thanks so much for watching this afternoon and every arch. coming up, my friend and colleague, ed schultz and "the ed show." >> good evening, americans, welcome to "the ed show." live from new york. i'm michael eric dyson in for ed schultz. as ed would say, let's get to work. ♪ >> one thing crews work on is learning to sit down and shut up. >> who ordered the devilled cheese and sausage. >> i spent the past month in washington, d.c. and it is terrific to be back in america. >> we love you, ted! that's their world. but that's not the real america.

that isn't the world we grew up in. that isn't the world you want your kids to live in, the world you want your grandkids to have. >> it is really great to be back in america. >> holy cow, people in texas actually like what this guy is doing! >> getting awfully windy. texas term. >> ted cruz will meet with the owners of small businesses in ft. worth, less than 24 hours after the country's biggest business leader criticized him. >> the president of the u.s. chamber of commerce had some harsh words. one thing cruz could work on is learning how to sit down and shut up. >> you guys, you know what, you've got me straight now. ♪

>> urgency to fix the healthcare.gov website is growing. it faces growing criticism from conservative cry babies. obama care's most outside wart and awkward opponent, senator ted cruz, gave a speech to a tea party crowd in his hometown of houston monday night. during the speech, he highlighted the website's rough rollout in a manner most foul. >> you know the nigerian e-mail scammers? they have been a lot less active lately. because they have all been hired to run the obama care website. wow, enough of the nigerian nightmare already. the joke was clearly cruz's attempt to brush off criticism for his own failed effort to defund obama care. the law is getting stronger support from the public, despite technical issues from the website enrollment. a new "washington post" abc news poll shows obama care continues to be divided among party lines.

but there is a slight uptick from 42% in september to 49% in october. president obama acknowledged obama care's rollout has been rocky, but defended it. >> there's no sugar-coating it. the website has been too slow. people have been getting stuck during the application process. and i think it's fair to say that nobody is more frustrated by that than i am. >> ted cruz's preel school level cracks didn't stop with the nigerian comment. he tweeted the picture of a welcome home cake he received from his supporters. the green eggs and ham themed cake pays tea party homage to cruz's 21-hour floor speech where he argued americans did not like green eggs and ham and they not like obama care either. dr. seuss wouldn't have dug you, brother cruz, at all. here's what cruz went on to say at his homecoming. >> it was unfortunate. that many senate republicans made the decision not to stand united with the house republicans.

but i'll tell you, i'm hopeful with a little bit of time and reflection that senate republicans will decide to come together again. i would love to see republican unity. you see all of us stand together against this train wreck that is obama care. >> ah, tisk tisk, tisk tisk. senator cruz is strongly mistaken if he thinks people will stand with the republican party. americans do not like it when the government shuts itself down. they don't like it when political gridlock costs the country $24 billion. $24 billion. they don't like hundreds of thousands of federal workers losing their wages. new polling numbers show americans are extremely unhappy with the way the federal government works or fails to work. the abc news "washington post" poll shows americans' approval of congress is at a 40-year low. these wounds to congress are self inflicted. it's a result of budget brinksmanship. blame for the shutdown is being focused on the republican party, which is at least -- at its least popular level in data

since 1984. on the flip side, president obama's favorability is hardly in stellar shape. but he appears mostly unharmed. is approval is essentially the same now as a month ago before the shutdown. and the furlough notices flew. get your cell phones out. i want to know what you think. tonight's question, should democrats remind americans that every republican is just like ted cruz? text a for yes, b for no to 676 it 22 or go to ed.msnbc.com. i'll bring you the results later in the show. congressman matthew cartwright from pennsylvania joins me now. congressman, do republicans care that their image is in such disastrous shape? >> oh, i think they do. i think they have to cringe when they hear things like what you quoted senator cruz saying at the top of the show. i mean, jokes about nigerian

scamme scammers. you know, i wonder how much off-the-cuff that really was, and how calculated it was to appeal to senator cruz's base. many of whom believe that the president is from africa. but, yeah, in answer to your question, i think that republicans really have to be recoiling. the mainstream, you know, i call them country club republicans. the center of the road type republicans. they must be at their wits ends when they try to think about how to deal with senator cruz. but you get this. you know, you see this happening when -- when a law like the affordable care act becomes pretty obvious that it's going to take root, that it's going to work, that it's going to be a part of the american legal structure. it's the further and further right wing fringes that continue to attack it, as the other attacks melt away. >> sure. well, with all due respect to you as a political figure and other politicians, we know that many politicians are

poll-driven, number-crunching empirical number verifiers, whether up and down. so why is it the poll numbers that are steadily sinking aren't impressing the republicans with the fact that the american public just doesn't like what they're doing. >> oh, i think a lot of them are paying attention to it. in fact, we saw during the shutdown a lot of the centrist republicans were actually coming out and saying in public that they would be for a clean cr. opening up the government again with no strings attached. but you hear -- you know, the continual rain of quotations from the right-wingers. i have one here, michael eric, that i want to read, speaking of senator cruz. quote, never in the history of the world has any measure been brought here so insidiously designed as to prevent business recovery to enslave workers and to prevent any possibility of employers providing work for the people. i mean, that kind of over the

top, overblown rhetoric we have seen. but that wasn't from senator cruz. that was from republican congressman john taber in 1935, and he was talking about social security at the time. >> wow. the parallels are pretty frightening there, as dr. king would say. what is it about the whistle politics that you referred to earlier in regard to ted cruz about the nigerians now on the payroll, basically trying to work on the website? why is it that they continue to exploit the impolicit racial passions deeply embedded as opposed to playing to the higher road where we can all come together? >> i don't know that they're doing that, michael eric. but i will say that i suspect it. and whether they're doing it on purpose, it does appeal to the people who think that way. there are, you know, a lot of fairly backward people that are a part of the base of people like senator cruz. and comments like that just are right up their alley. >> yeah. well, we're going to talk about

a judge later on, a republican, who you might have heard about. who said, look, enough is enough. you know, are there going to be other republicans joining him who say, look, this is too extreme. i'm here as a republican, i want to stand behind principles that can be morally defensible, but this kind of stuff that they're doing now is playing to a base -- constituency in their party which really goes against the best interests, even of the republican party, much less to say the entire nation. >> well, as i say, i think -- i see it as kind of the last great gas gasp of the right wing against the affordable care act. it's sort of to be expected. the moderates fall away from the attack, you know, after 44 times repealing it. they got tired of that. they were bound to. the rest of us already are. but the right wingers stay at it. and that's what's going on here. >> well, do you think that the moderates are going to be able to gain any ground in terms of trying to regain the authority within their own party? i just don't believe that john boehner cottons too well to the

right wing of his party, even though he defers to them with regular intensity. >> i see a great irony here. somebody like senator cruz or folks who are in blood-red districts who can go on with nonsense like this, they're not in trouble. they're not going to be in trouble. the people who are going to be in trouble are the ones who are guilty by association, and we're talking about the moderate republicans who are in closer districts who stand a reasonable chance of losing because of their association with the republican party, and what it got up to with this ridiculous shutdown we just went through. >> right. well, look, finally, tell us behind the scenes what's really going on, what some of these moderate republicans you know who are really, you know, just turned off by what they are, you know, right wing brothers are doing. you're there behind the scenes. tell us, is there really a ground swrel for some kind of simpatico for moderate democrats, moderate republicans, to move this country forward? >> you know, michael eric, i

want you to know, i get along with all of my brothers and sister members of congress, and most of them are great company, nice people to be with. it's just that when -- some of the hard line right wingers get up to a microphone you kind of just have to put your hands over your ears when you hear the things they say. but, yes, there are a lot of moderate republicans that i think really want to save their party. it sounds like senator mcconnell is desperately trying to save the party. and i think the speaker of the house is really at his wits end, and has been for some time with how to deal with this situation. >> no doubt. well, all i can say is god bless you up there, my friend. congressman matt cartwright, thank you so much for your time tonight. >> my pleasure. remember to answer tonight's question at the bottom of the screen and share your thoughts on twitter at ed show. and on facebook. i want to know what you think. coming up, a fox conspiracy theory that will take your breath away. plus, a texas judge does the

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time now for the trenders. in the social media world, this is where you can find us. the ed show social media nation has decided and we're reporting. here are today's top trenders, voted on by you. ♪ diamonds are a girl's best friend ♪ >> the number-three trender. the lockdown. >> the pair got engaged in front of family and friends. >> was it love at first sight? >> kanye puts a ring on it. >> kanye popped the question at at&t park. he rented the park out for the

occasion. >> she is my joy, she brought my new joy into the world. >> posted this photon instagram of the 15-carat stunner. ♪ >> the number two trender. five for fainting. >> this story is just perfect. like every little, like, frightening bedtime story. >> twist the bones in the back. >> the five things the falldown was a set-up. >> did you see this going on in the background towards the end of the speech? she is okay. she tweeted she is alreal right. pregnant and diabetes. tell me this isn't a staged event. he caught her. >> you are a conspiracy theorist. >> top trender. republican rejection. >> i have tried to live a life of principles. shaped by mi familiaria and country. i can no longer be a member of the republican party. >> forget it. i'm outta here. >> i'm now running for

re-election as a democratic candidate. >> a texas judge rules against running on the gop ticket. >> rational republican beliefs have given way to ideological character assassination. i cannot tolerate a political party that demeans texans based on their sexual orientation, the color of their skin, or their economic status. i cannot place my name on the ballot for a political party that is proud to destroy the lives of hundreds of thousands of federal workers, my principles have led me to the democratic party. i can only hope more people with principles will follow. ♪ change will do you good let's turn it professor james peterson, director of africaa studies at lehigh university and msnbc contributor. professor peterson, before i get to judge keys, i have to ask a question about con kanye west, getting heat because of his interview on the bbc, and on jimmy kimmel.

even though he i man misdirected in some areas, i think he's essentially right and brave. tell us just a very briefly why it's important he brings up the subjects he does, aside from getting married to kim kardashian. >> i think in his music he has raised a lot of important issues. i would love to see him talk about issues of gender and i disagree about classism completely displacing racism. although i love the fact that a hip-hop artist is raising that issue. and the stories about the merchandise with his confederate flag image, it seems to me that kanye west is really good at raising issues. i think i would challenge him to be a little bit more constructive in his music and engage some of these issues a little more long-term. important considerations, though. and always at the center around issues of class and center. >> back to the judge. is judge keys' decision a sign

of things to come for the republican party? will the rational republicans begin to distance themselves from the lunatic fringe? >> i think so, in some interesting ways. so i think the moderate republicans, particularly in the senate, are really just done with senator cruz, a lot of reporting about the kind of internal conversations. we saw last week some of them come out against the heritage foundation, an interesting move in and of itself. i think we'll see this play out in different ways. we have to understand that judge key, he was getting ready to engage in a primary. by someone who is a little bit to the right of him. but also someone who was connected to law enforcement, and judge key has made some interesting decisions against certain tactics, specifically here, the use of certain tests for intoxication. he has been against certain law enforcement tactics. so i think he saw the writing on the wall in some ways. but i also take his explanation at face value, as well. which is the party has kind of left him, particularly in the rhetoric. even if we can't get comprehensive immigration reform done, a state like texas is sort

of engaged in the demographics of destiny. getting browner. he understands that it's also getting more progressive and getting younger. and i think in that environment -- he's a young man, i think he's under 40. and i think in that environment, the democratic party seems to be more appealing to him politically. >> isn't it interesting that the republicans are leaving a lot of dough, so to speak, on the plate. they're leaving a lot of votes in a vote-rich potential constituency that would be conservative, morally. whose ideas -- think about it, as a latino -- if he's catholic and conservative with moral values, that would line up nicely with the republican plank, if you just don't insult me as i enter your bigger tent. what is it about the republicans that they have an inability to take advantage of the natural moral constituency that they might have available to not only latino, but african-americans who are cultural conservative? >> it's right. i think sometimes the politics of the -- of the tea party sort of caucus within the republican

party, seems to me to defy lonlic, along the lines of just plain politics. if you just look at the numbers, look at demographics. clearly, the latino voting population votes overwhelmingly for the democratic party. but to think that suggests that there is no room or no space on the conservative end of the political spectrum for hundreds of thousands if not millions of latinos in this country doesn't seem to make sense. and they're unwilling, it seems, to check their messages of hate. too many stories over the last 18 months, not just around immigration reform oh, but about race, around gender. where we see republican political leaders, you know, making comments that are just -- you know, they're just sort of retrograde, racist, sexist type comments. and we have seen them push for some policies that match that kind of rhetoric. and i think, you know, the american people, millennials, people of color, just have little to know tolerance for that. >> well, you mentioned something earlier about judge key that he was running against somebody who

potentially is to his right, and as a result of that, this is a absolute political calculation, along with his, you know, if you will, innate feelings about the situation. but to what degree can we count upon those kind of political calculations in the future to create a broader republican party where they're able to bring in people, maybe bring a judge key back in? do you think a guy like him will never have space within republican party? or can the republican party take the challenge and say, hey, let's grow a bit to include people like him? >> well, you see, here's the trap the republican party is in. they're in favor of things like citizen united, and the kind of unchecked money and politics. some democrats are in favor of this, as well. but the way it impacts the republican party is it's stratified and it's empowered and emboldened the tea party caucus. and just billionaire extremists who want to promote certain kinds of retrograde ideologies. so in this environment, you continue to see this peeling off. i caution our viewers to

understand any time you have someone switch from being a republican to a democrat, you have to think with what's the democratic party looking like and why aren't our political options more broadly construed and more nuanced than that. but it seems to me that someone like this judge here is making an important decision but also a calculated decision that is just in response to what we have seen on the right. it's not just the government shutdown. it's not just the war against women. it's not just the fact that the demographics of this country are changing and at least one political party doesn't want to acknowledge it. it's also that nasty rhetoric that i think americans are just totally -- they're done with it. what we want is government to work. we want government to function. and it seems right now that the republican party is dysfunctional. >> well, do you think -- let's flip the script a bit. we're always talk about the way republicans can exploit a vote-rich population through natural conservatism identifying with them. morally speaking, that is. what about the flip side? should democrats be more intentional about taking advantage of republicans who might be willing to switch

because they're outdone or they're just finished with what's going on in the republican party? should we be more evangelical in our outreach to those moderate republicans? >> i -- you know, i don't think so, doc. we spent a lot of time talking about the republican party, the media does, because of the fragmentation at this moment and the kind of uber popularity of the tea party. but i really believe that the democratic party has got to come to terms with its own left flank, that the democratic party has got to actually meet the needs of the desires of millennials and this coalition, diverse coalition of single women and young voters and people of color that re-elected president obama. and it's really got to look at certain issues that are -- that have been left on the table, issues around drone strikes, issues around not negotiating with some kind of -- oxymoronic grand bargain and really holding the line with earned benefits in the social safety net. issues with violence in our inner cities. issues around the environment. i think there is a list of issues the democratic party

needs to embrace and engage in some substantive ways to actually match its own demographics right now, to match the people that are voting democrat, and voting democratic right now. so they've got a lot of work that they have to do on their own before they need to recruit anymore republicans. >> all right. well-stated, professor james peterson. thanks for joining us. >> thanks, doc. coming up, republicans wage war on obama care enrollment. plus, fuzzy math lands the governor of maine in tonight's pretenders. but next, i'm taking your questions. ask med live. just ahead. stay tuned. [ mom ] with my little girl, every food is finger food.

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look, i think, first of all, americans have this impression of a false dichotomy of a false choice and division between freedom on the one hand and quality on the other hand. so we think there is a tremendous tension between the ability to do everything we are supposed to be able to do that the constitution engages us, allows us to do. receip right? the second amendment, which is, of course, the ability, if you will, to -- you know to, bear arms. and i think that some people think it's the second commandment, not the second amendment. and the reality is, we in america are almost erotcally attached to our guns as a symbol of our freedom in this country. so we think any attempt to be equal, that is to say, let's balance out our concern for ownership of guns with the possession of freedom and those who are in right mind and mentally not deranged to be able to own that gun. so the reason we have guns in our schools is because we're attached to them. the reason we have guns in our schools is because the gun lobby in this country thinks they are

so -- it's so necessary to defend even teachers owning guns, as if a teacher having a gun would be the response to a child bringing a gun to school. how about employing education, how about decreasing violence? how about not being intently engaged with the notion of violence that says that american manhood is proved by how many guns we own. how many people we can murder. our video games testify to that and i'm not against video games. i think video games are great. i think rap music is great. i'm not attacking culture but i think our addiction to violence means we're somehow against a notion of being culpable and response at the same time. so we accept this as the price of freedom. and i tell you, that's a false sense of freedom. you know, philosophers talk about freedom from and freedom to. freedom from imprisoning conditions that would ultimately en snare us in narrow prevention views of american society, and freedom to, the positive sense

of freedom. the freedom to be able to exercise our citizenship as americans in this country who protect our young and vulnerable. i don't think that in order for us to be able to enjoy the right to own guns, we should be willing to pay with the price of the blood of our children on every school room and everiel school door in this country, potentially. so i ask america, please be more sane and rational about this policy. this is why the president must gird up his loins again to make this a serious, if you will, bone of contention for his legacy as an obama presidency should not simply be about health care, which is great. not simply about expanding the borders of opportunity for most of america, which is remarkable. but also to protect our vulnerable children. stick around. the rapid response panel is next. i'm mandy drury with your

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smoothly as it was supposed to work. >> yeah, that's an understatement. welcome back to "the ed show." president obama has admitted the obama care rollout could have gone smoother. thankfully, the website will be fixed and people will still have plenty of time to sign up for obama care. but, of course, republicans are blowing these glitches way out of proportion. some are even coming up with some hilarious conspiracy theories. case in point, the quitter from alaska, sarah palin. palin wrote a column where she theorized the shaky barm rollout was a plot by the president aimed at pushing us to a single-payer system. i wish. clearly, the half-term governor is delusional. single payer would be nice. meanwhile, the chattering class is taking the obama care trash talking to a whole another level. >> obama, to continue to speak about the actions of his administration, as a guy with a great seat but no responsibility, is totally off-putting. and it does not have a whiff of

leadership. >> if i could, on credibility, just like on katrina, the problem president bush had, diminishing the significant of what was happening. you had the president yesterday talking about glitches and kinks. >> one difference is katrina was a storm. the health care was of obama's creation. >> true. >> so i'm not defending my white house's handling of katrina. but it was a natural disaster. this was a disaster of obama's creation. and imagination. >> maybe they were at war is a better analogy. >> the parallels and analogies flying everywhere. president obama's health care law will provide 30 million americans' health care. there is no doubt it will save lives. government negligence and the handling of katrina cost american lives. the botched war in iraq resulted in over 4,000 american soldiers being killed. comparing these two horrible chapters in american history so a law that will save lives is simply unconscionable.

joining me now is our rapid response panel, ruth con i have, eugene robinson of "washington post" and dr. o'donnell. gene, is it fair to compare iraq and katrina to obama care? >> no. of course not. and you said it best. iraq, people died. katrina, people died. obama care, people are going to live. otherwise, might have died. it's -- it is unconscionable. i do my live internet chat on tuesdays and i did it today and somebody came at me with this c conspiracy theory this is to set up a single payer and i suggested the caller and his family try a bit less caffeine and fox news. >> if the republicans keep, if you will, chipping away at obama care, do they really have a hope they'll be able to repeal the law? that doesn't seem to be a good strategy. but do you think they're trying to erode public confidence and therefore discourage people from enrolling in the program?

>> yeah, they have been out to get this program for a long time. and we now know they were having meetings with the koch brothers and tea party groups in january when the president was being inaugurated to get out their talking points that this health care law had failed before it ever got off the ground. so this is just the same talking points. and they have been determined to try to attack the health care plan from the very beginning. and then they were so busy shutting down the government and costing people billions of dollars and nearly wrecking the international economy, they have gotten off to a slow start on this attack about how the rollout is a disaster. the rollout has some problems. there is no doubt about it. but, you know, like you said in your intro, i wish it were a plot to bring about single payer. part of the problem is the u.s. health care system is very complex. and the affordable care act maintains this network of private health care providers. and that is much more complicated and much more expensive than if we had a single payer program. if we had medicare for all. and all this talk about socialism and all these attacks on the idea of universal health care don't line up with where the public really is. 88% of people in a recent harris

poll said they were overwhelmingly in favor of medicare, a very popular program. it works really well. less expensive. more efficient. and people have the choice of any doctor or hospital they want. so i don't think this is going to fly. i think the problem for the republicans is the reality of more people being able to get health care is actually going to be very popular. and it is going to work. >> well, dr. o'donnell, given what ruth just indicated, do you think the fact is that, i don't know, six months from now, a year from now, people will look back and say oh, my god, what were we worried about, the consternation about? now people are being enrolled, lives being saved, people enjoy it. even those against it to begin with now have been used to it and as a result of it, see what the advantages are. >> i think it's very likely that the bulk of the folks that are enrolling will find tremendous benefit and those benefits will be revealed over time. one of the things i find so striking is that when, you know, when lyndon johnson was taking members of congress by the lapels and pushing medicare and

medicaid through, the socialized medicine characterization was being used back then. probably -- and it was a tremendous disinformation campaign that was conducted regarding medicare and medicaid in that time period. the thing that makes this so different is that we're in a 24/7 news cycle. we've got social media that just bangs away at all kinds of information and disinformation. and absolutely, as has been noted, there has been a concentrated effort by the republican party, by the conservatives, by the tea party, to undermine every aspect of this, resulting in what we saw last week. i mean, the thing that i don't get about this is you have people talking about how they love america. but they don't seem to much care about americans. you know, they love democracy. they want to build and extend democracy. but we've got anarchists operating in a capacity in which they are part of a democratic

body that passed this bill in both houses, signed by this president, and upheld by the supreme court. so i just don't understand how anyone who is part of the anarchy against obama care can justify these behaviors. >> gene, in light of what donna just indicated, do you think we need more than the president out there on the front line, so to speak, to be more visible. do you think harry reid, or do you think, you know, within the congress nancy pelosi and others ought to be more, you know, if you will, bullish about insisting, look, this is something that works, this is what has been signed into law. let's also collect -- do you think we need more of the bully pulpiting from those figures? >> i think more voices are better than fewer voices. you know, nancy pelosi and harry reid certainly held the line on the affordable care act during the recent brinksmanship over the budget and debt ceiling. and i'm sure they will step up and have something to say.

but, you know, this sort of republican desperation to try to stop obama care before it came into effect, you know, they are on to something there. because the fact is that once it comes into force, and once it's in effect and people have obtained insurance through it, and it has changed their lives and helped their lives, it's not going away. and so even if there is a republican president or republican congress, they'll name it something else as president obama says. once it starts working, they sure won't call it obama care. >> right. >> but whatever they call it, it's going to be around. and that will be a tremendous accomplishment. >> well, ruth, in light of that, what can ordinary citizens do to make sure that their voices, so to speak, are registered, that their support for this particular piece of legislation can bolster the efforts of these professional politicians? >> you know, i mean, i think people are supportive of the idea of extending health insurance. and we don't have to support this legislation anymore, because it's the law of the

land, and it's going to happen. and it's going to make things better. there is going to be lower costs, more transparency, kids can stay on their parents' health insurance until they're adults. but the truth is, people should push for national health care. and i think we should make sarah palin right. i think that we should look at our heart attack system and say you know what, we can do better than this, and even better than the affordable care act. and in those 26 states where republican governors have decided not to allow medicaid expansion and we have 8 million people who are too poor to qualify for the affordable care act, and can't be covered, they need to push hard and we need to push hard on their behalf. and i think, you know, we can do better than this as a country. it's a lie that the american health care system is better than the rest of the developed world. in fact, we spend a third of every health care dollar on administration. it's very inefficient and we have a lot of uninsured people. this is a step in the right direction. i think people should push for national health care. >> ruth connive, eugene robinson, and o'donnell. thank you so much. coming up, voter suppression deep in the heart of texas. sounds like those cowboys could

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welcome back to "the ed show." this is the story for the folk who is take a shower after work. voter suppression blooms in texas.

immediately after the supreme court gutted the voting rights act, lawmakers in texas expedited the suppression measures that came into effect this week. >> you will have to show this, a photo i.d. if you do not have a driver's license, there are several other forms of i.d. you can use including a passport or a texas i.d. card. if you don't have any of them, you can go to a driver's license office and get a free certificate. >> when will we learn? even so-called certificate i.d.s with no purported financial tag are by no means free. qualifying for the election certificate requires documentation that's costly to obtain or even to replace. as of last week, only 41 certificates have been issued in the entire state. where an estimated 1.4 million voters lack photo identification. i.d. laws that slash senior citizen, low income voices target women as well. >> let's see your name on the

voter registration roll is not the same as your driver's license, some examples would be if you have a nickname on the registration roll and your full name is on the photo i.d. or maybe you were recently married and your new last name does not match your maiden name which is on the roll. >> disenfranchisement comes conveniently for the lone star state. women are her natural base and therefore a natural target for the gop. joining me now senator nina turner. can you argue and i know some people will think this is ludicrous. but can you argue that republicans only want white men of means to vote? >> i mean, dr. dyson, they're certainly taking a page out of the book of where this country was centuries ago. you know, we are a nation of progress, but they are trying to take us back. these extremists. and the fact that they are creating laws that in many, many

ways suppress, oppress, and regress access to the ballot box. it's not only shameful, it's immoral and against a democracy. and i got wendy davis, my sister senator, i guess they fear her just that much. but this is wrong. and it has a negative ripple effect for all of this country, not just texas. and this very law that they have passed right now, you know, remember a district court ruled that that law was unconstitutional. because the u.s. supreme court gutted portions of the voting rights act, here we are. we have not lost our minds, dr. dyson. the gop extremists have lost their ever-loving minds. >> to be sure. but, look. take a moment to platform this particular issue. a lot of people think wait a minute. it's a piece of i.d. what's so hard about that? you live in america, get an i.d., you want a license for a car, you got to get it. so tell us why this is such a disproportionately negative law

for women and other minorities especially when it comes to access to the means by which identification is distributed and also because of the differential between urban and suburban and rule that and kind of thing. >> absolutely. getting a license for a car or having a passport to leave the country, those are not fundamental rights. but access to the ballot box, that is a fundamental right. one woman, one man, one vote. the reason we should all be concerned about this because in this great democracy of ours, the one place we all can be equal regardless of our gender, our ethnicity, our religion is the ballot box. and the fact that folks use their political power to try to take it away is wrong all day long. we must put a stop to it. i will tell you, dr. dyson, the author natalie smith and her article, the quote she has from sister susan bea anthony.

i want women to take this with them when she said no self-respecting women should wish or work for the success of a party that ignores her sex. she said this in the late 1800s and it is as if she is speaking in the 21st century. our democracy works when all people can participate in it. we are better together. and that is why we cannot stand idly by and let the extreme gop try to take away the right to vote for everybody who does not fit the category of people who they believe should have the right to vote. >> what's it like there on the ground? are women being organized? are people joining particular constituency groups that would allow them to articulate their vals, vision, understanding of this heinous law or this suggestion that somehow the gender character of these identification laws are going to get by. so what's being done on the ground to rally the troops?

>> not at all, dr. dyson. hell hath no fury like a woman scorned. women are coming together. i believe men who respect women are coming together to say this is wrong. we must stand up against this kind of stuff for our foremothers who fought very hard and for future generations of young women who deserve better than what they are getting now. i can tell you organizations like emily's list and democracy alliance and other groups, league of women voters, people are getting together to educate folks about how important it is to maintain the integrity of our democracy through the right to vote. and that folks who want to put laws in place like this, they don't even deserve to serve in elected office. they are rigging the system, and it is wrong. and we must stand up and not lent. we are better together. women do not need permission slips to be able to exercise their right to vote. dr. dyson, on one hand it's our health care. now they're trying to block us from voting. >> all right. give them a pink slip as well.

nina turner, thanks for your time tonight. that's "the ed show." it's michael eric dyson, that's me, in for ed shultz. he may be a rejected stone, but now he's the rock of gibraltar. "politicsnation" with reverend al sharpton starts right now. >> thank you, dr. dyson. and thanks to you for tuning in. tonight's lead, republicans whistling past the political graveyard. tea party republicans are literally celebrating. the man whose extremist stunts are tearing down the party. senator ted cruz. tea party activist in houston even gave him a cake with green eggs and ham in icing. all their way of saying thank you. >> thank you, today! thank you, ted! thank you, ted! >> thank you, ted? thank you for what? for destroying the party?