line. >> where does this stop? when does the united states with very little cost stand up for these people and stop this horrific -- you can't look at those pictures without being deeply moved. and the san diego mayor will step down after reaching a settlement with san diego officials. and my exclusive interview right now coming up with aaron sorkin. >> headline writer didn't exaggerate. the headline writer lied. >> good day, i'm chris matthews if for andrea mitchell. a lot to discuss this afternoon. i sat down this morning with oscar winning director and screenwriter aaron sorkin.

most recently known for his hbo hit "the newsroom." he woke up to a harsh headline "mother jones" this morning. it says that sorkin said the huffington post sucks. he had this response to me. >> i'm here in d.c. i did an event last night for the new republic at the motion picture association. we screened this sunday's episode and there was a q & a after. and mother jones, terrific outlet, posted a story this morning saying that i said the huffington post sucks. and i certainly did not say that. the headline writer didn't take me out of context. the headline writer didn't exaggerate. the headline writer lied. and i just want to make sure that david corn, everybody -- i'm sorry, that arianna and everybody at the huffington post

knows that i did never and would never say that. >> well, we reached out to mother jones to get a comment. i actually spoke with david corn, the bureau chief of the washington bureau and he said mother jones has withdrawn that sucks headline. joining me now for our daily fix to talk about this and political headlines, msnbc contributor and "the washington post's" chris cillizza and amy water, editor for the cook political report. it's so interesting that sorkin was talking last night. i wasn't there but i was reading the notes from the report from mother jones about the tendency of the media to hype up every fight between every politician and point exclamation points around it. here we have an example of it. he was using it, it seems to me, as an example of the way the journalistic discourse tends to hype up the politicians. >> aaron sorkin would know nothing about hyping anything up in washington.

>> you're taking a shot now. >> i did not. >> did you just give a chris matthews ha? i think i heard one over there. >> i've been working on that. >> that was pretty good, chris. >> look, his stock and trade is making washington seem a heck of a lot more interesting than it often is. >> you are too -- i disagree with you. >> you think so. >> i think he understands the romance of politics. >> maybe. >> and the people i've worked with take it deadly serious. chris cillizza, i know you're a believer, too. when you saw the young people in "west wing with the with the that's how it was with jimmy carter. we may have been wrong in everything but everybody believed in what they are doing and it wasn't a game. i think sorkin had that right. >> i think trying to present aaron sorkin as a historian as to somebody who writes a dramatized version of washington, that's what he does. i don't think he pretends to be a chronicler. i think in general he gets things right about washington.

i do think a lot of people criticize -- i think the important point you make, i know amy and i agree on this because we talk about it all the time, the important point is, for every one bad apple, there's 50 or 100 members of congress, people who are serving in lower level elected offices who do it for the right reasons and unfortunately, the focus always tends to come on to the bob filners of the world. when there are lots and lots of people who don't sort of -- they're not kevin spacey in "house of cards" constantly positioning themselves. >> thank god they're not kevin spacey in "house of cards." >> what? >> putting them in cars and putting the exhaust on. >> i haven't seen the whole -- did you just spoiler it for me? >> you have to catch up. by the way -- anyway, i think this is an interesting fight we're seeing here. you can catch more of my

conversation with aaron sorkin. anyway tonight, we'll do that on "hardball." let me talk about bob filner here. you said he was from the rotten apples of the barrel. he's left out of the barrel today. the other news a bit of a bombshell. let's stick with filner here. he's agreed to withdraw from the office. >> yes. >> he's leaving friday after a closed door meeting with city council. >> or there's something in the deal about how much liability he's under versus the city of san diego, all of those things. there has to be something in this deal. >> are there civil suits in this case yet? >> no. when i talk to somebody who does employment law, it's just not that filner could be liable, it's the city of san diego as well, since he's a city employee. >> the workplace. >> it's the workplace. i think that could be a big piece of this. >> so many people testifying here publicly and coming forward

after all these years. >> 18. >> there's a lot of people. you're right, i think he isn't the typical politician. in other news, bradley manning, the convicted army private revealed he wants to live as a woman and change his name to chelsea manning. he was sentenced to 35 years yesterday, wednesday, on charges including espionage connected to wikileaks. this morning in an exclusive interview on the "today" show, manning's lawyer said he expects the government to help manning to transition to being a woman as he does serve out his sentence at ft. leavenworth prison. the lawyer explained why manning is revealing this requirement or desire now. >> chelsea didn't want to have this be something that overshadowed the case. wanted to wait until the case was done to move forward to the next stage her life. the ultimate goal is to be comfortable in her skin. and to be the person that she's never had an opportunity to be. >> meanwhile, the sentencing hearing continues for the u.s.

soldier who massacred 16 unarmed afghan civilians including children last year. army staff sergeant robert bales pleaded guilty to the murders and a jury will decide if he'll spend the rest of his life in prison without parole. earlier this week, the prosecution called nine afghan witnesses to the stand, in brutal detail the survivors recounted the attack, many pleading for their lives during the predawn rampage. bales' lawyer will try to make the case for leniency and plans to call a number of medical doctors to the stand to show his client suffered a breakdown during his final deployment to afghanistan. so chris, this thing, let's talk about the situation with regard to manning. >> sure. >> it seems to me that this really -- may have nothing at all to do with the guilt or innocence or state of mind. i do recall during the course of hearing about the trial that there was some discussion whether the stress of this

person's situation, whether they were female in a male body, we're all experienced to know what that conversation was about. did anybody say that would have influenced the private's decision to do what they did in terms of releasing the information, which was so damaging. >> certainly not that i've seen. obviously, i think myself and most people were shocked to see -- i actually saw it, savannah guthrie tweeted out the link to the comments made by the lawyer there. and you know, i think everyone sort of is grappling with it, yes. look, that's a very stressful situation. >> i would think. >> that you are in. who knows how people react to it. i think the difficult thing here, the lawyer made the point, that he wanted to keep these things separate, this change of gender and the leak investigation. because of the dove tailing of the timing, a lot of people will

work to conflate that. i am no psychiatrist, psychologist or anything else. i'm not going to be that person. >> you know, we've come so far in my lifetime, 20 years ago, this would be consider eed jockular. are you inside someone who feels they are a male or female, whether you want to have surgery or take the hormone treatment or whatever. i think people don't think it's funny but realize there's tragedy in this situation. we'll be right back. a little wh. but now she wants my recipe [ clears his throat ] [ softly ] she's right behind me isn't she? [ male announcer ] progresso. you gotta taste this soup. thto fight chronic. osteoarthritis pain. [ clears his throat ] [ softly ] she's right behind me isn't she? to fight chronic low back pain. to take action. to take the next step. today, you will know you did something for your pain. cymbalta can help. cymbalta is a pain reliever

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at a time when a higher education has never been more important, or more expensive, too many students are facing a choice they should never have to make.

either they say no to college and pay the price for not getting a degree, that's a price that lasts a lifetime, or you do what it takes to go to college but then you run the risk that you won't be able to pay it off because you have so much debt. that's a choice we shouldn't accept. >> president obama this morning, that's him in his first stop on his bus tour, a trip that has been prebutted if you will, reince priebus, head of the rnc. reince priebus said more campaigning isn't going to change the fact that the obama presidency and democratic policies have made life harder for young americans. you can be sure that the president will really take every single opportunity he can to do what he does best, which is talk and talk and talk. that's reince priebus. nbc's kristen welker was on the bus. there she is on the move. see how long this shot lasts. let's use our time on that speeding bus. the president is talking about

real-life, kitchen table issues, the challenge of people in their 20s and late teens and their parents in many cases, to decide how much money to spend on college. you know now you'll have to pay it back with interest. >> right, chris. by the way, this is what the bus tour looks like. we're headed to syracuse right now, the second stop. it's about 150 miles. we'll be on this bus for a little while. to your point, chris, that's right, president obama focusing on the issue of college affordability. of course, if you look at the polls, the one thing that folks still care about most jobs, the economy. this is part of a broader message that president obama has been touting for the past several weeks. today he mapped out his plan which would essentially link federal financial aid to a new college ratings system. it would rate colleges based on things like tuition, debt, graduation rates. the president challenging colleges to make an education more affordable and seasonally saying they will be awarded with

federal dollars. he also talked about expanding one of his programs that caps student loan payback rates at 10% of their salary. those just a few things that president obama put on the table today. you talk about the prebutt by reince priebus. we're getting reaction this afternoon, chris, from john klein, the chairman of the house education committee. he said he was interested in the president's ideas but also expressed concern that those ideas could ultimately wind up driving up the cost of college. now, all of this, chris, if you put this into a broader picture is part of the president teeing up the fall budget battles with republicans, the of course debt ceiling and, of course, the budget. when you talk about the budget you talk about education, college affordability, those will be some of the things they discuss. the president drawing the battle lines. in the past several weeks the president has made a number of other stops. he's talked about housing winding down fannie mae, freddie mac, investing in infrastructure projects.

>> kristen welker, traveling in the bus, i love this coverage. it's great. thank you, kristen from nbc news. >> thanks, chris. some good news to report right now, beau biden has been released from the hospital and is heading home to delaware. vice president joe biden and dr. jill biden released a statement saying their son beau had undergone a successful procedure and is in great shape. beau biden tweeted this picture with a message, on our way home. can't wait to get back. what a good family. the delaware attorney general underwent a biopsy at the m.d. cancer center in houston sunday night. we send our best wishes to the biden family. rad school. 20 years with the company. thousands of presentations. and one hard earned partnership.

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hosni mubarak was choppered from his prison cell to a term of house arrest which for now will be at a military hospital as the former president awaits a long line of proceedings. we go live to cairo. is there an emotional or crowd reaction to what looks to be kinder treatment of mubarak that you're getting apparently for morsi? >> in terms of the crowd reacti reaction, no, there hasn't. there hasn't been much of a reaction on the street. that is a stark difference from two years ago. there have been organizes including some of the youth movements who participated in the 2011 revolution and some of the newer ones since then who have been angered by his release, putting out statements condemning he was being released and are calling for street protests in the coming weeks. none have yet actually taken to

the streets. there's no doubt that the country to some extent has been shocked or to some extent indifferent about his release today. although outside the prison there were a handful of people supporting them throughout major cairo suburbs and areas and the rest of the country, very few reaction so far, chris. >> is it possible in egypt to find a center for is it just a battle between mutually exclusive points of view, the army's and the brother's? is there something in between politically? >> it's a very, very small number of people. right now this country is extremely polarized. that debate has become to some detriment a binary one. to those who support the muslim brotherhood and support former president mohamed morsi. there are those in the middle increasing by become more vocal who have expressed reservations

about how the military conducted itself while rejecting the muslim brotherhood. it's not that they embrace but they reject from of the disproportionate use of force to crack down the politicalty motivated crack down by the military. it's a small number but it's nonetheless present here. >> thank you so much. joining me now in the studio, u.s. ambassador dennis ross, msnbc analyst and former special assist and the to president obama and "washington post" diplomatic correspondent ann guerin. thank you, both. your names have been in my head in these areas. you guys know your stuff. syria, the red line has been crossed. generally speaking, why does the president agree to red lines with anything? you agree with netanyahu. why don't you say i have a red line? i have a brain and i'm going to use it when the time comes and i know what to do. do we have a red line that means anything in syria or in effect

we can't figure out who to give it to anyway. >> there's a lot of things that take place underneath it that are absolutely not. secondly once you draw it you're obligated to do something. in a sense that's where the administration is now. i think it does need to do something. initially when the president "a," drew it and "b" when we made a decision to provide lethal assistance, although small amounts of it, the purpose was to send the signal, don't do more of this. the fact that they have done more -- >> you accept the report that it was the regime, the assad regime using the rocket -- the poison rockets? >> i do because of where it's taken place. it's taken place in the suburbs of damascus where the rebels are recently made gains. i think that explains it. the other thing is if they didn't do it, it means they lost control of their own stocks. the rebels aren't creating it. one way or the other it's a bad sign about the regime. >> where do we go from here if

they crossed the red line, apparently so, what does the administration do to make good on its commitment? >> this ups the pressure on president obama, not only is it likely to be shown to be a clear crossing of red line, he said almost exactly a year ago, but you're starting to hear from allies most notably today the french, that they think that this is really something that is going to require some kind of coercive international reaction. >> do we know who to give the guns to if we do that? >> we are giving guns but nothing that would possibly have -- it will not change the outcome of the year, wouldn't do anything about chemical weapons. what we're giving them are the things they said they wanted only up to a point. we're not giving them anything that could shoot down israeli or international aircraft. >> this is like lawrence of arabia. remember when the british wouldn't give them anything but small arms in the arab revolt.

>> we need to make a basic decision. what's our object knife syria? is our objective to change the balance of pou to produce a political outcome at some point or is our objective to simply contain the conflict? if our objective is one of those two things we have to do more than what we're doing right now. right now we're not doing enough either way. >> let's get into assad's head, bashir assad. his use of chemical weapons would mean we're going for broke here. he must know it's crossing that line. >> look, he does know that. think about the fact that there's actually a u.n. team in syria to investigate the previous uses of chemical weapons. the message he's sending it i don't care. >> which means what he wants to do is fight to the death. >> which means he sees this is exessential terms, number one. this was an area undercutting the narrative that they were putting out there, that he was winning the war again. there were places along the

coast where they were doing well. this is in an area of damascus where the rebels were making progress. >> what would they do if they were rational? there are no escape country, is there? is there a reasonable scenario whereby vladimir putin would accept them? >> well, he hasn't so far. the russians are assad's greatest friends up until the point when it comes to giving them -- which he hasn't been willing to do. you've seen the russians say yesterday in what should have caused a massive eye roll around the world that this was probably the opposition itself staging some kind of event for the benefit of the u.n. weapons inspectors across town. so you'll get rhetorical support, international

diplomatic support from the russians but probably not an exit plan for assad. >> they don't give a plan to get out. it doesn't help us. >> that's been a question all along. what would assad do. >> let's go to egypt for a second. we saw this amazing picture. it's been called cinematic as the helicopter taking him from the hospital. >> i think that's part of what's going on. they're trying to create a certain legal framework around it because they basically said you can't hold him any longer under the terms you're holding him. >> where is your sympathy here? i have this old world notion, we had france, i was there after sadat was killed, in walked in a big, strong guy. i was working for tip o'neill at the time. he's going to hold that country together. and he did. >> he did.

but he also did nothing to advance that country. and he did -- he benefited a very small circle of people around him. and he allowed things to get dramatically worse. i'm someone who dealt with mubarak over the years for a long time. i was constantly telling him you have to find ways to begin to address your problems and i was constantly told i was naive. i'm not so sure i was naive. >> does he believe there was no way to give any power to the muslim brotherhood? >> he did at one level but he aloud them to take over the professional syndicates. they came to dominate the medical, the engineering, the lawyers. he was allowing them to dominate a large part in a sense -- >> as long as what, what did he hold to himself? the military. >> yes, he held the power but by the same token he was providing a safety valve for them. >> isn't this what the saudi royal family does? blow up the rest of the world but leave us alone. >> they did that for a long time. they began to realize they weren't being left alone and there was a cost to them. they began to change then. >> there's i real irony here in

that mubarak's demise united the islamists and the secular opposition in egypt. they were demonstrating together in tahrir square and two plus years later, you've got mubarak not return to power but out of prison and the islamists out and the military in and the secular quiet. what happened to the revolution? >> again, i ask the same question, quickly, is there any middle or center like we said there's a center in the united states. the suburban moderate republican. the more conservative democrat. is there something like that between the muslim brotherhood and the military that we can look to? >> there really isn't today. but there could be in a sense if the military overplays its hand. the military has to be careful about how far they go. the fact is they have enormous popular backing because the muslim brotherhood alienated the vast majority of egyptian society. the military is taking advantage of that. but they have to be smart. if they overplay their hand, if

they don't begin to create empowerment, if they don't focus on governance as opposed to control. what was the big muslim brotherhood mistake? they wanted control and didn't want to govern. >> their long-term goal was to go further toward sharia. >> absolutely. >> thank you so much. >> thank you. students return to the ronald mcnair discovery learning academy two days after a gunman entered the school and exchanged gunfire with police. no one was injured in the incident and many are attributing that outcome to a brave school clerk ab antoinette tuff who tried to calm brandon hill who police say was carrying an ak-47 rifle and 500 rounds of ammunition. in a newly released 911 tape you can hear tuff convince hill to stand down. >> he's on the ground with his hand behind his back. tell the officers don't come in with any guns, shooting or anything.

they can come on in and i'll buzz them in. sit right there. i'll buzz them in so you know when they're coming. okay? okay. just stay there calm. don't worry about it. they'll see you're trying not to harm me, okay? okay. >> okay. it's gonna be all right, sweetie. i just want you to know i love you, though, okay? i'm proud of you. that's a good thing you've given up. don't worry about it. we all go through something in life. [ male announcer ] running out of steam? ♪ now you can give yourself a kick in the rear! v8 v-fusion plus energy. natural energy from green tea plus fruits and veggies. need a little kick? ooh! could've had a v8. in the juice aisle. need a little kick? help keep teeth clean and breath play close.fresh and close. with beneful healthy smile snacks. with soft meaty centers and teeth cleaning texture

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ft. hood. the former army psychiatrist has been representing himself during the trial but declined to call any cross-examine any witnesses before resting his case. he did it yesterday. nbc's mark potter is following the trial and joins us from ft. hood, texas. mark, this say terrible example, i think, and frightening to a lot of americans of a person who comes with a mideast background who seems totally loyal to america and says i switch, i switched sides. >> reporter: and it was a murderous switch according to prosecutors and all the events that happened here, a terrible event that happened four years ago. the jury is now waiting to take the case. the panel of 13 senior military officers is going to break for lunch and at 1:45 central time, 2:45 your time in the east, they will begin their deliberations. the reason for that, just about 20 minutes ago nadal hassan was

asked if he had a closing argument he wanted to make? he said, quote, the defense chooses not to make a closing statement. so the case has moved on and it will be in the hands of the jury shortly. the pros 'cuse spent about an hour and a half talking about how this was a premeditated event, the prosecutor described this as, quote, a premeditated murderous plan to quill akill an said he had a jihad duty in his mind to do so. much of the time was being described as a planned event, not just something that happened. he said hasan bought a high-powered weapon, took target practice, he cased the building where the event was to take place. he said hasan was upset he had been told he was to deploy to afghanistan and pick the day of the shooting, november 5th, 2009, for a specific reason

because that's when the unit he was assigned to go off to afghanistan with was showing up at a medical processing center for processing to be prepared for the trip and that's when and where the shooting took place. the big question has always been would hassan give a closing statement? we know the answer to that now. he has said he was the shooter. he has described that he switched sides in this case. what happens next is, if he is convicted of just two of the premeditated murder charges and there are 13 of them, we then go into the penalty phase where it's possible that he could be sentenced to die and in that separate hearing, at least 16 family members have been -- have said they want to come forward to speak to the court, the jury panel about how this has affected their lives and hasan will have a chance to speak and we'll have to see whether that occurs. first and foremost, the jury now has the case and it's possible, chris, we could have a verdict

today. >> do we know what form of capital punishment the military employs? >> reporter: i don't know that. i truly don't know that. >> i was wondering whether firing squad is still an option or how old times -- >> reporter: it's been a long time since they did that. it's been 52 years, 1961, when they executed someone. there's a lot of talk in legal circles that even if he is sentenced to die, it will be years before that actually occurs. >> i understand. >> reporter: if it does, because of all the appeals. you can tell they are walking carefully in this case, dotting every "i," crossing every "t" to make sure they don't make mistakes with that inevitable appeal in mind. >> great report, mark. what a strange and tragic case this whole thing is. thanks so much for reporting. >> reporter: absolutely. thank you. coming up, we go inside the oval office during some of the

crucial moments of the nixon presidency and some of the recordings that continue to fascinate us. >> we're still behind you out here. and i wanted you to know you're in our prayers. >> each of us has a different religion, you know. >> yes [ bleep ]. >> ron, we have got to build peace in the world. how did you marry such a pretty girl? my god. >> well, i'm lucky. >> you're lucky? that's right as i was lucky. re o be an even better company - and to keep our commitments. and we've made a big commitment to america. bp supports nearly 250,000 jobs here. through all of our energy operations, we invest more in the u.s. than any other place in the world. in fact, we've invested over $55 billion here in the last five years - making bp america's largest energy investor. our commitment has never been stronger.

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came through, they don't -- there's so little credit for that. >> the folks may understand it. you see the folks didn't understand the checkers speech but the people did. i mean, the commentators didn't and the commentators didn't understand cambodia but the people did. >> the hell with the commentator. >> presidential historian doug brinkley is a professor at rice university's eisenhower center for american studies. he joins us now from austin, texas. this is classic richard nixon, blasting away agnew-like at the commentators, yet he was probably as right as he ever was in his life when he said the regular people out there like nixon a lot more than the journalists, the elite journalists, ever did, that's for sure. >> these tapes must be like catnip for you, chris. anyone interested in political history, they're quite remarkable. the bit you just played with

george herbette wa ettert walke calling, ronald reagan dialed in, gerald ford, billy graham, most of them trying to buck up nixon's spirits a little bit. he was susceptible to flattery, being told that he'll be able to hang in there, don't let the bad g guys, the press, the commentators, get you down. it's a remarkable release here. it's supposedly the end of the tapes being released, chris but i think there's a lot more going to be coming out in the coming years, because some people have put some for national security reasons, on hold. >> by the way, when i went over fo to the archives, the annex in college park, i tell you, they are amazingly interesting. you never are told where the treasure is. you have to go looking for it.

h.r. hald h.r. haldeman. >> i'm never going to discuss this [ bleep ] watergate thing again, never, never, never, never. don't you agree? >> yes, sir. you've done it now and you've laid out our position, you've taken your steps. >> interesting thing, we haven't heard -- the only cabinet officer that has called, and this is 50 minutes after the thing is over, is cap weinbergen, bless his soul. all the rest are waiting to see what the polls show. [ bleep ] damn strong cabinet, isn't it. >> he doesn't even like his own cabinet. he doesn't trust them. he picked them. what is this? nixon trashing his cabinet because they haven't called to buck him up within a certain number of minutes. what do you think about that?

>> everybody is jumping ship and he had to get rid of haldeman ehrlichman. at one point nixon calls him, he's like my brother. it's the last guy that he really can trust. he's fired haldeman. it's a fascinating relationship between those two. >> i interviewed bob haldeman right before he died. he's a christian scientist. he refused surgery on his stomach cancer. i said what was watergate about? he didn't get it. he never was a real politician. >> i think with this new 300 hours it shows how the president's trying to salvage

things via the soviet union and china. i thought some of the dispatches with david k.e. bruce who as you know, one of the great diplomats, he suddenly grabs bruce, puts him in the white house, he says you're going over to china as my guy but don't listen to the state department, even though you'll be ostensively working with them, you'll be my eyes and ears. if you could somehow get rid of watergate and focus on the other things here, it's in foreign policy that nixon sees his resurrection. >> here's another conversation between george herbert walker bush, chairman of the rnc back then, and nixon talking about dirty tricks. here they are. >> would you rather not know details if i told you something was wrong? i told peterson something that i know. >> no, you tell me. >> this guy is involved. >> how's he involved?

>> he's involved because he's in the dirty tricks department. >> the prosecutor tell me what you got. >> well, you can imagine how people that are survivors of this era, george schultz or henry kissinger, he's in these tapes quite a bit, how they're sitting on bated breath. how did it come out? what did i say? the very thought that people were being recorded and not knowing it, it's deeply embarrassing to anybody calling in. in the end, all of these show, everybody leaving ship and nixon having to soldier on with kissinger in foreign affairs in the last years of his life. i thought the brezhnev thing is interesting. he's plotting all the great things they'll do. the listeners know watergate dooms all that. >> there's a great story i have to share about nixon and dealing with drunks. he was out with joe mccarthy in the early '50s when mccarthy was in his heyday and he got completely drunk and he had to

get him to his car near dupont circle, because mccarthy couldn't find his car. near the end, he had brezhnev out at he got completely drunk and nixon had to carry him upstairs to his bedroom. he took the meanest angry communist and he got brezhnev to his car, got him to bedouin he was drunk. what a career nixon had. nothing like it. >> and these tapes show a real intimacy with mao tse-tung, a warmth nixon had. it's remarkable. >> i think he liked the summit. >> he loved it and wanted another one. the tapes show he was desperate to get him to visit america during watergate, tour the country and nixon was planning a second trip to china that never occurred. >> it's interesting, his last tour of the world was that

wonderful trip with anwar sadat where the people were cheering him. what a fascinating story nixon continues to be. jack ferrell is working on a new doug, thank you. doug brinkley, one of the greatest historians of our time, and we'll be right back.

we're monitoring breaking news in southern california right now. a charter bus carrying at least 30 passengers has overturned on 605, the freeway. it's in irwindale near los angeles. los angeles county fire department and emergency responders have arrived on the scene about 30 minutes ago. the freeway in both directions is closed. which political story do you think will make headlines in the next 24 hours. chris cilizza ought to know. is this going to be about the whole celebration, marking is probably the right word, marking of this, one of the great events in american history. i think one of the top two greatest addresses as a student

of this, one of the other being the second inaugural lincoln when he tried to explain to the american people the horror and understanding of the civil war in biblical terms, trying to understand is reparation really for the evils of slavery. here we had martin luther king in this wondrous way identifying civil rights with america and saying this is something we need for our country, not just for african-americans and the sons and daughters of former slaves, but this country has this. the way he set it up in the speech, talking about the mountains, topography across the country and how it was essential that we do it across the country. >> no question. >> amazing. >> commemorating 50 years and the march on washington. many people were getting involved in d.c., the dream, talking about the summit. yeah, i mean, i think sort of historically certainly one of the single -- singular moments

of, you know, our american -- our collective american history. >> that was when the civil rights movement was in bloom. it hadn't gotten bitter as it did in many ways because the vietnam war got more divided and more divided. even with the successes of the voting rights act of '64 and 65, that was the most wonderful part. it was a unifying moment, too. it pushed kennedy. it certainly pushed him to move. >> you know that well. >> i know that well. somebody said well the other day, you need the inside and the outside. it was our colleague reverend al sharpton. you need the politicians and the advocates working together. that does it. thank you, chris, washington post. that does it for us, the special edition. it's only special because i'm here. "andrea mitchell reports." peter mitchell reports. my wife and kathleen were here taking over for our friends.

follow the show on line and on twitter @mitchell reports. tamron hall has a look at what's up next on "news nation." chris, thank you. we're following several stories at this hour. the justice department launches a new search in the voter i.d. legislation. pete williams will update us. also our nbc station in san diego is reporting that mayor filner will resign. he is out of here. a deal has been struck. we'll get the latest details here. plus, the voice of reason. the amazing 911 call from the georgia school clerk who was able to talk down a gunman with an ak-47. will her actions reignite the gun debate especially when it comes to school safety. we'll have an entire section of our show dedicated to this woman and what she did. it's all coming up next on "news nation." and you smiled. and threw it. and i decided i would never, ever leave it anywhere.

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a voice of reason. today students return to the georgia elementary school where an armed man with an ak-47 and 500 rounds of ammunition entered ready to kill. we are hearing the minute-by-minute conversation between the gunman and the school employee who walked him back from the edge. >> it's gonna be all right, sweetie. i just want you to know that i love you though, okay? nd a i'm proud of you. >> we will play an extended version of that 911 call including parts you may not have heard. a panel including former fbi profiler clint van zandt will join me live for a half an hour interview. plus, bradley manning's sudden revelation he wants to live as a woman. on the road again. president obama kicks off a two-day bus tour on college debt. i'm tamron hall. we'll get to all of that in a