dh morning my question -- why is bobby jindal prosecuting poor people? plus, the most important birthday party in american politics happens tonight. and how women are fighting back against the all-out assault on their rights. but first, how the most irritating news story of the week is a reminder that sometimes you just get the democracy you deserve.

good morning. i'm melissa harris-perry. last month we were cheering president obama for his defiance in the face of the republicans' shutdown and their threat to breach the debt ceiling. the republicans wanted to gut the affordable care act. the president was having none of it. >> as long as i am president, i will not give in to reckless demands by some in the republican party to deny affordable health insurance to millions of hardworking americans. i will not negotiate over congress' responsibility to pay bills it's already racked up. nobody gets to hurt our economy and millions of hardworking families over law you don't like. >> he dug in his heels for weeks. he refused to budge on the aca. instead, he demanded that republicans vote to reopen the government and raise the debt ceiling. and it worked. on october 16th, congress struck a deal to do both. good job, mr. president.

who says democrats always cave? well, this week that guy, the defiance guy, he was nowhere to be found. republicans had been howling for the aca's head. i know, what else is new? but this time it was for the realization that more than 4 million people were getting cancellation notices, notices saying their individual health policies would not be available next year because of the affordable care act's strict new rules for such policies. republicans accused the president of lying by telling the american people that if you like your plan you can keep it. so president obama did not dig in his heels this time. instead he made a mea culpa on thursday saying he messed up on the aca. the website rollout was botched, he said, he was wrong about keeping the plans you like. >> i'm just going to keep working as hard as i can around the priorities that the american people care about, and i think it's legitimate for them to

expect me to have to win back some credibility on this health care law in particular and on a whole range of these issues in general. and, you know, that's on me. i mean, we fumbled the rollout on this health care reform. >> the president announced he would allow insurance companies to continue offering pre-aca plans for another year, plans that don't meet the health care law's strict rules for individual insurance policies, plans that offer such limited coverage that if you actually get sick it might feel a lot like you don't have health insurance at all. the president caved, not a lot, but just enough. the aca is still nearly intact, and the insurance rules will still go into full effect next year. but it does make you wonder, why take that stand in october at all? why let the government shutdown for the first time in 17 years to protect the health care law? why do that if you were just

going to give in anyway? well, so, maybe it's about the president protecting his party in advance of the midterm elections. i mean, apparently now it's really important to get blue dog louisiana senator mary landrieu re-elected. the white house is probably hoping that the president's self-flagellation and delay would give landrieu cover to back away from the bill she proposed that would let people keep their plans. but landrieu already attracted some democratic support from conservative democratic senators like kay hagen of north carolina and mark prior of arkansas who are also facing their own tough re-election battles in the south next year. doesn't look like she's ready to back down. so, all right, listen, "nerdland," can i speak frankly? let's pretend we're sitting together in the living room and that i'm not talking to you from a studio in new york. because right now now how i am feeling is probably not appropriate for broadcasts. i am pissed. our country has been trying to

achieve meaningful reform for more than 100 years, in fits and starts from teddy roosevelt to bill clinton. we've had incomplete but deeply important successes with medicaid and medicare, even cobra policies. but it was not until president obama and speaker pelosi finally made this decades-long struggle a top agenda item that we finally, at least in some measure, began to move toward a meaningful, contemporary expansion of health care coverage for all americans. and republicans fought it every step of the way. members of the republican party purposely misrepresented the bill when it was a proposal. once it became law, they aggressively lied about its provisions and what they would mean for american families and businesses. they resisted their legal responsibility as e elected officials to enforce the law, taking it all the way to the supreme court. and they have used confederate-era tactics of attempted millification to kill the law upon implementation. and now, well now, democrats are

joining in! howling about the horrors of obama care and its faulty website. and yesterday the u.s. house of representatives approved a bill proposed by congressman fred upton that would allow insurers to keep selling their subpar plans not only to people who had them before but to new customers as well. which really just means that insurance companies can keep making massive profits from vulnerable people in the individual market without providing them meaningful protection. so i'm thinking maybe the resistance is just winning. maybe we're going to fail again to extend health care to the american people. and not only that, but maybe the americans who actually most need the coverage are going to cheer even as they defeat the very policy that could have helped them and in the kind of ugly place in my gut i think, well, good luck with that. because sometimes you just get the democracy that you deserve. anybody in "nerdland" want to talk me down?

>> jim:ing me now is antheeya butler, professor at the university of indiana, and a republican strategist former aide to rick santorum. thanks for sitting through my rant. >> it was interesting. >> i think no doubt republicans scored a big political win in terms of having the president to back down on this question of full implementation immediately, right, by basically allowing people an extra year with those plans. but is it a win for the american people? it's clear it's a win for the republicans. is it a win for the american people? >> first of all, if the president did anything, he did something unusual. he got "the wall street journal," "new york times," and "washington post" to all agree in editorials yesterday that what he did by extending this for a year was wrong. the bigger problem i see is i think he's lost a lot of credibility. he criticized republicans for saying can't we just delay this, absolutely not, the wrong thing to do. well, look, now for political reasons he delayed the obligation of businesses under

the act to -- requirement for a year to cover people or be penalized. he now has for another year extended the right of insurance companies to cancel people. plus there is no obligation to go back to people who have already been notified and say they're covered. all the things he said he wasn't going to do and all the warnings that were given i feel like he's ignored. i do agree he's lost credibility and i frankly believe he looks very political in this, problematic for the democrats. >> political certainly in the sense this president never has to run for re-election again. i want to listen to what the president said on thursday if where he's clearly trying to provide some cover for his party, for congressional democrats and senators, as they face tough re-election bids. >> i want them to know their senator or congressman, this were making representations based on what i told them and what this white house and our administrative staff told them so, it's not on them, it's on

us. >> this is, you know, vintage obama, you know, president obama, taking responsibility. i've always appreciated and respected that about him. on the other hand, i keep think, but no, no, no, these people are not trying to fix obama care. they are trying to kill it. hold the line. >> exactly. i keep thinking why are you so naive to not realize what is really happening around you? everybody wants you to fail on the other side. and so now you've capitulated to the failure. what are you going to do? you've said this is wrong. let me give you an example of what this means for a regular person. my driver who drove me from philadelphia this morning, his wife has a health plan, got the cancellation notice, doesn't know what to do and now she thinks under obama care her insurance premiums will be higher. we're playing these political games but real people are trying to figure this thing out and we can't in a month and a half. and if you've gotten those letters already, what is going to happen? insurers are trying to figure out what's happening now because of what happened on thursday.

now this whole thing is in a complete disarray. >> and it need not be. for me, i said this last night with reverend sharpton, the spoiled milk analogy. we have a responsibility that we don't allow people to sell spoiled milk, even though we have people in this country who are hungry, you can't buy spoiled milk at the store because the government set asset of regulations about what our food safety is. similarly, we cannot sell these plans. we're going to move on from this topic mostly because if we stay on it my head will explode. >> makes great tv. >> it does. we're going to add a couple folks to the table and go to iowa when we come back, because it's the most important birthday party of the year. it's happening tonight. and you're going to see why the birthday boy is the only one closing his eyes and making a wish.

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there's something big happening tonight in the world of politics, something huge, an e event that could have ripple effects for year, set the stage for the next presidential election. it takes place in altoona, iowa. if you haven't guessed it already, it's this guy's birthday party. ter tomorrow he turns 67. the keynote speaker at his birthday bash, congressman and erstwhile presidential candidate, paul ryan. now, you may ask yourself why is paul ryan in iowa hoping to raise money for the governor's re-election campaign? good question. why didn't senator marco rubio attend the bash last year? why did rick perry, rick

santorum, her man caine, michele bachmann, ron paul, and newt gingrich attend in 2011 after one of their debates? and why did then vice president george h.w. bush attend the very first birthday bash way back in 1985? it wasn't just because they were friends. people, say it with me. the iowa caucus! that wacky, weird, wonderful way that iowa has of picking presidential candidates. picture it, crowding into a vfw hall or school auditorium with a dozen or few hundred of your neighbors, people chanting and cheering, drinking punch, trying for hours on end to convince their neighbors to cast their precious vote for the right candidate or the left one. it is the first presidential contest in the nation, and, yes, it's still a little over two years away. but in iowa politics, no such thing as arriving fashionably late to the party. you best visit early and often. already this year the state has been a practical parade of people who fancy themselves

presidential material. senator ted cruz headlined the reagan dinner there in october. it was his third appearance in the state in three months. rick perry and rand paul visited recently. so did mike lee, rick santorum, mike huckabee, and don't forget former alaskan governor sarah palin. although i think she's running less for president and more for a spot on "the times" bestseller list. every event, at every event, hopefuls shake hands and schmooze with voters and the political big wigs of the machines and organizations who help to actually work to create these presidential candidates. that's because the caucus' influence is undeniable. it pushes some to the front of the pack to attract free publicity, momentum, and, yes, money, and makes some reconsider the whole idea. winnowing the field down considerably for future primaries. me, i like iowa. maybe it's the former high school cheerleader living inside me, but i love the idea that you actually have to rally your neighbors to join your team. no solitaire pulling of the lever in iowa.

you must take a stand publicly, which means you have to make an argument to defend a position at their best, the caulks are a space of actual democratic deliberation that has meaningful and immediate consequences. that's pretty rare in our politics these days. through a more pessimistic lens, we are an enormous diverse nation that allows just a few most lie white folks living in the midwest to have an outside influence on our entire process. it begs the question -- should we be celebrating or protesting the birthday party happening in iowa tonight? joining the table is a staff correspondent for the "national journal," also karen finney, host of msnbc's disrupt and former spokesperson for the dnc. so, karen, i want to start with you because you've been to many an iowa caucus. who are the players, two years out, the players in broad strokes who begin thinking about iowa, showing up? how do the iowa caucuses influence who ends up president?

>> at this point it's about dollars. one of the things ted cruz has done is not just make appearances in iowa but try to make appearances in in iowa where they can lock down the big donors. when ted cruz was there earlier this year, people were impressed with him if you're from that side and you would be impressed with ted cruz in that he was able to connect with part of the evangelical crowd. my suspicion part of the reason paul ryan is going because the rumor has been that cruz is starting to lock down some of the big donors, which means with the donors comes different blocks of support. the one thing i would say also about iowa, because i agree with you, and we made a change to the calendar when i was at the dnc, i love iowa, love the butter cows, love the state fair, love the fried oreos as much as that sounds disgusting. >> i love them. i eat them at mardi gras. >> but part of our concern was iowa and new hampshire going

first, we weren't vetting our candidates or engaging enough of america. i think we engaged a lot of america in 2008, thankfully, but that's why we added south carolina and nevada. i think that's better for the proesz says and for the candidates. i think all this semp is on iowa so early, remember, people who have won the iowa caucus have not necessarily gone on to win the nomination. >> in fact, particularly true on the republican side. we just sort of, you know, looking back at folks on the republican side who have actually won the iowa caucuses in sort of recent years, and in fact what it mostly seems to be doing on the republican side is winnowing it down. the folks who win that iowa caucus are not necessarily the people who gone on to win particularly the republican nomination for the u.s. presidency. so is it still -- they're all there tonight. is it still a valuable thing? >> yeah. it zefl still has that winnowing effect especially in 2016 when the field is so crowded. but maybe that's more emblematic of looking at the fissures

within the republican party. it speaks to whether you are capturing the enthusiasm of the conservative base. in 2012 we saw mitt romney went on to win the nomination but didn't win the presidential race and a lot of republicans said, well, part of it is because we really didn't appeal to the conservative base the way that other conservative candidates did. can a republican appeal to the conservative base winning over moderates in other states? >> that is the chris christie question of the year. the name you did not hear me say is chris christie being at this thing. yet we know now he's the head of the republican governors, is he going to be going all around the country, but can a chris christie from new jersey with his kind of jeer see-boy way go to an iowa state fair and do well and connect with people? >> that's the wild card. i was part of rudy julgiuliani' team before i was part of rick

santorum's presidential team and rudy could not play in iowa. i will say this. i was one of the ones that were skeptical. why do we have the middle of the states have this much power. my opinion has changed. you have to understand. >> people take it seriously. >> they don't kick the tires. they look under the hood and take it far 20,000-mile test-drive. rick santorum won iowa spend dlrg 30,000 on television versus mitt romney spending a fortune as well as rick perry spending a fortune, newt gingrich, because they get to know the candidates personally and they don't decide till very late. >> you know what i hate about that argument, i apologize for such a strong word, other states would do that too if they had the chance. by the bay, not that voters in other places don't care, wouldn't get that engaged, but the mythology and -- like i said, love iowa and new hampshire -- >> they're not trained to do that et yet. iowans are trained to do that. >> that means don't give them a chance at snaul. >> in other words, not something inherent to iowans.

not being a midwesterner. there's a long culture of it in which people come to take it seriously. i think it's true that iowans take it seriously. i wonder, though, what if it went around to different states? what if it was a different first state every four or eight years? >> i think iowa's different because they have both this process that they do and it's a strong religious base. you have the faith and family freedom coalition, all these coalitions that are always doing stuff, vetting these republican candidates over and over again. for republicans especially when you're talking act a base baste that has this big, strong conservative religious gridlock right now, they've got something that nobody else has. it's in texas too. but the way that bob beanderklatts and all the rest of these men run these caucuses, all the republican candidate have to go to iowa and spend time there. this is why rick santorum won. he did that trek. >> we're going to come back on the republicans in iowa, then we'll talk about the dems in

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[ coughs ] ♪ [ male announcer ] you can't let a cold keep you up tonight. vicks nyquil -- powerful nighttime 6-symptom cold & flu relief. ♪ we're taking a look at the ideology of iowa caucusers on the republican side. 45% of them in the last election cycle calling themselves very conservative. 43% somewhat conservative. so you end up with a vast majority with, you know, a pretty conservative label there. but also looking -- so there's our chart. we love it when they do the flying charts this.

and the other thing that's important to look at is in 2012 in the iowa caucuses when you just look at the number of people, rick santorum there is at 29,839. that's what wins, right? mitt romney, 29,805. that's not many people. there are colleges with 30,000 people in them. this is a relatively small group of people quite conservative. how does that impact the ability of these folks to go on and win generals? >> it winnows the field down and shows you're not just convincing people who are casual voters. they're extremely engaged. not only are you winning them over in the caucuses but you have the potential to win them over as activists who are going to be involved throughout the campaign. it's kind of the gift that keeps on giving. ? they're not good for one vote. they're good for 20 votes. >> right. ? they'll make the calls, talk to their neighbors and call across state lines sh not just iowa votes. >> yeah. if you're able to capture the enthusiasm of such engaged voters and have this kind of ground game that works to get that, you can replicate that in

other states, like in 2008 and barack obama. >> yeah. but i wonder, though, so i want to get to the dems in a second but on the republican side at this moment, i mean, part of what's occurring in this party is this divide as you point out, this kind of ideological divide, this question about governing. how much is that going to impact what we see happening in these caucus states? >> that's the challenge that we've seen the last several cycles for the republicans. you may be able to win that very conservative base of the iowa caucus republicans, but particularly in 2014, 2016 america, you've got to be able to show you have broader appeal if you're going to win a national election. remember, part of the challenge for a lot of these kand damtds, the things they had to say in places like iowa in the caucuses, the self-deportations, the -- you know, some of the real nasty stuff, you can't then -- in a general, then you're on defense for why you had to move that far to the right. >> but let me ask you, then, how that connects with your belief

about how seriously iowans take their role, because they recognize they're not just sort of picking someone who they like. they are vetting a field for a general election. and so i'm wondering if iowa caucusgoers are in part not only just sincere voters but also strategic ones who are saying, all right, i'm a little to the right but actually i know that i'm going to want someone who's sort of midright. >> what they do not do is say who's going to win in november. >> they do not. okay. >> one thing i want to remind everybody, barack obama would not be president today if it was not for iowa. let's be clear about that. >> that was a very different situation than when we're talking about the republican caucuses because the whole question going into iowa was can a black man get enough white votes. if he can do it in iowa, maybe he can -- >> but when you look at those iowa caw caucusgoers, 99% of republican iowa caucusers are white. but 93% of democrats are white. >> it's also very liberal state who shows up in democrat

caucuses in iowa. >> sure. right. very different iowan -- >> elect rat. >> granted, but now president obama, then senator obama, winning that, i agree, it was -- not only that he won it but that hillary clinton came in third. i think that's the other really important part was that she comes in behind, right, comes in third there. >> a lot of this, too. iowa also about expectations. in other words, rick santorum could have come in first, second, third or fourth and moved on because the expectation was he wasn't going to do that. mitt romney could not have come in fourth and moved on. rick perry tried to an couldn't move on. my kjell bachmann, none of them. when there's a big field like this will be this time, it won't necessarily pick the nominee but who's thrown off the island. >> that's critical in part because, again, if hillary clinton had not won in new hampshire immediately behind this, that would have been it. right? it wouldn't have been the long game. but you were saying that long game for the democrats is

actually good for the party. it kept people involved. in states we hadn't even heard about in a long time. >> a, we were and the obama campaign ultimately because the democratic party was able to -- we turned this over when you become the nominee, think of all the new people we were able to register to vote on both sides, the hillary clinton campaign and the obama campaign, engaging people in those states. in new york, people are like, yeah, whatever, it will be over before they get to our primary so i'm not paying attention until later. it was such a wonderful thing to see ho -- so many more parts of the country get to be engaged in this process. >> it didn't feel wonderful at the time. >> i know. >> it felt like bloodletting. did not feel like this is strengthening us. >> you never got to participate and have your vote matter in a primary and finally it did. i don't disagree it was a miserable time, but for americans and democrats it was a positive thing. >> i want to talk a little more about democrats, specifically the idea of hillary clinton

perhaps arriving in iowa again but also the fact, and i love this, republicans are now doing a thing where they're going to try to get women voters. i'm interested in how well that is going to work. more when we come back. customer erin swenson ordered shoes from us online but they didn't fit. customer's not happy, i'm not happy. sales go down, i'm not happy. merch comes back, i'm not happy. use ups. they make returns easy.

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and right now you can drive one home for practically just your signature. get zero due at signing, zero down, zero deposit, and zero first month's payment on any new 2014 volkswagen. hurry, this offer ends december 2nd. for details, visit vwdealer.com today republicans reason the only ones showing up in iowa early. >> 2016 is hillary's time! run, hillary, run! if you run, you'll win and we'll all win! >> oh, chuck. chuck schumer appearing at the iowa democratic party function this month. as you can see, he is an adamant supporter of hillary clinton. run, hillary, run! even as the woman herself keeps her plans close to the vest. but democrats aren't the only ones thinking about women in the

caucuses. this "new york times" report shows that a new firm sets out to secure women votes for a vulnerable gop. katie packer gauge, who you'll see in the middle of the photo there, she's a deputy campaign manager for mitt romney in 2012. she and two of her political strategist colleagues have launched a new firm to help republicans woo the ladies. we have chuck schumer saying run, hillary, run, in part of hopes of galvanizing women voters and the republicans saying we're going to need to get women voters back. >> they do. i think one of the things they have to be fearful of is that their obsession with reproductive politics will drown out any other message they might have to attract republican women who might vote for them. this firm is interesting in this way. at least they're making a sense to say we need to go after the younger women we'll probably miss. i think that's a big part of the republican party they don't know how to deal with, they don't

know how to get younger women in who might be on one way fiscally conservative but on the other hand not conservative so much as far as their reproductive politics. they have to find a way to peek to these women. the women who are 55 and up i don't think they have to worry about because they are going to vote republican. >> that said, particularly as we think about iowa, just last week we were talking about this, the republican party only has a problem with women of color. they've got white women on the lock. we were just looking, 42% of white women voted for president obama but 56% went for mitt romney despite all the -- >> but they have to figure out how to get latina women. they're not going to get african-american women. they've just given up i think. but they have to figure out how to get young latinas. >> if you look at the virginia governor's race, cuccinelli did fine among married women. he got killed among single women. >> unmarried. >> i'm sorry. unmarried. politically correct. i apologize to the entire table.

>> on bee half of the party, i will take that apology! on behalf of the republican party to the entire gender. >> and i'll also apologize for obama care if that helps because lift that's envogue. >> my party makes the same mistake. >> the truth of the matter is where republicans i think are failing is not when we try to target by jender, by race. where i think we're failing these days is hardworking middle cross, blue-collar american who is liked ronald reagan now think all we e do is fight for tax breaks for the wealthy and no longer understand their lives. >> when you is say that sente e sentence, hardworking, blue-collar -- first of all, that group is disappearing as a result of the economic realities of the end of blue-collar jobs in america. the other thing is when you say the language, hardworking, blue-collar americans, the image that we draw in our heads is of a white man, midwesterner, and that person, like when you say that, it actually sort of rises up a little thing for example latina women who are hardworking domestic worker who is look at

immigration policies. >> i would put them in there. i'm saying i think it's understanding that there are people that want to have the american dream who no longer believe that the rules of working hard will get me there. that's where i think -- >> immigration reform would be the first most important place to demonstrate that. you want to talk about people who work hard on a daily basis, don't get the pay they deserve, and who are true believers in the american dream, that's the american immigrant community, the mostly latina -- >> do you think republicans are against immigration reform? >> i think they're so against doing anything in the context of this american presidency, president obama's presidency, that they're willing to stand in the way of immigration reform. >> i will give you some of that and agree. however, there are -- boehner said he's not doing it between now and the end of the year. let's be honest. >> okay. but it's not a matter of we don't have enough time. >> you couldn't even get a website that's operational. and between now and the end of the year you want to do immigration reform?

ry dick louse. >> the website being operational could in part be because we had to go to the supreme court to fight over a law -- >> three years to get it going. >> i think to the point about immigration it's really an issue of like 2016 is going to be the big reckoning for the republican party. after 2012 there was an identity crisis and there are, to your point, a lot of republicans who are not only saying we need to do immigration reform but are putting their necks on the line to try and push for something. i mean, look at what happened in the senate. now lindsey graham has to face a race back in south carolina after he put his name on this comprehensive immigration reform bill. but there is still this problem where you have a very conservative base who comes out in midterms and those are the voters that members of congress in the house are most concerned about. >> yes. these gerrymandering districts. >> also ideologically very extreme. it's not just gerrymandering districts. that's part of it as well. >> if they put the senate version of the immigration bill

on the floor of the house it would pass. the only reason that and enda are not on the floor of the house is because john boehner can't afford to let that happen because of the crazy caucus. >> and, oh, because of the crazy caucus. speaking of john boehner and the crazy caucus, we'll go to that in my letter this week. but first let me say anthea, see you in the next hour. john, thank you for coming. >> thanks for having me. >> apologizing to the jend prer the party. you can come back any time. elahe izadi, thanks for being here, karen, thank you. you can see more of karen later today at 4:00 p.m. eastern on "disrupt." i'm going to stop by and do a little disrupting of my own. next is my letter of the week to my favorite new breakfast club. there are cameras,, police, guards...ds us. but who looks after us online, where we spend more than 200 billion dollars a year.

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live during weekend brunch. especially tough when that breakfast is being enjoyed by one of the most powerful men in the country and you're trying to get him to put down the saltshaker and pay attention to your serious concerns about immigration policy. but breakfast was no match for 13-year-old carmen lima and 16-year-old jennifer martinez. at 7:00 a.m. wednesday morning these two young women approached house speaker john boehner at his favorite breakfast spot on capitol hill to urge him to act on immigration reform. both of the girls are the children of undocumented immigrants and told the speaker in their appeal why for them this policy is personal. >> so how would you feel if you had to tell your kids at the age of 10 that you were never coming home? >> that wouldn't be good. >> i know. so that's what happened to me. that happened to me. i thought i was never going to see my dad again because of [ inaudible ].

and i cry sod hard when he told me that at the age of 10. >> now, let's be honest, when it comes to belief and wish fulfillment, most americans think asking congress for what they want is about as effective as asking santa claus. which is why i'm encouraged by these two young women and their extraordinary faith in democracy. so this week my letter goes out to them. dear carmen lima and jennifer martinez, it's me, melissa. the first thing i lead like to say to you is i'm sorry, i'm sorry when you asked the speaker what he'd do about immigration reform, he told you this. >> well, i'm trying to find somebody to get this thing done. >> so we can count on your vote for immigration reform? >> try to find a way to move the bill forward. >> but just three hours later when asked what the house was going to do about the senate's bipartisan immigration bill, he told the rest of america this. >> we have no intention of ever going into conference on this senate bill.

>> now, i know hearing that has got to make you feel a little disappointed right now. the second thing i want to say to you is don't be discouraged by your disappointment because although this might be a setback, this is not a defeat. every u.s. policy reform that has advanced the cause of equality was won after a yielding effort and endurance in the face of obstacles by those who fought for the change. and the fight to push america forward on immigration is going to be no different. to fortify yourselves for that effort, i want you to hold on to that faith in the legislative process that motivated your conversation with speaker boehner. because with congress' approval ratings, the lowest they've ever been, that faith is a quality in short supply in the american electorate. even as i'm having a crisis of faith in the system these days, but our democracy does not work without it. our democracy does not work without you. the political process cannot move forward without americans who, like you, despite their disappointments, remain willing to be part of it, who continue

to hold our lawmakers casualtiable and demand that they do the job of advancing policy like immigration reform, which a majority of americans are calling for them to enact. i want you to recognize that john boehner was not the only leader in that restaurant on wednesday, because you set an example that he and our congress would be wise to follow. you showed ow debate and disagreement can be a bridge instead of a barrier. so at this moment i want to urge you not to stop pushing and maybe when you're old enough to think about running, run. because the one thing government needs more than people like you to believe in it is for people like you to be part of it. so on that one day instead of petitioning the power of a man hungry for his breakfast, you can wield that power yourselves to make a difference for those who are hungry for change. in the meantime, keep up the good work, because thanks to you, the struggle will in fact

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in my city of new orleans this week a school that serves at-risk kids has lost yet another student to gun violence. 15-year-old terence roberts was found shot to death monday just a few months after enrolling in the net charter school. he is the fifth student from the school killed by gunfire in the last six months. his story is yet another example of the pervasive gun violence that exists in america, an epidemic that disproportionately takes the lives of young men of color. in her new memoir, "men we reaped," jesnyn reflects on the toll of the community.

joining me now. thank you for being here. i wanted to -- i read the memoir. the men that you lose are not all too to violence. or at least to that sort of violence. but it reminded me so much of the story of what's happening in new orleans, this sense that there is kind of a catastrophe that impacts everyone. how does writing the memoir help you to sort of continue to work through the continuing pain of that experience? >> writing the memoir helped me, you know, work through this because i think i was really -- living through it sort of stunned me in a way. you know what i'm saying? living through it, i felt like i was reeling all the time and i wasn't really thinking about thinking about the violence, the effect of that violence, the

effect of grief and loss. and so i think writing about it made me much more mindful about it so that i was able to sort of understand that the kind of impact that grief and that loss and that violence really has on, you know, we as an individual but also on an entire community. and, you know, an entire people. >> i read the book before i read reviews of the book, and pretty regularly in the views people say things like jesnyn ward escaped her community or got away from it. and i kept thinking, no, the goal isn't to escape. talk to me about how you see a relationship particularly to deep south, so to that mississippi gulf coast and to new orleans. >> i mean, i went back, you know? i had plenty of opportunities to go other places and, you know, settle elsewhere and make a life elsewhere, but i chose to go back into mississippi and go home to the gulf coast, you know? and part of the reason i chose to do that is because i feel like i want to be there to fight the good fight.

and there's something about living there and continuously sort of facing -- you know, facing those realities and facing those demons that keeps you aware, i guess, and that keeps you sort of hungry and working. so, you know, i went home to the south. i still feel very much a part of that place and that community, so i don't feel like i've escaped anything at all. >> many of us are thinking a lot in these weeks about renisha mcbride in detroit and the loss -- to violence of a black woman. yet so many people who we lose whether to suicide or drunken drivers as you lost your brother or to the gun violence are men in our lives. what is the particular impact on women when our intimates, our beloved, our friends who are the men of our lives are lost? >> well, i think, you know, i mean, you know, briefly at the end of the book, i bring up the

fact that, you know, there are young women that i know in my community that have died too. so i think that, you know, that young women in my community and women in general, they live with that fear that they will lose those that they love. but then i think they also live with the fear that they will die, you know, by -- through violence and die early just as the young men do. you know, and that kind of fear that you live with day in and day out, i think that breeds a sort of hopelessness. >> yeah. it changes how you interact with the world. >> yes. >> if you don't presume that you have another 20 years. >> exactly. >> another 30 30 years. >> exactly. >> an exquisite book, a very painful book, personal book, different than your award-winning fiction and i thank you for writing it. i know it took a lot of courage. ? thank you for reading it. >> thank you. jesnyn ward. up next, the all-out assault on women and how some politicians and even religious

activists are fighting back. and a woman at the forefront of virtually every social movement of the last century, gracely boggs, is here in "nerdland." more "nerdland" at the top of the hour. americans take care of business. they always have. they always will. that's why you take charge of your future. your retirement. ♪ ameriprise advisors can help you like they've helped millions of others. listening, planning, working one on one. to help you retire your way... with confidence. that's what ameriprise financial does. that's what they can do with you. ameriprise financial. more within reach.

♪ [ male announcer ] old el paso frozen entrées. now in freezers. welcome back. i'm melissa harris-perry. dr. george tiller ashlgts physician from wichita, kansas, was one of only three doctors in america providing access to aborgs in the third trimester of pregnancy. his motto -- trust women. dr. tiller was assassinated 4 1/2 years ago, shot and killed at his church by an anti-abortion activist. his clinic closed shortly afterwards. right now there are only four doctors in america who still perform late-term abortions. they were profiled in the documentary "after tiller"

released earlier this year. two of those doctors, colleagues of dr. tiller himself, went to practice in new mexico, a state with none of the limbs on reproductive rights that, for example, kansas had in place. they were followed not long afterward from volunteers from the anti-reproductive rights group that once protested dr. tiller. in recent weeks they've been driving this operation rescue so-called truth truck around albuquerque, complete with gory images and a message advocating vote for the late term abortion ban. they're talking about a new city ordinance that would ban abortion after 20 weeks in albuquerque. election day is tuesday, but early voting ended yesterday. already almost half of those who voted in the last city wide election have already voted in this one. that's according to a new report on the ordinance from msnbc.com reporter aaron carmon. while 13 u.s. states have passed 20-week abortion bans and have been found twice

unconstitutional, this is the first-ever city-wide referendum to attempt one. we are in uncharted territory here, and as an activist in favor of women's reproductive rights told msnbc, nobody really knows what will happen. there's no model for this. joining me is msnbc.com national reporter erin carmon, comedian and writer liz winston, author of "lizz free or die." still with us, anthea butler, professor of religious studies and graduate chair of religion at the university of pennsylvania, and cassie underwood, a pro voice activist and writer working on a memoir about her personal experience with abortion and the healing that came after. thank you all for being here. erin, i feel like i both love having you at my table and hate having you at my table because when you're here with this brilliant reporting it is about how this frontier keeps pushing more and more efforts to restrict women's reproduct rooifgts.

what does this new fight tell us about what's happening? >> what's so interesting is new mexico is a blue state that won twice for barack obama, it's incredibly progressive when it comes to women's access to reproductive health, including the fact they have medicaid funding for abortion, there are no gestational limits, they allow that decision to be up to the women and the doctor. it's become a refuge in a lot of ways. a lot of p the people who live the are not so happy about these folks coming in from there from the susan b. anthony list in washington, d.c., operation rescue from wichita. they have become this sort of test case. i think what it tells us is that they are not stopping with red states like texas and oklahoma. they have a long game here. it starts stat local level in albuquerque, goes up to the state legislatures and nationally. and they have been planning this to chip away the entire abortion rights. >> on this long game, talk about the specific strategy that is the so-called truth truck. you rode around in the truck. this is what makes you a reporter and me not because i would be screaming on the inside

of that. what was that experience like? >> they were very kind to me. >> of course. it's not a lack of sort of personal kindness in that sense. >> sure. i think what it's like is they are out there every single day. so they have a political strategy. they have a direct action strategy ji that involves screaming in people's faces as they're trying to exercise their personal rights. they have -- you know, they're going after political officials so the idea with this referendum is if it passes and certainly if it does pass it's going to be tied up in court for a long time, they are looking for some momentum. they want to say not only in these red states have we passed these so-called fetal pain -- this is a very made-up concept -- these fetal pain bills. they've passed them in all these states, trying to pass it in the u.s. congress right now. and that is going to make it seem like there is a groundswell against reproductive rights. >> lizz, i want to build on this because the piece to me that feels like is missing is the

idea that reproductive rights and reproductive justice advocates can go on the offensive. what we are seeing is that the anti-choice people are on the offensive. there is like there is no battleground we are not willing to go into. it feels like we're on the defensive, holding to line. is there a way to strategically hold the line but also say we have a strategy for extending rights, making it easier to have access? >> well, yeah, that's sort of been my tact, too, and i think what i want to do because i've been raising awareness for planned parenthood and events around the country, and way i've seen over and over again talking to these clinic workers is our local legislatures are screwing us and the people who come to our clinics don't know who their state rep is, don't understand what's coming out. what i'm trying to do is we're doing a telethon monday night out of new york that is reaching out to help the women of texas but also to have a reminder to people to say -- and this is

what was fascinating to me, which was rewe all watched wendy davis, and she was so inspiring, and the women of texas who rallied and were active were so inspiring, but what we didn't do is turn to our own states and say what's going on here? >> man, they crazy in texas. >> that's right. and you know what, oregon is the only state that has not curbed any kind of abortion rights since roe. that means probable the state you live? is somehow out to get you and we need to get people to rally around and find out who that is. >> in louisiana we have it all, transvaginals, 20-week bans, you got to ask your mama, your next-door neighbor, your cousin and brother for permission. >> i think mardi gras is the only affordable breast exam left in louisiana. >> i hate to laugh because it's so not funny. and yet -- i wonder because i wanted to make that point that dr. tiller said trust women. dr. tiller wasn't saying i'm going to go out and force you

into a 20-week abortion. it was about trusting women. particularly on a kind of ethical basis, how can we make an aet cal, moral, even a religious claim for you must give women an opportunity to be full human beings who make these difficult choices? >> exactly. when you near a pate riarchal soelt and still ynr a society women can't make decisions for themselves because men say you can't or other women say we need to let men make decisions for us that's simply not true. i'll break it down. allow a woman to have her own conscience to do what she sees fit in consultation with her doctor and everyone else. these things have happened for last 40 years because it's been a sprefk strategy. whether we're talking act capturing a local clinic or hospital, now they're trying to capture entire states, okay. and now in the case of albuquerque, let's start in albuquerque -- >> start with the city. >> start with the city. what we don't seem to understand

is this is a crusade for these folks, okay so, they have very strong religious beliefs about why they are e begin to think about people and why their ideology is this way, those who believe a woman should have the right to choose need to employ our same kind of logical strategies to think about how we're going to push back against this. >> interesting when you use the language of a crusade, it is a reminder that in politics, simply having a majority is insufficient. there's a majority of american who is want gun control but those who don't have so much more engaged and active. even if it's a majority who says we should have choice, if that minority is composed of a crusading feeling -- next we e ear going to go to washington and talk more about the question, but i want to talk about how going on the offense sometimes means us having the right to speak often, must mean us having the right to speak about our experience, not just the truth trucks.

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and help keep the spirit of the holidays alive. not everyone can be a foster parent, but anyone can help a foster child. since 1977, the hyde amendment has banned the use of medicaid funds to pay for aborgs. the effect has been to limit the ability of poor women to terminate unwanted pregnancies. doubling down nearly 35 years later, just days before he signed the affordable care act into law, president obama signed an executive order limiting what its health insurance exchanges could do. quoting it, "the act specifically prohibits the use of tax credits and cost sharing reduction payments to pay for abortion services except in cases of rape or incest or when the life of the woman would be endangered." what do you do if you need an

abortion but you are too poor to afford one? for many women, the abc is you turn to the only people willing and able to help -- abortion funds. joining me from seattle is trina stout, a board member of the care project, a nonprofit abortion fund raiser in the pacific northwest. thank you for joining us. >> thank you. >> so talk to me about abortion funds. i'm not sure this is a part of the reproductive justice movement that many people know about. where do the funds come from and what do you do with the funds? >> sure. so first of all, an abortion fund is a hotline that helps women access safe abortion care by providing information and funding. the care project is an entirely nonprofit volunteer-run abortion fund, so we rely on donations to help the women we serve. the donations, they come from individual donors, and we -- after we've spoken to a woman on the hotline and helped her fund raise and assess her needs, we

send a fax to the clinic that's basically a voucher so that when that woman arrives on the day of her appointment she is able to be seen. >> trina, washington state, where you are, out there in seattle, is actually doing pretty well on this question of allowing access post roe v. wade. it is a state we don't see many of the kinds of laws we've seen encroaching in other places. yet the question of funding is still critical. how important is the issue of being able to afford abortion for women who are seeking them? >> it's very important. the average cost of our first trimester abortion in our region is $550. and that even in states where their medicaid does pay for abortion care, that is sometimes there are women who are just on the cusp and that's not a realistic amount for them and their partners to raise in a week or at all. >> yeah. cassie, i want to come to you here in part because the abortion funds are hotlines.

they're places people call and say here is my situation, here is my experience. what happens if we listen to women not just on the hotlines but more broadly tell us why they are seeking to terminate unwanted pregnancies? >> well, in my experience, it was a gut feeling to end my pregnancy that took my mind a while to catch up to that. and i'd been touring the country with a group of five women sharing our stories. we were most recently in texas. and what we've seen is that people have come to us with love and compassion. we're not telling them in a political context. we're creating an environment that's really just about people and communication. and we've met a lot of people who want to hear about our experiences that includes the need to find money to have the procedure. >> trina, let me come back to you for just one moment because we talk about the fact that the president before the passage of aca signed that executive order

basically doubling down on the hyde amendment amendment, but it's not because he's deeply anti-choice or something. when we look at what they've toll us since 2009 we've seen an e enormous increase in the number of laws and policies introduced into state legislatures to restrict abortions. where you are in washington, are you all worried that these kinds of restrictions are coming your way? >> women and families in washington are actually very fortunate. we have pro-choice voters and pro-choice leaders. washington is the only state to have legalized abortion by popular vote. our current legislature is working to expand access to reproductive health care instead of take it away. so here in washington i'm not worried, but the care project serves women in idaho, alaska, and oregon as well, and in idaho they face many more barriers. >> yeah. absolutely. trina stout, thank you so much for your work and the work of abortion funds around the country. up next, the power of four

little words -- i had ayn abortion. why more and more women are coming forward to say it out loud. being your own boss! and my customers are really liking your flat rate shipping. fedex one rate. really makes my life easier. maybe a promotion is in order. good news. i got a new title. and a raise? management couldn't make that happen. [ male announcer ] introducing fedex one rate. simple, flat rate shipping with the reliability of fedex. i got this. [thinking] is it that time? the son picks up the check?

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even when we're apart. [ male announcer ] in stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy and more, swanson makes holiday dishes delicious. here's what she said. i had no idea what was true. lindsey, who got an abortion -- who ended a pregnancy last year after an assault, wrote, "this

guy forced himself on me. when the women at the clinic went over my options i bawled. society's so focused on women being mothers i felt selfish for not wanting to be a mom." it's relatively easy to talk about reproductive rights and abortion access in the abstract. it requires breathtaking courage to stand in public and say i had an abortion. because when you say it, you invite hateful and violent responses. that is exactly the kind of courage one of my guests has. she shared her story in "new york" magazine. cassie underwood is a writer and pro vase activist who encourages others throughout the country to share their stories too. i want to come back to you. share a bit of your story with us. >> walking around pregnant when you don't want to be is a nightmare. i wanted to tell everyone.

now i think who did i think i was? i had no idea that the average abortion patient is all of us. >> that last sentence in particular, that is all of us, when you look at the statics, one in three women will seek an abortion, that there is no one majority race when it comes to the question of -- that most women who have abortions already have children. those are the numbers that in fact it's all of us, and yet i can see even your emotion right now. there is so much shame associated with it and therefore so much courage necessary to say i had an i abortion. >> i have an essay in my book. i got pregnant the first time i ever had sex in high school. i ended up at a crisis pregnancy center. one of the things about these people is you have people there masquerading as a physician and a person of god. the woman said to me, your choices are mommy or murder.

and when a person who is impersonating a doctor and a person of god tells a 16-year-old who's terrified and scared and pregnant that their life is insignificant, it matter, and it's happening all over the place. and i had an abortion. i will say it. and the haters come. but what i encourage everyone is if you've had an abortion, you then become a person that they have to think about when they start demonizing. it is not abstract. there are people they love, their mothers and sisters who have them, who made a choice. sometimes that choice was i'm not ready. sometimes that choice was very -- it's an unbelievably painful experience. there's a panoply. the one thing that is not acceptable is to shame a woman for making a decision that she knows is best. >> the idea of that shame -- and i'm thinking, lizz, particularly about the truth truck and the notion of those late term

abortions, most people who seek an abortion after 20 weeks are seeking abortions in the context of pregnancies they very much wanted and had hopes to carry to term but there are these tremendous medical problems that occur. i mean for the most part that's what that is. so i'm thinking about that truth truck with those aborted fetuses, but what if they have to face the -- what if the women are standing there? >> right. what i find as a journalist who writes about these issues a lot is that you want to be an ethical steward of people's stories like the woman that i wrote about in oklahoma but that even if it is a wanted pregnancy, and some of them are not wanted pregnancies at that point, but they're often very challenging circumstances one way or another, even the woman i wrote about in oklahoma, i did not go out and say i'd like to find a white married woman with a fetal anomaly and an unwanted preg is i. that is what i found because she navigated all the punitive laws there. when i told her story to the best of my ability, the hatred

that she faced, this woman who fit what you are supposed to be when you have an abortion, people calling her a murderer in blog posts, comments, e-mailing me, and i understand why people don't tell their stories. i think obviously it's a huge public service. it's tremendously courageous to sit here and say i had an abortion, but i also understand why people don't do it because of what they're subjected to. >> absolutely. >> cassie, you said when you were doing this work, people are showing love and support. honestly i'm a little surprised to hear that in part because when dr. tiller was assassinated, you know, more than four years ago i wrote for the nation of peace about the assassination, i talked about this feeling of terrorism, and in it just one of the lines towards the end, i just -- i simply said, i have had a child and abortion and a hysterectomy. in other words, i have done everything with my uterus that one can do, and i love and respect women who have chosen many different paths. it was the first time in my public life that i got not just the hate mail but i got

incredible death threats from having simply said that sentence. i'm a little surprised that people are embracing, are warm. >> i was surprised too. and we have -- we had no idea what we would walk into when we'd walk into these classrooms and churches and theaters and share our experiences with abortion. but we really set the stage early on and create like group guidelines that we're going to be talking about this from a personal perspective. and we tell our stories and we have very different stories, and we then teach people how to listen with love and respect which is not something we're taught how to do. we're taught how to tie our shoes and how to write an essay but not taught how to listen to each other. and then we teach them how to tell their own stories. and we have the people in the room do that too. and we've had people come up to us afterward who say i have been pro-life my entire life and i will never think of abortion in the same way again, i'll never

think of to a woman who has an abortion in the same way again, and we really strip it of all political context as much as we possibly can and just come at it from a place of love. >> i think the "new york" magazine will do that for a lot of people, that feeling of once you read this. and i deeply respect your point about stripping it of the politics so that people can feel the heart of it. and yet, anthea, when i am able to talk about i had a child, i had an abortion, i've had a hysterectomy, at every point i had full medical coverage. at every point in each of those choices i was a woman with an education. and i was able to make the choices very privately. right? when i speak about it public, it's a choice to be public. i didn't have to walk the gauntlet at a clinic because i had -- and that is politics. right? my ability to make those -- >> -- on the internet -- >> they do everything. >> it disappears on the internet. >> it's the public shaming and this is part of the problem because especially for poor women, if you have to go and get an abortion, you don't have the money so, you might have to go get some money for something,

you get to the clinic and is yelling in your face and telling you you're an awful person for doing this, if you get the a i abortion, you come out and they're telling you you're going to hell. at the same time they are stripping away everything you needed to be able to take care of a kid if he wanted to have it. >> or prevent a pregnancy. >> and so what i want to understand, what i want to say publicly here is this logic of what' we're talking about with abortion is wrong. if you're going to tell women they can't get an abortion and you're going to take away all the benefit, the gynecological help, strip away everything, you'll create a nation of women who will be trapped and none of you will care about the babies they birth ord you're saying because once they get here you don't give a damn about them. >> exactly right. i never have understood how anybody gets a seat at any decisionmaking table by saying two different things, one, i'm not a doctor and i know nothing about science but -- okay. out. two, i want to reduce the number of abortions, and the way i want to do that is to remove access

to affordable birth control. you, out. >> yeah. >> in ohio, the quote, unquote, right to life is suing to block the medicaid expansion. they want -- which does not cover abortion. it covers contraception. and, you know, there's a split, but there are two groups who are suing because they don't want low-income women to have access to contraception. >> so no contraception, no abortion, compulsory pregnancy, and then the children that you have have to be hungry. because that is what will punish you for having had sex. that is what will punish you. >> they don't want poor women to have joy. >> it's time we sacre lizing sperm in this country and make it the most important thing it is because understand it's not just a woman who's making a baby. a man is on the other end of that thing. >> anthea butler wins "nerdland" for day. erin carmon, whose must-read article, must-read article is up on msnbc.com. lizz winston, anthea butler, who

went with the sacrilege and sperm, and cassie underwood, whose bravery and courage is part of the group of women here and your continuing work. i wish you safety and godspeed in everything that you do going forward. up next, punishing people for trying to feed their families. the other side of this story. you're not going to believe what louisiana's governor is up to. fbj for real. how are things with the new guy? all we do is go out to dinner. that's it? i mean, he picks up the tab every time, which is great...what? he's using you. he probably has a citi thankyou card and gets 2x the points at restaurants. so he's just racking up points with me. some people... ugh! no, i've got it. the citi thankyou preferred card. now earn 2x the points on dining out and entertainment, with no annual fee.to apply, go to citi.com/thankyoucards

i don't miss out... you sat out most of our game yesterday! asthma doesn't affect my job... you were out sick last week. my asthma doesn't bother my family... you coughed all through our date night! i hardly use my rescue inhaler at all. what did you say? how about - every day? coping with asthma isn't controlling it. test your level of control at asthma.com, then talk to your doctor. there may be more you could do for your asthma. last month a technical glitch in the electronic system that processes food assistance allowed some shoppers to buy groceries in excess of their monthly balance. a malfunction at xerox, the vendor for the electronic benefits transfer, caused the system to crash in 17 states include louisiana on october

12th. some retailers like two walmart locations in louisiana, responded by allowing customers to fill their carts with purchases well in excess of their limits on their ebt cards. after the system came back online, more than 12,000 insufficient funds notices were generated from transactions on the cards ebt shoppers used to make their purchases. loss was borne entirely by the retailers and resulted in no cost to louisiana taxpayers. walmart for its part decided not to press any charges against customer who is bough more food than their ebt balances allowed them to afford. but louisiana governor bobby jindal decided to make a different decision. at the urging of senator david vitter, jindal has vowed to find and punish those who walked away with more food than they could pay for by taking away their ability to buy food all together. anyone who overspent their balance and has previous ebt

infractions could lose at least a year of eligibility and in the worst-case scenario, those with multiple violations will lose their benefits permanently. adding to the vulnerability of those already 47 million americans who may already be missing meals due to the november 1 cut in food assistance from the s.n.a.p. program. joining me now from new orleans is someone who works every day to help fill that gap for hungry family, natalie jayrow, the president and ceo of second harvest food bank. nice to have you with me. >> good to be with you, melissa. >> what do you think of the governor's decision to prosecute people who purchased more food than their ebt benefits allowed? >> well, melissa, we're just deeply concerned about anything that distracts from the crisis that one out of six people in louisiana are at risk for hunger, that we've just had this very deep cut in s.n.a.p., that more cuts are being contemplated, and that food banks simply cannot fill that gap. >> natalie, you all are not a political organization.

your goal is to help feed hungry people. but even with everything that your organization is doing, the political decisions are creating a gap and you may not be able to fill them. is that correct? >> the november 1st cuts actually were the equivalent of losing 41 million meals here in the state of louisiana. that would be as if all five feeding america food banks just ceased operations overnight. so we're already not meeting the need, and this is just really making the job of the community supporting us incredibly harder. >> so it's only been a couple of weeks since that cut on november 1. what are you hearing from communities right now? i know that the s.n.a.p. benefit cults began in november included for a family of four $36 a month. i think for people with plenty of money $36 a month doesn't seem like very much, but what does that mean for a family of four living on s.n.a.p.? >> we talk to people every single day, me lis. for a family of four, it might be 18 meals a month that they're

losing. and there's a great deal of concern and worry and desperation. >> food banks have tended to be the last line of defense for hungry family, but now you're the fist line. is that what we're looking at here? >> that's absolutely true. whereas once we were an emergency food provider, now families are increasingly using us to meet their monthly food budgets. and, you know, we're just deeply concerned that that's not even possible for us to do in the face of these cuts. >> going through the holiday season, what is your message to americans, whether it's there in louisiana or really anywhere in the country? what's your message about what food banks like yours are up against? >> first of all, food banks depend on the support of the community. it's never more important than it is now because of these cults, because of what our families are going through in louisiana, and the other thing i would say is every day at second harvest we get to see the incredible generosity of people who are giving back to each other. i would really like for that to be the moral conversation that

is part of our political discourse. >> i appreciate that framework, the notion that the moral conversation is how we give to each other, not how we take from one another. thank you so much for that. >> thank you for having me here. >> natalie, thanks so much for your work. up next, i am beside myself. a true legend lands in nerd land. the extraordinary gracely boggs is here. she has been personally involved in more civil rights struggles than most of us have even read about. and gifts store. anything we purchase for the paper cottage goes on our ink card. so you can manage your business expenses and access them online instantly with the game changing app from ink. we didn't get into business to spend time managing receipts, that's why we have ink. we like being in business because we like being creative, we like interacting with people. so you have time to focus on the things you love. ink from chase. so you can.

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pbs' award-winning series "p.o.v." in 2014. in 1941, grace was part of the effort for a proposed march on washington to protest the defense industry's refusal to hire black workers. at the height of the red scare, mccarthy era, grace spent a decade studying and organizing with famed marxist c.l.r. james and as a result has a pretty impressive fbi file. that file grew thicker when grace moved to detroit because, as she put it, that was where the workers were, the people with whom she sought to be in solidarity and struggle. in detroit, grace became involved in the black power movement and met her husband, james boggs, an autoworker, writer, intellectual, and an african-american man who was himself a revolutionary thinker. grace helped to organize a massive 1963 freedom march in detroit. and after the tradition nal civil rights establishment

excluded grace and james and other marxists from detroit's civil rights conference, she went on to help found the freedom now party, whose aims at ideology were more self-consciously radical. and though she is a chinese-american, grace has long been capable of articulating deep truths about african-american struggles. like this insight from 1963. "i don't think whites understand the degree to which negroes do not want their whiteness. i'm trying to suggest that the negro is striving to become equal to a particular image of himself that he has achieved. but he is not trying to become equal to whites." for decades, detroit has been gracely boggs' primary site of struggle. and in 1992 she founded the detroit summer program to transform the city's vacant lots and teach young people that activism and change begins with them. at 98, she is still an activist challenging people to evolve, to reconsider their assumptions,

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let me make it a challenge to you. okay? with people of color becoming the new american majority in many parts of the country, how are we going to create a new vision for this country? a vision with a new kind of human being that is what is demanded at this moment? so that's your challenge. >> that was a scene from "american revolutionary: the evolution of grace lee boggs," which premieres in new york this afternoon and will have its national broadcast premiere on pbs' "p.o.v." series in 2014. i am pleased to be joined by writer and activist grace lee boggs, who is a foot soldier in every sense of the word. also with us is grace lee, the

producer and director of "american revolutionary." so, grace, first i want to thank you for the film, for bringing grace lee boggs to even more people. tell me why this film for you, why was it important? >> i think it's really important these days to -- you know, it's so rare to be able to actually have a conversation with somebody who embodies history itself, somebody who represents so many important social movements in our country. and i had that opportunity to meet grace over the last, you know, decade and i wanted to share that with a wider audience. >> we at this table, we spend all of our time talking. we don't do a lot of doing. and yet you theorize that talking matters, that ideas matter. >> well, i think we don't know until we open our mouths and the connection with other people what we're going to say. it's the most sort soft spontaneous things that human

beings do and the most social thing. and i began really thinking differently about how change takes place through conversations we held in maine starting in 1968. it reminded me of when i was studying for my doctorate. i had a professor, paul weiss, who dick cavitt used to have on his show, who said he was like a socrates from the east side of new york. i think my idea of speaking, conversing, talk shows have such an enormous potential, i think. we never know what's going to happen, particularly when you have a very old woman like me on them. >> you talk about the rebellion in detroit. detroit which has been your home for so long. the rebellion in the late 1960s. you weren't there throwing bottles, but you do believe that

the ideas that you and that your husband and that all of you helped to cement in that place were meaningful for crafting that rebellion. all these yearslater, how do you is 'it? how is -- those are ideas, were they productive for detroit and still productive today? >> i've been in the radical movement for nearly four decades and i never felt the need to distinguish between a rebellion and a revelation but when we tore up the city and people called it a revolution, i thought, we really have to figure out what a revolution is from rebelling, from protesting. it was then that we began to think about revolution as an evolution of humanity, something that's not just taking place in institutions but taking place inside our souls, something very

personal, very spiritual happening. >> is revolution still necessary and still possible in this country? >> well, it's amazing what i felt particularly this weekend is that people want revolution but don't know what it is. they want something to make there lives more meaningful and to make life more healthy for all of us. they want it as a solution. they want it as healing and they don't know what it is and the w0rd scares them. people think of revolution only in terms of 1917 and taking power and all that sort of hostility and it isn't. it's a very healing solutionary process. >> i am impressed in the film in part, grace, by how many young people respond, to see you in front of a classroom of young people in their 20s still

seeking questions that you were asking in your 20s in such a different america. what is your experience as a film maker being with grace lee boggs on college campuses? >> it's really special. i think that people are hungry. i made the film also because i was hungry to hear some of these ideas and also to get the perspective that she can provide as someone who has lived through history and lived through all of these tumultuous times. it's just amazing. it's not just young people. with grace anyone under 80 is a young person so it's amazing to see the kind of audiences coming to the film. young people, people of all ethnicities, all walks of life, young and old respond because i think the message that grace is putting out there is really a human message. she asked the question what is it to be a human being and that's the question that all of us are searching for today. >> as you are asking that question, what does it mean to be a human being, what sorts of

answers are you finding? well, i think that the response to the film particularly has shown that folks think that to be a human being is to live meaningfully, and they feel that this time particularly is important to live a meaningful life. the idea that revolution means to live meaningfully and create solutions for daily issues, that's amazing i think. it changes the mind-set of the whole population. i think we in this country can contribute that revolution to the world. i think we did in a certain sense in the 18th century. >> there are material consequences for asking this question, so in detroit right now all eyes are on detroit because of the killing, the shooting of a young african-american woman, renisha

mcbride. you have been in detroit for so many decades. what does that killing tell you? is it what you expect from detroit? is it new? is it a failure to answer the question of what it means to be human? >> i think every atrocity in detroit -- and there are a lot of them -- helps us to see that in every situation there is both danger and opportunity. what's been wonderful about detroit is that people have seen the crises and the devastation and used it to create something new, to create a new positive. they don't only succumb to the negative. >> i want to play very briefly a moment in the film where you say you feel sorry for people who don't live in detroit. let's watch for just one moment. >> i feel so sorry for people who are not living in detroit.

detroit gives a sense of epox of civilization in a way that you don't get in a city like new york. it's obvious in looking at it that what was doesn't work. people always strive for size, to be a giant. this is a symbol of all giants fall. >> there is a devastation of broken glass and concrete and to see this, actually it's a death of something and hope of the birth of something else. >> indeed, giants fall and something else replaces. grace lee boggs, thank you for being here. >> grace lee, thank you for bringing more of her story to more people through the film. that's our show for today. i'm going to see you tomorrow morning at 10:00 a.m. eastern. we're going to talk about the

"washington post" op-ed this week on the nausea of conventional people when they have to look at inter racial couples and what happens when black and white bodies meet. plus the changing politics of relationships with iran and china and also girls in space. seriously, okay, that's all right here starting at 10:00 a.m. eastern. right now it's time for a preview with alex whitt. >> i cannot follow you with girls in space. nuclear talks for iran are set for this wednesday. i'm talking to the author of a book called nuclear nightmares and the big three weigh in on what oprah calls a level of disrespect for the president and his office which she says is because he's african-american. they are sometimes forgotten as the victims of war, the children of fallen soldiers. i'm talking to theirector of a

poignant new documentary. controversy over a california high school's mascot. some say it's offensive so why is the school defending it. i'll be right back with more. this is humira working to help relieve my pain. this is humira helping me through the twists and turns. this is humira helping to protect my joints from further damage. doctors have been prescribing humira for over ten years. humira works by targeting and helping to block a specific source of inflammation that contributes to ra symptoms. for many adults, humira is proven to help relieve pain and stop further joint damage. humira can lower your ability to fight infections, including tuberculosis. serious, sometimes fatal events, such as infections, lymphoma, or other types of cancer, have happened. blood, liver and nervous system problems, serious allergic reactions, and new or worsening heart failure have occurred. before starting humira , your doctor should test you for tb.

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>> what's next in the health care fight? could the latest moves by the gop damage the president's signature law? update next. >> more scandal at the secret service. how did one agent leave a bullet behind in a hotel room? in toronto it's not just about the mayor but the attention he's getting around the world. a look at that. the golden gate city, it takes the top spot in today's list of number ones but it's not necessarily for the best reason. >> hello, everyone. welcome to