just as angry about warren buffett paying 16% in taxes as they are about another issue. like for instance, the banks continuing to be bigger and bigger and bigger because they know if citi goes under, the taxpayers are going to have to bail them out the next day. >> these are all issues, joe,

that we as a party really do own and have been strong on traditionally. and why it is we're not pulling ourselves together around the fundamentals of tax reform, around closing loopholes, around carried interest, for example, around a banking system that is, in fact, too big to fail and therefore anti-competitive and speaks against the level playing field that republicans have always stood for, these are our bread and butter issues. yes, we talked about them during the last elections cycle and i am hearing people begin to talk about them more now, almost on a populist libertarian platform that i think the party will be in as we run up to 2016. >> governor? >> i put your ambassadorial hat back on. the last time i saw you was probably in beijing. >> that's right. >> give us, you know, what is the relationship in the next four to five years between our country and china? you know, is it adversarial?

we see combining efforts to try to deal with the north koreans. what do you see as the arc of that relationship over the next five years? >> well, there will be elements of competitiveness and elements of cooperation. and there needn't be conflict. a man who is the new head of state, he's going to be around ten years. now they're reorganizing their government. even this month, they're having the national peoples congress. so he will have consolidated his power. the head of state. he'll be president, he'll be head of the party, he'll be chairman of the central military commission, and he'll have the next many years ahead to begin forging a strategic agenda for china, presumably a lot of reformelements, expanding civil society, he's even talking about rule of law. that's a very good thing. he'll continue to spend on the military. why? because they can. and they want to be able to protect their ceilings where they're bringing in raw materials. that means we as a country have

a huge opening to be able to forge a different kind of strategic dialogue with china. because nothing in this world is really going to get done whether it's debt in europe, whether it's conflict in sub-saharan africa or the environment unless we're able to sit together at the table and have a dialogue that we just haven't been able to forge in recent years. so the stakes are extremely high. and we've got to get this relationship right. otherwise it's going to fall victim to the headline of the day, which are never going to be too positive. we've got to keep focused on the strategic aspect of the importance -- most important relationship of the 21st century. >> former governor jon huntsman, thank you. it's always great to see you and all your brothers. >> i'll bring them all next time. >> bring all the daughters. good lord. robert gibbs, stay with us if you can. still ahead, chuck todd joins the conversation along with buzzfeed's ben smith. up next with the market at an all-time high, we'll bring in financial expert miles nadal and

nasdaq ceo bob gryfeld. first bill karins. >> overnight, very impressive stuff, especially mountainous areas in west virginia and virginia. i-95 is like this magical line. it's like the highway that divides the rain and the snow. it goes from philadelphia, baltimore, d.c. through fredericksburg. the green shows you where it's raining. the white shows you where it's snowing. pretty much everywhere west and northwest of i-95. heavy, wet snow. east of 95 you're getting all rain. d.c., so far has seen so but at 36 degrees, it might as well be rain. no accumulating snow yet in d.c. i think the timing for when the heaviest snow will come through the d.c. baltimore areas, 10:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. that's your best shot of that heavy, wet, accumulating snow that could knock out power. we'll watch that for you. later today all rain, jersey, southern new england. later tonight you'll change over to a little snow but nothing like what your friends see to the south. as far as the snowfall accumulations are going to go,

we're not done yet. even on thursday, we'll still see the ocean storm affecting especially new england. the area from worcester outside of boston down through providence could pick up even some heavy snow all the way into friday morning. that's why i think you could see about six to ten inches from worcester. i think the providence and boston area around three to six. today, baltimore and d.c., six to ten to four to eight. up to this point, it's been too warm. reagan national, there's snow, but it's just melting when it hits the ground and pavement. that will change, though, later today. you're watching "morning joe" brewed by starbucks.

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24 past the hour. here with us now, ceo and chairman of the holding company ndc particles, miles nadal, trend of the show. and the ceo at the nasdaq, rob gryfeld. bob, help us understand what's happening with the dow given the other economic factors that are not sort of measuring up as well. how are we supposed to understand this? and also not get a little tinge of anger? >> i would say it's important to look at it through the eyes of investors. >> okay. >> important to recognize that there's been three actions in the last year or so that are

reduced the outlook for the deficit by about $1.7 trillion. what's forgotten about is the budget control act of 2011, cutting expenditures by about $1 trillion over ten years. we obviously had the fiscal cliff, took $600 million of revenue into the equation. and now we have the sequester. that's 1.7. why is that meaningful? investors' time horizon typically is between two and four years. those actions have moved the problem or kicked the can further down the road outside the investors' time horizon. so people who are buying in the market today -- >> yeah. >> -- are thinking about what will the world look like in the next two to four years during the period of time i'm invested in this activity? in that period of time, they're coming to the conclusion, based upon the last three actions, that we're within a reasonable expectation of, you know, fairly solid economic progress. >> joe, we have miles here along as well as robert gibbs.

jump in. >> bob, what you just said seems to be counterintuitive to a lot of people that say that chaos in washington, d.c., dysfunction in washington, d.c., causes problems. but we notice as we get closer and closer to the sequester deadline, stocks continue to go up. so are you saying that perhaps a lot of people on wall street saw those cuts, saw the sequester as a positive investment opportunity because it did push the debt crisis deadline two to four years away? >> well, certainly there is dysfunction in washington. there's no denying that. and that dysfunction will have a dramatic and severe impact on economic progress. i think people are coming to the conclusion that that severe impact on economic progress will not be in the next two to four years. and when they make their investment decisions today, by and large they're looking at that time frame. it's important to recognize in traditional long mutual funds, those that are seen as the great and the good, the typical

turnover period of time is down to about 18 months. >> so miles, how do we translate any and all of this into people actually getting hired again? >> let me just go and just add to what bob had talked about and just bring some clarity what joe said. first of all, i mean, the market is about alternatives. so if you take a look, in 2008, the high-yield index was 25%. the s&p was trading at about 15 times earnings. today the high-yield index is at an all-time low of 5.7%. and the s&p is trading at around 15 times. so in terms of alternatives, the market in general for equities is at worst case is the best house in a bad neighborhood, and best case is a great house in a great neighborhood. so the reason why there's such a huge movement toward equities is because it's the best alternative for financial assets. and people need ultimately

income and appreciation to ultimately retire. now, the other thing is, bernanke has been the best thing to happen to the stock market. his commitment to low interest rates is really what's fueling demand of people going into equities. and he's committed to low interest rates until there is a significant and stable increase in employment. he articulated that in the last week. we don't -- he doesn't see that -- he doesn't see 6% unemployment till 2018. so the reality is, with the uncertainty of the economy of which the government is not doing much to help that, you're going to have low interest rates for a long period of time. in terms of employment, it's important to understand that 80% of the top fortune 100 companies, their business is outside of america, 80% of it. so there is empty growth. it's just not happening domestically. >> not here. >> i think small business growth is happening at a more

accelerated rate. but the problem is that their access to capital for small businesses is really very, very difficult. so i think it's a slow trudge through the snow to get employment growth to happen at a more significant clip at this point. >> robert gibbs. >> just building off, mika, i think your first question is, you have people at home who are watching who may not have gotten in as the elevator went up. and i was surprised that the statistic you said, that the mutual fund horizon now is only 18 months. you think of it as i'm going to put it there, and it's going to go up and down for the next 30 years. you know, what is your advice, you know, to the small investor, to the mom and pop as they're watching this thing go up, you know, what's the best advice for them? >> well, the first thing i would say on the good news side, you have households have the lowest ratio of debt to disposable

income since 1983. and to tie back to what miles said, it's hard to fight the fed. because then you have the ability to say, okay, i'm going to get 0% or get an dividend of 2%, 3% or 4%. with respect to households, obviously when you make an investment decision, i like to say that equities are really the first derivative. it's a derivative of the economy. you don't make that decision unless you have some belief in the general economic health of the environment. so you have to come up with your decision, your personal decision, with respect to the economy. and then you should always be informed with respect to the investment you make. and i always believe what warren says. you invest in what you know. so then you make decisions from that point of view. >> is your general economic outlook positive for the next two to four years? >> you go first. >> wow. wow! >> they're not flipping a coin. >> i would say yes. >> okay. >> we'll do secret ballot.

>> i think i'm more muted than that. >> yeah. >> i think there will be a reasonable trudging along as we have done for the last number of years. >> man. >> i do believe as much as i said, the investment more rihor it's not impacting investors today. that situation will change. i don't want want to minimize that the dysfunction in washington has to change. it's a cliff will hit, wall we'll hit, we're not sure when, and it will come in an unexpected way. >> you know, mika, i think both of the guys would agree with me here. we continue -- we're in a period right now of deleveraging, and this is deleveraging that's been going on for some time. i wrote in a book eight years ago that if you looked at what happened in the late 1990s, we had to face the fact that part of that was because of the nasdaq bubble. and of course, we replaced our nasdaq bubble with a housing bubble. and when the housing bubble burst, we replaced the housing bubble with a bubble coming out

of washington, d.c., where there's been an awful lot of spending, and democrats would say a lot of investment. we hope a lot of that takes root. but even if it does, we're still deleveraging. and i thought it was fascinating, the article we were looking at yesterday about household debt is down, mika, but also more young people are carrying no debt, and "the wall street journal" story defined it as people -- households s 35 yes and younger are carrying less debt than ever before. that's a trend. there's a great part of that. that's great news on one part. other parts of that would make economists nervous because that means they're not spending their money, and the consumers aren't driving a consumer-driven economy. >> bob and i were talking in the green room. when you look at the global economy, i mean, europe is still has significant issues. and as we articulated, we're years away from that improving. america is the tallest midget.

it is growing, but it's growing at a very modest rate. you're not going to see 3%, 4% gdp growth we think for years. it is growing 1.5% to 2% or 2.5% which is still not enough to stimulate overall employment -- or lowered unemployment rates, but it's still, you know, modestly positive. so when you say, are you positive on the economy? i'm positive in a cautious kind of way. but as joe articulated on the "charlie rose" show which i thought was really a terrific debate, there are things on the horizon that are very scary. and i thought paul krugman's perspective was kind of a little frightening in the sense that he didn't see any possibility of any black swan on anything that's happening. and if you talk to any informed businessperson, that's not possible that you could completely eliminate the

probability that nothing including this multitrillion-dollar deficit would have no impact. as we articulated in the green room, nobody could run a company or a home the way the government is running its business. >> bob, do you agree with that? >> yes, i do, completely. one side note, one of the markets we run is estonia. i had the opportunity to spend time there. they have their own set of issues with mr. krugman in that they practice austerity. they grew by 8.3%. so they have, as a religious faith, that you can have austerity and growth, and they're living proof of that. so i always get upset with people who deal in absolutes because there's always gray involved here. also have obviouslyausterity differences between what's happening in david cameron's great britain, not great right now. they're suffering through a triple-dip recession. and you also have germany. what's happening in germany. and angela merkel ignored the calls for higher deficit

spending. she made a lot of tough choices. and the germans' economy is doing pretty darn well right now. >> bob grifeld, thank you so much. come back on the show. it was great to have you on. miles, you're going to rejoin the table next hour. still ahead, nearly 20 years ago, mark sanford was first elected to congress. well, now he wants to go back. we're going to break down the crowded and competitive and colorful race in south carolina. more "morning joe" when we come back. what's next?

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up next, thousands try out but only a handful survive the brutal training to become a navy s.e.a.l. up next, former s.e.a.l. officer eric writeon and how he's helping soldiers returning home from war. i know what you're thinking...

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the author of a the warrior's heart: becoming a man of compassion and courage" and founder of the mission continues organization. phil griffin has been telling us a lot about eric. it was kind of over the top when you read the jacket. >> it sounds as though we're talking about ourselves here, eric was born and raised in missouri. anyone can do that, harry truman, after being a rhodes scholar at oxford, check, easy, and serving as humane teitariah. >> who doesn't. >> boxing champion and decorated combat veteran, also founder of the nonprofit and author of a "new york times'" best-seller. are you planning on trying to get with the game at some point and make something of yourself? >> i'm working on it. >> slacker, slacker. >> wow. impressive resume for sure. and you've got some -- i want to hear about "the warrior's

heart," but you have this organization that you started that's entitled "the mission continues." let's start there. tell us about that. >> so what we're doing at the mission continues, we are working with hundreds of sve veterans around the country helping them come back and find a way to continue serving in communities across america. we're taking men and women like jeff hall who grew up in chicago with a family that had to survive based on donations from food banks who today, after a 20-year successful career in the navy, is actually helping run a food bank in boston, massachusetts. people like natalie williams who was a medic in the united states navy who today is actually working at st. louis children's hospital. >> so a lot of veterans will say, especially those who have endured or served in repeat tours of duty, it's hard to come back. >> yes. >> it's almost easier to go back. so what are some of your messages -- what helps them try and take that mission and that sense of mission and have it work for them at home?

>> well, one of the things that you find in the military is that every single day you're waking up and you've got a team around you. and you have a purposeful mission in front of you. when they come back home, one of the things that we're trying to do at the mission continues is to rebuild that sense of community for them, get them reengaged in addressing hands-on community problems, whether it's water conservation, immigration, but they start serving again here at home. and when they do that, they really start to rebuild that sense of purpose, and they make our communities stronger as well. >> joe, go ahead. i see him waving. go ahead. >> eric, talk to us about, first of all, it's remarkable reading what we've always heard that navy s.e.a.l.s have to go through too much, but you really, in this book, take us there. and you say that it's the mission of the navy s.e.a.l.s to separate the merely strong from those who are iron-willed. can you talk a little bit about that and talk about how that sort of severe, intense training

have prepared the navy s.e.a.l.s to do what they've had to do over the past decade to protect america? >> when a lot of people think about navy s.e.a.l.s, they focus immediately on the physical courage, on the tactical proficiency. but one of the things that you find, in order to make it through that training, in order to make it through that brutal training, you have to be doing it for a purpose that is larger than yourself. and for us, as we were going through the s.e.a.l. team training, there were moments when you said you know what? i can for the next ten seconds. i can do this for the guy on my right and left and i can be strong for them for the next ten seconds. if i can do that, i can make it for the next ten minutes and if i can do that, i can make it to lunch. what you found was that in order to be of service and to make it through that training, you had to be dedicated to a purpose larger than yourself. and that's what's helped the navy s.e.a.l.s accomplish missions overseas, and it's what they have, that sense to make it

here at home. >> when were you thrown upon cold rocks in the middle of the night and had to crawl up those cold rocks? what was the low point for you? >> joe, for me, my low point came at what should have been one of the easiest moments in hell week which is considered to be the hardest week in military training in the world. it's a week where the entire class sleeps for a total of two to five hours over the course of the entire week of training. for me, when we were allowed to sleep for the very first time, we were about 72 hours in. everyone was so tired that you'd literally fall asleep standing up. everybody ran into the tents to sleep for the first time, and i couldn't fall asleep. and i started to think then, i started to think, what's going to happen to me if i can't sleep? you only get two to five hours over the course of the week of training. i remember i was actually going a little crazy at the time. a thought ran through my mind, i thought to myself, maybe if i

can't sleep now, maybe they'll let me take a nap later. you're at this really, really difficult point. and for me what happened was i got up. i walked out of the tent. and i just said to myself, i said, this isn't about me. this test isn't about my service. this test is about my ability to be of service to the people who are sleeping in that tent right now. once i took that focus off of myself, i was able to go back into the tent. we started again. and continued with the training. >> john heilemann? >> i want to come back to the issue of veterans coming back and getting reintegrated back into society. on those interactions, on both sides there's a lot of assumptions. veterans bring back certain conceptions about what the world thinks of them. they've heard a lot of things about posttraumatic stress. talk about the misconceptions that each side has about the other and how they can get over that. >> so there are a couple of misconceptions on both sides. one of the misconceptions on the side of people who haven't served overseas is that they

often assume that everyone who's coming back has posttraumatic stress disorder. in fact, it's a small minority of veterans who have posttraumatic stress disorder. and those who do have it can find ways to get over posttraumatic stress, to work through those symptoms and find ways to reintegrate into their community. that's one misconception. on the veterans side, a lot of times there's this misconception that they're going to come back and no one is going to welcome them. that they're going to come back and no one is going to understand them. in fact, there are communities around the country that are ready to welcome veterans. they want them to come back home. and if we can create the right kind of dialogue and create the right kinds of opportunities for veterans to start to serve again, what we find is that communities, veterans, civilians and veterans, they come together, and they find great ways to make their communities stronger. >> the book is "the warrior's b heart. thank you so much. the organization as we mentioned earlier is the mission continues as well. eric, thank you. tomorrow on "morning joe," mayor

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the dow jones industrials at never before seen heights. >> all time record high. >> making history today. >> if they tell you everything's awful, tell them, no, it's not! [ laughter ] >> amen. the non-inflation-adjusted values of the stocks of 30 large companies that sort of track the american economy 50 years ago are higher than ever. we're back, baby! [ applause ] >> and the best part is we never had to fix our systemic issues. >> coming up next, the dow jones hits uncharted territory with its highest close ever, but with unemployment still hovering near 8%, what can washington do to bring the economy into balance? we'll discuss next on "morning joe." [ male announcer ] at his current pace,

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good morning. it's 8:00 on the east coast, 5 a.m. on the west coast. time to wake up as you take a live look at new york city. welcome back to "morning joe." back with us on set we have john heilemann, richard haass, and in washington, eugene robinson. all right. we'll get to the passing of hugo

chavez in just a moment, but first the dow. even though many americans are feeling the impact of the 2008 financial crisis still, wall street is not feeling such pain. yesterday the dow finished at an all-time high, breaking its previous record set in october of 2007. this year alone, the dow is up 8.8%. home depot has benefitted most from the dow's recovery. the company's market value has risen by $50 billion. however, not every company trading on the dow has seen the same success. 12 of the 30 stocks traded on the dow are still recovering from the financial crisis. >> so, mika, let me ask you, how do your friends feel? did you guys all get on that google chat where you could all have the conference center? is everybody popped up and talking about, oh, i'm excited because my job has gone up that much more, and i'm excited because my prospects -- >> no, because that's not

happening. >> there's such a disconnect, there's such a disconnect between main street and wall street, because i know a lot of your friends as well as my friends are hurting. they're hurting because they're falling further behind from where they were four, five years ago. the stats show it that mediian house income is down over the past four years. poverty rates are higher than ever before. and these numbers -- >> hunger. >> -- far from exciting me, actually make me a bit nervous about, again, the long-term structural problems in an economy where the rich keep getting richer, the poor keep getting poorer. >> they paycheck any angmake me. >> and washington can't do anything to address those underlying structural problems turning us into this divided society. >> yeah, and willie, i don't know what your circles are like, but i know a lot of highly qualified people who are still looking for work who look at these numbers and must feel more

angry than we do. it's a frustration situation in terms of our economy because it does not seem to be moving forward for the american people, and yet you've got statistics like this and numbers like the dow coming out, breaking records. >> unemployment's bad, even people who do have jobs aren't getting raises. but this is a moment where i think history should guide us. if you look at five years ago when it was at its peak, something terrible happened a year later. so i think if you read some of these economists, even people who work on wall street, the enthusiasm is tempered just a little bit. they know it's been helped along by the fed which has pumped money into the economy, quite frankly driven people into the stock market. >> on one hand it is vulnerable, extraordinarily low interest rates promised for a long time. it's also vulnerable to external shocks.

something with the euro zone, with iran. there are some strengths here. it does show something about the underlying strength of many american corporations, greater efficiencies that have been introduced. the one area where a lot of americans do benefit from this is in their retirement plans, 401(k)s and the rest. the question is how many americans got out of the market four or five years ago when they got scared and didn't get back into it. one of the lessons is you ought to be careful about market timing. no one's quite smart enough to pick the lows is highs. people who stuck it out did okay. >> joe? >> eugene robinson, you have richard haass talking about greater efficiencies and of course we all want to be as efficient as possible. u.s. workers more productive than ever. but the downside of that is of course manufacturing jobs that used to pay $33 an hour go overseas, they come back, and as we were saying yesterday, they

come back in the form of 14, 15, $16 an hour jobs that can't support a family of four the way they did back in the '60s and '70s. >> and also those jobs don't have the pensions and benefits they used to have. you look at the dow and say what's the reason it's so high? corporate profits are terrific, and so celebration in the board rooms, but why are they so high? well, because corporations, like countries, can borrow money at essentially no interest. so it's so cheap for them to borrow capital, and also because labor is cheap, because there's so many people unemployed, and it's so -- these are great times for the dow. they're not such great signs for the economy as a whole. and meanwhile, the main source of wealth for most families, the value of their home, really hasn't rebounded the way the dow

has. so i have a feeling most people are scratching their heads and saying, well, that's awfully nice for mitt romney, but not necessarily for me. >> lots of other news to get to, including, joe, jeb bush getting some criticism from republicans in washington. hundreds of venezuelans poured into the streets of caracas yesterday mourning the death of president hugo chavez who lost his battle with cancer. chavez's body will remain in state for three days. his funeral will be held this friday. venezuela's constitution statsz elections will be held within the next 30 days. the vice president will serve as an interim head of state until then. hugo chavez was 58 years old. richard haass, looking ahead, also looking back at his legacy. >> well, chavez was the ultimate pop list, and he was fueled by the increase in oil prices. it gave him a chance to run a

really active foreign policy. he essentially had his own agency for international development, and he would put billions of dollars through subsidized oil and the rest into places like cube ba, nicaragua, and so forth. he has a vision for latin america that was radical. he was not democratic, to say the least. he was an extreme populist. my own hunch is he did not put venezuela on anything like a long-term trajectory to sustain his own vision because so much of it again was simply because of the higher oil prices. so i think venezuela and the region faces a long period of uncertainty. my hunch is his own guy will one the election. he does have a lot of popular support, but he didn't, again, economically or politically put this country on a long-term track that can be sustained. the economy is in a real mess with inflation, with extraordinarily high levels of

debt. it's all based upon oil. so big question marks. and i still think the future in this part of the world is likely to look more like the democratic oriented countries than it is like cuba or venezuela. that's the good news here. >> joe? >> well, you know, obviously he's been a thorn in the side of the united states for some time. you look at some of the quotes of some people. i have lost a good friend, says sean penn, and i mourn a great hero, willie. and we'll let you comment on sean penn and oliver stone, if you would like and the impact of their statements and their friends. but "the new york times" has someone writing in today, saying that chavez left the country full of decay, dysfunction, blight. the wall street journal says

it's more impoverished today than ever before. even a newspaper account that ran in the "new york times" yesterday that seemed to be overly positive about his reign talked about how dissension in the country was more divided than ever. so it's a mixed legacy. >> well, as i think a lot of people have pointed out, i think the admiration for some people in hollywood was about sticking it to george w. bush as it was to hugo chavez. that said, it was somebody who was a populist. you can gone on human rights watch and look at all the abuses during his reign, including shutting down the media, ending term limits. obviously he was authoritarian and a dictator in some records but there are people in that country who feel he looked out for their interests in a way no one before had.

>> actually, willie, that's a very good point because for all his anti-democratic leanings and actions and everything that's been said is absolutely true. you would not want -- i don't think you or i would want to live in a country, bob, that hugo chavez was president of. nonetheless, he was elected four times, and he gerrymandered, and he suppressed the privately owned media. he kind of coerced them into running his long speeches and his sunday television show that would go on for hours and hours and hours. but you know, it was horrible for a lot of people and he kind of wrecked the economy by just spending the oil wealth as if it were coming out of a spigot. oil production is down. it's a mess. but he's very popular among the poor of venezuela who were ignored for years, for decades

by a kind of ecleptocratic political and business elite down there. and they were seething with anger that he was able to transform into political support and loyalty. i don't think his successor, who is his hand-picked guy, has that sort of charisma, but he'll probably win as richard haass said. >> we're going to come back to this with richard in just a bit, but some other news right now. with more republicans embracing immigration reform, former governor jeb bush, who you saw on the show yesterday, in the past mr. bush favored a path to citizenship for millions of undocumented workers, but in his new book he argues those immigrants should have been given permanent legal status instead. senator lindsey graham who is working to craft legislation on the issue, said the proposal outlined in mr. bush's book quote, undercuts what we're

trying to do. but governor bush seemed to change his stance during a series of recent interviews. >> let's wait for a few minutes and see now jeb bush changes his mind again. his opinion on immigration is not evolving, it's devolving. he keeps going backwards. frankly, i don't think jeb bush is a florida leader. i think marco rubio is. disturb has been elected to nothing recently. rubio is the leader on immigration. >> joe, a new poll by latino decisions shows immigration reform is by far the most important issue for hispanic voters. that's followed by the economy and jobs education and healthcare. >> john heilemann, let's talk, john heilemann, about your next book.

bush 2016. i think this may have to be the opening scene of jeb bush getting out of a cab on a dark morning and walking into the today show and announcing he's changed his mind. the second i heard it, i said, the game change boys better get an interview with him. this to me seems to be the greatest sign that jeb bush is looking to run in 2016. what are you thinking? >> well, he is certainly -- it was certainly surprising to hear some of the things he was saying on television yesterday on the today show and this show and elsewhere. there's a ton of speculation about what he might do in 2016. there's no one as talented as the republican bench is right now and as much as people talk about bobby jindal and chris christie and others, that he is certainly the giant among them. he doesn't have quite the status in the party that hillary clinton does in terms of being a

front runner if he were to get in, but there's no question that he's not if not head and shoulders, he's head above everybody else. i think it's people who are looking to -- are pretty busy right now trying to figure out where he's going. >> mika read some tea leaves. mika, the tea leaves that you were reading were around his waist. >> yes. >> you said he lost a lot of weight. you said he's still running. he's lost a lot of weight. >> no. he's either highly considering it or testing the waters or he's made the decision. if anyone's trying to read tea leaves and think that he might not, it's only because me might not be able to. >> yeah, there's really no reason for him to back off his position, reached haass, on the path to citizenship and moving it back now to a path to legal

status. as harry reid said, that's a position that's devolving. jeb had been critical of republicans over the primary process for not staking out his position on the path to citizenship. so something's in the works here and it's very unusual for any leader to take a step back on an issue like this. >> but it also tells you how fast this issue is moving. we're now at a play with the whole immigration play that six months ago was inconceivable. now comprehensive reform i think is likely and there's got to be quote, unquote, a path to citizenship along with green cards for the highly educated. but three years ago you would have thought the entire immigration board was border security and now you've got a fundamentally change on path to citizenship. this to me is a major shift in american politics. >> coming up on "morning joe," he's the star of the longest running show on the usa show, psych. now approaching its 100th

episode, dule hill joins us. and chuck todd joins us along with editor of buzzfeed, ben smith. first bill karins with the forecast. >> by the way, mika, bill karins, just so you know, bill karins is now celebrating his 100th inaccurate weather forecast. >> oh. >> very proud. >> that's okay. bill, take it e way. go for 101. >> it's just proof that no matter what you say around here, you get to keep coming back. >> d.c. still dealing with snow falling but not accumulating. 36 degrees. we have watched some airports piling up with delays. notice d.c. area and baltimore are not seeing many delays because of the most flights are canceled. la guardia about an hour and a half. so the white on the map shows you where the snow is. line over top of i-95.

we have gotten heavy amounts of snow out west. these areas here in west virginia, northern maryland and central maryland have piled up 4 to 8 inches of heavy, wet snow. we've already got 100,000 people without power. but so far the i-95 corridor has avoided that. i'm expecting the heaviest snow at about 10 a.m. to 4 pm in washington, d.c. if it debates to noon or 1:00 and it's not sticking, then we have to lower these snow totals a lot. so that's the timing for the d.c. area. as far as the rain, rain on the new jersey coast, also philadelphia rain, new york city rain a little later today. that'll change over to brief snow later tonight. then the storm goes off the coast. then we'll deal with large waves, coastal beach erosion. so as far as the snow totals, again this is through 24 hours. there's another piece of this storm thursday and friday night that will hit new england. this is for the next 24 hours. hagerstown, maryland, 8-14.

leaning for the lower cities themselves, but then providence, boston, new york, just a slushy inch or two. looks like some of those heavier bands of snow finally beginning to move in. then things will get treacherous out on the roads. so again the worst is just now arriving in the nation's capital. [ female announcer ] born from the sweet monk fruit, something this delicious could only come from nature. new nectresse. the 100% natural no-calorie sweetener made from the goodness of fruit. new nectresse. sweetness naturally. new nectresse. the people of bp made a commitment to the gulf., and every day since, we've worked hard to keep it. today, the beaches and gulf are open for everyone to enjoy. we've shared what we've learned, so we can all produce energy more safely.

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is it helpful when someone

as high profiled as dennis rodman goes and calls kim jung you think a nice guy? >> you know what, dennis rodman was a great basketball player, and as a diplomat, he was a great basketball player, and that's where we'll leave him. >> 20 past the hour, joining us from washington, nbc chief white house correspondent, chuck todd, and here on the set, editor-in-chief of buzzfeed ben smith, and we're back at the table with joe and me. just to start things off, gentlemen, congressman paul ryan finalizing his latest budget proposal aims to eliminate -- he floated the idea of tweaking his pledge to protect people aged had 55 and older from any impact of reforming medicare.

ryan reportedly favors the idea of raising the age to 56 or higher. but some members of his party in competitive districts are worried about the fallout. it would take $4 trillion in deficit reductions to balance the budget by 2023. how do we get one side to agree on something in terms of this, joe? >> yeah, and chuck todd, right now you've got paul ryan who's balancing so many things. obviously an interest in balancing the budget. at the same time conservatives inside the caucus that may not be as realistic as paul ryan about what's politically possible, and also doesn't have the battle scars from his medical fights several years ago, are pushing paul ryan and john boehner to say we do this in ten years. if you start moving that date to 56, 57, you tell a 57-year-old, how, we're changing the rules or

medicare, that's going to cause a political firestorm that's going to really put the republicans back on their heels when i think they're in a good spot with barack obama right now. >> and i'm curious to see how he gets to a balanced budget in ten years and keeping it note touching it to 55, and not raising taxes. that's going to be a very interesting thing to pull off. he's going to be either that or making a ton of assumptions on economic growth in order to make up whatever gap he needs to do it. that to me, i think that's why paul ryan was floating the idea of moving the number because he's probably struggling to get there without raising taxes. wouldn't be be fascinating with he does get there and close some tax loopholes and keeps it at 55? that would make the budget be taken more seriously by

washington and the white house. if you come up with a budget that what cans democratic programs and doesn't look like an effort to compromise, that's -- >> it'd certainly make paul ryan and the republican house look a lot more serious about deficit reduction, in the long-term debt reduction, actually, than the president or the democrats in congress who of course haven't passed a budget in over four years. but, chuck, i've got a plan, and maybe if paul ryan will put this in the budget. forget the tax increases, forget about medicare, just put it up. maybe if the house republican administration will stop allowing visitors, young kids from across america that roll up in school buses that come to washington, d.c., to live out the dream. >> here we go. >> as i've said before, like a freight train coming out of the midst in slow motion, thank you, professor pierceson for that.

maybe if they do what the white house is doing and bar little children from visiting -- >> well, i think the white house is only barring children. i think they're only barring children. >> i think so. >> that's right. just children. letting all adults -- >> forgive me, chuck, for demagoguing children, because this is something of course that democrats have never done before. but go ahead. >> can i say -- >> look, the white house is on -- they believe this is a no-win situation. somebody gets laid off based on this. and by the way, joe, let's take this in a larger context. that's how budgets never get cut in washington. when you sit there and say, well, that's not a lot of money, why are you doing that, that seems silly. that's not a lot of money, why are you doing that? that seems silly. that's how budgets never get cut in washington. so you could make the argument that eventually if you do a lot of the things that everybody thinks are silly and you cut a half a million there and a

million there and a million there, eventually you might get real money. ain't that the argument republicans used to make? >> miles, jump in. >> in running a business, when you need to make significant change, you do it one step at a time. as chuck said, you do is one cut at a time. you make cuts of half a million here and half a million there and half a million here. and then over time it becomes material. you can't do it just in one fell swoop. the other thing, though, it may be politically incorrect or difficult, but i mean, joe, entitlements at 55, the average life expectancy has gone up by some five years in the last 50. it's no longer logical to have entitlements cut in at 55 when life expectancy has gone up. there is some logic to the idea of raising it. and a year or two makes such a

material difference to deficits that to -- >> why's it so hard? >> to not bring logic and action together really doesn't make sense. >> i think -- >> well, again, i've been talking for some time -- i'm sorry, john. i've been talking for some time about how we've got to reform the entitlement process. but you want to give americans lead time to prepare. you don't -- you know, the closer you get to 62 or the closer you get to 65, the more unfair those cuts and those changes are. when you want to avoid european austerity as i said comes in the form of a postcard to a greek postal worker saying, guess what, your retirement structure has changed, you're now going to be getting 50% less of your retirement benefits. we do need to give americans lead time. and that's why i think even 55 is too soon. we have a generational crash

coming, and by 2021, 22, we better have a system that's already been changed and planned ahead ten years because we've got to give americans lead time to prepare for some dramatic changes. i'm sorry, john, go ahead. >> ben. >> i would say besides what paul ryan is finding, there's not a -- there's this sort of i think the democrats like to say that republicans are beating the drum for deep entitlement cuts, but i think what paul ryan is finding this week is a lot of republicans, if it has to happen, it should happen but they'd rather the democrats owned it. >> i will ask chuck, because i'm missing him so much. chuck, you're a well-known vote counter. when it comes to, if there is a sweet spot for entitlement reform of any kind, what does it look like that can marshall some

kind of democratic support? because in the end, there's a lot who think that we don't really have an immediate short-term entitlement crisis and that talks of doing things in a dramatic way is just crazy. so they're willing to contemplate the notion of entitlement reforms down the line. what does a deal look like that could get a sufficient number of democratic votes to make this actually possible? >> well, if the president himself has taken off raising the age, you're going to get 45 or 50 democrats. if you're going to deal with the age -- and honestly, i've always -- i don't know why this is in the hands of politicians. i think they need to figure out how to get this decision away from themselves a little bit. force actuary tables to make these decisions, and raise it a year every 25 years, in 25 years, which i think is what bowles-simpson did. i think they need to figure out a way, if you take the issue

away from the politicians where just the calendar makes these decisions for them a little bit, as we found out, they did a pretty good job in sequester, and we'll find out whether this was an effective way to deal with government spending cuts. but in sequester, the idea of forcing them of inaction leading to action, actually might have turned out to be in the most effective way that we see government spending ever cut in our life-times. and maybe you have to figure out how to take it out of -- >> i don't think there are a lot of people in capitol hill right now or certainly the white house who are looking at the sequestration decision and saying wow, that was a great idea, let's do that again. >> but if they really thought -- i'm sorry, you know what, yes, they say it, but if they really wanted to stop it, there were majorities to stop it. neither side wanted to make a serious effort. i think there's a silent majority who decided maybe there's no way to deal with this

and this was the only way we can have a rational discussion about the budget in six months. let's have this go into effect and then have the discussion about where do we go next. >> joe. >> and mika, ben touched on i think a very important point. the fact is it's not just democrats who are scared to do dramatic things to entitlement programs. it's the overwhelming majority of republicans, outside of paul ryan who took a courageous stance several years ago. i was glad he gave us a starting point. my concern is i've got no problem with entitlement reform. i've been banging that drum since 1995. my problem is that you don't -- if you don't give seniors a sufficient lead time -- actually, future generations of beneficiaries, you've got to give them the lead time. and 55's even a little too tight. >> miles? >> i think the bottom line is you need to move the ball down

the field. the question is how far and how fast, but to not take action is completely irresponsible. and we've talked about simpson-bowles. i saw 2 1/2 years ago when simpson presented. i didn't say all the components were practical but it addressed all of the issues in an intelligent way to have a discussion. >> let me just quickly say, john heilemann was also at the bohemian club and he wrote some notes, but it was about certain things he was picking in san francisco. do you even remember that weekend? >> i do, joe. it's seered in my memory. that'll never fade. >> but club reference, everybody's wikipediaing that right now. >> ben, what are you guys pursuing in buzzfeed today?

>> i think one of the interesting stories, jeb bush, what he's doing, i think whether he can handle the current news cycle. he really botched this week. >> all right. thank you. chuck, we'll see you coming up in a few minutes on "the daily rundown." coming up, the other headlines, including a big change coming to airport security. "morning joe" is back in a moment. [ kitt ] you know what's impressive? a talking car. but i'll tell you what impresses me. a talking train. this ge locomotive can tell you exactly where it is, what it's carrying, while using less fuel. delivering whatever the world needs, when it needs it. ♪ after all, what's the point of talking if you don't have something important to say? ♪

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that's a good point. let's just leave it there, actually. some "business before the bell" headlines. in less than an hour, the dow jones will hope at its highest level ever. this year alone the dow is up 8.8%. home depot has benefited the most from the dow's recovery. the company's value has risen by $50 billion. the largest railroad in the u.s. and one of the country's biggest consumers of diesel fuel is planning to switch to natural gas. the bnsf railroad company will begin testing natural gas as a fuel source for its locomotives this year. if successful, the experiment

could result in a decrease on oil dependence by the railroad industry. for the first time since the september 11th attacks, the tsa will allow small pocket knives on u.s. flights. flight attendants have voiced their concerns, saying policy change will put the lives of passengers and crew members in danger. >> what's the case for that? >> up next, mark sanford looks to break back into politics with a run to reclaim the seat he once held in congress. we'll look at that race, next on "morning joe." [ male announcer ] marie callender's finally found a way

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south carolina's in search of a congressman, and next month, the state will hold a special election to fill the seat vacated by tim scott, who was appointed to the senate when gym demonitor resigned. enter former south carolina governor mark sanford who is looking to return to congress after representing the same district nearly 20 years ago. but he'll have to overcome both a crowded field of 15 other republicans and his own past. >> i'm running for congress. >> hi, i'm curtis -- >> chief blanfurd. >> in a field chuck full of contenders, cutting through the noise can be tough. voters know former governor sanford's name. >> i've been unfaithful to my wife. i developed a relationship with

a -- what started as a dear, dear friend from argentina. >> but that name recognition could hurt as much as help. today he's running on two issues, fixing the debt and forgiveness. >> none of us go through life without mistakes. we can learn a lot about grace, a god of second chances, and be the better for it. >> sanford is trying to focus attention on his record of cutting government spending. >> i absolutely failed in my personal life and marriage, but one place i didn't ever fail was with the taxpayer. if you were look at my 20 years in politics, what you'd see is a remarkable consistency. >> mark sanford argued bitterly with the state legislature, famously carrying two pigs into the statehouse to protest. he was the only governor to try and reject federal stimulus funding for his state, and he

prides himself as a tax reformer. but the scandal took its political toll. he left office with just a 36% approval rating and now faces a hungry pack of would-be spoilers. >> i'm talking rick the stick bryant. elizabeth killing them softly mothly. and chip, this is my actual name lime house. >> among the candidates are some other well-known names, including teddy turner, son of ted turner. turner has spent tens of thousands of dollars on ads touting his economic credentials and being a washington outsider. but his famous dad may have an impact. >> what? conservative teddy turner? how did you get to be a conservative with such a liberal father? >> well, my dad asked me that all the time. >> and whoever makes it out of the march 19th republican

primary is almost certain to meet democrat elizabeth colbert busch. if her middle name sounds fegly familiar, try pronouncing it without the "t." . holy cow, my sister is running for congress. >> by the way, joe, elizabeth colbert busch actually donated $500 to mark sanford's campaign back in 2001 and she would face an uphill battle because the district hasn't gone blue in more than 30 years. >> no doubt mark sanford does have a battle, but he seems to be doing well. what i always liked about mark sanford he went off big-spending republicans as much as after big-spending democrats. you had that part in the package where he was carrying the pigs into the chamber. guess who was in the chamber? >> who? >> republicans. they were all republicans, and

man, those career politicians in columbia, south carolina, were not happy that a governor in their own party was outing them and basically exposing their pork barrel projects. i think at the end of the day, the people in south carolina are going to be forgiving and like me, they're very concerned about the size of the debt, the long-term debt and deficits, and mark sanford has a very long, consistent, strong record on that, and i think it's probably going to help him a lot down there. >> south carolina has been forgiving recently in a big way. also his record is on the right side of this conversation for sure. up next, from the hit show "psych," actor dule hill joins us. keep it here on "morning joe." [ female announcer ] going to sleep may be easy, but when you wake up

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what are you doing here? >> don't worry, gus, i come in peace. i'm hear to apologize, not to you, to rachel. clearly you and i got off on the wrong foot, or whatever you guys call it across the pond. >> we call it a foot.

>> it was my fault. >> that was very sweet of you. >> you seem like a sweet girl. >> thank you, sean. >> unfortunately, you are also a killer, a killer of women, at least with blonde hair. >> no, sean. you will not take it beautiful relationship and accuse of girl of murder. >> that has happened before? >> yes. >> i can't help it if she likes to kill. >> there's a real serial killer out there. >> did you just call me your girlfriend? >> i'm sorry. >> don't be. >> that was a scene from an upcoming episode of "psych" on usa. joining us now, he is psyched. the co star, dule hill. good to have you here. >> glad to be back. >> this is season number -- >> seven. >> wow. and renewed already for an eighth. what do you think the key to this show's success is, because it's hard in this, i think, atmosphere to even get something

on the air even though there's a need for content, it's making it stick that i think is the key. >> i think it's multiple things. we're like kids in a candy store that people can relate to who don't have a childhood dream, and the fact these guys have grown up to live their dream. >> grown-up men. >> and i think the social media is great too. the media that has done a great job. >> how do they do that? >> whether it's the hashtag killer we did online last year, whether it's the slumber party we did a few weeks ago, getting the psychos hyped for the return of the reason, and then all kinds of things they do on facebook and twitter. >> since this show revolves around grown-up men acting like children, i will give john heilemann the next question. >> you all would be great on the show. >> yeah. in a historical kind of way. >> i'm the one that acts like a

child. he acts like an 80-year-old man. >> it balances out. >> you can be like henry or lassie. >> you guys have a muffle episode coming up right? >> yes. "psych" meets "glee." >> do you sing? >> we all sing. >> you do? >> we filmed it. >> can you sing for me right now? >> morning, mika, here we are. ♪ >> drinking my starbucks tea. >> that's good. >> more? >> it's early in the morning, you know what i mean? >> yeah. >> john and john and mika. ♪ >> wow. he's open. that's pretty good. >> i'm always curious, how much is ad libbed, how much can you all work on as you're running through an episode. are there moments of inspiration

where something's not in the script? >> i think 85% of the time, the other 15 is ad lib. or it could be something from the crew throwing something in. >> it says there's some sort of tap dance skills, do you use? >> i am a -- i do tap a little bit in the musical. >> you do? let's do it. i've always wanted to tap dance. i'm terrible at it. i'll try it. >> i've been up since 6:00 in the morning. >> what does that mean? >> that's incredible. this is fun. >> i feel like you were tap dancing all the time out here on this show. >> oh, yeah, that's what we do. very cool. so what are you -- oh, only 15 seconds left. what's your favorite part of doing this show and what's the part you hate the most? >> i think it's the comradery, we have a great dynamic there

working as cast and crew, and i think the hardest part is being away from my family so long, six months in vancouver. if i was here in new york, i would do it for a life-time. >> next time you want to talk about the bart let administration. >> which show have you enjoyed more, west wing and this. >> obviously the west wing was a different dynamic, but the "psych" fans are the best ever. >> "psych" airs tonight on usa, 9 pm, 10 pm. thank you, dl dialog w, dule hi. next, what did we learn today?

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