labor. soon to give birth to her first child with prince william. kate middleton checked in to a private wing of the london hospital just after 1:00 a.m. eastern time. we'll be bringing you the latest on the royal delivery throughout the show. we are also following the reaction to president obama's comments on trayvon martin's death and race in america. we'll speak with the president's former professor at harvard law, charles ogle tree, later in the hour. but we begin today with a milestone in financial reform. the third anniversary of the dodd-frank wall street reform and consumer protection act. three years after dodd-frank was signed in to law, its ability to prevent another financial crisis remains the subject of heated debate. according to the "washington post," as dodd-frank turns 3, it remains a work in progress. the post notes the same intense lobbying and political wrangling that took place when the bill was being written has continued to hold up or water down some of its provisions. while much remains in development, dodd-frank's

establishment of the consumer financial protection bureau has been a clear success. president obama recently touted its work say being the cfpb has already gotten back $400 million from mortgage and credit card lenders for the 6 million americans victimized by predator lending practices. as for the banks, capital requirements are now higher and regulators have made progress in reducing risk and bringing transparency to the shadowy wor world of derivatives, the complex financial instruments which warren buffett famously dubbed financial weapons of mass destruction. next month, new rules forcing publicly traded companies to disclose the ratio of ceo to median worker pay, a multiple that according to bloomberg news, has grown to 204-1, up 20% since 2009. but other elements of the law are proceeding slowly. though the pace has picked up over the past two months, of the 398 rules mandated by dodd-frank, only 39% have been

instituted. last week treasury secretary jack lu promised that by the end of this year, all of the core elements of dodd-frank will be in place. he further maintained that the law was succeeding in its primary mission -- putting an end to too big to fail. >> as a matter of law, dodd-frank ended the notion that any firm is too big to fail. now if a financial firm fails, taxpayers will not have to bear the cost of the failure. >> but some remain skeptical. "the new yorker's" john cassidy writes officially, of course, there is no prospect of another big bank bailout but the position isn't the reality. if a bank juch as jpmorgan is on the verge of collapse, it is indiai inconceivable the government would allow it to go under. the nation's eight largest banks hold $16 trillion worth of assets equal to the entire u.s. gross domestic product. joining me now to discuss from

washington, the chairman and ceo of the motion picture association of america, former senator from connecticut, chris dodd. and from boston, former congressman from massachusetts, barney frank. gentlemen, thank you so much for joining me on this day, the third anniversary of landmark legislation dodd-frank. chris dodd, i'd like to go to you first. we heard that sound from jack lew saying that too big to fail is no longer a reality in america. at the same time, ben bernanke in march said, too big to fail is not solved and gone, it's still here. do you think the problem has been solved? >> well, we believe it has. and obviously only time will tell. you've got to test these things at some point, i presume. but that amendment, the shelby-dodd amendment passed with over 90 votes on the floor of the senate, it was man news consensus around it. senator barbara boxer added language there that made it against the law for the united states government to bail out a financial institution. and as you'll hear from barney, all the mechanisms that were

allowed for the federal government to step in are now gone. so it is against the law to do what was done a couple of -- two or three years ago. that's number one. number two -- and again, the likelihood that the congress of the united states would bail out a major bank, i don't know what planet people would be living on to think you could actually get the votes today to bail out a financial institution that threatened the economy of this country. so we believe we've done the job but obviously time will tell whether or not we've actually completed the task. but certainly it was the driving motivation. no other issue in the entire -- issues we discussed here had more consensus around it than our determination to end too big to fail. >> congressman frank, i think the average american hears that the eight largest banks hold $16 trillion in assets, that they're 30% bigger than they were pre-crisis and they think, okay, maybe there's not the political will to do a bailout but there's also the economic reality, could you actually let these banks fail if something happened? >> yes. people may get confused.

first, let me underline what chris said. in 2008 when the economy was about to melt down, it took the combined efforts of george bush and his administration, barack obama, the democratic nominee, the democratic and republican congressional leaderships of both houses to barely get that loan to the banks. i don't know where people think there is going to be this political demand to bail out any big bank. it is exactly the opposite. by the way, as chris pointed oud, every mechanism that was used, what the fed did with aig, et cetera, we abolished those and we made it illegal. but here's the confusion people are having. we do believe there is some institutions that are so big that their failure will require us to do something. but specifically not included among them is to keep the institution going. if a very large financial institution can't pay its debts -- that's what we're talking about -- and that threatens the rest of the economy because they can't pay people, then other people don't get paid, et cetera, the first thing that happens is the institution is abolished. those are the death panels. sarah palin talked about death

panels. they're not in the health care bill. they're not for old ladies. they're for insolvent banks. bank is put out of business. ceo, executives are fired. the shareholders' equity is wiped out. at that point it may be that the federal deposit insurance corporation -- which has always been our instrumentality for winding down failed banks -- they may have to pay some of the debts to prevent there from being this cycle. but every penny paid out is required by law to be recovered from financial institutions with $50 billion in assets or more. so, yes, if a very large financial institution failed, we would have to deal with the consequences. but we would deal with the consequences only after abolishing the bank and by recovering the money from other people. >> senator dodd, i want to talk about the fdic process. because former senator ted kaufman in "forbes" wrote there is no precedent soming the mega bank problem through the fdic.

the largest problem was washington mutual which had assets of under $330 billion. it was essentially resolved by selling it to jpmorgan chase. who is going to take over jpmorgan chase or bank of america whose assets are each $2 trillion if they go bust? >> barney answered the question. do you it exactly as he describes. that's what the legislation calls for. the fdic, as sheila baird dem strapted they have the know-how, the knowledge to unwind institutions. because of what we've written in and ways which you pay for all this, they believe they have the right to see the history to achieve the very results. i know people are concerned about this. i understand that. but we think we've done a good job in avoiding exactly what we did in the past and that's to have the american taxpayer write the check when a major financial institution. also by requiring more capital, leverage which we have only recently, we think we minimize the likelihood that these kind of things can occur. we believe this will work.

time will tell but we believe it will work. >>ky say at this point -- >> go ahead. >> one of the things -- you gave a very good list of what's been done. we were a little worried. chris and i were a little concerned because the commodities futures trading commission was running in great opposition in requiring that american banks that do risky derivative transactions in foreign countries, that they would not be regulated by our regulation. our bill said they should. and we won that fight. give credit to the head of the cftc and the obama administration and that was a critical victory that the rule now is, unless the foreign country has a set of regulations as good as ours -- and we'll decide that -- then they will be regulated. but the other point is, the single biggest cause of this, we all understand, were mortgages that were given to people who shouldn't have gotten them, they were then securitized and sold, et cetera. we banned those. one of the things that happened in the law that we passed -- by the way, the republicans tried to blame us -- they ran the congress from 1995 to 2006 and

never allowed any legislation to go through to block those bad mortgages. when senator dodd and i became chairs we put that into law. one of the things that's not happened since 2010 are the granting of the kind of imprudent mortgages you should get. interestingly, by the way, the head of the american bankers's association, frank keating, criticized us in a recent "wall street journal" article because we were restricting too many poor people from getting mortgage loans. >> i think you made a fair point. in terms of predator lending practices and credit card companies and certainly on the mortgage issue there's been a lot of ground made. but there is the reality -- and senator dodd, gi to you on this -- that only 39% of the 398 rules mandated by dodd-frank have been instituted. there is certainly a case to be made for being careful when writing this legislation but i will quote sheila bair, former fdic chair how just mentioned, she says this stuff don't get any better with time. the longer you wait to finalize the rules, the more they get

watered down, more exceptions get built in, people's memories start to fade and the pressure is not there." the sunlight foundation recently reported there were 218 meetings between regulators and bank l lobbyists compared to 153 with pro-reform groups. to say there is an inordinate a money being thrown at watering down some of the provisions of dodd-frank i don't think is news to you but i wonder how you respond to that. >> well, it is a very good point. it is what we worry about. certainly as you point out, i think rightly so, you want to get this right, this is a complex bill, these are very important regulations being crafted. they're controversial. you want to give people an opportunity to be heard on them. we all agree on that. but obviously it is taking too long. you're having us on today because it is the third anniversary since this bill was signed into law. but i take some console in all of this that you have the secretary of the treasury, mary

miller, who at at the treasury as well, testifying in the last week that they believe the remaining rules that will be edon'ted wi adopted will be done so by the calendar year. i'm very optimistic that it can be done this year and it is very, very important that that happens. it is a legitimate criticism but again, i think you have to take into consideration how complex a lot of this is in getting it right. it was very, very important but i hope we are seeing the end of this road by the end of the year. >> i can make a very important point on this? >> go ahead. >> one of the problems is, the largest grant of additional authority in the bill that we passed was over derivatives which congress, under republican leadership, unregulated. the democratic administration went along with it. we gave a lot of power over derivatives. credit the fault swaps that hadn't previously existed to two agencies, the commodities futures trading commission and the securities and exchanges commission. problem is we didn't anticipate the republicans taking over the

house of representatives and one of the serious problems is that the republican congress, they know they couldn't repeal the law, it is too popular, but they have held back the funds, the republican louse, that's needed for the commodities futures trading commission. you talk about the trillions that are out there, and you are right. they have only a couple hundred million to do this. there was a deliberate, and unfortunately partially successful effort, by the house republicans to underfund the agency that we needed to rely on. that's -- but they didn't stop it. they've slowed it down. but a major reason for the slowness was the lack of adequate funding that the republicans deliberately were able to do. democrats in the senate have pushed to get it up there but we still don't have enough. >> indeed that seems to be the republican playbook for so much landmark legislation include being the affordable care act which is to say death by a thousand cuts. >> i just think -- you made a good point. sheila bair made a good point. blessing and burden in america is that we have no memory. it works to our advantage from time to time but it is also a burden. i was so glad at the outset of

this program you reminded people only five years ago what we were going through. the numbers of unemployment on a monthly basis for over 13 months of over 500,000 people. some $12 trillion of economic loss had occurred in the country. personal wealth in excess of almost $19 trillion. you've 8 million people that lost their homes. unemployment rate was staggeringly high at 10 olympic. jumped from 5% to 10% in the space of almost a year. people have forgotten how bad it this was. if we aren't doing anything to straighten out the financial services of this country we could find ourselves right back in that hole again and america ought to lead. what barney and i were determined to do is set a template. if we didn't lead, someone else would. what happened last week with the derivative subject matter allows us to leave because now europe is going to follow the lead of the united states. that's extremely important in the final analysis. >> i would say, the notion that -- when we talk about who's

forgotten, many under or unemployed americans very much remember the financial meltdown. it is the lawmakers that seem perhaps to have a case of amnesia. we'll take a short break and when we get back we'll continue our conversation with senators dodd and frank and discuss the increasingly short distance between wall street and pennsylvania avenue. that's next. plus, here is a live look at london where royal watchers and much of the rest of the world await news of the monarchy's youngest royal. while the appetite for all things crown related has never been larger, what about the role and cost of kings and queens? martin bashir joins us to discuss that ahead on "now." [ brent ] this guy's a pro, herbie. [ herbie ] there's no doubt about it brent, a real gate keeper. here's kevin, the new boyfriend. lamb to the slaughter. that's right brent.

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we're back with the two

principle ashth tekrchitects of financial reform, senators chris dodd and barney frank. i'd like to talk about the increasing distance between wall street and washington, d.c., what some folks have called the revolving door. i'll read a quote -- one of the oft repeated justifications for while wall street must be regulated by wall streeters is that what goes on there is both so complex and so essential that only those who have been part of it can be trusted to oversee it. this argument is bunk, of course. it is nothing more than a way for financial institutions and washington to make sure the status quo gets maintained. do you agree with that? >> not necessarily. look, i realize that's the easy answer to a lot of this but a lot of good people in the banking industry that work very hard. i'm not going to pile on. that's a temptation to want to do that. but many out there actually do a good job to try and serve their consumers.

community bankers across the country in small towns, there's some 8,000 of them. a lot of good people work at even larger institutions. obviously it is complex. this is one subject matter that not a lot of people in congress are terribly aware of, understand it. it is very complex. i'm not sure we necessarily get very far by nearly trying to draw bright lines here. obviously you'd like to reach out just beyond the financial services community when it comes to important jobs at the treasury. can you go to the manufacturing sector and other places to organize labor where there are very talented people who understand financial institutions as well. i think there is a danger of sort of just having sort of a one path and not reaching out to a broader spectrum of the economy to bring people in. but i don't necessarily believe that because people come from the financial sector they are inherently evil or inherently bad or inherently corrupt. i just don't buy that. >> congressman frank, i'm certainly not trying to insinuate that people who work in the financial sector are inherently bad or evil and that there isn't some role to play, but do you find anything worry

some about the fact that jack lew used to be at citibank. >> think of the president appointing someone to be hid of the s.e.c., securities and exchange commission, and worrying that too much was going on that had to be stopped sew decides he's going to go into the industry and get somebody to make head of the securities and exchange commission who in fact was steeped in those practices. the president's name was franklin roosevelt and the man he appointed was joseph p. kennedy who did become a very effective chairman. you left out one person in your list. gar giny ginsler was the golden guy. we were glad to come to his aid. i took great comfort from this political decision. yes, over the objection of almost all the large financial institutions they were told

their overseas activity in derivatives will be regulated by america unless we decide -- our regulators -- that the foreign countries do as good a job. as far as jack lew is concerned, jack did spend some time at citi corp. before that he was close to tip o'neill, he worked very hard in the clinton administration. i haven't seen any evidence that jack lew was anything other than a major player. one of the people who have some significant wall street experience after his government service was a man named paul volcker. the volcker rule which we were glad to help enact into law and i believe will be enacted in very tough form, will be a great protection. so yeah, you got to be careful about this, but as of now i see no evidence that the people who had worked in the financial industry are being weak. i did notice recently "the new york times" front page of the business section saying, boy, mary jo white's getting tough. that's a good thing. >> by the way, alex, just to add to that, you take people like

neal womin, they provided great leadership and source of information and support as we worked through all of this. there are very good people there. tim geithner i think did a good job in many, many ways. i know he's received a lot of criticism but again without their help and support as we did out of the white house, this would have been very difficult to do. so i endorse what barney's just said. think it is more testing how people do in the jobs they have, whether or not where they've come from necessarily. but again i'd emphasize the important point of reaching out just beyond that sector when you are talking about leadership in our financial services area. >> congressman frank, i want to sort of ask you in the broader picture here. there is some concern i think in american society, after the financial melt dourn that was of historic proportions just a few years ago, that the little guy is still being ignored and i point you to an article on the front page of the "new york times" yesterday that talks about aluminum cans.

"hundreds of millions of times a day, thirsty americans open a can of soda, beer or juice. every time they do it, they pay a fraction of a penny more because of a shrewd maneuver by goldman sachs and other financial players. efforts by them has cost american consumers more than $5 billion over the last three years." you read this, you hear about how republicans are trying to sort of unwind or water down the provisions of dodd-frank. what happened in american politics along the way where ordinary every day americans, and protections around them, have become something to be negotiated on capitol hill. >> well, first of all, i have to differ with the history. there's no golden age. it wasn't any better 40 years ago and 50 years ago. entrenchments always have an advantage. it sometimes kind of takes a crisis to push them back. this has now become very much an issue between the parties. the fact is that the republicans have -- i want to defend them a little bit. you said, well, the republicans had forgotten some of the

lawmakers had forgotten things. somebody said of the kings of france after the revolution when they were restored, they have forgotten nothing because they learned nothing. they didn't forget anything -- they were against regulation during the period when they ran the congress, when they won't do anything about fannie mae and freddie mac or subprime loans despite their rhetoric now that says they were so upset. they overwhelmingly opposed any financial reform during the period. chris got three republican senators. i think i got two republican representatives to vote with us. it is an ongoing kind of fight. by the way, here's another problem we have. and these things connect. the president is trying to overcome filibusters to get some judges appointed for the district of columbia circuit court. that's the court that hears all the appeals from regulations. the cftc, under our legislation, stepped in to try to limit speculation. they did what they call position limits. basically saying if you don't use a commodity, please don't buy it up because you're only doing that to drive the price

up. the judges in the district of columbia overturned that. they said, you didn't do a good enough job. so i agree that that is a problem, this kind of manipulation. we have given them the power to change it. given enough appropriation and given a judiciary that's not going to overturn it, i'm confident we'll be able to help. >> i like the ending on a positive note, congressman. >> but alex, one point. the consumer financial protection bureau and the confirmation of mr. cordray the other day is great news. that's designed to help that individual homeowner, that small business, that small community bank. that was one of the major achievements of this bill. >> indeed. and seeing richard cordray finally sail through the nomination process i think was a shot in the arm for a lot of us that are concerned about financial regulation. former senator chris dodd and former congressman barney frank, thank you both so much for your time and thoughts. >> thank you, alex. you are looking live at london. the nexus of royal baby watch 2013. we'll have the latest on labor day and a look at the social and

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one of the defining speeches of the obama presidency was not delivered to a packed stadium. it did not have the president's final edits jotted into the margins, more did it include a teleprompter. instead, it was a 17-minute extell pre extell praness discussion on race in america, delivered to a half-empty press room on a friday afternoon. president's words were honest and deeply personal. in the view of conservative "new york times" columnist david brooks, his speech was a symphony. >> i thought this speech was one of the highlights of the presidency. i thought it was a symphony of indignation, professionalism, executive responsibility, personal feeling. it had all these different things woven together i thought beautifully. >> brooks' reaction highlights why last friday could mark a transformational moment for the country. despite the hyperpartisan environment in washington, brooks was not the only conservative to praise the president. >> what i got out of the president's statement, which i thought was very impressive, is

that we need to have more conversation in america. i think we continue to make progress, but there are events like this that highlight and emphasize the fact that we still have a long way to go. we cannot be complacent in our society when we still have a dramatic disparity back black you youth unemployment an non-black youth unemployment. >> there is still of course a long way to go. prejudice runs deep in american society, deep enough that even the president himself has been subject to racial bias, a point he made powerfully clear on friday. >> there are very few african-american men in this country who haven't had the experience of being followed when they were shopping in a department store. that includes me. they are probably very few african-american men who haven't had the experience of walking across the street and hearing the locks click on the doors of

cars. that happens to me, at least before i was a senator. >> but the evidence is not just anecdotal, it is born out by statistics. a s a study by the aclu, blacks are nearly four times as likely to be arrested. while blacks make up one-quarter of the city's population they are targeted more than hafr the time under the city's stop and frisk policy. while african-americans make up 13% of this country, they make up 41% of death row inmates. ultimately the president was not simply responding to the death of trayvon martin and george zimmerman's acquittal, he was addressing the silent burden that people of color have carried for centuries, one that they must still bear today. "here was the unprecedented spectacle of an african-american president essentially explaining structural racism to america." joining me today, nbc news capitol hill correspondent luke russert, bloomberg view columnist margaret carlson, editor of the new republic,

frank forr, and former deputy white house press secretary, bill burton. joining us from boston, harvard law school professor charles ogle tree. professor ogle tree, i'd like to go to you first. we spoke on friday night about this, and in the days since i've been actually quite happy at the reaction from some in the conservative and republican circles about the need to have a broader conversation about race. my question to you is, where does the country go from here? the president did not exactly outline a path and i wonder as you've thought about this in the days since where do you think we need to go nationally? >> i've been thinking about this a long time, alex. i'm glad that the president at least said let's have a conversation on race. we are a divided nation and i think that is a problem. i think what we need to do is have these local community meetings talk about race. bring not just your friends but people who you may view as your enemies who don't want to have this conversation because it has to be had everywhere. let me tell you why. juror b37 made some very

profound comments about the jury's verdict in the trayvon martin case. it is clear that they made a determination that trayvon was like other young black men and the reality is that trayvon is statistically one of those teenagers who are black who would have 50% of dying of homicide, not of disease, not of any other issue, but homicide. that tells me that we have to as a whole community address the problem of black men. >> bill, as someone of mixed race, i want to know your thoughts as the president spoke explicitly about his experience with racism in the united states. but also made what i thought was a fairly dramatic statement when he said there's been talk about should we convene a conversation on race. i haven't seen that to be particularly productive when politicians try to organize conversations. and he instead sort of suggested that these conversations should be had among faith groups and community groups but not in the political class. what did you think of that? >> i thought it was a very good

point. i think it is rare when a politician brings people together you actually -- just to have a conversation about something like race, you actually make some kind of progress. like the president said, people often just harden in their views, walk away feeling the same way they felt beforehand just that they happened to have a photo-op where they got to sit with the president or national leader to do so. but the issue of structural racism in this country, the structural barriers for african-americans is an important one. i hope that of all people that justice roberts was listening to what the president had to say because when you consider that there are efforts in this country to try to stop african-americans from voting, stop young people from voting and make things more difficult, make it hard to participate in the process, at a time when there are real barriers for folks to participate and to succeed in this country. that is an important conversation to have. it is just not necessarily one that politicians ought to engage. >> luke, in terms of actual -- if there was a mention of legislation, the president talked about racial profiling,

stand your ground laws, and as bill said, i think it led a lot of people to start thinking about what just happened in the supreme court in the voting rights act. in terms of congress, you're on capitol hill. is there -- and do you think there will be momentum after this to try and get something done in terms of section 4 of the voting rights act? do you think there will be more bipartisan consensus or agreement in terms of that something needs to be done? >> i think before this speech there was certainly some momentum in terms of trying to do something for the voting rights act. jim sensenbrenner who is a very conservative member of the house gop conference has actually been quite adamant that there needs to be something done. eric cantor reached out to john lewis. they've had conversations about what they can do. they are still trying to figure out technical aspects of the law and where they can operate within section 2 and section 4 but do i think you'll see something come out of congress here. because while the real conservatives from the southern areas who are affected by this are sort of saying don't tell us what to do, there is an idea within the house gop conference

that it looks really bad if we block this. especially in light of this speech. but the thing that i found quite interesting is that president obama i think despite from educating a large swath of america with his had speech on friday, it's shocking that no one on the republican side in congress has released a statement about it, about this speech in general. i think if anything it probably educated a lot of those members at least to the idea of you know what? this is not just a foreign problem in a big city you've never been to. this is much more universal than that. >> frank, in terms of bipartisan consensus or lack thereof, matt drudge had a tasteless photo of the president in a hoodie. sean hannity had much to say about the president's drug use as a young man which was not exactly -- i think fitting the tenor of the moment. but to luke's point, is this something where optics alone will dictate that the republican party does something on this, even if there are not statements being released? >> it seems like there is a

pretty large segment of the party that think they can tamp down democratic vote. i do think there is value to having an actual conversation on race orchestrated by the president of the you united states. that every time that he's had an intervention in this subject except for the gates controversy, he's been able to explain things in a way that's incredibly sophisticated and i do think helps contribute to the environment that we exist in which is, yeah, you've got your sean hannities an matt drudges going off and saying race-baiting type things, but they are condemned by at least some mainstream. and if you look at the overall playing field as a nation we're responding to this in a way that's pretty -- that's pretty sophisticated. >> and hopefully productive.

professor ogle tree, this statistic cites a u penn study from august 2012. in his first two years as president, president obama talked less about race than any other democratic president since 1961. i wonder what you think about that. there's been a lot of back and forth about whether or not he needed to -- whether it was his place to, whether by virtue of being the first plaque president that was enough. where do you sit on that issue? >> i just had a conversation with president obama yesterday after talking about some of this on the morning shows on sunday. he really wants folks to move on this issue and have these conversations. he doesn't want to chair it because he wants the nation to give him some ideas what to do. i think that makes a lot of sense. in terms of race, he made it clear when he was running for president that he's not going to be the black president. he's going to be the president who happens to be black and i think that -- and i agree with that philosophy. even though now what he said about trayvon martin has now elevated trayvon martin to a national and a global issue and

he will be with us to eternity now because we will always think about what are we going to do about trayvon martin, about young black males, about unemployment and failed education systems. he's opened up the opportunity for us to have a real dialogue and discussion and we can't solve this problem in a day or a week. it is going to take a very, very long time. question is are people willing to strap on the boots and take that time. it may take months, it may take years to get a real dialogue going. i think he's going to be part of it. >> one of the things that was interesting to me and david marinas has an astute observation -- on friday afternoon at the white house obama was speaking not so much as a president addressing the populous but as a black man addressing white society. it was a rare case where president obama was speaking only as what he inherently is

rather than what he wanted to be. a change from rhetorically someone who has a tendency or is wont to sort of lay out grand visions for the country. here was just the practical reality of it. >> it was so personal and it was the "even me" part of it that resonated i think. even me. i've had these experiences. and we can say, one of the criticisms of conservatives is, oh, yes, this all happened to him while he was at a rich boy's school in honolulu. yes, it probably did. that's the point. and even -- until he was a senator he heard the door locks click. that so -- you know, catches your imagination of what it must be like. you look at obama and you say, well, no, it could have never happened to him. yes, but it did. that educates people in a way loftier speeches don't. now i've had a feeling about how often you should do this. i think the rarity of it, being so rare, actually helps, that it

captured our attention in a way that other things might. i hope we don't get lost in having conversations. i'm so glad you can channel it in to these -- think there are senate judiciary hearings, stand your ground, fixing the voting rights act. there are things to channel some of this enlightenment into. >> professor ogle tree, the president ended talking about a more perfect union. we talked about this speech not written beforehand, it was delivered to a large, somewhat empty room. but the theme of it i think cuts to the core of the obama presidency which is trying to create a more perfect union but a presidency that's inherently optimistic about the future. he talked about malia and sasha, his daughters. he fundamentally believes we are getting better as a society. when you think about the president thinking about his legacy, that would seem to be part of it, is that he worked to move the ball forward. >> it is. i've known barack obama for 25 years, since he was a student at harvard.

he's always talked about bringing folks together. i think this idea of a more perfect union is exactly what he's talking about and i think a lot of us are going to get on the train, get on the bus, wherever we have to go to make this happen, not just have a conversation but to really move for change. i think that's going to happen in our lifetime. >> harvard law school professor charles ogle tree, thank you so much for your time and thoughts. >> my pleasure. coming up, the countdown is on. bill burton, the countdown is on as bill burton and the entire world await the newest member of the royal family. we'll have a debate on the pros and croons of the crown just ahead.

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heir it comes! the headline of britain's top tabloid after months of mania. the great kate wait is nearing its end. earlier this morning the duchess of cambridge, kate middleton, was admitted to st. mary's hospital in london and is in the early stages of labor. joining the panel now, host of his show right here on msnbc, mar gan sheer, and producer extraordinaire for this very television show, mr. matthew alexander. matthew, thank you for your courage. martin, thank you for your time. i ask you, martin, when we talk about baby watch and certainly there is a frenzy here. i would assume there's some folks that are mildly interested in this in the uk. i will point out though, while a majority of britain, 77%, support the monarchy, 17%

opposes it and that 17% this week is going forward with an online campaign, #bornequal asking is this an intelligent way to decide our future head of state? do you predict, could there ever be a time when the republicans win? >> i can't imagine it. i think there are both historical and present contrary reasons for why there is such affection. first, the royal family's conduct during the second world war had a powerful effect on the nation. they stayed in buckingham palace even though london was being bombed relentlessly. and whenever there was a town or an area or suburb of london that was hit badly, the queen mother actually went to it and stood alongside the individual citizens whose properties had been destroyed. so that was a powerful galvanizing effect. second, the queen has lived with unimpeachable character for the whole of her life. she's dedicated her life of service. she's not been disloyal or

unfaithful as all of her children have been. and so the consequence of that is that the affection for the family is both historic and contemporary. there is i think a genuine concern about what happens when the queen passes away. but if you looked last year at the diamond jubilee celebration, her performance in the olympics, the ratings for the affection of the monarchy is actually higher now than in the last 20 years. i may differ but i don't foresee that being a decline in affection for the royal family. >> i wonder how younger britains -- understanding that you are also now an american now as well, matthew, and we are thrilled about that. but growing up in england, the queen as a symbol, what did that mean to you? >> well, to people like me it didn't mean that much but for other people it did. i remember you talked about the polling now. back in the '90s when the monarchy seemed like it was constantly verging on crisis right before diana died.

a poll taken in 1977, people called in, it was a huge telephone poll. millions called in and they said should we get rid of the monarchy or keep it, i being rebellious young teen called in and said, we should get rid of it. then i told my grandmother born in the same year as the queen in 1926. what she said to me was, matt w matthew, how could you after all she's done for you? >> exactly. >> i want to touch quickly on the subject of power and class and that sort of structure that's -- we talk about in the united states we're a democracy, this dodd-frank segment. there are still haves and hav n have-nots in england. there is still great praise for this small group of people. >> we can afford to be fascinated with the monarchy and this aristocracy because they are not ours. we don't have to worry about the type of kind of permanent

inequality that's baked in to the system. even though there's -- in many ways the british welfare state is much more advanced than ours, you still have the finance sector there kind of running perhaps even more amok than our own. >> i would also thrown in that there is, i believe, a template for american royalty. you see it. look at kennedy family. in this day can you walk down the street and see post es for jfk exhibits 50 years after his presidency. one thing i will see as a millennial, i love this baby. these are positive role models. it's great. >> i will say, martin, as we close, the monarchy costs british taxpayers 33.3 million pounds a year. >> is that more or less than the bbc? >> and that, as compared to an assessment of what the royal family brings in this terms of tourism, which is about 500 million pounds a year. so on a purely fiscal basis, there is some value. also, just a quick thought. don't you think that our current first lady or your first lady is

the equivalent of a member of the royal family. >> although she was elected into that office instead of born. >> yet she attracts the same level of attention and scrutiny as any princess. >> certainly. martin bashir and matthew alexander, our british correspondent team, thank you. thank you to luke, margaret, frank and bill. that's all for now. i'll back you tomorrow. "andrea mitchell reports" is next. [poof!] [clicks mouse] there's doughnuts in the conference room. there's doughnuts in the conference room. automatic discounts the moment you sign up.