divides. to some outspoken conservatives, this data spells the downfall of american society. >> something going terribly wrong in american society. >> you look at biology. the natural world, the roles of a male and female in society. the male typically is the dominant role, the female, it's not anti-thesis, not competing, it's a complementary role. we as a people in the smart society have lost the ability to have complementary relationships in nuclear families and it's tearing us apart. >> it could undermine our social order. >> the chairman of the slate group, jacob wiseberg, host of her show on msnbc, melissa harris-perry, msnbc contributor, maria theresa kumar and senior nbc national correspondent, josh green. there's a lot to be said about this. melissa, let's start out with eric ericsson's contention and he began that litany of complaints by saying i'm so used to liberals telling

conservatives that they're anti-science. but liberal who is depend this and say it's not a bad thing are very anti-science. the national order of things, melissa, apparently means men should be the primary breadwinners. >> it does make you wonder if he's ever seen national geographic where the liness gets up and goes out hunting. there's a lot of ways in the natural environment, whatever, i think we have to put that to the side. part ever what's been fascinating to me is watching this on one hand, 50 years after or actually, yeah, 50 years after the moynihan report. which made a very similar claim about african-american families. and this was at a point before the 1964 civil rights act and before the '65 voting rights act. and daniel patrick moynihan, a liberal in congress, commissioned a report that in part says, the fundamental problems of inner city communities aren't all of the structural economic or racial problems, it's that black households are upside-down. they're run by these black

matriarchs and these black matriarchs are emasculating black men and making them unable to have a traditional family structure. instead of the recognition of the economic realities is what we're looking at here. >> maria-theresa, two sides of this. one a social side and one as melissa points out, the economic side. one of the reasons there are so many more households headed by female breadwinners is due to necessity, which is to say, there are more single moms now more than ever and if you look at the discrepancy of households with married women, the top breadwinners and the households that have single moms as the top breadwinner, $23,000 and $83,000 on average. >> they're making it sound like these women have a choice. they have a choice to go out and stay at home or go out and work.

oftentimes, not only are the ones that are the only sole breadwinners of their family. and also look at the men who have lost their jobs in the economic downturn. industries in construction, hospitality, in manufacturing. and why did women keep their jobs? because they were cheaper for the most part. >> because women get paid less. >> right, 70 cents on the dollar and we're not even talking about african-american women and latino women who disproportionately who are affected in realms of poverty. what we need to have is an honest conversation. why are women heads of households, are they choosing to do so. more importantly, this is where the republicans lose their pulse, is that they're not with the times. they're not with the times. and very basic fundamental level so when they're going out and claiming that they're rebranding themselves, they're rebranding themselves for young people, for african-americans and latinos and single women, who participate overwhelmly in elections, they're missing the boat. their rhetoric not only doesn't resonate, but it's also so

antiquated that people can't even start listening. >> it implies, it is so cavalier , it takes away the part of the reality that this is born out of necessity. jake, you look at the numbers on recession, men lost jobs earlier and they got them back faster than women. >> this is across the economy, this is at the high end. women are better educated, attending college, graduating from college. in many cases they're more qualified and earning higher incomes at the top end. what cuts across all social classes, is that men aren't very comfortable with the social reality. surveys show that men whose wives earn more than them, even at the top of the scale, where there's plenty of money and one, the spouse doesn't need to work. they are less happy, less well adjusted. and you know, say what you will, men have not come around en masse to accept this. >> men, not including --

>> i think did you poll which of those men watch fox. >> personally i like the idea of my wife earning more than i do, i hope that happens. >> we talk about the economic necessity of working. we can't just say it's the market driving this. we're talking about conservative policies that take single mother who is are poor, and force them to work. period and we have since the 1990s, right. so ever since welfare reform, the notion that a mom staying at home with their children is good is only a notion that extends to middle class white mothers who are married. if you are a poor mother of color, we don't think it's better for you to stay at home. we think that the moral requirement is for you to go out and work and leave your infant child sometimes, alone or in a circumstance that is really quite difficult. so if we really believed it, like i would be down with this particular lie, if in fact it applied to everything. everyone. and if in fact public policy was willing to underwrite the ability for poor women to be stay at home moms. >> another problem with the fox

panel. not only did they do terrible violence to gender stereotypes, they also misunderstand the policy problem part of it. i'm going to point this out, not just to plug the new cover of "business week," which is about alpha dads and men who have to strike the same kind of work/life balance. if you a want a platform that could appeal to upper class working professionals, middle class working professionals, it might have a choent that spoke to these dads issues and how families with two incomes juggle the work/life balance. >> the other problem with this, it's like a pandora's box. they keep nominating the todd akens and say we'ring in never going to do it again and this gets uploaded into the republican bloodstream. a conversation about women and gender roles, something that the republican party seems to be stuck in the 1960s on. and that gets into a conversation about abortion and choice. the same conversation linked

female breadwinners, to college dropouts and women who have had abortions. con dplating a series of heated social topics. >> it's offensive the way they conflate everything. and i think this is where we have an opportunity to say what happens when you do have men and women equally going out and earning the dole. that's not the only country that we can do this. if you look at sweden where they do have family policies where the woman can take a year off to take care of their child. >> both parents. >> both parents. >> but it talks about a social contract. when you actually start talking about who should be responsible for your children, it should be both parents. and creating that opportunity so that both parents can take the luxury of spending time at home. but by putting the onus only on females we're going back to the 1960s and you're not having a relevant conversation relative to the here and now. >> i think it's an admirable goal, but our society is so many

years from that. even enlightened liberal-minded people. you don't find that many stay at home dads who are happy with their position. >> is that true? josh, you were talking about that this morning. the notion of the stay at home dad is the kind of sha luby, video game-playing loser. >> that's the reality. >> i'm not pointing at you. >> sorry, i was presenting myself as enlightened dad. not a -- well i think there's something to that. if you look at the polls especially of younger men, they don't necessarily feel that way. but the piece makes the argument, written by a working mom, i should point out, i didn't write the piece, sheila kulakar, she's amazing. if you look at the challenges that men deal with, they're slightly different than the moms deal with. one there's the stereotype of losers, stay at home dads, hapless, babies strapped to their chest, wandering around the park. >> god forbid. >> sorry, go ahead.

>> the other one is you can make an argument now, that it's more harmful to a male career, men are expected to be ambitious, go-getters who never take time off for their family. if you go to your boss and say hey, i want to take half time off and stay at home with my kid. does that knock you off a career path? >> part of what happens in the conflation, is we conflate class and i think the pew report was trying to be as careful as it could to not do that. what becomes easy on a panel like this is for us to go to the middle class narrative. when people work for an income, and they also work at jobs that fulfill them and jobs that are connected to the education they have. let me just suggest, there are many poor women and men who might prefer to not go to their poverty wage, 40 to 60-hour a week job that is paying them at a fast food place. who actually would have a great preference for staying home. but they cannot because of the public policies we've created

that will not provide for them in the context of poverty. you may have women who earn a great deal of money, but it's less about the money and more about the fact that they like their jobs. they love their jobs and even if they could quit them, they wouldn't, because it is more intellectually and personally stimulating to work than to change diapers. and those are two different problems. >> and jake, in "slate" there is the observation that what is really hurting americans isn't female equality, but growing income inequality between the rich and everyone else. pitting men against women is simply a distraction from the real economic issues facing us all. because it is a story about class. i mean if you look at the numbers, single women breadwinners make $23,000 a year on average. married women who earn more than their husbands make $80,000 on average. those married women tend to be whiter than the single moms who are making $23,000 a year. >> this is the huge social change in american life and it's one that we just have no way to grapple with now. because it's affecting everything. but they're very few public policy proposals that do

anything, to affect it more than in a mortgagenal way, right? there aren't even ideas on the table that would reverse income inequality. there are a few ideas on the table that would have a marginal impact on diminishing it. like climate change in that respect. it's the big issue, it's one that president obama has, has talked about focusing on. i don't think he knows how to do it. i don't think we know how to go at it. >> before we go, maria-theresa, this stat continually staggers me, half of the jobs created in this country in the last year were for $33,000 a year or less. the president brought up the conversation around the minimum wage in state of the union. so far there hasn't been a robust conversation about something that is so basic. and we talk about as jacob says, like the policy prescriptions to alleviate this or at least make it a fairer playing ground. and there aren't any right now. >> well because for whatever reason, when you start talking about raising the minimum wage, all of a sudden businesses go out of business, right? so let's have an honest conversation of how do you

increase a living wage so that you can actually enjoy this idea of do i want to stay at home or do i want to work. make it a truly personal choice. and when you also look at, you have 40% of the women that are heads of households that their children are living in poverty, we have a national crisis on our hands, we don't want to talk about the hard issue, which is the dirty word that is poverty. when we can start addressing that and having an honest conversation, we can start talking about policy prescriptions. >> this is the beginning of that honest conversation, maria-theresa kumar. thank you. after the break, hostile letters are reigniting an already-hostile debate. we'll discuss ricin, guns and rhetoric next on "now." [ musick ] i knew there were a lot of tech jobs available out there. i knew devry university would give me the skills that i needed to make one of those tech jobs mine.

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jts this week two letters were discovered containing the lethal poison, ricin. one sent to new york city mayor michael bloomberg and the other to the director of his gun safety group, mayors against illegal guns. a third similar letter was addressed to president obama and intercepted at an offsite screening facility. federal authorities are questioning an army veteran in texas who may have information about the letters. all of which were mailed from shreveport, louisiana. late yesterday, the white house confirmed that earlier this month, it had received another letter containing ricin which came from spokane, washington, the orjen of several other ricin-laced letters, mailed to a c.i.a. building in d.c., as well as a judge, a military base and a post office in spokane. law enforcement does not believe the spokane letters are connected to the shreveport

letters and warned that coverage of the plots may be spawning copy cats. the big question is why, the letter sent to mayor bloomberg and the director of the ill lien guns reads in part, you will have to kill mend my family before you get my guns. anyone who wants to come to my house will get shot in the face. the right to bear arms is my constitutional god-given right and i will exercise that right until the day i die. the dark, threatening language of the letters is rooted in profound fear of the state of the nation's gun laws and recent attempts to reform them in the name of public safety. stoking fear and warning of impending gun seizures has been part of the nra's playbook for years. >> we're in the midst of a once in a generation fight for everything that we care about. we have a chance to secure our freedom for a generation. or lose it. forever. we must remain vigilant.

we must remain ever resolute and steadfastly growing and preparing for even the more critical battles that loom before us. >> at last year's nra convention, ted nugent vowed to turn his outrage into violent action. >> if barack obama becomes the president in november, again, i will either be dead or in jail. we are patriots. we are braveheart. we need to ride into that battlefield and chop their heads off in november. >> and while the language has gotten progressively louder, the sharpening of battle axes is nothing new. >> as we set out this year, to defeat the divisive forces that would take freedom away, i want to say those fighting words, for everyone within the sound of my voice -- to hear and to heed and especially for you, mr. gore.

from my cold, dead hands! >> joining the table now, washington bureau chief of "mother jones" and an msnbc political analyst, david corn, it's not often you have charlton heston as a lead-in. >> but when you were quoting the letters that were sent, i was thinking, it sounds like charlton heston wrote these. >> well -- >> it's not by accident, as you noted. the nra playbook for years for decades has not to have an honest policy disagreement about gun laws or gun reform, but to be extremely demagoguic. saying barack obama is coming for your guns in black helicopters and sell them to socialist muslims who will come for your children and wives and husbands. it's been to such an excess that it doesn't surprise me that some unhinged individuals out there start to take it literally.

and believe that now is the time to rebel and to strike out with violent means. >> you know, josh, what was sort of shocking to me as you heard the letter, the language in the letters -- and in given the tenor of the debate and given the vitriol and rhetoric coming from some parts of the gun safety reform argument. it wasn't surprising that that language is now part of the discussion. >> a lot of it trickles down from guys like wayne lapierre who go on tv and sort of go ballistic with these spittle-flecked speeches about how people are going to come and take away their guns. that's been the tenor of the debate. that's why there's so much anger at even the modest, modest measures that democrats and some republicans attempted -- >> attempted, did not even succeed, there was no passage of -- >> they can't get background checks. >> i want to be careful, because certainly ricin-laced letters coming from i apologize, louisiana, is really. >> if in fact they are from

louisiana. >> if they are from shreveport, we should feel distressed about that. i do agree with david, that's probably an unhinged individual of some kind. the thing that i want us to be more appalled about, morally and ethically appalled about, is what is coming out of baton rouge from the state legislature. in louisiana right now, passing a law that provides for lifetime rights for conceal and carry. in a state where in my city in new orleans, we suffer from the highest homicide rate as a result of guns in the country. where on mother's day, 19 people were shot. blocks from my home during a second line parade. where a little boy who just had his 11th birthday was shot twice and lost his own 5-year-old kous ton gun violence. in that state, in baton rouge, so yes, the letter is out of shreveport. but far more of concern is what the state legislatures are doing to make sure that everybody in fact does get to keep all of their guns. >> what's fascinating, jake,

there's a doubling down on the strategy. there's no nod to moreality or realty or what's happening on the streets in chicago or new orleans. one email in january of 2013 mcconnell campaign email. dear patriot, you and i are literally surrounded. the gun-grabbers in the senate are about to launch an all-out assault on the second amendment, on your rights, your freedom. let me tell you, mitch mcconnell is ready to lead the fight to protect your rights. this is part of mitch mcconnell's re-election campaign strategy. >> the feverish atmosphere around gun rights is not new. we're just seeing more of it. what's interesting to me is there are two issues which do seem to produce some pattern of domestic terrorism in this country. abortion and guns. i think it's interesting democratic question, how we deal with that these are issues in which a small extreme minority in some cases encouraged by people who aren't violent, but who have an interest in stoking

that up. are so unhappy with the result of democratic decision making or afraid of what will result from democratic decision making that they resort to horrifying kinds of violence. the question is how do the rest of us deal with that situation. because the intimidation is real. there are places where abortion doctors can't practice in the country and i would not be surprised where people who are thinking, interested in takinging taking i on the issue of responsible gun control shy away from it. you have to think twice, it's no different from the salma salman rushdie episode. >> running ads against mark pryor in arkansas. now mark pryor is a democrat and he did not support gun safety reform. there's been a lot of consternation from the left. saying okay you may cost a vulnerable senate democrat a seat should you be doing that. and bloomberg apparently is going to go full bore on this and say this is a litmus test for our candidates. >> well bloomberg is saying i'm not a democrat.

i'm, and he's not, he's dealing with the issue. and it may cause a problem for the democratic party overall. and you know, on the short-term. but in the long-term, this is one of the core issues, the president has made this a core issue, gun reform has been a core issue on democratic side for a long time. it's hard to figure out how you're going to get advances here without bringing some political pressure onto the system. this is the classic poly-sci case, abortion and gun control. you have a small numb of people who feel this so fervently, they will do literally anything, they'll go to great extremes and the rest of the country want gun control measures, 80%, 90%, but don't feel it's essential to their political cultural identity. how does the system process these type of inputs? it's a problem. >> i think mark pryor's response is really telling. i think we can play sound from his new ad.

he basically doubles down on his resistance and uses the old regional argument, we're not going to let those new york people tell us what to do down here in arkansas. let's play a little bit of that sound. >> the mayor of new york city is running ads against me. because i opposed president obama's gun control legislation. nothing in the obama plan would have prevented tragedies like newtown, aurora, tucson or even jonesboro. i'm committed to finding real solutions to gun violence. while protecting our second amendment rights. i'm mark pryor. and i approved this message because no one from new york or washington tells me what to do. i listen to arkansas. >> well, listen, he listens to arkansas. >> that's so great. >> there it is, though. >> this is the nullification discourse, that's occurring, that has been occurring with increasing frequency during the obama years. both first and second term now. is this idea that we just are sort of loose confederation of states, and that the southern

states -- >> states rights argument. >> those carpet-baggers -- >> the other time that, what was the topic that was about? >> what a useful thing. >> and as destructive to this conversation as anything else. the elites in washington, we're just trying to make the streets safer. >> the elites in washington are sending many millions of dollars to these southern states, when you look at kind of the map of federal dollars that go to support states that are often living in tremendous poverty. again the other thing that louisiana state legislature is doing at the same time that it's arming everyone is also simultaneously refusing the medicaid expansion, right. so that people will be ill, poor people will not have access to the medical care they need. but don't worry, they'll be armed. >> they'll have as many guns as they want. >> bloomberg has a hard question here, though, whether he wants to force border state democrats who are in swing districts and swing states to commit political suicide. because many of them view this issue as political suicide.

and the climate is such that you sort of can't make inroads, until you can. ten years ago it was gay marriage. now gay marriage isn't that issue any more. i think guns unfortunately still are this issue. >> do you think it is -- do you think it will change inevitably as attitudes towards gay marriage have. because it feels like this is something where the country goes back and forth and back and forth, it's not necessarily an arc in one direction. >> i guess i think over a longer arm of time. i don't think we're going to have a different interpretation of the second amendment. i don't think we're going to have real gun control like they have in european countries. but i think some restriction on assault weapons, on background checks, thing that's probably going to happen. >> and also the fight got abandoned for 15 years when democrats decided not to fight it i think there's a little more room for the pendulum to swing toward modest gun control. >> and reality, unfortunately, will intrude again on this debate. it happens -- >> this is reality. we're trying to kill people with

ricin-laced letters. >> happens again and again and some people thought newtown was actually a tipping point. it turns out those people were wrong. but it doesn't mean that there might not be another one. >> it could be an inflection point. i don't mean to get very graphic. graphic as in graphs. anyway, coming up, george w. bush continues his re-entry to our mountain biking with wounded warriors at his 1500-acre crawford ranch. there's perhaps no better way to catch the former president in his element except perhaps than when he's clearing brush as when he is on his bike. the "huffington post" went along. [ female announcer ] the best thing about this bar it's not a candy bar. 130 calories 7 grams of protein

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a.p., president george w. bush discussed what he called the zen, his method of staying calm on steep and dangerous mountain bike rides. this year during bush's annual three-day ride with wounded veterans, the "huffington post's" john ward asked the former president if they had reached zen out there. according to ward, the 43rd president replied -- i'm beyond that. what does it mean when you're seeing triple? he then answered the question himself. ultrazen. we'll learn more about w going ultrazen when john ward joins us next on "now." [ male announcer ] this is betsy. her long day of pick ups and drop offs begins with arthritis pain... and a choice. take up to 6 tylenol in a day or just 2 aleve for all day relief. all aboard. ♪ all aboard. i've always kept my eye on her... but with so much health care noise, i didn't always watch out for myself. with unitedhealthcare, i get personalized information and rewards for addressing my health risks.

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who checks all the weekly ads to get the best sale prices in town. do you think you can get the same great prices at walmart with the low price guarantee? let's find out! what's memorial day like at your house? we like to have a barbecue and go swimming in our pool. that's cool. ooh, lime chips! oh, i love these! walmart will match that price at the register. that's great! we're always working to lower costs so you get more savings. i think this is my new store. you looked through all those ads. walmart matched the prices. you ready? yes. oh, wow! that's the walmart low price guarantee backed by ad match! save time and money this memorial day. bring in ads from your local stores and see for yourself. george w. bush the hobbyist is back and alas, this time there are no paintbrushes. over memorial day weekend, bush joined 13 wounded veterans from the iraq and afghanistan wars on a three-day mountain bike ride through his 1500-acre ranch.

bush has been hosting the bike ride to honor veterans since he left the white house. the "huffington post's" john ward joined the president on the bike ride where the president opened up. with us from washington now, senior political reporter at the "huffington post," john ward. john, it is great to see you. great to have you on the show. and i am thrilled to hear more about this epic bike ride with the 43rd president. tell us a little bit about what the mood was like on the trail. >> the mood was you know, a lot of men and women having a lot of fun. the trails were at times challenging and the weather was hot. it was on his ranch out there in texas, in crawford. beautiful scenery. so i'd say the mood was pretty jock l jocular at times, bush was throwing around hoots and hollers and he was joking with people pretty loose. but people were also focused on

not falling down the 50-foot drop to our right at times. >> you got some great quotes and insights from the former president, john. among them, marco rubio, the george w. bush says rubio is articulate. it's always good when bush is weighing in on who is articulate or not. i met him once, maybe twice, my brother likes him, so i like him. i thought that was sort of telling. if jeb is cool with him, i'm cool with him. >> yeah, i mean bush has made no secret of the fact that he wants jeb to run for president. so it wasn't a diss at all of rubio. but it was very much sort of a backhanded endorsement of his brother. over rubio and it was fairly succinct. it wasn't like he was going to great lengths to praise the senator from florida. >> you know, dave corn, the bush-bush-rubio dynamic is interesting because jeb has gone out of his way to praise marco rubio. but you get the sense that there's some frenemy vibes, perhaps in florida. >> you do. >> a lot of soap opera with the

bush family. i think john looks really buff. i have to say. >> well he managed to do the bike ride. >> i'm impressed. i have a question, john, because there was a line in the piece that jumped out at me. it was a very long piece. it's good, though. and that's when you asked bush i think about the war in iraq and those sort of troublesome matters. and he said, i tried to solve problems diplomatically. my question is, does he really believe that. because at the time of the invasion of iraq as you know, the weapons inspections were ongoing. they weren't over yet and diplomatic efforts were still under way to reach a resolution. so is he just spinning, is he trying to revise his trip or was he delusional after the lack of oxygen from the bike ride. >> had i not made the decisions i made these men wouldn't have been in combat. on the other hand, every one of these men is volunteers. i believe strongly that the decisions i had made were the right decisions. if people study my decision,

they would recognize i tried to solve the problems diplomatically. >> right. there's two pieces there. there's the one david asks and the question of his relationship to the veterans and their wounds. you know, as to david's question, i think he does believe that. you know, he's gone into great detail in his book about how he saw it and they went to the u.n. a number of times and yes, there were still things going on at the time. so you know, we point out in the piece, that's a disagreement that will be one for the ages, as to whether or not he exhausted his options diplomatically or not. he felt he did. a lot of people feel like he was raring to go, after 9/11 certainly in afghanistan, what he did. and then in iraq. as well about a year and a half later. you know, as to his relationship with the veterans, he was very, i thought pretty frank about his own responsibility for them. but also his, his thinking as to why it's not something that's entirely on his own shoulders. that's also something that will

rub some people wrong. but there were vets on the ride who pretty much backed him up on that. >> the last piece, john, it's always interesting to examine former presidents and their relation to the public arena. you asked him about fame and bush said i've comes to realize that power can be corrosive if you've had it for too long. i don't long for fame, and really, shy away from it. avoid it i'm not very shy, avoid it. >> that's the best bushism in a while. avoid it. >> i kind of have to channel my inner bush to just read that what did, tell us a little bit more about that exchange. >> yeah. i mean i thought that that exchange was among the most reflective things i've heard bush say about himself. >> ever. >> in a long time. probably ever. >> i talk in the piece about how especially when he was in office, he would always ridicule questions about his internal process as naval-gazing, i think the fact that he's out of

office, his approval ratings are up. he doesn't feel as defensive, and he had just been kind of - excising and was more relaxed, made him more effective. and i thought the comment about power being corrosive and dimming your vision was fascinating. i would like to hear more from him on that, honestly. >> indeed, perhaps it's easier for him to speak out now that someone else is winding down the wars and figuring out how to pay for them. but hey, that's just me. john ward, a fascinating piece in the "huffington post." out now, thank you for your time, my friend. >> thank you, alex. in the murky waters of insider trading, the feds have their lures set on one particularly big fish. but somehow, s.a.c. capital steve cohen always seems to avoid the hook. we will talk billionaire hedge funders and the complicated process of prosecuting insider trading, just ahead. i woke up to a blistering on my shoulder.

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captain ahas been had his great white whale and the securities and exchange commission has steve cohen. we dive into the deep blue sea when bethany mcclain joins us, next. [ ship horn blows ] no, no, no! stop! humans. one day we're coming up with the theory of relativity, the next... not so much. but that's okay -- you're covered with great ideas like optional better car replacement from liberty mutual insurance. total your car and we give you the money to buy one a model year newer. learn about it at libertymutual.com. liberty mutual insurance. responsibility. what's your policy?

for years, steve cohen has been the biggest, boldest billionaire on wall street. he's been called the hedge fund king and the godfare, cohen's $14 billion hedge fund s.a.c. capital always seemed to beat the odds, making it the envy of wall street. cohen lives in a 35,000-square-foot mansion in connecticut with its own golf course and art collection. now it seems the story of steve cohen or his firm may be too good to be true. a sprawling seven-year criminal

investigation led by u.s. attorney preet barara has uncovered a large insider trading network. to date, nine current or former employees of s.a.c. have been charged with insider trading. in march the firm agreed to pay more than $600 million to the u.s. government. the largest fine in the history of the s.e.c. a week after cohen wrote a check to the government, he bought himself a picasso worth $150 million and a $60 million house in the hamptons. his second. but now, the investigation is getting very close to cohen himself. journalists bethany mclean and brian burrow tell the story of cohen and s.a.c. capital in the june issue of "vanity fair." a tale laced with details of coded emails and whispered phone calls all in the pursuit of illegal gains. do this day, cohen denies any wrongdoing, but burrow and mclean speculate he could be the next to fall and depict cohen as

the fed's version of moby dick, steve cohen isn't just another hedge fund billionaire, he is the hedge fund billionaire. doughy and clerk-like, cohen is the gatsby of our age, a middle-class kid from long island who caught the gambling bug, fleecing his high school pals in all-night poker games and now worth an estimated $10 billion. but as the walls around him begin to crumble, thus far cohen has been able to escape. in the piece a hedge fund manager speaks to maclaine and burrow, and says that cohen gets off. >> bethany mcliaclaimaclaine, w story. >> what do we know as far as the insider trading that has been prosecuted at s.a.c. >> well, it's fascinating, because it is a little bit like a needle in a haystack in the sense that there's this haystack

of this gigantic insider trading investigation. much of which has not nailed people at s.a.c., but rather elsewhere. but it's also become increasingly apparent that the government's end target is indeed steve cohen and his firm, s.a.c. capital. so it's all been building to a crescendo in a sense. and even though cohen has not, not even been charged, the government's ongoing investigation has already cost him a great deal. investors have pulled $1.7 billion out of his fund despite the spectacular returns and are likely to pull a lot more in the coming days. >> it would seem like steve cohen is operating with if not impunity, a certain sense of self-confidence, if he gets tagged with a $600 million fine, going to the s.e.c. and then goes out the next day and buys a second home in the hamptons and a $160 million picasso painting. do you, in your research, in your reporting on this, is there any sense of tangible fear with cohen himself or his associates,

that he might go down? >> well, i think that the purchases, they would argue, are at least steve cohen's people would argue are an accident of timing. perhaps unfortunate accident of timing. i don't think they were particularly worried in the firm's attitude has always been not us, not guilty, we have the best compliance in the world. but the big $600 million plus settlement with the s.e.c. was an about-face and a signal to a lot of investors, wait a minute, why are you settling and paying this huge amount of money if you say you've done nothing wrong? and cohen, along with others at his fund have been subpoenaed for by the grand jury. and that's put additional pressure on them. i'm not sure this can ever touch cohen personally. whether or not it should, he's built such a sort of operation of lawyers and compliance people around him. that i think, i think it might be, might be difficult to actually get to him. >> you know, bethany i'm going to open this up to our panel in

new york. josh, the question of criminal prosecution and the admittance of wrongdoing is something that's often skirted around and bethany makes a point. if investors are pulling funds from his hedge fund that is in and of itself a a punishment of sorts. but john cassidy argues in the "new yorker," getting these guys to admit they did something wrong is imperative. something that's vis-a-vis, the big banks, you've got to get the "guilty" piece of this. >> this is one of the big debates going on in washington. and senator elizabeth warren is one of the ones who is forcefully pushed this point in hearings. is that we may have a problem where the banks are too big to indict. and either the government lawyers don't feel like they have a strong-enough case or a strong-enough team to indict people like this for fear that they might lose. i think that the tendency over the last couple of years has been towards settlements. and there's growing pressure, i think not just from liberal, but from conservatives, too, people like david vitter, for the government to take a stronger

hand in trying to prosecute some of these folks, take them to trial and ultimately try and yield or extract that guilty plea. >> the interesting thing here, though, is there's a lot of focus on this case, s.a.c. capital. who is not involved in the shenanigans which brought down the economy in 2008. which is the point that elizabeth warren and others have been making. that we never really came to terms with the people who did that. how could all of this happen and the prosecutions didn't materialize. not one wall street banker -- >> i'm not saying the case should be proceeding, it's a fascinating, jay gatsby character and policies and mansions. >> david's point is described as don't hate the player, hate the game. like at this point the notion that going after this one guy, right, whatever the problems may be. you know with cohen. but leaving intact the entire system that both rewards this kind of behavior and also --

encourages sort of the more legal version of it. >> well there's a question of insider trading is illegal, right. >> very hard to prove. >> very hard to prove and very hard to nail the guy. at the top with it. but we also know that you don't produce returns at this scale over time without insider trading. it's sort of not possible. it would be an incredible run of luck. and it doesn't -- hedge funds aren't doing that. so we know the firm was engaged, was producing profits from insider trading what i don't really understand is why they don't indict the firm. why do they settle with the firm and go after the head, bethany, i guess a good question for you if you're still with us. is -- why do they go after the firm? >> you've got you're mixing and matching two different investigations. the securities and exchange commission settled with the firm over two specific trades. there may be more. the justice department has an ongoing criminal investigation. so there are two proceedings on parallel tracks, if you will.

>> is it possible that the justice department would indict the firm? >> it is possible. there's an ongoing grand jury, ongoing investigation. so it is quite, it is possible, yes. >> bethany, you know, it sounds like steve cohen was at the top of this. in terms of actual practical day-to-day trading, he he wasn't actually doing that much. is that fair, as far as an assessment? >> well he does run his own book. but he does sit at the top of basically this pyramid of traders who operate in pods, very independently. and then cohen benefits from their gains, but thanks to this pod system. if they're doing insider trading, it can't be tagged to him. so it's very interesting analogy to executives in the financial crisis, actually and we can talk more about that later. >> and we certainly will. "vanity fair's" bethany mclean. the article is riveting, everyone should pick up a copy of it. thank you to our panel. i will see you monday at noon

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