word with lawrence o'donnell." the president went back to connecticut today to talk to the people who republicans are hoping america will forget. >> we will not walk away from the promises we made. we're not for getting. >> president obama will be in connecticut this afternoon. >> it really is a make or break week. >> make or break week for gun legislation. >> connecticut has shown the way. now is the time for congress to do the same. >> the u.s. senate is about to reconvene. >> congress is back tackling gun legislation. >> after a two week recess. >> let's have a debate on violence in america. >> 13 senate republicans threatened threats of the filibuster. >> senate republicans seem afraid to engage in the debate. >> i don't understand it. the purpose of the united states

senate is to debate. >> going to filibuster a bill they don't even know. >> i don't understand it, what are we afraid of? >> 90% believe we should do something. >> i don't think 90% agree it is monday. >> allow a vote. >> there's no reason for this blatant obstruction. >> the second storm is brewing over the budget. >> wednesday, the president will formally send his budget to congress. >> send his budget blueprints to congress. >> this is the compromise i sent to the speaker last year. >> the question is whether anger from the left makes republicans give the budget a second look. >> the president is showing a little leg here. >> there you go. >> it is somewhat encouraging. >> he offers a tantalizing budget proposal. >> it is not my ideal plan. >> not saying it is perfect. >> it is a compromise i am willing to accept. >> for john boehner to say it is a waste of time, it is not. >> members of congress, welcome back. >> after two week recess, please, please, get to work.

talking about life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. >> the kids at sandy hook were aware they were where they were supposed to be. so were movie goers in aurora and worshippers in oak creek, so was gabrielle giffords, at a super market, listening to concerns of her constituents. they were exactly where they were supposed to be. they were also exercising their rights, to assemble peaceably, worship freely and safely. they were exercising the rights of life and liberty, the pursuit of happiness. >> the right to life is self-evident, so said our founding fathers.

we hold these truths to be self-evident. the first right the founding fathers mention was the right to life. rights can come into conflict with other rights. my right to swing my fist ends where your nose begins. the right to bear arms, if it is to be interpreted as individual right, can come into conflict with your right to life. the right for nancy lanza to bear arms, own arms, to share her arms with her gravely disturbed son came into conflict with 26 individuals' rights to life in sandy hook elementary, rights that were snuffed out by the legally obtained assault weapon and legally obtained high capacity magazines that nancy lanza's son used to kill her and then killed 20 children and 6 adults in an elementary school. government's job is to balance those rights.

the government is now populated by some who hold the right to bear arms higher than the right to life. president obama is not one of them. >> we've got to believe that, you know, every once in a while we set politics aside, we just do what's right. you got to believe that. and if you believe that, i'm asking you to stand up. if you believe in the right to bear arms like i do, but think we should prevent an irresponsible thing from producing harm, stand up. stand up. if you believe the families of newtown, aurora, virginia tech, and those gunned down in the last four months deserve a vote,

we all have to stand up. you want the people you send to washington to have an iota of the courage that the educators at sandy hook showed when danger arrived on their doorstep, then we all have to stand up. if we do, if we come together, raise our voices together, demand this change together, i'm convinced cooperation and common sense will prevail. we will find sensible, intelligent ways to make this country stronger and safer for our children, so let's do the right thing. let's do right by our kids. let's do right by these families. let's get this done, connecticut. thank you, god bless you. god bless the united states of america. >> krystal ball, sounds simple when he talks about it. we are trying to find a balance. there's a right to bear arms, a right to life. >> that's right, 90% of

americans think it would be reasonable to have at least a background check before you exercise your right to bear arms. one thing that was clear to me in this speech, has been clear to us all along, has not been clear to everyone, that the president's engagement on gun control is not some political tactic, some chess move. this is an issue that he cares deeply about and is willing to use his political capital, as much as he possibly can, to get something done. now, will we actually get something done? it's not looking great in terms of universal background checks, but i have to say on an issue where 90%, 9 out of 10 americans support universal background checks, if republicans block this at this moment, they may be able to do that in the short term, but if there's no long term price to be paid for that,

we don't have a democracy in this country. >> ari, the right to life, which republicans like to talk about in terms of abortion cases, they completely ignore pretending that the second amendment is a right that is paramount and rises above all others. >> they do. and sort of the constitutionalization of the political differences is applied selectively. i am reminded of what senator cruz did and you reported on here, he talked about the notion that there's no limits on any rights. actually, the first amendment has limitations, the second, the fourth has many limitations because of the aggressive interest of the police in calling anything a reasonable search and seizure. so we do have a blueprint for this. we know how it works. and nothing that's on the table on the hill now would confiscate guns at all. that's not even an issue. i agree and want to echo something krystal said that's important and what you showed in that long excerpt from the speech, this was not a political

speech, this is against the white house's political agenda, right? we all know and anyone that spent any time looking at congress knows it is difficult for either party to take on guns or the nra, nor does the president politically want to make this the big focus when there's immigration and budget he is introducing wednesday. what we are seeing is the best of barack obama this week, a man who's putting the country first to adopt john mccain's famous appeal, doing it in a real way with political risk because it is that important. one of his advisers said although he made many tough decisions, the day of that massacre was the toughest day of his presidency in his mind. i think we see that in the rigor he is bringing to try to do the right thing. >> the president watched "60 minutes," scott pelley did a great job speaking to victims of families, the parents who sat there talking about what it is like to lose a child. president obama used that today. let's listen to this.

>> i've heard nicole talk about what her life has been like since dillon was taken from her in december. one thing she said struck me. she said every night i beg for him to come to me in my dreams so that i can see him again. and during the day i just focus on what i need to do to honor him and make change. now, if nicole can summon the courage to do that, how can the rest of us do any less? >> how do you stay in touch with the child that you lost? >> you know, i dream about him all the time and we talk and he and i talk, when i take my walks, i just feel him. if i ask him to be present, he is. and i know he'll always be there. and i have faith, too.

i have faith that he is. >> krystal, not easy for these parents to do what they did on "60 minutes." they're strongly behind the president on this. >> absolutely. just incredibly courageous to be willing to grieve publicly and put themselves out there in the public sphere in this way. and i just have to think not to switch back to the crass politics of this, but for republicans not to even have the courage to vote no, but to block a bill from even coming to the senate floor. i just don't know how you defend that, i don't think you can defend that. the other part of the speech tonight from the president was framing this saying they're using these tactics to block even taking a vote. these families deserve to have a vote. i think that framing is incredibly important. i think it could actually be something that maybe brought filibuster reform around because it is an idea that makes sense to american people. >> a price to having a weak

minority leader, mitch mcconnell so weak in his home state, he had to join this group saying we will filibuster. leaders on either side never join filibusters. he is talking about doing that. fran seen wheeler is one of the voices they hope you don't hear, president obama and "60 minutes" are doing everything to make sure they do hear. >> i heard fran seen wheeler that lost her son ben that day say the four months since the tragedy might feel like a brief moment for some, but for her it feels like it has been years since she saw ben. and she's determined not to let what happened that day just fade away. >> people do change because the country goes in different places, but we're going to bring it right back so that america can see, four months to them, it feels like it just happened a moment ago.

and yet it's been years since i've seen my son, okay? so we're just -- we're not going anywhere, we're here, and we're going to be here. >> that's hard to watch because i don't think anyone who hasn't been through something like that fully knows what she is going through, but i think any tragedy like this goes back to what we are as a nation. that's why as you pointed out, lawrence, the president was talking about our very founding principles tonight because we have to figure out what we do as a nation, as a democracy, to resolve and regulate in this area. i can tell you, if we don't have votes, what we were saying earlier, we don't have a democracy. that's the surest way to start a wider outrage in this country. it goes beyond what we do, goes to the point that we have a minority party that doesn't even want to have a debate in the

light of day, and that's wrong. >> thank you both for joining me tonight. coming up, why margaret thatcher is not remembered as a socialist. she did strongly support good socialist programs and she helped get rid of some of the bad ones as any good socialist would do. and in the "rewrite," why we should thank jay-z and beyonce. if you have been moved by the words of barack obama in speeches, you've probably been moved by some of the words written in those speeches by john favreau who will join me. and julia louis-dreyfus, the funniest person. stay with us. asional have constipation,

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americans in poverty and the unemployed seem easy to forget

that sequester cuts will make it more difficult for people experiencing hard times. their plight depicted in a new broadway play, "hands on a hard body" about people competing to pin a pickup truck. unfortunately, they don't have lobbyists to represent them in the halls of congress, but they have the voice of, and i mean this, the best presidential speech writer in history. he will join me next. mine was earned in djibouti, africa, 2004.

the battle of bataan, 1942. [ all ] fort benning, georgia, in 1999. [ male announcer ] usaa auto insurance is often handed down from generation to generation because it offers a superior level of protection and because usaa's commitment to serve the military, veterans, and their families is without equal. begin your legacy. get an auto-insurance quote. usaa. we know what it means to serve.

now what's important to understand is not everyone will feel the pain of these cuts right away. the pain will be real. >> that was president obama on the first day sequestration took effect on march 1st. who was being hurt by the sequester budget cuts? in his first column for "the daily beast" the president's former speech writer said we can ask americans who are losing their jobs at military bases in tennessee, illinois, and virginia, week ask health care employees facing layoffs or teachers in iowa, workers cleaning up nuclear waste in washington, ask the children in ohio and pennsylvania who will no longer receive early education that head start provides. we can ask the scientists and researchers at duke and university of florida who must end their pursuit of discoveries that could change or save lives. we can ask the hungry families in utah who can no longer rely on the local food pantry,

disabled tenants in california that will lose housing vouchers, elderly cancer patients in south carolina being denied chemotherapy treatment, or the 39-year-old army veteran in maryland who believes the only way to survive his pay cut is with another combat deployment. every memorable speech given by senator barack obama and presidential candidate barack obama and president barack obama was made better, stronger, and more moving by the help of john favreau who left his post as the president's top speech writer, not long after his second inaugural address. when he left the white house, president obama said he has become a friend and a collaborator on virtually every major speech i have given in the senate, on the campaign trail, and in the white house. john favreau joins us from washington. thanks for joining us, john. >> thanks for having me, lawrence. >> i hope it becomes a regular thing.

i would love to spend all of this time praising your writing, writer to writer. >> thank you. >> but i've said it, i think your team was the best speech writing team the white house ever had. i think the president is the best presidential speech writer of his own material that i've heard, i assume you as boss of that team are the best of the best. thanks for that, john. i am fascinated in how much focus the people who are suffering, the sequester cuts and the cuts to come, are not getting attention in the crossfire of all of the issues floating around washington these days. the only attention that goes anywhere near their direction is the obsession with budget cutting that republicans continue to push. >> yeah, that's right, lawrence. i mean, a month ago a lot of republicans and some folks in the media were saying the president was exaggerating the effects of the sequester. a month later, we see these effects and cuts are real and

hurting a lot of people. kids losing education, cancer patients being turned away. the republican economic plan after the 2012 election is the sequester on steroids, a super sized sequester. it is going to get rid of most government services and investments outside of health care, defense and social security. and that means that everything that we're seeing now, all of these cuts and pain that a lot of people are feeling will be magnified if that comes to pass. the question for republicans is is there going to be one candidate, one 2016 candidate that stands up and says i am a small government conservative, i don't want a lot of spending but this goes too far, this is not what this party stands for, this is not how you build a strong economy or strong middle class. >> another question is is there anything the president can say that republicans will be even willing to entertain? we saw the president's budget

come out with a lot of steps toward republicans, including the notion of chain cpi, immediately dismissed by john boehner. listen to fox news neil cavuto and john boehner and how he reacted to the press's proposal. >> rejects it out of hand because the president includes tax hikes in the deal. keep in mind, the tax hikes the president is talking about were and are the same hikes speaker boehner was negotiating a little more than a year ago. closing tax loopholes and credits that would make for a cleaner tax code. and now coupled with the first ever shot at reigning in out of control entitlements. boehner called it essentially a waste of time. this is the same boehner that hated it when the white house did the same to his buddy paul ryan when ryan was trying to rein in medicare. time to stop saying no and say maybe.

>> it is hard to get a crack in the republican wall for president obama. >> it is. and i was on the last trip with the president, we were in virginia, and there was a republican congressman that came with us who represents a district effected by the sequester because of military bases. he said i am willing to consider revenues, closing loopholes for millionaires if it means protecting jobs in my district. he was later destroyed by his caucus and special interest groups for even contemplating compromise. this is exactly the thing we need to stop. this is what drives people insane about washington. the president and his budget met the republicans more than halfway. ratio of spending cuts to revenue since the president took office is more than two to one. yet they are still saying no to a dime of tax hikes on the

richest people in the world. >> john, thanks for joining me in what i hope is the first of many appearances on "the last word." >> thank you for having me, lawrence, appreciate it. coming up, travel to cuba may be a crime for you, not for jay-z and beyonce, and that's the stupidest thing in american foreign policy. that's coming up. governor of getting it done. you know how to dance... with a deadline. and you...rent from national. because only national lets you choose any car in the aisle... and go. you can even take a full-size or above, and still pay the mid-size price. this is awesome. [ male announcer ] yes, it is, business pro. yes, it is. go national. go like a pro. [ male announcer ] how could switchgrass in argentina, change engineering in dubai,

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what is a british conservative? a british conservative is way

more liberal than an american liberal. but american conservatives don't know that, which explains a lot about what they love about margaret thatcher, who was a british conservative, which is to say a british socialist. that's next. with the spark cash card from capital one... boris earns unlimited rewards for his small business. can i get the smith contract, please? thank you. that's three new paper shredders. [ boris ] put 'em on my spark card. [ garth ] boris' small business earns 2% cash back on every purchase every day. great businesses deserve unlimited rewards. read back the chicken's testimony, please.

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or can not empty your bladder, you should not take toviaz. get emergency medical help right away if your face, lips, throat or tongue swells. toviaz can cause blurred vision, dizziness, drowsiness and decreased sweating. do not drive, operate machinery or do unsafe tasks until you know how toviaz affects you. the most common side effects are dry mouth and constipation. talk to your doctor about toviaz. diarrhea, gas, bloating? yes! one phillips' colon health probiotic cap each day helps defend against these digestive issues... with three strains of good bacteria. [ phillips' lady ] live the regular life. phillips'. with the innovating and the transforming and the revolutionizing. it's enough to make you forget that you're flying five hundred miles an hour on a chair that just became a bed. you see, we're doing some changing of our own. ah, we can talk about it later.

we're putting the wonder back into air travel, one innovation at a time. the new american is arriving. in the spotlight, the death of socialism in the united kingdom. today in his farewell to margaret thatcher, george will said she helped bury socialism as a doctrine of governance. today, it was hard to tell who republicans loved more, ronald reagan or margaret thatcher. it is also hard to tell which of the republicans mythologize more. republicans falsely credit reagan and thatcher which bringing down the soviet union when they did no such thing. the soviet union collapsed from within. to believe that the soviet union would be thriving today were it

not for reagan and thatcher is to believe that communism is a good idea, that it works. in fact, imperialistic dictatorial communism collapsed of its own horrible weight. it simply could not survive in a modern world where freedom is necessary in every economy as is by the way some socialism as margaret thatcher well understood. it is not as if no one knew that the soviet union was going to collapse. well, it's actually as if only one person knew. senator daniel patrick moynihan predicted in 1979 it would collapse. the horribly run economy couldn't possibly provide for the people of the many different countries who were thrown together against their will under the thinly stretched banner of the imperialistic soviet union. as mentioned, the other false credit, margaret thatcher gets, is for killing socialism and

burying it as george will said. what do you call a socialist that gets rid of bad socialism and keeps good socialism, like i would? i call that person a good socialist, like margaret thatcher. >> the principle that adequate health care should be provided for all regardless of ability to pay must be the foundation of any arrangement for financing the health service. we stand by that. >> ah, there's margaret thatcher voicing her unyielding support for socialism in britain's health care sector. now, as i've said before on this program, there's good socialism and bad socialism just as there's good capitalism and bad capitalism. we should be trying to use good socialism and good capitalism where necessary which is all she tried to do. she saw it would be better for

british airways to be run as a private company instead of run by the government, but she did not think health care should be left to capitalism. or there wasn't a large enough role for socialism to play in housing, for example, in britain. she was in favor of that. nor did she seek to abolish government funded pension system for all, their form of social security, which like ours is a socialist program. she boasted about spending more on socialism than the labor party. >> for every pound labor spends on national health service, this government has spent three. >> she also bragged about spending more on the social security system. >> next month, the old age pension will go up by 11%. and that despite the worst recession since the 1930s.

>> each of those things are beyond the pale for republicans that loved margaret thatcher so much, as is extending unemployment insurance. >> the world recession has brought high unemployment to almost every country. again and again governments took the lead extending unemployment insurance. >> and republicans who today are trying to cut funding for the disabled in social security would be horrified by what margaret thatcher did on spending for the disabled. >> spending on people who are sick and disabled has very nearly doubled under this government again after allowing for inflation. this october we gave extra help to 2.5 million pensioners who need it most and abolished the earnings law. >> of course, sarah palin's handlers didn't tell her about any of this before they wrote a statement for her, praising

margaret thatcher, and posted it on facebook. she was at least a tax cutter, i'll say that for margaret thatcher, but not the kind of tax cutter a republican in this country could vote for. cut the top income tax bracket from 83% to 60%. you see, british conservatives like thatcher are way to the left of american liberals. there's no american liberal who would advocate a 60% top income tax rate. in her last year, she did manage to get the top income tax rate to 40%, only in her last year, which is still higher than barack obama's top income tax rate of 39.6%, and yeah, those two tax rates are close, but hey, higher is higher, and all the margaret thatcher worshippers out there tonight wouldn't be squirming now if they had the lower tax rate, if

the thatcher tax rate didn't end at a spot above the obama top tax rate and the clinton top tax rate. but she didn't do that. she didn't get the tax rates lower because she wasn't conservative enough. i repeat. get this. british conservatives aren't as conservative as american conservatives, and british conservatives are more liberal than american liberals. margaret thatcher left office with the lowest bracket, the lowest income tax bracket, at 25%, where today's republicans want the highest income tax bracket to be. she also doubled the british sales tax, the value added tax. she doubled it to 15%, a tax that dramatically increases the costs of everything you buy in that country. that's a sharply regressive tax, but it is a tax used to fund

social programs and margaret thatcher doubled that tax, and yet she's still loved by american republicans who are ignorant of every single thing i have told you so far. when thatcher came into office, taxes as a share of gdp were 33%. when thatcher left office, that was 35%. grover norquist and all of the republican worshippers of margaret thatcher are outraged today that we are averaging 18%. those republicans insist that it is outrageous in this country for taxes to be 18% of our gdp, which is about half of what they were under margaret thatcher. half! barack obama is half the taxer that margaret thatcher was, half the socialist that margaret thatcher was. president obama hasn't dare

propose a health care program as purely socialistic as margaret thatcher's health care system, the one she supported and bragged about. but republicans call barack obama a socialist as if it is an epithet, and call margaret thatcher a hero. ignorance is the first requirement for republicans adoration of margaret thatcher. sarah palin and most republican presidential candidates would be horrified to discover that margaret thatcher actually believed in evolution. >> i began with charles darwin and his work on the theory of evolution of the origin of species. darwin's voyages were among the high points of scientific discovery. the beliefs of darwin's era should help to see us through, the belief in reason and the scientific method. >> every elected republican in

washington would refuse to applaud if they heard margaret thatcher say this. >> it is mankind and his activities which are changing the environment of our planet in damaging and dangerous ways. the problem of global climate change is one that effects us all, and actually will only be effective if it is taken at the international level. it is no good squabbling over who is responsible and who should pay. each country should contribute. those that are industrialized must contribute more to help those that are not. these protocols must be binding and there must be effective regimes to supervise and more tore their application. >> thatcher was horribly conservative and horribly wrong about some things, and i mean horribly. she supported apartheid in south africa, regarded nelson mandela and his congress as terrorists

and was sharply anti-gay rights. >> children who need to be taught to respect traditional moral values are being taught that they have an inalienable right to be gay. >> margaret thatcher, the socialist, is gone, but margaret thatcher the socialist was forgotten long before she was gone. [ lisa ] my name's lisa, and chantix helped me quit. i honestly loved smoking, and i honestly didn't think i would ever quit. [ male announcer ] along with support, chantix (varenicline) is proven to help people quit smoking. it reduces the urge to smoke. it put me at ease that you could smoke on the first week. [ male announcer ] some people had changes in behavior, thinking or mood, hostility, agitation, depressed mood and suicidal thoughts or actions while taking or after stopping chantix. if you notice any of these stop taking chantix and call your doctor right away. tell your doctor about any history of depression or other mental health problems,

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bing wins it! bing won. bing did win. people prefer bing over google for the web's top searches. don't believe it? go to bingiton.com and see what you're missing. in tonight's "rewrite," rewriting the crime of going to cuba. jay-z and beyonce's trip to cuba presents us with a crime. either they committed a crime by going there or it is a crime that they get to go there legally and you can't. but the biggest crime of all is the single stupidest piece, the embargo with trade with cuba. of course, beyonce and jay-z and anyone else should be able to go for a vacation to celebrate their fifth wedding anniversary as it was originally reported in their case. now that the couple's lawyers are controlling the message, the trip is described as a legal cultural exchange with cuba.

but they did bring body guards with them who would not fit under our government's definition of who would be allowed to participate in a legal cultural exchange trip to cuba, they also brought their mothers, beyonce and jay-z's mother came along for the ride. if their trip was legal, they got very special treatment from the obama administration, specifically the treasury department, which authorizes such trips. the couple's lawyers refuse to disclose any detail of the trip, but all indications at this stage are that they did not travel with a group that has a license to travel to cuba, like, for example, smithsonian journeys which offers trips starting at $5880 per person. thousands of americans are on those legal trips every year, and probably many, many thousands more americans simply slip into cuba from mexico, much cheaper that way, then return

via mexico, so that there's no trace of them having been in cuba, because cuban authorities routinely don't stamp american passports because they, of course, want to help us violate our stupid american laws about visiting cuba. going to cuba was easy for me because i have the general license to go to cuba any time i feel like it. that license is granted to all "journalists", violating our stupid law about travel to cuba turns out to be not very risky. you can be fined, almost no one is hit with a big fine when caught. the typical fine is about a thousand dollars. the problem for americans occurs when we are trying to re-enter this country. you know that form you fill out that asks what countries have you visited while you were away? i came back to this country through mexico, i filled out that line saying i visited two countries, mexico and cuba, and i handed it to the agent when i

was going through. the agent, i was ready to show the agent my msnbc id, but he looked at the form, looked at the two words, cuba and mexico, said nothing, and waved me on. another agent did the same thing with a friend of mine on the same flight. i advised my friend to actually tell the truth on the form, even though there was no legal basis for his trip to cuba. he put cuba and mexico on his form. the agent looked at that, asked no questions, and just waved him into the united states of america. what tens of others do, put the word mexico on the form, never mention cuba, in effect lie their way back into their country. we can thank the electoral college for all of this insanity because florida is a swing state, with a lot of electoral votes, and because we know that it can be won or lost by very slight margins.

presidential candidates, both democrat and republican pander as desperately as they can to win every vote in florida, including that segment of cuban american voters that still believe the embargo is a good thing. those voters control our inane cuban policy. they are represented by members of congress that take this policy seriously. two have written a letter to united states treasury asking about beyonce and shawn carter's trip to cuba. restrictions on tourism travel are common sense measures to prevent u.s. dollars from supporting a murderous regime that opposes u.s. security interests at every turn and ruthlessly suppresses liberties of speech, assembly, and belief. marco rubio, the most prominent member of the cuban community is complaining loudly about the trip, and what has our crazy

embargo that these members of congress and marco rubio love so much achieved? what has it actually achieved after all these years? absolutely nothing, thanks to the embargo, the castro brothers were able to stay in power their entire lives because they always had a villain to point to to explain why life in cuba is so harsh, why obtaining the basic necessity of life was so difficult. the castros blamed every problem in cuba on the united states. by contrast, we dropped the american travel ban to china in 1971. and what has happened in china since then? china rather quickly got infected with coca-cola and levis, which is to say in coke's place, semi addictive capitalism. and the march towards more capitalism has been steady. china is a mix of socialism and capitalism is the envy of the world.

cubans wish they could be more capitalistic like the chinese or like us, and nothing would speed the eventual demise of communism in cuba more than dropping the american embargo and dropping our restrictions on travel to cuba. the president can't do this alone because the most egregious parts of the restrictions are written in law. congress will have to repeal that law someday. now that president obama never has to run for re-election, never has to win another vote in florida, he is politically free finally to do the right thing and now that the president's friends have been seen traveling to cuba, now is the perfect time for him to do the right thing. now is the perfect time for him to be the first president who says the first sane thing about our embargo of cuba, that it

must stop, that we must have free and open relations, including diplomatic relations with cuba, that there is no conceivable reason for china to receive more favorable treatment from this nation than cuba does. now we have a don't ask don't tell policy at our border when americans return from cuba, but any agent who catches you traveling to cuba illegally can decide at that moment to make your life hell. one such case actually dragged through the courts for years. but from this day forward, now that we see that the president's friends can come and go freely from cuba, this government has forfeited the moral right to penalize anyone for traveling to cuba. and for that, we should all thank jay-z and beyonce and their mothers and their body guards for setting the precedent

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i thought maybe we could agree that at any joint meetings that you and i have with the president, i will be first in and i will be last out. >> fine, but as senior strategist, i'll already be in the room. >> are you suggesting that a senior strategist is a higher position than a vice president? >> it depends on the vice president. >> yeah? well, this one is me, and i'm [bleep] great. >> that's three time emmy winning actress julia louis-dreyfus, playing the

funniest fictional vice president ever. joining me now from burbank. julia, i have to ask you, i have seen every episode of veep, plan to see every episode of season two that starts sunday night. >> that's right. >> i don't know what party you are in. i don't know if you're a democrat, republican, libertarian. pretty sure you're not libertarian. i haven't figured it out yet. could you please tell america? >> i cannot tell you, i cannot tell you, i will not tell you. and actually, to be honest with you, we never discuss it. what we discuss is keeping it i'm not going to say nonpartisan, but unidentifiable. the whole idea is about behavior and by aligning ourselves with a party, all of a sudden it will seem like we are poking fun at the other side and we are poking fun at everybody, so we want to make it without political bias, if we can. we try. it is hard by the way, but that's what we go for.

>> you talked to joe biden about this? >> yeah, i did. i got a really -- an incredible voice mail message from him in which he called to say -- to say congratulations on winning the emmy, which was unbelievable. then he extraordinarily apologized for not calling me sooner to congratulate me. it was just amazing. but he couldn't have been nicer and i am very happy about that, because the last thing in the world i want him to think or any vice president to think is that we're poking fun at a specific vice president, because we're not. >> that does sound like something that your character, your vice president would do, call up the actress, playing the vice president. >> yeah. >> and then saying congratulations. >> exactly. that's a good idea for a story line, by the way. the only problem would be she would say something on the voice mail she shouldn't say, then we

would have to figure out how to delete that voice mail, through the cia or something. i don't know how does one delete voice mails. >> to keep this going, what we would do, she would come on this show as a guest and play the voice mail to the nation, an awaiting nation, wanting to hear what the vice president had to say. >> that's right, exactly, that's right. and then you know what would hit the fan. >> exactly. >> so i think, yeah, anyway, we have an episode, right now, we have an episode. >> it is usually harder than that, isn't it? these guys work hard writing these episodes? >> we work very hard putting them together, but apparently it has become a cinch. >> so "veep" premiers sunday night, april 14th. >> yes. >> you're scheduled to get another emmy for season two. >> please, oh, please. are you kidding? i am so grateful to have this opportunity to do the show a second season and work with these fine actors.