seem to use walk bands over ipods. and we also have from little professor still teaching math. >> it even talks. >> i never had one. >> of course you're like 25 years old. >> we also have a rotary phone. >> we have some retro rotary phones. "morning joe" starts right now. turns out the average human is smarter than the average american. here now we have a segment average human versus average american. [ laughter ] >> the average human. >> which grand master of the

older knights did the outnumber forces. >> valet. >> the average american. >> would you like to solve the puzzle? >> superman and spider woman. [ buzzer ] >> this has been average human versus average american. >> that didn't happen. please tell me that didn't happen. willie? >> i would have gone with wonder woman. >> oh, my god. good morning. oh, my lord. i'm sorry, america. it's thursday, october 15th. welcome to "morning joe." with us on set we have former communications director for george bush, nicole wallace. we have steve rattner. in washington, my only friend in the world that takes ambien,

former "new york times" report er -- >> tuesday most red sox -- >> it is tuesday. >> justin verlander. seriously. >> i don't take it any more. i haven't for a long time. >> she guzzles cough syrup. >> i'm tired of the shutdown. >> your ambien comments all linked together. have you seen that? >> no. but i'll look. >> it's the only thing that comes up when you google my name. thank you very much. >> you should not be googling themselves. >> all that hard work on capitol hill, working night and day, night and day, bringing the people their news for the "new york times" and mika here has tied the ambien --

>> why is it googling your name. >> let's talk about the news. >> let's change the subject. >> why don't you ask jeremy if he sees any movement on capitol hill. >> jeremy, once this thing ends, it's so embarrassing. i was talking to my dad yesterday. is there any safety net? i cannot believe. what happens if congress can't do what it's supposed to do? >> right. this is what qualifies for quote-unquote tremendous progress as harry reid said, a solution that punts the difficult decisions a few week, a few months down the road. this is what congress has done for the past several years and this looks like the kind of deal we're going to get. while there was progress last night in the senate, i would remind people that the senate is only half of the equation here and we don't know what's going to happen in the house. john boehner has to make a very difficult decision about sending whatever comes over from the senate to the house floor. he could very well decide to amend that bill, send it back to

the senate. each day that goes by we get closer to the thursday default deadline. i don't see this wrapping up as neatly as the headlines this morning would suggest. >> the organization already, ahead of even the prospects of a possibility of a deal, you got the same group that was responsible for funding these ads that marched republicans into this boxed canyon and have gotten their approval rating down to 27% already criticizing a potential deal. >> while they are organizing protests to protest exactly what they did, what they created later this morning senator mitch mcconnell will present a bipartisan plan to his fellow republicans that could end the shutdown and extend the nation agencies borrowing limit at least for a couple of months. the deal would keep the government funded until january 15th, the same day a new deeper round of sequestration kicks in. it would raise the debt limit

through february 7th and create a new budget conference to no later than december 13th. the senate could vote on the bill tomorrow. the deal does not include any language to dismantle obama care nor would it include a repeal of the medical device tax, two sticking points for the tea party caucus. senator ted cruz said he's still unsure whether or not he would block a vote on the bill. come on. >> lots of luck. go ahead and do that. just try it. go ahead. >> in the house congressman huelskamp -- >> i'm daring you to do it. do it hot shot. or will you sit in the back and when people are responsible and actually give a damn about this country and give damn about the full faith and credit of the united states and actually care about the people who are working

day in and day out, hoping to keep their job, you're going to keep posing and hurt those people? i don't really get it. it's kind of like -- it's great for you, i know. i know it's really great for you politically but it's just like the veterans memorial that you used as a political backdrop. it's a great backdrop until the next day the vets that actually organized the rally came out and were really upset that you would use their rally for your own political points. so, go ahead. you guys go ahead. just keep using america as your political backdrop. hurt all the people you want to hurt. hurt, by the way, small government conservatives. republicans. working class americans. that actually used to support our party. but are now wondering what in the world. keep doing it. keep doing it. i hope it really helps you out because it sure is not helping

the conservative movement. it's not helping the republican party. and it's not helping this country. go ahead. what's happening in the house? >> congressman tim huelskamp suggested the larger impact in voting for the deal said we got a name for it in the house it's called the senate surrender caucus. anybody who would vote for that in the house would virtually guarantee a primary challenger. according to roll call, senator cruz held a secret meeting at a washington bar and restaurant, tortilla coast with roughly 20 of the most conservative members of the house. they were reportedly discussing how to respond to a potential budget deal in the senate. but their cover was blown when according to roll call the group was spotted by majority whip kevin mccarthy who was dining with some other members. mccarthy is a regular at the capitol hill restaurant. >> if you're going to hold a secret meeting on capitol hill -- tortilla coast >> not the one.

>> it's right there. that one of the things -- >> that's a public meeting. >> you only have one restaurant. you got tortilla coast and then bull feathers. those are the only two restaurants. you don't hold a secret meeting. >> where would you hold a secret meeting. >> secret meeting hypothetically speaking might be held at one of the nearby hotels. rent a hotel room to have a secret meeting. >> that seems like a public meeting. >> not tortilla coast. >> i hope the solution to this problem is known as the tortilla coast accords. >> i think we should call-up the caucus. >> if you're in washington, d.c. and you're on the hill go to tortilla coast because they have the best chips. the problem is you eat all these chips they are so good you are stuffed -- >> i'm sorry. >> i'm expecting a free burrito.

>> a little known fact about that tortilla coast, paul ryan used to work there. >> did he? >> i knew i loved him for so many reasons. >> when did paul work at tortilla coast? >> before he was a congressman. >> got free time now. >> little known fact. anyway, so think about this cynical game and this is what upsets me. a lot of conservatives who actually yesterday, they actually are every bit as conservative as these people that are out there. this is not about conservatism. this is about tactics and this is about publicity. what makes me so angry is that some republicans, some conservatives will have to step up and they see that 24% approval rating. they know it will go lower. they know the senate is in

jeopardy. they know the white house will be in jeopardy down the road. >> could be? is. >> independents who actually broke for romney last time, independents have pulled away. >> moving towards this disastrous roll out of obama care. >> disastrous. unfortunately now these republicans are going to have to scramble. probably not only save the full faith and credit of this country on the day of default two, three weeks later and they will do it and a couple of people in the back will throw pot shots at them. they know they have to do that. they don't have the guts to stand up and say we're the ones that destroyed the republican party's opportunity to actually do well during this time. >> to actually delay obama care. that was on the table until ted cruz came along, to actually

make some gains in the policy debate about obama care. that was on the table before ted cruz came along. i love these alternate realities, the novels that play out what could have been. what could have been this month, the republican party could be seeing record highs in their approval rating if they simply stood back and pointed to all of the problems that they predicted with an expansion of the government's role in the health care. it's not just the computer -- >> by the way, this wasn't alternate reality. steve rattner a month ago i was saying and conservatives were bashing me republican positive ratings were higher than they had ever been at 2011. we were doing great. we fell off the cliff just as charles krauthammer, joe scarborough, scott walker, chris christie warned them, jeb bush. we all warned them this was

going to happen. and it's happening. and the highest number since 2011 have now turned into the lowest numbers in the history of polling. >> yeah. as you say, if you had done nothing, stood by and watched these computers crash and people not get enrolled their poll numbers would be higher. i don't think changing obama care in the congress at this moment was ever on the table or ever was going to be on the table. >> no. but if this hadn't become about the brinksmanship of shutting down the government for an aim that was unachievable there could have been conversation about the medical device tax. there could have been a debate. it was a legitimate one for the republicans to spearhead about delaying obama care. >> especially with all of the glitches. >> systemic failures. >> if the roll out happened the

way it happened which was disastrous by any democrats most generous descriptions the republicans could have introduced legislation to end implementation. >> i agree that's true. to bring this back to the here and now. obama care -- >> you don't want to live in my alternate reality. >> we can but three hours is a long time to live in alternate reality. >> we take ambien. >> just to bring it back to here. obama care is off the table now. now the question that you're talking about what do the republicans do? remember as jeremy pointed out even if this deal gets through the senate which it will eventually whether wednesday or friday we'll see then it's in front of the house. even if they vote for it all it does is start another clock with no teeth, no back end, no real consequences to fight this all over again so the republicans haven't lost anything by going along with this.

they get another bite at the apple and see what happens. >> if you're a member of the house, if you're a member of the tea caucus how can you vote for this which is we want to take a bite out of obama care. the deal that senators reid and mcconnell put together delays the reinsurance by a year and has tighter income verification but that's about it in terms of obama care. how can that caucus in the house that john boehner would need to pass it through how could they vote for this deal. >> i don't think they ever will. there was almost nothing you could put in this bill that was going to get through the senate that they would vote for anyway. the question becomes how soon does john boehner realize he needs to depend on democratic votes to get this through. going back to the point that steve and nicole made earlier, i picked up on a real palpable sense of anger among a lot of

the more moderate democrats they could have gotten a much better deal. they feel had they fought this question out over spending and taxes in a much broader way and not a limited fight over obama care they could have gotten a grander bargain. now they feel their backs are up against wall, you're staring away at two days away of a default. >> today a new round of polling s'mores trouble for the republican party. according to abc news and "the washington post." 74% of americans disapprove of the republican party's handling of the budget. >> the good news is 21% do. like if we were playing football 21 points would be enough to win. >> let's go find them. >> that's a negative 16-point swing over the past three weeks people. democrats aren't doing much better. 61% disapprove of their handling

of the talks. the gap has seen a negative six-point swing. president obama finds himself in the best shape with a 42% approval rating. his net favorable swing is negative two points within the margin of error. looking just at republicans nearly 50% are not happy with the way their own party is handling the crisis. that's interesting. more than 75% of all independents disagree with the gop's budget. >> stop right there for a second. nicole look that. first you're splitting your party down the middle 50-50 is bad. >> disastrous. >> in the past independents used to break 50-50. just so you at home can remember what happened during the romney election, a lot of republicans were saying that if most of the independents were breaking mitt romney's way should mitt romney win. of course he didn't because more democrats came out.

that independent line has been leaning more republican over the past four years. the fact that we're losing those voters, puts numbers, nicole, to all the things i've been saying for five years if you want to win the philadelphia suburbs, if you want to win the i-4 corridor in florida, if you want to win presidential elections and stop hillary clinton from being president over the next eight years so republicans have back-to-back some say the white house that middle line the republicans are bleeding support on that has real world effect. maybe not in the most conservative house districts in america -- >> most conservative states. where we've done well, if you turn it around and look at the year scott brown won or 2010 when republicans did well it was because that number was the exact inverse, it was because close to 80% of independents decide with republicans. to go back to my alternate

reality if we were having a discussion about how philosophically wrongheaded this health care was, we were having a broad discussion about the overreach and expanding the role of government those numbers would be reversed. >> this is what's so maddening also -- do you support obama care? >> i don't know any more. my husband asked me the other day. no i don't support obama care because i think the government is an incompetent deliverer of health care. >> medicare? >> you can do your left wing block stuff later on. i oppose obama care. i have from the beginning. i did every day. here's my point. that we are united as a party. this is the madness of ted cruz's political war that he's begun. we as a party were all united

ideologically. we all believe it's a terrible idea for the federal government to be the chief organizer of our health care system. we think it's disastrous. ideologically, philosophically at our core. >> logistically. we have that case study this week. >> but we're divided as a party over tactic, over stupid tactics and that's the most remarkable thing. that's the thing that's missed. it's unbelievable. >> the implosion over tactics. >> this is not pro choice republicans. >> other foreign policies that are raw. >> here's the ramifications to this. leon panetta very critical of the president's handling. look at this out of china even a

deal to avoid default is reached may not be enough to save america's standing throughout the world. one example of an editorial from a chinese state-run news agency. writing in part this, the cyclical stagnation in washington for a viable bipartisan solution over a federal budget and an approval for raising debt ceiling has again left many nations tremendous dollar assets in jeopardy and the international community highly agonized. such alarming days in the destinies of others. all nations big or small poor or rich -- >> this is a mouthpiece of the chinese government. a lot of people say so what? so what? chinese business leaders are saying this. >> christine lagarde. >> business leaders across the middle east. people that invest in america

and the dollar are starting to say this. >> yeah, no question. look the chinese own say a trillion dollars of our debt. the old joke if you owe your banker $10,000 you have a rob. if you owe him a billion dollars he has a problem. it's a question of what our debt looks like. going forward it's our ability to sell debt. the ability of people to buy our debt. it goes our standing in the world. we can't point to other countries and say you should do things this way. >> we're talking about international trade, we're talking about the dollar. can you explain how this affects working class americans? can you explain how this collapse and the rise of interest rates impact people that are struggling to make a house payment, a car payment, to get one of their children through college? >> put it in a broader context. there's no question and we can show charts other times these kinds much dead locks cause economic contraction. they hurt the economy.

consumer confidence is at a nine month low as we sit here today. people pull back. >> who does that hurt? >> it hurts the average american who is out there trying to make a living and finding that washington is actually the biggest impediment in the recovery of this economy. not anything going on overseas, not the american workers it's what's going on in washington. >> so much to get to this morning. coming up on "morning joe," erskine bowles. senator amy klobuchar and chuck todd. up next, amazing he joins the table for "the politico" playbook.

oh, wow. bill >> what's up bill >> never a let down. the big storm in the middle of the country continues to move up through minnesota. we have snow this morning in south dakota once again. this is a picture here from daddywood, south dako deadwood, south dakota. the map behind me shows the big storm, east coast holds on to about one or two more beautiful days. if you're traveling to the airports today, chicago will deal with rain and windy conditions. that's the recipe for airport delays. thunderstorms hit or miss from dallas to san antonio, maybe houston late today, st. louis with some early morning rain. we're tracking that rain heading for st. louis. nothing too bad maybe half hour. there's the big storm in the northern portion of the country. zoom out. texas will get some rain as we go throughout the afternoon and

evening with thunderstorms. all signs are pointing right now that this will not make to it the east coast. the east coast should be pretty nice for at least two more days so enjoy it. beautiful conditions from miami all the way up to new york city. you're watching "morning joe" on this tuesday. life with crohn's disease or ulcerative colitis is a daily game of "what if's". what if my abdominal pain and cramps end our night before it even starts? what if i eat the wrong thing? what if? what if i suddenly have to go? what if? but what if the most important question is the one you're not asking? what if the underlying cause of your symptoms is damaging inflammation? for help getting the answers you need, talk to your doctor and visit crohnsandcolitisadvocates.com to connect with a patient advocate from abbvie

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was on set. >> yes. he was on the fence. >> i think he loves his dad. >> time now to take at that look at the morning papers. "the washington post" top secret documents released by edward snowden say the nsa is collecting millions of contact list from personal e-mail and instant messaging accounts from around the world including here in the u.s. they show 700,000 address books were collected on a single day, including more than 400,000 from yahoo! alone. there's also hundreds of thousands of lists stored from chat services. >> seriously -- >> that's not good. >> stop using the internet. how much does a carrier pigeon cost these days >> they are down. >> i'll get about five. >> get a fleet of carrier pigeon. >> boom. send them all at the same time.

i'm serious. >> seriously, five good ones. send them out. got to be good ones. anyway the "l.a. times" for a second night in a row, dry ice bombs at lax. they recovered three others he in restricted areas including one below a plane. on sunday night a similar device exploded in a bathroom of a restricted area of a different terminal but didn't do any damage. authorities don't believe there's a terror connection. >> "usa today" blackberry is trying to ease the fears of its customers in an open letter addressing the future of the company. blackberry tells customers it has substantial cash on hand and a balance sheet that's debt free. the letter acknowledges the rise of competitors like apple and announced plans to make bbm messaging available on iphones. >> you still have a blackberry?

>> don't even get me started. i love blackberry. i've lived on these things. the new ones are a piece of junk. there's four different things that don't work on it. everybody in washington lives on these. >> you know, i love typing on blackberries so i pick it up. i have my old blue one. i pick it up. it dials. then i pick it up like once a month. you know what? i'm going to go back. and then i try to look -- i hear world war iii has begun in a just try to get it on the server and -- they still haven't figured out how to put up a basic website in less than a minute-and-a-half. it's unbelievable. >> somebody needs to steal the keyboard format. >> i am carrying around a broken one in my purse because even though it doesn't send or receive e-mail i still prefer

the alarm function and the contacts in there. >> i'll say that keyboards, these keyboards we love so much will be obsolete. this generation of siri is pretty remarkable. >> yes but there's a problem with that. their keyboard needs to be improved. the keyboard is terrible. you don't want to talk into your phone all the time. it's ridiculous. on a train or -- >> i remember when our 5-year-old. >> i miss the old telephone. >> i miss the typewriter. >> listen, if you guys can do me a favor and tweet @joemsnbc, i would the old style telephone. at any point heavy one that you put down. >> my dad has one. >> i'll tell you why. you can't find them when you go out in stores and actually -- >> no, they are junk. >> i'm not being a grandpa. phone service is terrible. i live in an area that doesn't

hatch great phone service and even our land line, it doesn't matter what you get. i want to go into the kitchen, at any point bright yellow phone that has the cord that goes to the floor. you know the quality, seriously quality here. the quality is 100% better. >> you just need to hop into your ford taurus, drive down to radioshack -- >> stop making fun. i want the old bell telephones that -- where can i find these things. someone let me know. . it one. >> the "boston herald," this is a fascinating story a high school volleyball player from massachusetts was suspended for five games and demoted as captain after giving ride to a friend who was drunk. when 17-year-old erin cox showed up at the party to pick up her friend law enforcement officers were at the scene and she received a summons although

police acknowledged she hadn't been drinking. cox is in violation of zero tolerance policy. come on, seriously. the people that are running the school i think they used to run washington they are that dumb. and blackberry. >> we say we want teenagers to do she did and then punish her. >> they so few times do it. >> don't discourage that behavior. >> the teenage brain actually worked. >> too bad. >> speaking of teens. >> we have a new title 0 for the introduction. president and ceo of politico. >> so powerful. >> i'm going to start speaking in a deeper voice. >> you know what -- >> clean up my language. >> do you have expensish rugs in

your office now -- >> it wreaks of richmamahogony. >> this is better for democrats than republicans. democrats at least get this punted into next year. they don't have to give up very much at the end of the day. make minor tweaks to obama care they are so small they are significant. republicans will home in the interim there's a deal at getting the deficits that they find much more appealing than what's on table. this is a huge problem for john borne. he'll meet his members today, they will hate this deal. any member of the tea party will say it's surrender.

it is surrender. if they got into a strategy that was inevitable to end in surrender so get over it at some point. >> then i ask you this because people have known john boehner for a long time, people have contributed to john boehner for a long time, billionaires that run the biggest banks in america and they say they can't get through to the guy. they can't talk to him. but they have no confidence in john boehner is going to do the responsible thing if america does face an economic collapse. >> i believe he'll do the responsible thing at the very last second and in very messy way. they will come out today and try to push through something that just republicans would vote for that would never make it through conference and at the end of the day he has to get half of his members to support something that looks like the senate bill that was crafted overnight and hope that democrats support him which they will and that's the messiest outcome possible for him. let's say he'll say i the good fight to the better earned and i

had to collapse or the economy will collapse. i have to believe john boehner won't allow default. >> if the senate talks about its bill today, votes on it tomorrow that gives the house hours until the midnight deadline. >> it has to play out rapidly. there has to be a vote in the senate in the next 24 hours followed by a quick vote in the house to get it done. it's mechanically possible. if there's mass protests among conservatives today and delays it then we're against the clock. >> isn't your instinct -- because i'll tell you this is what newt used to do. stands and stares at the rest of us. we put newt in this position. here's what we'll do. we'll vote together or not. so we're just going to sit down here and newt would say we're not going to let you set us up as the bad guys while you sit back comfortably in your chairs voting no and being reckless.

like boehner couldn't do that. >> couldn't do that. probably 100 of his members would say whatever. >> that many. >> it's basically -- >> 100 republicans willing to let america go into default? >> i think a big number would, if the alternative is the deal on the table. >> so a clean cr would 100 republicans let america go into default. >> it would split the party almost in half. 120 republican votes. >> tell me, when do they decide that they would vote? does the stock market have to go down 5,000 points before they would break. >> don't know. remember there's a caucus inside of that caucus that are the deniers. they think default won't have the consequence that people around this table are talking about. most economists -- >> what precedent are they working off of there? >> willie i got a response from

my twitter question on the phone. this is what they said. you are a right-wing hack. go to fox. i don't know if that's exactly what i was looking for. go to fox, right across the street. it's an easy walk. that's all i want. >> i would like the rotary. >> i want this. this is heavy. it works. when you talk on the phone, the person on the other side of the phone can hear you. why is it so hard for people to make phones that actually work. >> i don't need the red light. >> he's holding the red light. >> i want one of those red phones but you can't buy it. >> i like the one that still rings when you slam it down because there's a bell in there. >> that's what i want. >> need one. >> we'll be right back with

grandpa. >> coming up next, the colts didn't want to pull out. they didn't go long to pull out all the stops. >> but they went ahead and did it. >> we're going to do it, by golly. great baseball game last night. we'll be right back. mike rowe here at a ford dealer with a little q and a for fiona. tell me fiona, who's having a big tire event? your ford dealer. who has 11 major brands to choose from? your ford dealer. who's offering a rebate? your ford dealer. who has the low price tire guarantee, affording peace of mind to anyone who might be in the market for a new set of tires? your ford dealer. i'm beginning to sense a pattern. get up to $140 in mail-in rebates when you buy four select tires with the ford service credit card. where'd you get that sweater vest? your ford dealer.

and his new boss told him two things -- cook what you love, and save your money. joe doesn't know it yet, but he'll work his way up from busser to waiter to chef before opening a restaurant specializing in fish and game from the great northwest. he'll start investing early, he'll find some good people to help guide him, and he'll set money aside from his first day of work to his last, which isn't rocket science. it's just common sense. from td ameritrade.

i love them. seriously. >> it ain't 1984. >> all right baseball. >> so i have gotten a number of tweets. people very nice. really nice. there's like three or four, of course you want an old style phone you gop. they say you want to go back to the past. slavery. of course you want a phone. i didn't know that the confederacy had phones like that. >> oh, my god. >> that's one i want, not your beige one. >> things might have turned out better if they had phones like that. general lee could pick up the horn once in a while. >> now they will say you have a confederate flag in your office. >> turn out better for the south. >> must be exhaustive to be that angry all the time.

it's 6:00 in the morning. >> this early. >> i'll be watching a baseball game and tweet hey this is fun watching game with my kids. oh, yeah while people are starving. >> if it's any consolation the same thing happens to democrats? >> it does. >> no matter what you say, oh, you just want to take over the world, you want the government to run everything, you want to raise people's taxes. >> they have different things to say. >> look at this picture that t.j. has up. i don't know what -- that's one of the most disturbing photos i've ever seen. holy cow look at that mascot. >> who is that? >> it was boden college. the bear was on work release.

he was on work release and they brought him over. >> a handy mascot. >> paws are all over the place. >> what happened to baseball? >> let's talk about the baseball game out in l.a. cardinals, dodgers game, fourth inning, adrian gonzalez at-bat with a man on third. rbi double dodgers up 1-0. later in the fourth, he's struggled in this series but not here. he thought it was a home run. paused for a while. even with the pose he lands a stand up triple. he's punked. he was o for the series until that point. meanwhile l.a.'s young out pitching the cards, adam wane wright, dodgers take it 3-0, they trail the series 2-1, big win. obviously had to have this one. ninth inning a dodger fan dressed in a bear costume.

tried to pump up the crowd. fan showing off some moves. are we sure it was a fan and not a stunt. that bear hurts. he's hurt. he twisted his ankle. will be out three to six weeks. he tore something. >> he's a character. >> oh, my gosh that's incredible. >> let's see monday night football. colts and chargers first play from scrimmage. andy luck hands it off to richardson. 35 yard gain. colts wind up settling for a

field goal. second quarter philip rivers finds zone. san diego up 7-3. chargers kicker nick novak added four field goal enough to give the chargers a 19-9 victory. by the way i've been told i should clarify when i said about the phones, it would have turned out better for the south had they had the phones. i didn't say it would have turned out better for the country if you know what i'm saying. >> the twitter feed has already started. >> i love it. >> i tweeted it yesterday. maybe one of the baseball shots in a long, long time. >> great shot. >> coming up next the daily call as matt lewis joins us for the must read opinion pages. we'll be right back.

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♪ 50 past. live shot of the capitol. live with us from washington senior contributor, matt lewis. you write for the daily collar, fools rush in. you're either for the tear party or an establishment rhino. that's the choice everyone on the right must make. it's a false choice. i'm not comfortable with the big spending establishment republicans of yesterday or the tea party radicals of today. what gives? the problem is that we shouldn't have to choose between these two things. it should be possible to elect smart serious conservatives who want to repeal obama care, reform entitlement, curb spending, and keep taxes, low et cetera, all without whining and the protesting and oh, yeah the

shutting down of the government part. matt, who are those people? >> matt, you basically wrote the column i want to write. joe scarborough says, he's slinging 98 mile-per-hour fastballs right now. you've been writing some great columns over the past couple of weeks looking at the divide inside the conservative movement. matt what's so distressing. we were talking about it before. >> we all agree on the policy. >> exactly. >> we all agree on the issues. it's about strategy and figuring out how to win back the white house and the senate that we disagree on. >> absolutely. i'm a bill simmons fan too. any comparison i'm happy with. look, part of it is you've got these tea party folks who weren't active. there's this perception that conservatives long time movement conservatives finally got fed up. truth is in many cases these are new folks who were really apathetic, weren't involved in

politics even a decade ago. trying to make up for lost time. they don't appreciate the fact that conservatives have made great strides. just since 2009 conservatives have elected people like marco rubio, people like governor from wisconsin -- >> scott walker. >> scott walker. some major strides but politics take time and i think these are folks who are in a big hurry and not that politically experienced. >> you know what upsets me, matt. there were very few of us that were complaining about george w. bush spend go to much. i'm sorry, nicole. when i have somebody come up and lecture to me about big government wait a second where were you in 2004 where i wrote a book talking about big government republicans or in 2006 writing an op-ed how we would lose if we didn't. for some of these people to lecture us rather than fighting

big government republicanism and then like you said because they are guilty they weren't doing anything over the past decade now they are converts and they want to prove they are the most self righteous of all. >> when you write a book criticizes george w. bush and the spending, you were a rhino then for doing that. >> i was a rhino -- thank you, matt for saying that. in 2004 i write a book attacking george w. bush while a lot of these people were going along with medical part d. going along with the biggest domestic spending splurge ever. where do these people come from suddenly? >> here's an interesting thing. conservatives are worried about immigration and assimilation. one of the things that happened within the conservative movement itself is immigration after 9/11, after barack obama's election, after t.a.r.p., there was a series of people who hadn't been politically active or had been on the left who came

into the conservative movement and really they don't have the sort of traditional conservative temperament or political world view. and so the conservative movement is struggling right now with an identity crisis. >> matt, stay with us, if you will. >> thank you. still ahead chuck todd rolls out new polling that challenges the idea of a completely polarized america. plus senator amy klobuchar with the debt fight in d.c. we'll being right back with "morning joe". ♪ [ male announcer ] staying warm and dry has never been our priority. our priority is, was and always will be serving you, the american people. so we improved priority mail flat rate to give you a more reliable way to ship. now with tracking up to eleven scans, specified delivery dates, and free insurance up to $50 all for the same low rate. [ woman ] we are the united states postal service. [ man ] we are the united states postal service. [ male announcer ] and our priority is you.

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up next "the washington post" eugene robinson joins the discussion. plus from campaign to fix the debt, erskine bowles. harold ford jr. is here in the studio. "morning joe" will be back in a moment. sfx: birds chirping sfx: birds chirping

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one national monument that remains closed is the world war ii veterans memorial in washington, d.c. there was a big protest rally at the memorial yesterday. sarah palin was there. as was the guy who started this whole lockout texas senator ted crews who demanded an answer to this question. >> let me ask a simple question why is the federal government spending money to erect barricades to keep veterans out of this memorial. >> i'm not sure but i think it's because of you, right? we learn it from watching you, okay? it takes a lot of cahonies to lead a protest against yourself but that's what makes ted cruz ted cruz. >> i don't understand how the spin on the -- >> i don't know if you can say that word in spanish. >> welcome back to "morning joe." nicole wallace still with us and

matt lewis in washington. also joining the table, visiting professor from nyu,er democratic congressman harold ford. >> professor. >> and in washington, we have political analyst eugene robinson. i'm not done. in charlotte, north carolina, former co-chair of the president's bipartisan debt commission and co-founder of the campaign to fix the debt, erskine bowles. >> we love erskine. >> later this morning senator mitch mcconnell will present, a bipartisan plan to his fellow republicans that could end the shutdown and extend the nation's borrowing limit for a couple of months. the deal would keep the government funded until january 15th, the same day a new deeper round of sequestration kicks in. it would raise the debt limit through february 7th.

the senate covet on the bill as soon as tomorrow. >> erskine, it does look like we're going kick the can down the road for a couple more months. this is continuing to govern by crisis. >> let's look on the good side of it. we got a chance to stop the madness. we're not going to default. we're going to open up the government. and we're going to set up this hopefully the last process at least it's the last one i'm going to buy into where we have a chance with paul ryan and patty murray to actually get some kind of a deal done. you know, whether we can get as far as i want to get or as far as you want to get, who knows. but we have a chance with two respected leaders to actually get something done and what we're trying to do out here in the hinderlands is build up a lot of support and pressure on

these guys in washington to move out of the comfort zone and make the deals we got to make. we got to reform the tax code. we have to reform the entitlement programs. we have to make changes in the sequester so we can put in some other mandatory programs in there. there's great agreement, you know, in lieu of some of the cuts we have in things like education, infrastructure, research and military readiness. >> gene robinson, leon panetta came out yesterday, made some surprising comments, criticizes the administration for the type of cuts and where the cuts were made. this is government by crisis. 70% of our intel people furloughed and of course death benefits somehow we didn't figure out a way to pay for the death benefits with all the money going to the pentagon. this is what happens when you have government by crisis. this happens year after year after year. >> this crisis of where the money is going, of course, under sequestration was created.

it was artificially created in order to be unbearable, but -- it is a ridiculous way to run a country. and gee, all we needed was a clown like ted cruz to come in and egg on the house republicans to shut everything down and he seems to manage not to bear any personal responsibility or have to make any tough calls himself. but we'll see what he does. he could torpedo this whole thing by refusing to give his consent. >> matt lewis, what's going to happen, matt? i've been calling a lot of my conservative friends in the house on the hill, they seem just as concerned as everybody else that we could have a default. we could continue the sequestration process which really hurts defense, hurts dod, hurts our intel capability. what your hearing? >> here's what i think might

happen. i'll throw this theory at you. we're sort of assuming that the tea party contingent is either playing a high stakes game of chicken in order to extract as much as they can, they are rational actors but going to the brink and pull back. there's another possibility that they are operating on a different paradigm, more of a long term revolution, actually. part of that could be to take down speaker john boehner. it wouldn't surprise me if you have this scenario play out. the senate comes together passes something, it goes to house to and house republicans, not enough votes to get past the hastert rule. john boehner has to make a decision does he put something on the floor of the house that won't win enough republicans but might pass, might get the government open and prevent default, or not. if john boehner does that then i think you could have a

revolution in the house on your hands where boehner is toppled. i think the conservatives may then declare victory and say hey this was really the first step in what we're trying to accomplish. it could happen. >> wow. erskine it's willie. good to see you this morning. i would ask you how frustrate is it for you someone who was given the task and assigned to come up with a grand bargain, leaving politics out of it, erskine bowles that's become shorthand for us four to sit and watch as you came up with that plan and democrats and republicans alike kind of turned their backs to it and rolled their eyes. is it hard four to watch the politics that go on with questions that are so important? >> willie, i think it's insane. it's frustrating. when i walk through airports and i'm going through them six out of eight days, i can tell you people yell across the airport don't quit, don't give up, stop this in washington. won't you please go up there and

do something about negotiating a deal. i got an idea, willie. doing the same thing over and over again is insanity. and we got one more chance here to actually get a deal. the way we got a deal in the 1990s was to have a negotiator between the president, you know, the house and the senate. that person went back and forth over and over again, you know, maintained the confidentiality, built up trust and was able to find out where the two sides actually could agree. we could get somebody like, you know, like dennis could do this. the new chief of staff. he has a lot of trust on both sides. rattner could do it. but you need somebody who will go back and forth trying to get a deal done so we don't get to the end of this thing and as joe said just kick the can down the road. i don't think the american people will put up with another one. >> by the way, willie, erskine goes to nicer airports than do i

because we both shout to erskine stop the intransigent. which by the way is fine with me. mika. >> go ahead, harold. >> the last person to do the go between that erskine bowles laid out was him and if we had his kind of leadership again, we might be in a different place. two quick things. i hope democrats stop calling this a be republican surrender largely because as much as it could resemble that in some ways it's not helpful. we're very close -- there's no need to hurl that as we go forward. two, as the budget guys get together, the ryan plan, the murray plan and the simpson bowles plan there's commonality and common ground amongst those three plans. that should be the start of the budget plan and hopefully the president and the white house will embrace that and we can begin to move forward in a more

experiod d expe exped impb tm expedi expeditious way. >> nicole wallace, take a look at new round of polling that shows more trouble for the republican party. according to abc news and twaesh post, 74% of americans disapprove of the republican party's handling of the budget talks. more than any other party. that's a negative 16-point swing over the past three weeks. democrats not doing much better, 61% disapprove of their handling of talks. their gap has seen a negative six-point swing. president obama finds himself in the best shape with 42% approval rating, his net favorable swing is negative two points twin margin of error. looking at just republicans, nicole, 50% are not happy with the way their own party is

handling the crisis and more than 75% of all independents disagree with the gop's budget strategy. >> look, this is the divide we keep talking about. this is the divide over the tactic of shutting down the government. i want to pick up on something that matt said. i do believe the tea party is trying to create a revolution. i also believe the tea party wants to find out where the third rail is. it used to be we can't shut down the government, it used to be we can't go into the sequester. those things have passed and they are emboldened by that. >> part of the reason why is the president oversold the effects of sequestration. by the way, let me ask you, how many americans really know and care that the federal government shut down. i know there are a lot of people hurting. so a lot of people hurting. but you know what? 80%, 85% of americans --

>> we're saying the same thing. >> this is my point. before all the groans go up. my point is it hasn't affected the tea party members personally yet. >> oh, no. >> correct. what it should reveal to republicans, and republicans have to stop doing success afraid of the notion of being primary. republicans have to say bring it on, primary me. the tea party brought you -- the sequester something they are proud they brought you but brought down spending but not the right kind of spending. we need to tackle entitlements. they brought you a government shut down where people who don't have a voice, people who depend on federal benefits have been hurt. >> the va. >> i think the debate in the republican party has to become -- where this revolution is testing what is sacred now and where the third rail is that's healthy and that's good and we should test the limits and we should sometimes test the sacred cows in politic, we

should be updated. what shouldn't happen is responsible republicans shouldn't be intimidated by these words i'm going primary you. >> that would be fantastic. that would make a big difference. >> seriously, i got primaried willie my last time i ran. >> joe, i think matt -- >> i'm saying because i only voted to impeach bill clinton twice instead of four times. i got primaried and i was told i was not conservative enough. tom coburn is being a rhino. instead of hedging i said come on. come on. i invite any conservative group to come in and support this guy, i will stomp the life out of you. i will humiliate you and drag your political carcass across washington. i said that. they said out. i got 80% of the vote. sometimes i wonder, matt, why

are these people afraid of their shadows? >> i completely agree. if you believe in what you're doing you should say bring it on. let's have that fight. i will win based on the issues and i'm going to out work you. >> you say it a lot nicer than i did. >> i think nicole was exactly right about something just now because look, identify been lamenting the tea party and how they get involved and they don't have the political experience. i think that's certainly true. but there's the other side which is some of the people who have been in the conservative movement in the republican party for years are operating under a sort of almost fdr paradigm, where they are under the assumption, making assumptions, almost like a "moneyball" thing, conventional wisdom says you can't dare go up against government. you can't dare try to make government smaller. you'll be destroyed. so i think some of this is

actually really is healthy and i think the new tea party folks, you know, you take the good with the bad. there's some naivete but we might find out that guess what the world has changed and americans are less dependent on government. >> the "new york times" this morning, tim huelskamp, we got a name for it in the house called the senate is your rent did your caucus. anyone who would vote for that would guarantee a primary challenger. >> i would invite anybody to primary, tom coburn in any state in america. >> erskine? >> joe, this is not a one way deal. you know we've also got to buck up these democrats who are willing to vote for entitlement change because they are equally worried about being primaried by somebody from the left that will be financed from the aarp or afl. we need to buck up beaumont sides and do a deal. >> amen.

>> to that point, how should democrats react to the point that erskine just made. what responsibility do we have? >> obviously democrats do have responsibility but democrats are not -- it's not the exact same position. i mean there's not a tea party on the left and the democratic party. there are people more to the left, people more determined to protect entitlements as they are, but it's not -- it's not exactly the same thing. democrats frankly are not -- >> why not >> afraid of being primaried. it doesn't happen. >> what would happen, though? some of the things that nancy pelosi has said whenever you talk about saving medicare for the next generation of recipients is so demagogue it.

nancy pelosi said we're going to throw old people out on the street. no i would say it's actually a bigger problem on the democratic side because entitlements, that's where the real crisis is in the long term. >> i totally disagree and there is plenty of movement actually on the democratic side on entitlements, perhaps not as much as be republicans would like to see. not immediately. but democrats have long been willing to talk about this stuff -- >> erskine -- >> move on some of this stuff if it's done in a way that is fair, that spread the burden that does not balance the budget and solve the debt problem, the long range debt problem solely on the backs of the poor. >> gene, we're talking about medicare recipients in 2032, for god's sake. >> exactly. so we're talking -- plenty of democrats, for example, are

willing to talk about, you know, increasing the cap limit on social security. plenty of democrats are willing to talk about means testing for medicare. there's plenty of room for a conversation there. frankly, not that there aren't people far to the left in the democratic party but you can't compare the crazy that's going on in the republican party today with what's happening in the democratic party. >> erskine bowles, i most definitely can. the only difference is republicans are crazy over 12% of the budget that drags the long term debt. some liberals are crazy over the 88% that will destroy this country economically. like for instance, here's a great example. i'm talking about this today, i'm going to get bombarded by the left today saying you want to throw granny out in the street. i'm talking about 45-year-olds in the year 2525 and suddenly i

hate poor people today. it's unbelievable. >> not a discussion people are ready to have on both sides. >> erskine. >> we need to do two things. one reform the tax code and make the promises of social security and medicare and medicaid real and to do that we're going to have to make some modifications. we made promises we can't keep. we can make some changes to social security that will strengthen it for people at the lower end and slow the rate of growth for people at the upper end. things that gene would find and say it makes great sense. it's difficult for a democrat who goes home and says i'm going talk about reforming medicare or reforming social security. they do get attacked on the left and we got to give them support like you have to give support republicans who are willing to reform a tax code on something other than a revenue neutral basis. >> i agree. erskine bowles, thank you very much. matt lewis and eugene robinson

thank you as well. great conversation. >> thank you guys. gene, i love you. >> i love you too. >> matt lewis, slinging fastballs. >> the age of amazon. how exactly did jeff bezos turn an online book seller to a powerhouse. a rare look inside one of the business world's iconic innovator. >> i bet he sells telephones at work. >> up next chuck todd and new polling on the american center with richard dorment. you're watching "morning joe." we'll being right back. and just give them the basics, you know. i got this. [thinking] is it that time? the son picks up the check? [thinking] i'm still working. he's retired.

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. pretty sunrise at reagan national airport in washington. here with us now, nbc news chief

white house correspondent and political director chuck todd. >> so, "esquire" magazine, are you on the cover? >> he's mentioned. >> is it me or is it joe? who is that. >> wait. >> somebody we work with. >> is that chris matthews. >> no it's not chris matthews. >> willie geist >> scarlet. >> senior editor of "esquire." >> it's called selling magazines. they are still in the business of selling magazines. >> do you think scarlet johannsson would sell more magazines than chuck? >> i would buy it. >> chuck todd in tidy whities. >> is that a tattoo bracelet? >> get right to the substance.

i read "esquire" for the pictures too. >> how about the south korean. he was something else. thank god. >> finally got a hit. >> all he had to do was get on base and it just changes the tenor of the game. >> speaking of scarlet johannsson i saw "in good company" a couple of days ago. it's a good movie, man. i got toad mitt. dennis quaid since "the right stuff." is that not hip enough for you. seriously in good company if you wear thin companies you can't watch good old movies. >> i tell you not these i like all four of them. pigs actually okay. horses and cows all good.

>> for a new look, the issue reads in part everything we're told about politics in america today there's no middle ground between left and right, blue and red, us and them is wrong. there's a large grouch americans even a majority who make a new american center that's passionate, persuadable and very real. they are merely waiting for washington to find them. chuck todd that's all we hear. it's all we've heard over the past seven years when we go out. all we hear is what you're reporting. >> it is. look, first of all "esquire" had the brain child of this. they came to us. there's got be a center. not just what is the center any more of american politics on issues. we'll get into that. who is it and how big it is. the thing that blew us away we knew there was a center. how big it was. it's 51% of the country. a majority is somewhere in the middle. they don't even know it. the true hard core left -- >> how do you define this. >> we did this large survey, asked people over 100 questions.

it was done. we had something nearly 3,000 interviews. you asked them different questions, different views on economic issues, social issues, all these various issues and our pollsters, we used the obama pollster and romney pollster and they worked together and segmented them into eight groups. two are truly liberal groups. the bleeding hearts and the gospel left. two of the groups are hard right. the radio sort of talk radio right and the evangelicals, 28%. what was stunning is how big the middle truly was. okay. some of it is obvious, suburban woman our minivan moderates, highly educated business types and we call that the mba middle not to be confused with the lebron james middle. pickup truck populace. economic populace, socially conservative. then our favorite one the whatever man group which is basically the highly cynical

young folks, the young folks that think washington forget. >> who knew turtle -- >> do you like our faces. >> i love the pickup populist. >> duck dynasty. >> we talked about this when we put together, media play as roll pinpoint amplifies the extremes. on cable news show you have far left or far right or screaming between the far right and far left that doesn't exist in people's dinner tables or breakfast tables. what did you set out -- clearly you had a hunch that there was something here. you were surprised by the findings? >> i think what's most interesting about this is the middle isn't defined by a lack of intensity. they have very passionate position on a lot of different things. they don't conform the contours towards the traditional liberalism. they support gay marriage. they support abortion rights.

they support raising the minimum wage. they are very weary of government regulation. they are weary of immigration reform and affirmative action. you see this hodgepodge of beliefs that exist within the middle of these two fringes. >> what's the political implications of this. >> two ways to look at it. cynical political consultant will do with this information what they've done for years is cherry pick. we have our hard core. in many ways you saw the obama romney campaigns go about this. the obama folks saw that the middle was, you know, while maybe they weren't crazy about some of obama's government regulation policies and expansive government issues they were with him on social policies so they went after and cherry picked women. they went after those minivan moderates. if you were on the republican side they tried to get the

pickup populists. that's the cynical way to look at it. i'm sitting here and saying 51%. what's the common thread. the common thread is fairness and the common thread is americatocracy. what you saw in this middle ground and yu say there's a 51% majority that somebody could build off of. the idea fundamentally person who believes in gay marriage and believes we don't need affirmative action that's not in conflict. that's an ideology of americatocracy. >> where the rubber hits the road as perot used to say, how do you get somebody out on the first tuesday in 2016 in davenport, iowa to fight a snowstorm and go stand in the corridor of a gym locker room supporting somebody that may not ring all the hot button bells.

we hear they are passionate but are they that passionate. are you saying this won't happen in the republican or democratic party it would have to happen with an independent candidate. >> it has to happen with an outside force. i'm in the minority. everybody says it can't work, it can't work. i think you look at this data and by the way it's not michael bloomberg because we tasted the soda base. they don't like regulation. but my point is, i would look at this and say there's a passionate middle ground here to go with what rich was saying is that these are not squishy people. these are passionately -- they have a defined belief, they don't like the idea that they are forced to passaic red jersey or blue jersey. >> picking up on what chuck was saying i don't think it's possible to get that out there but i think that's a function of the fact that washington isn't reflecting what's going on in america right now. the primary process doesn't

reward people who thinks outside of the red and blue. >> two key parts of it for sure. >> think about it. these people they want voter i.d. laws and raise the minimum age. >> they are anti-regulation and -- >> yet they would raise taxes on the rich. >> raise taxes on the rich. >> you can't be a politician in washington and say oh, my god what do do i? >> unbelievable. >> this is a fascinating survey and what a remarkable way to look at politics and -- >> "morning joe" middle. >> mika is still looking at some pictures in "esquire." you can find much more on the msnbc news "esquire" polling. >> look it's miley cyrus. i'm just saying. >> we didn't ask a single thing about twerking. did we have anything on twerking? >> you lost me there.

we're pretty sure that's not how you use a sledge hammer. >> the blue man group -- >> women in restaurants and cars we love issue. richard dorment thank you. chuck we'll see you coming up on "the daily rundown" at 9:00 a.m. coming up why doctors say george w. bush is very lucky when it comes to his health. much much explains how the president's heart scare over the summer was much more serious than first described. we'll be right back with more "morning joe". [ male announcer] surprise -- you're having triplets.

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about the health of president george w. bush who had a stint inserted into a coronary. >> reporter: he was one of our most athletic presidents. just this past memorial day weekend leading wounded warriors on a 62 mile bike race in the

texas heat at his crawford ranch. a month later he was in zambia not knowing he was suffering from a silent killer tail routine physical in august. mark mckennan. what was described at the time as a routine procedure was a lot more serious. a coronary artery that was blocked and life threatening. a lesson other factors including unhealthy food choices can lead to heart disease say doctors not involved in bush's care. >> exercise is not a guarantee against developing heart disease. therefore it's very important to keep in touch with our doctors to make sure our blood sugar, blood pressure are regularly monitored. >> reporter: bill clinton jogged

but he had quadruple bypass surgery and two stints in his artery in 2010. dick cheney had a heart transplant. george w. bush has bounced back quickly. >> this is stuff -- so this guy, you were just saying really healthy eating. >> healthy either. i mean like anybody on the campaign trail he could have a sweet here and there, but he's a very healthy either. >> wasn't one of these big steak type dinner. >> weight. you watch pictures of him during his presidency, he was trim and fit and still is trim and fit and this is something that had a lot of people very worried. we're happy to see him -- >> stress and lifestyle. >> genes. >> a lot of this is genes in the end. healthy eat is great but there's a genetic component. >> what shocked me is 67.

he is such a healthy guy. >> so active. >> unbelievably active. >> all right. up next senator amy klobuchar is optimistic about a potential debt deal but how much are democrats willing to give. we'll ask her next when "morning joe" comes back.

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delta is looking beyond. 80 thousand of us investing billions... in everything from the best experiences below... to the finest comforts above. we're not simply saluting history... we're making it. hi there. 45 past the hour. joining us now from capitol hill democratic senator from minnesota senator amy klobuchar. okay. you're not wearing the same clothes as yesterday your. has it been that long of a night. >> no it hasn't. >> watched you on tv yesterday and i thought you were wearing the same thing. how is the group of 12 doing in trying to get others involved in some sort of an agreement. >> the group of 12, which you know, is a lot of women.

we got some good ideas going and common ground that helped senator reid, senator mcconnell as they reached their agreement. that was our role. we worked over the weekend. it's a good model as we go forward with the long term budget issues. this agreement is essentially a few months. my husband was joking as he was giving me grief about it he said he has library books that are overdue for longer than that. but it's a few months that's an incentive to get some long term budget work done which is what we really have to do for the country. >> what at this point, i know you can't talk about, you know, nitty gritty, but there are some areas where there's hope that you can point to? >> well, first of all, we're going to get the government open again. secondly, we're going pay our bills, which was incredibly important to this. and the third is that people are signalling another commitment here with this short time period for the continuing resolution to

actually negotiate. the senate has a real budget, the house has a real budget to come together to do it. i would say those are the bright spots. the fact that some of these partisan poison pills weren't included on this agreement is really important when you look at some of the issues that were in the mix, whether it was birth control or delaying the affordable care act those are important things for the american people. when chuck talked about that group of people in the mid that want people to compromise and get things done that was a victory for that. >> still worried about kicking the can down road. stand by. where does the government stand on spending that will help us get some perspective. steve. >> first of all, everybody talks about wednesday as being a deadline and it is an important day. it's the day the government can't borrow any more. one of the reasons why you don't see quite as much urgency as you would imagine if we were going default on wednesday because we're not going to default on wednesday. on wednesday the government will

still have about $30 billion on hand, money comes in every day, money goes out every day. if you look at at chart of what will happen over the next few months, you can see on october 23rd there's a $12 billion payment to social security recipients and that want may or may not be the moment at which we exhaust our cash. during the rest of the month you have a series of smaller payments that will take their toll. on november 1st you have a $58 billion payment, social security, medicare, interest on the debt going on october 31st. somewhere between october 23rd and november 1st is when we run out of steam and that's why, again, we have a little bit of time. and why the markets aren't reacting. >> before you get to your next chart senator klobuchar there's something symbolic about hitting that deadline and defaulting whether it takes a few days or not for to it happen. >> there is.

when you look what happened back in 2011 the dow plummeted 2,000 points. regular households lost $2 trillion in household wealth and it's just the lead up to it that's so bad for our economy. >> nicole, do you have a question? >> why did it take a group of predominantly women -- >> she doesn't need to answer that. >> and i want you to speak to how detrimental the animosity and the male digging in of heels or throwing insults on both sides was to this process? >> well, i think one of the best things about this group led by senator susan collin, republican of maine we were able to come together and find common ground without those kind of insults because when you have that kind of day in and day out attacks it's really hard to get things done when people are negotiating.

even though we come from different places i'm very hopeful as we go forward with patty murray, barbara mikulski, those relationships will make a difference make a difference when we get into what matters. >> i think it can't be overstated the importance of the relationships that were existing before we got to this crisis. >> exactly. >> harold, i want you to jump in in just a second. but steve, take us through your second chart. i'm especially interested in the third one on signs of skepticism but spending proposals. >> sure. so we're going to have this discussion that senator clover shar was talking about and i'd like the senator to explain why this is a good outcome. there's no teeth, no enforcing this mechanism to make it happen. there's going to be a fight about taxes, a fight about entitlements, gene robinson expressed the democratic point of view. there's also going to be a big fight about spending on all

these other programs, infrastructure, education, which is what this continuing resolution has been all about. this chart shows back when president obama arrived he expected to be spend dlrg 1.2 trillion on all these other programs by the time we got to 2014. in the summer of 2011, when we had the near crisis that senator was talking about, that brought that down. the continuing resolution, which hopefully will be passed, brings it down to $986 billion. and if the rest of the sequester goes into effect, it goes down to 967. the democrats want this 105.8 number, the republicans want the 967 number and that's where the fight's going to be over discretion nary spending. >> senator, based on what steve just laid out and in addition the ryan plan, the murray plan, even simpson/bowles, if

democrats hold to that $1.2 trillion and have that gap there, not asking you to negotiate on tv, but how would you propose to make it up? are you looking at cost-cutting medicare, social security, where the real costs are? will you and senator collins and others offer another plan to rally arnold as we go forward? >> thanks for the question, because that's the key. in terms of steve's issue about the enforcement mechanism, january 15th, that next round of budget control act sequestration cuts hit and that's where you take a hit beyond where we are now. that is incentive for people to come in in good faith and negotiate on some of the issues you just talked about, that long-term spending. second thing is the american people, who who have had it with this and don't want another shutdown. i've always favored more reform when it comes to how we can run the entitlements. look at medicare. minnesota is high quality, low-cost health care, and the president has put on the table some ideas for making it run better. you literally can sometimes get

better results for less money. and i know that erskine is around there today and he has some great ideas out of the debt commission report most of which i supported. so there has been a brewing, brewing interest in the senate for years now to get this done and to make some deals when we find common ground. and i do think there's ways to replace some of those cuts like nih research on alzheimer's and some of the cuts to infrastructure and things and replace it with some long-term reform as well as revenue. and let's not forget revenue. when you already have 70%, and ask erskine about this, 70% of this reduction has been cuts and we can add revenue. >> steve. >> just to end on a somber note, if you look at what's happening to the cost of buying insurance on government debt, it was very quiescent throughout this period. it's jumped up recently and you can see it's not been coming

down even though they seem to be getting closer to a deal. so this particular market of buying insurance against the government defaulting is still really worried about the outcome in washington. >> senator klobucar, thank you very much. right back with much more "morning joe." >> thank you. americans take care of business.

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good morning. it's 8:00 on the east coast, 5:00 a.m. on the west coast as you take a live look at new york city. time to wake up, willie. come on, joe. wake up. it's tuesday, right? back with us on set, nicole wallace, steve ratner, and in washington jeremy peters. >> why don't you ask jeremy if he sees any movement on capitol hill. >> jeremy, once this thing ends -- it's ridiculous. so embarrassing. i was talking to my dad yesterday. there is -- is there any safety net? i cannot believe. what happens if congress can't do what it's supposed to do? >> right. well, this is what qualifies for, quote, unquote, tremendous progress as harry reid said, a solution that punts the difficult decisions a few weeks, a few mos down the road. this is what congress has done for the past several years now, and this looks like the kind of deal we're going to get. and while there was progress last night in the senate, i would remind people that the

senate is only half of the equation here. and we don't know what's going to happen in the house. john boehner has to make a very difficult decision about sending whatever comes over from the senate to the house floor. he could very well decide to amend that bill, send it back to the senate, but each day that goes by we get closer to the thursday default deadline, and, you know, i really don't see this wrapping up as neatly as maybe the headlines this morning would suggest. >> by the way, the organization already ahead of even the prospects of the possibility of a deal, you've got the same group that was responsible for funding these ads that marched republicans into this boxed canyon and have gotten their approval rating down to 24% already criticizing a potential deal. >> while they're organizing protests to protest exactly what they did, what they created. later this morning, senator mitch mcconnell will present a bipartisan plan to his fellow republicans that could end the shutdown and extend the nation's

borrowing limit at least for a couple of months. >> yay. >> have i heard this before? the deal would keep the government funded until january 15th, the same day a new deeper round of sequestration kicks in. it would raise the debt limit through february 7th and create a new budget conference to resolve major tax and spending issues by no later than december 13th. the senate could vote on the bill as soon as tomorrow. however, the deal does not include any language to dismantle obama care, nor would it include a repeal of the medical device tax, two sticking points for the tea party caucus. senator ted cruz says he is still unsure whether or not he'd block a vote on the bill, come on, and -- >> go ahead and do that. just try it. >> unbelievable. why does he -- >> go ahead. go ahead, big shot. put the full faith and credit of the united states of america on your shoulders. have fun with that. good luck. do it. i'm daring you right now.

go ahead and do it, hot shot. or you can just sit in the back. and when people are responsible and actually give a damn about this country and gave damn about the full faith and credit of the united states and actually care about the people who are working day in and day out, hoping to keep their job, you're going to keep posing and hurt those people? i don't really get it. it's kind of like -- it's great for you, i know. i know it's really great for you politically, but it's just like the veterans memorial that you used as a political backdrop. it's a great backdrop until the next day, the vets that actually organized the rally came out and were really upset that you had used their rally for your own political points. so go ahead. you guys go ahead. just keep using america as your political backdrop. and hurt all the people you want to hurt. hurt, by the way, small

government conservatives, republicans, working-class americans that actually used to support our party but are now wondering what in the world is going on. keep doing it. keep doing it. and i hope it really helps you out because it's sure not helping the conservative movement, not helping the republican party, an it's not helping this country. but go ahead. go ahead. and what's happening in the house? >> congressman tim huelskamp suggested the larger impact of voting for the deal, saying, "we've got a name for it in the house. it's called the senate surrender caucus. anybody who would vote for that in the house as republican would virtually guarantee a primary challenger." according to "roll call," senator cruz held a secret meeting at a washington bar and restaurant, tortilla coast, with roughly 20 of the most conservative members of the house. they were reportedly discussing how to respond to a potential budget deal in the senate. but their cover was blown when, according to "roll call," "the

group was spotted by majority whip kevin mccarthy who was dining with some other members. mccarthy is a regular at the capitol hill restaurant." >> if you're going to hold a secret meeting on capitol hill -- >> hold a secret meeting. >>er to tia coast? it's right there. >> not the one. that seems like a public meeting. >> unfortunately you only have one restaurant. you've got two. tortilla coast and bull feathers. and those are the only two restaurants. so you don't hold a secret meeting. >> where would you hold a secret meeting? >> secret meetings, hypothetically speaking, might be held at one of the nearby hoe tems. you could rent a room in a hotel. >> meeting room. >> i, too, have a hypothetical secret meeting if you needed one. >> that seems like a public meeting. >> not tortilla coast. >> i hope the solution to this problem is ultimately known as the tortilla coast awards. >> if you're in washington,

d.c., go to tortilla coast because they've got the best chips. only problem is you eat all the chips, they're so good, you're stuffed by the time -- >> the gua skrshgs good, the salsa. then a little salt on -- i'm sorry. makes me crave chips. >> i'm expecting a free burrito. >> me, too. >> little known fact about that tortilla coast, paul ryan used to work there. >> did he. >> i knew i loved him for so many reasons. >> why do you know that? >> before he was a congressman. i would hope. >> he's got free time now. >> little-known fact. it used to be a rib joint. but anyway, so think about this cynical game. this upsettles me so much. think about this cynical game that these people are playing. on the phone with a lot of conservative who is actually -- yesterday that actually are every bit as conservative as these people that are out there. this is not about

conservativism. this is about tactics. >> exactly. >> and this is about publicity. what makes me so angry is that some republicans, some conservatives are going to have to step up and they see that 24% approval rating. they know it's going to go lower. they know the senate's now in jeopardy. they know that the white house could be in jeopardy down the road. >> right. could be. is. >> yeah. i mean, independents who actually broke for romney last time, independents have even pulled away us from. >> and they were moving toward us with this disaster role out of obama care. >> with obama care. disastrous, but unfortunately now these republicans are going to have to scramble, try to not only stave full faith and credit of this country if not on the day of the default, two, three weeks later, but now they're going to do it and a couple of people are going to sit in the back and throw potshots at him. >> yeah. >> because they know they have to do it, and they don't have the guts to stand up and say, yeah, you know what, we're the ones that screwed this up, we're

the ones that destroyed the republican party's opportunity to actually do well during this time. >> well, to actually delay obama care, that was on the table until ted cruz came along to actually make some gains in the policy debate about obama care. that was on the table before ted cruz came on. i love these alternate realities, the novels that play out what could have been, but what could have been this month, the republican party could be seeing record highs in their approval rating if they had simply stood back and pointed to all the problems they predicted with an expansion of the government's role in the delivery of health care. they could have said it's not just about the computer but the fact that they can't even get a computer -- >> this wasn't even an alternate reality. steve ratner, a month ago, i was saying and liberals were bashing me for saying it, that the republican party's positive ratings were higher than they've been at any time since early

2011. we were doing great. and we fell off a cliff, just as charles krauthammer -- can i say that? joe scarborough, scott walker, chris christie warned them. we all warned them this was going to happen. and it's happening. the highest numbers since 2011 have turned into thee lowest numbers in the history of polling. >> if you did nothing and just stood by and watched people not be able to get enrolled, their poll numbers would be much higher. i'm not sure what you were saying, nicole, in the sense that i don't think changing obama care in congress at this moment was on the table. there was no way the president was going do that. >> if this this hadn't become about the brinksmanship of shutting down the government for an aim that was achievable, i believe there could have been conversations this year about the medical device tax. i believe there could have been conversations, could have been a debate, and it was a legitimate one for the republicans to

spearhead about delaying obama care. that was a legitimate thing. it was shutting down the doft government -- >> especially with all of the glitches, and it's not even glitches. the systemic failures. >> here's my question. if the rollout had happened the way it happened, which was disastrous by any democrat's most generous description -- >> said as much yesterday. >> -- if they introduced legislation to delay the implementation, you could have had a real debate about that. >> if they waited and all that happened, yes, i agree that's true. but to bring us back to the here and now for a second -- >> you don't want to live in my alternate reality? >> well, we can, but three hours is a long time to be in an alternate reality. >> we take ambien. >> it's a good one. >> just to bring it back to the here and now, obama care is obviously off the table now. >> right. >> now the question you're talking about is what do the republicans do. as jeremy pointed out, even if this deal gets through the senate, which it probably will

eventually, wednesday or friday, we'll see, then it's in front of the house. even if they vote for it, all it does is start another clock with no teeth, no back end, no consequences to fight this out all over again. so the republicans haven't lost anything by going along with this, they get another bite at the apple and we'll see what happens. >> if you're a member of the house, the tea party caucus in the house, how could you vote for this given what you've set up for yourself, which is we want to take a bite out of obama zmar the deal senators reid and mcconnell put forward has tighter income verification, delays it a year, but that's about it in terms of obama care. how can that caucus in the house that john boehner would need to pass it through, how could they vote for this deal? >> i don't think they ever will. i think that there was almost nothing you could put in this bill that was going to get through the senate that they would vote for anyway. so the question becomes how soon does john boehner decide that he needs to realize -- how soon

does john boehner realize he needs to rely on democratic votes to get this through. now, going back to the point that steve and nicole were making earlier about what republicans could have gotten out of this,ly say that i picked up on a real palpable sense of anger among a lot of the more moderate democrats that they could have gotten a much better deal. they feel had they fought this question out over spending and taxes in a much broader way and not over such a limited fight on obama care, that they could have gotten a grander bargain than this. so they feel now their backs are against the wall, you're staring two days away at deadline on default, and they've got to swallow this deal that none of them really like. >> today a new round of polling shows more trouble for the republican party, to your point, steve. according to abc news and "the washington post," 74% of americans disapprove of the republican party's handling of the budget crisis. >> but the good news is 21% do. >> oh, god.

>> if we were playing football, 21 points would be enough to win. right? >> more than any other party. >> let's go find them. >> a negative 16-point swing over the past three week, people. democrats aren't doing much bett better. 61% disapprove of the handling of their talks. the gap between the favorability on the issue has seen a negative six-point swing. president obama finds himself in the best shape wa 42% approval rating. his net favorable swing is just negative two points within the margin of error. looking just at republicans, nearly 50% are not happy with the way their own party is handling the crisis. that's interesting. more than 75% of all independents disagree with the gop's budget -- >> stop right there for a second. you'll all remember this. look at that middle line. first of all, the fact you're splitting your party down the middle 50/50 is bad. >> disastrous. >> in the past, independents used to break 50/50. but just so you at home can remember what happened during

the romney election, a lot of republicans were saying that if most of the independents were breaking mitt romney's way, then shouldn't mitt romney win? and of course he didn't because more democrats came out. but that independent line has been leaning more republican over the past four years. the fact that we are losing those voters puts numbers, nicole, through all the things i've been saying for five year, if you want to win the philadelphia suburbs, if you want to win the i-4 corridor in florida, if you want to win presidential elections and stop hillary clinton from being president over the next years so republicans have back-to-back sold would say liberals in the white house, that middle line right there, the republicans are blaming support on, that has real-world effect. >> right. >> maybe not in the most conservative house districts in america but anywhere else. >> well, in the most conservative states. where we've done well, if you

turn it around and look at the year that scott brown won or look at 2010 when republicans did well, it was because that number was the exact inverse. coming up on "morning joe," we'll check in with jim vandehei. >> oh, he's just great. >> he is. >> you didn't sound very sincere. >> i love him. isn't he great? >> why don't you just say bless your heart. >> bless your heart. >> that's not good. >> what do you think of jim? >> he's the best. >> he's fantastic. >> oh, wow. >> who else do we have? >> dry ice bombs explode at l.a.x. for a second consecutive day. we'll tell you where the fbi investigation stands this morning. plus, a high school student-athlete is suspended from competition after showing up at a party where booze was being served. apparently they didn't care she was a designated driver, making sure another kid got home safe. thousand school is defending its decision. but first here's bill karins with a check on the forecast.

bill? >> that's a wild one. texas has been the worst weather in the country over the last couple days. they had a lot of rain over the weekend and it continues today. over the weekend thunderstorms, and thunderstorms and lightning can be very dangerous. here's an example. this was a bass fisherman. he said the pole started to feel a little electrified so he started heading for shore. almost too late. that lightning strike was literally about 20 feet off the bow of his boat. texas today not too much lightning but a lot of rain, possibility of travel delays moving into dallas-ft. worth as we speak. later today san antonio will get some of that rain. as far as how much rain, not a lot. maybe about a half inch to an inch, maybe a little more, getting drenched around shreveport, southern areas of arkansas. but that's about the worst of it. further out, the northern portion of the storm has been worse. we've gotten some snow on the backside of this storm. check out the pictures from south dakota. deadwood, south dakota, is under a winter storm warning and they've already picked up a couple inches.

you can see that snowplow had to come out this morning. that's the storm in the middle of the country. the east coast is looking perfect. the west coast is in the middle of what is a week of perfect weather. san francisco today 75 and sunny. enjoy the west. as far as the middle of the country goes, umbrellas needed. chicago, st. louis included. we went out and asked people a simple question:

how old is the oldest person you've known? we gave people a sticker and had them show us. we learned a lot of us have known someone who's lived well into their 90s. and that's a great thing. but even though we're living longer, one thing that hasn't changed much is the official retirement age. ♪ the question is how do you make sure you have the money you need to enjoy all of these years. ♪ to enjoy all of these years. great. this is the last thing i need.) seriously? let's take this puppy over to midas and get you some of the good 'ol midas touch. hey you know what? i'll drive! i really didn't think this through. brakes, tires, oil, everything. (whistling) you may be muddling through allergies. try zyrtec-d®. powerful relief of nasal congestion

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poor guy. has he recovered from that yet? >> so cute. >> that was great. looked great on tv. >> he says he likes you sometimes. >> he likes me all the time. >> that was mika's odd question. we're talking about when jim's son -- >> he's so cute. he was on the fence. >> i think he loves his dad. >> time to take a look at the morning papers. "washington post," top-secret documents released by edward snowden say the nsa is collecting millions of contact lists from personal e-mail and instant messaging accounts from around the world, including here in the u.s. they show nearly 700,000 address books were collected on a single day including more than 400,000 from yahoo! alone. there's also hundreds of thousands of lists stored from chat services. >> seriously.

let's stop using the internet. i'm buying -- how much is a carrier pigeon cost these days, will? >> they're down. >> are they? >> the numbers are down. >> i'm going to get about five. >> get a fleet of carrier pigeons. >> boom, send them out at the same time. nobody wants to talk to me. i'm serious. >> you'd buy five? >> i would do five. >> five good ones. >> designated -- >> just send them out. got to be good ones. anyway, the "l.a. times" for a second night in a row officials found what they're calling dry ice bombs at l.a.x. one of the bombs exploded and officials tell nbc they've recovered at least three others in restricted areas including one below a plane. now, on sunday night, a similar device, a 20-ounce bottle with dry ice inside exploded in the bathroom of a different terminal but didn't do any damage. authorities don't believe there is a terror connection. >> "usa today," blackberry is trying to ease the fears of its customers in an open letter

addressing the future of the company. blackberry tells customers it has substantial cash on hand and a balance sheet that is debt free. the letter acknowledges the rise of competitors like apple and announced plans to make bbn messaging available on i fons and androids. >> jim, you still have a blackberry. >> don't get me started. i love blackberry. i've lived on these things. new ones are a piece of junk. there are about four different things that don't work on them. i've had it about a month. washington lives on these. >> i love typing on blackberries so i pick it up, i have my old blue one, i pick it up, hit dial, but i pick it up like once a month. you know what, i'm going to go back and then i try to look -- you know, i hear that world war iii has begun and i just try to get it on the server and it's like -- >> yeah. >> they still haven't figured

out how to put up a basic website in less than a minute and a half. >> yeah. >> someone just needs to steal the keyboard format and -- >> right. i carry around a broken one in my person because even though it doesn't send or receive e-mail, i still prefer the alarm function, i prefer the contacts in there. >> the "boston herald." this is a fascinating story pap high school volleyball player from massachusetts was suspended for five games and demolted as captain after giving a ride to a friend who was drunk. >> she's great. >> when 17-year-old erin cox showed up at the party to pick um her friend. law enforcement officers were there at the scene and she received a summons although police acknowledge she hadn't been drinking. the school would say cox is in violation of the zero-tolerance policy. come on. seriously? >> they're in violation of what's right. >> the people that are running that school, i think they used to run washington. they're that dumb. >> good point. >> and blackberry.

>> all right. can we get to politico? >> everything we want teenagers to do she did and you punish her for it. >> and they so few times do it. >> yes. don't discourage that behavior earlier. picked up a friend. now other kids -- >> the teenage brain actually worked and they -- >> perfectly. >> yeah. >> speaking of the teenage prank. >> we have a new title for the introduction. >> what's that? >> president and ceo of political. >> so powerful. >> fancy. >> i'm going to start speaking in a deeper voice. clean up my language a little bit. >> do you have, like, expensive rugs in your office now and vases? >> my office reeks of rich mahogany. >> yes. >> oh my lord. >> all right. >> what's going on? let's talk tact the state of play you guys read about this morning. republicans, what do they get

out of the deal, at least the one that's on the table right now, the mcconnell and reid, what they're talking about today and will bring to their members today? what do republicans get out of that? >> not much. this is much better for democrats than it is for republicans. democrats at least get this thing punted into next year. they don't have to give up that much at the end of the day. very minor tweaks two obama care, but they're so small as to be almost insignificant. republicans are going to hope in the interim that there's some kind of deal on getting at the deficits that they find much more appealing than the stuff that's on the table today. this is a huge problem for john boehner. he's going to go meet his members today. they're going to hate this deal. anybody who's a member of the tea party is going to say it is total surrender. it is surrender. if they got into a strategy that was always inevitable going to end in surrender, so they should just have to get over it at some point. >> and i ask you this because people who've known john boehner far long time, people who have contributed to john boehner for a long time, billionaires that

run some of the biggest banks in america called john boehner, and they say they can't get through to the guy. they'll talk to him but they have no confidence in that john boehner is going to do the responsible thing if america does face an economic collapse. >> i believe he'll do the responsible thing at the very last second and in a very messy way. i think they'll come out today and they'll try to push through something that just republicans would vote for that would never make it through conference and at the end of the day he's going to have to get at least half of his members to support something that looks like the senate bill that was crafted overnight and hope that democrats support him, which they will. a that's going to be the messiest outcome. possible for him, he'll say, listen, i fought the good fight to the bitter end and the economy was going to collapse. i've always believed john boehner is not going to [ inaudible ]. >> jim vandehei, thanks. up next, a look at how the governments are reacting taking us down to the wire and the debt ceiling talks. michelle caruso-cabrera joins us. plus, he's been called the

henry ford of retail. bloomberg business week's brad stone, not brad stone, but he discovered fascinating new details about amazon founder jeff bezos. bad takes us inside how he transformed the online marketplace. back in a moment. >> didn't brad buy "the washington post"? >> he did. for sein a whole new way. for seeing what cash is coming in and going out...

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when we look at the recent poll numbers showing extreme disapproval for the republican's hand lg of the current budget talk, why is it a small group of republican congressmen remain so dug in with their current strategy? the answer could lie with a political tactic that started more than 200 years ago. >> what? >> nbc's kevin tibbles explains. >> this is fascinating. >> you're all willing to bring this country to its knees! >> reporter: ever wonder how they got here? >> we did not elect a dictator. we elected a president. >> reporter: a good many fingers are pointing at this guy, founding father and massachusetts governor gary grew this contorted district to ensure his party's victory in 1812. one political cartoonist likened it to a salamander. from that day on, the practice of redrawing maps to find friendly voters has been known as gerrymandering. north carolina's 12th district

looks like spilled coffee. pennsylvania's 16th is flexing its muscles. and one commentator compared maryland's third to a broken-winged terra dak till. then there's this -- they call it the earmuffs. you they maye think i'm zipping along in an eight-lane highway when in fact i'm traveling the single thread that links the two halves of the illinois fourth congressional district. >> the control of the house of representatives would switch from the democratic party to the republicans. >> reporter: when republicans won the majority of statehouses in 2010, it ensured they'd be redrawing the maps in those states. and lo and behold, it paid off in 2012. nationwide, democrats running for congress got 1.1 million more votes, but republicans sent 33 more members to the house. but it's not just republicans who draw safe districts. democrats do it, too. in 2012, both republicans and

democrats had a paltry 15% approval rating, yet 90% of house members were re-elected. >> we've now created a system where politicians are choosing their voters more than voters are choosing their politicians. >> reporter: mathematicians using algorithms have proposed creating electoral ma'ams based on geography and population to e eliminate the politics. >> if we continue to have a system which allows ridiculous folks to be elected, then we're going to have a situation where government literally does not function. >> reporter: and on day 14 of the government shutdown, some may argue that's exactly what's happened. >> harold, this is both sides of the aisle. we were talking act the civil rights act that drew up certain districts in states to ensure that there would be minority representatives. that actually, as we were saying, hurts the democratic party more than the republican party. >> it took what were fairly

reliable democratic voters and gobbled them in one district, whereas if you spread them out you might have reduced the likelihood in some cases that you'd have a black or hispanic representative, particularly a black remitive in the south. the question becomes what kind of policies do you want. it's more likely particularly for african-american voters, you'd have a larger democratic delegation that might work. but cook's point is interesting. we have a system now where politicians are choosing the voters as opposed to voters choosing the politicians. stunning. >> the numbers don't add up. 15% approval rating for congress and 90% of the members get re-elected. that's less of a turnover rate than the old soviet politburo. >> the 10% might have been retirees or open seats. >> yeah, exactly. >> it is ridiculous in every state if you look at it. connecticut's fifth stretches like in a swath from hartford, north hartford to the end of the state. every state has these odd-shaped districts that make no sense. >> as much as they draw,

democrats held a majority for 40-plus years. republicans when you came in and took over, that lasted till 2006. a shorter time period. then republicans won it back in 2010 as these districts were drawn the way they were. policies still matter and people still react to politics. one of the answers to this is an open primary system, where anybody can run. if you get more than 50%, you should get it outright. if not, the top two should go to a runoff. you don't limit the picking of these no, ma'am knminees to the who are rabid democrats or republicans. >> business before the bell with cnbc's michelle caruso-cabrera. michelle, we're counting down. >> yeah. good morning. right now the marks look like they'll open flat. we've had two business days in a row of big gains on the expectations that there is going to be a deal, some kind of deal getting done in congress. so the stock market has rallied. we have seen selling in short-term treasuries in the bond market. if the government owes you money

sometime in the next month or so, we've seen a lot of big institutions like fidelity, for example, selling those and not having any of those on their books. we've seen hedge funds step in and pick them up a lot of them because we know they are going to get paid. the story we're buzzing about over here is angela aarons leaving from being the ceo at burberry and going to a new position at apple. she'll be in charge of the retail division there. she was the highest executive -- highest paid executive in the united kingdom. shares of burberry are down 5% this morning because of her departure. and we think she's going to be one of the highest ranked women ever at apple. this is pretty exciting on a lot of fronts. it also tells us that apple probably sees itself as a luxury brand. back to you. >> the question, michelle, is this a feeling of a bit of a desperate move they had to do something dramatic for apple since they've obviously still an incredible company with incredible revenue but has been a bit static in general with their product development and everything else? >> yeah.

so i think there is some criticism of that. but the new phone is selling a lot better than a lot of folks had predicted. i'm not sure desperate is the right word. certainly their retail has been so phenomenal for so long and they really want to keep that going. remember, those stores bring in more dollars per square foot than any other retailer in the country. so they need a strong person to run that. >> get that special pattern phone now or something like that? >> oh, lord. yeah. michelle, thank you. michelle caruso-cabrera. we have an update now. on the "morning joe" book club. big news. >> this is big. this is huge. the kids have been waiting for this update. >> five days at memorial. life and death in a storm-ravaged hospital, which recounts the dramatic events at new orleans memorial medical center during hurricane katrina and its aftermath. it's on its way to being turned into a movie. the rights to the book have been acquired by producer scott gruden, the man behind "captain

phillips." visit mjbookclub@msnbc.com. we'll reveal our next pick of the "morning joe" book club this morning. up next, he first transformed online retail at amazon.com. now jeff bezos is taking on the newspaper industry. author brad stone joins us with new details. >> is he going to save the newspapers? >> that's what i'm hoping. the most free research reports, customizable charts, powerful screening tools, and guaranteed 1-second trades. and at the center of it all is a surprisingly low price -- just $7.95. in fact, fidelity gives you lower trade commissions than schwab, td ameritrade, and etrade. i'm monica santiago of fidelity investments,

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amazon's founder and ceo jeff bezos turned a simple online bookstore into a retail giant, raking in $75 billion this year alone.

here with us now senior writer from bloomberg business week, brad stone is out now with a new book, "the everything store: jeff bezos and the age of amazon." >> the guy has just revolutionized shopping in a way unprecedented. >> yeah. >> just unprecedented. but what's he up to? he's not really interested in politics. he's never been. what's he up to? >> i think a couple things are going op here. he loves content. he loves the written word. as i recount in the book, almost major decision at amson was derived from things he read. and of course he's built the kindle, an incredible editorial business for authors with the kindle. i think the opportunity presented itself and he believed his special brand of long-term thinking and innovation, could help revive it. >> a lot of people would say he helped kill a lot of publishers, a lot of bookstores. i mean, you know.

>> right. >> borders. barnes & noble on the run. >> he did. >> not eve an question. >> so why would he go back and buy "the washington post," which is, i mean, the oldest of the old? >> you know, i've worked in the newspaper world before, and the aura of managed decline in some of these institutions is incredible. and here he is with all these resources and a long-term orientation and a willingness to kind of try a lot of new things. you know, he probably -- it's a minor hit on his pocketbook so, he probably thought he could take a gamble and see if he could do something interesting. >> what was the moment that amazon became amazon? when did it stop being a quirky little idea where i could get a book and a place where you can get flat screen tvs? >> that's early on. that's '98, '9 9 when wall street was giving out free capital and he realized it was a land grab and amazon had to go for it. he made a ton of mistakes but got through it and became the everything store.

>> you know, when i think about the business coming from my cnbc background, the stock has more than tripled the last five year so, many years after they hit their peaks in so many respects. but they returned no cash to shareholders. you look at apple, which has such pressure to return billions to shareholders. they reinvest everything. there are quarters they report that are disappointing. when is the pressure on them to give money back to the people that have put money into the pane? >> incredibly there's not a lot of pressure because the shareholders, they believe. bezos has called his shots. i think of it like a sacrifice bunt in baseball. it's an out but you're advancing the runner. they keep doing that. they lost money last year but they invested in new centers and creating new tablets. investors think he's creating the next big walmart. >> he got involved last year so politically with marriage e equality, being a big issue, put money behind it. do you see him trying to take this model and involving himself in other issues, education,

infrastructure, research and development? >> already through the bezos family foundation they do a lot quietly in education, but i view him as apolitical, incredibly focused on the business. i don't expect him to take that prominent a political role. >> are we going to look back 30 years from now, 40 years from now and see this is the age not just of steve jobs who grabbed everybody's attention, but is this going to be the age of jobs and bezos? >> that's my bet. that's why i wrote the book. i think, you know, love out or hate it, and there are reasons to do both, he is building the next incredible technology in business franchise, and it's not just retailing but digital devices and these enterprise services that everybody in silicon valley is using them. >> i read a couple weeks ago he was adopted. surprised me he and steve jobs share that. how much did that impact his development? >> yeah. it's -- his mother had him when she was a teenager, and then remarried and his adoptive

father is is his father and they're great people and i met them. but as part of my research i tracked down his biological father who incredibly didn't know what had happened to his son, that his son was a billionaire, and how does it affect? you look at barack obama and bill clinton and steve jobs and john lennon, it's almost inexplicable how these incredible -- this incredible circumstances of their births yield to these leaders who, you know, won't accept the status quo and are kind of relentless. >> wow. >> and a big part of his drive. >> i think it's an ingredient. you know, clearly a lot -- and he has a fierce intellect. >> yeah. >> wow. incredible. the book is "the everything store: jeff bezos and the age of amazon." you can read an excerpt on our website, mojo.msnbc.com. brad stone, thank you. >> thank you, brad. fascinating. >> if you have questions for brad, tweet us using #mojoe.

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turns out the average human is smarter than the average american. here now we have a segment, "average human versus average american."

>> the average human. >> which did the island's greatly outnumbered forces in 1965? >> correct. >> the average american. >> so? >> weed like to solve the puzzle. >> go ahead. >> super man and spider woman. [ buzzer ] >> this has been "average human, average american." >> matt forte spoke to reporters in the locker room after the game. keep an eye on rich king, reporter, in the background here. >> you know, possession and not having any protector out there. we did a great job. finding those receivers. and, you know, we had a bad look at the defense checking out plays. you want to win all your home

games. hard to win on the road. if we can win tonight it's pretty great for us. >> get that man a chapstick, will ya? human sacrifice. i didn't know what he was doing there but mrs. king is a very lucky woman. >> that's awful. tomorrow on "morning joe," political strategist david axelrod and mike and murphy returns. also robert redford's going to be back in studio for a look at his new film. some critics are saying it's the best movie he's ever been in. coming up next, what, if anything, did we e learn? >> oh, yeah. >> the chapstick. when we made our commitment to the gulf, bp had two big goals: help the gulf recover and learn from what happened so we could be a better, safer energy company. i can tell you - safety is at the heart of everything we do. we've added cutting-edge technology,

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geothe last thing i want iswho doesnto feel like someone is giving me a sales pitch, especially when it comes to my investments. you want a broker you can trust. a lot of guys at the other firms seemed more focused on selling than their clients.

that's why i stopped working at my old brokerage and became a financial consultant with charles schwab. avo: what kind of financial consultant are you looking for? talk to us today.

now the part of the show where we show you lucas films' animation showing the government shutdown. closed today, day 15. that's snazzy. i don't get the pyrotechnics. >> i understand. >> anyway, what have you learned today? >> there's a quiz on nbc news.com. >> is that the one that asks you if you have a rash? make your eyes -- >> no! >> ew! >> was that not the one? >> no. that's not it.

>> it's they're part of the new american center. >> what have you learned? >> you threw me off. >> nicole? >> that if the government doesn't totally collapse we'll have the senate women to thank. >> that's great. >> what have you learned? >> she may cry at the drop of the hat, nicole wallace, but republicans bring on the primaries and challenge the debate. >> if it's way too early, it's "morning joe." not sure exactly what happened here over the past three hours. >> i don't know. >> but i think it's going to happen again tomorrow. i'm really sorry. really sorry. that's just the way it is. stick around. chuck todd is next and boy, he's excited. the dodgers. see you tomorrow. what are you kids doing? center stage -- brand-new numbers this morning looking at a giant jump of the country, not on the right or the left all the time or half the time. a special survey by nbc news and