and we'll replace stolen or destroyed items with brand-new versions. we put members first. join the nation. ♪ nationwide is on your side ♪ with 0-calorie monk fruit in the raw. it's made with the natural, vine-ripened sweetness of fruit, so you can serve up deliciously sweet treats without all the sugar. raw natural sweetness, raw natural success. this morning, my question e -- are you seriously attacking the first lady for being insufficiently feminist? and why today's immigration policy the nearly five decades old. and how the bodies of the bruised and buried paved the way for the great society. but first how lbj mastered the senate and what harry reid could learn from him.

good morning. i'm melissa harris-perry. all week we have been looking back in remembrance to the day 50 years ago yesterday that an assassin's bullet took the life of president john f. kennedy. the death of president kennedy, who has remained america's most popular president since he died, still looms large in the national consciousness. the moment so sered into our memory that americans old enough to remember it can readily recall where they were and what they were doing when they heard the news on november 22nd, 1963. now, ask those same people what they were doing the next day. those memories are likely a lot fuzzier. even though that day, november 23rd, 1963, marked another pivotal moment in american political history. it was the first full day on the job for kennedy's condusuccesso president lyndon baines johnson. johnson was sworn in just two

hours after president kennedy was killed. it's a moment very few people remember because it was a moment very few people saw. it was a stark contrast to the bloody public spectacle of kennedy's assassination before crowds of onlookers as his motorcade wound through downtown dallas and an anomaly among swearing-in ceremonies for popular elected u.s. presidents. america's 36th president was inaugurated before an audience of 27 people in a cramped cabin on board air force one while it sat on the runway at dallas' love field. it was the first and only swearing in to take place on board a plane and the only one to be officiated by a woman, johnson's friend, u.s. district judge sarah t. hughes. instead of the usual bible he placed his hans on a catholic liturgical book that was found on a side table in air force one's presidential bedroom. and yet that moment, that quiet unsayre moanious transfer of

power was the beginning of something big because as president, lyndon johnson would go on to implement a policy agenda of social reform that he called the great society. and it would become the most sweeping transformation of american domestic policy since president franklin roosevelt's new deal. johnson laid out his vision of a great society in a 1964 commencement speech at the university of michigan. >> the great society rests on abundance and liberty for all. it demands an end to poverty and racial injustice to which we are totally committed in our time. >> during his time in office, president johnson engineered a policy plan that targeted the eradication of poverty, the advancement of racial equality, the restoration of american cities, the expansion of health care and the preservation of the environment. johnson's legislative agenda helped to revolutionize the role of the federal government and in

so doing improved the lives of millions of people. and so even as kennedy's camelot continues to capture the public imagination five decades after his death, the political legacy of lbj, whose impact is most profoundly felt by americans even today. because between the two, president johnson was by far the more effective legislator. as rick pearlstein writes in "the nation," there is no question that kennedy was an utter failure as a passer of laws during his proverbial thousand days. president kennedy struggled to advance his domestic agenda through a fractured congress who obstructed any attempts at social reform. if that sounds familiar, it's because that congress shared dysfunctional tis with the congress we all know and loathe today. except at that time it was the democratic party facing the crisis split beg progressives and jim crows from the south.

those democrats formed a majority coalition with republican members in order to control d the congress. the very same congress that lbj inherited on that dark day in dallas. only he was able to succeed where his predecessor had failed because he understood something that kennedy did not -- how to wield power as a weapon, to win legislative victories in congress. it was a lesson johnson had learned during his time as a u.s. senator from texas when at age 46 he became the youngest majority leader in history. while in congress, he once said of himself, "i do understand power. whatever else may be said about me, i know where to look for it and how to use it." a master of the senate, biographer robert carroll's 1,242-page foundational work on johnson's years in the senate, carroll describes him as ruthless, shrewd, and a gifted political operator who uses his considerable gift to get things done, including the moment he characterizes as the culmination

of johnson's mastery of the art of political persuasion, his push for the passage of the civil rights act of 1957. you see, that law would establish a prohibition against interfering with an individual's right to vote in a federal election and to protect the vote for blacks in the jim crow south. as majority leader shepherding the bill through the senate, johnson was trying to achieve the impossible because before that time southern democrats had blocked every attempt at civil rights legislation since reconstruction. the liberal democrats were refusing to budge on an amendment that would weaken the law, but johnson stopped at nothing to bring both sides to the table. he used flattery, threats, double dealing southern charm, manipulation, deception, and sheer force of his will to sway the senate. and in doing so, turned the tide of history. on august 29th the senate passed the 1957 civil rights act, the first u.s. civil rights act enacted in 82 years. which kind of makes the current version of senate leadership

look a bit sad by comparison because instead of historic and transformative policy changes the guy holding his job today is making senate procedural rule changes. fed up with republican filibusters of presidential nominees and tired of dead-end deal making, senator harry reid made good on his threats to deploy the so-called nuclear option and on thursday the senate voted 52-48 to do away with the filibuster for executive and judicial appointments. in weakening the influence of the republican minority in the senate, the vote will open a path through some of the partisan blockage in congress. so is harry reid the new lbj, a man unafraid to wield power? or has going nuclear revealed his utter weakness? joining me now, associate professor of africana studies at the university of connecticut. and a founder and president of the center for inclusion. a professor for public affairs at princeton university, author of "governing america" and is

working on a new book about lbj. and raul reyes, nbc latino contributor and columnist for "usa today." thanks for being here. >> thank you. >> julian, i want to start with you. in this moment, do you think that lbj facing the constraints that reid is facing would have made the same decision, that he would have gone ahead and changed the senate rules and seen that as a power play or would he have tried to negotiate in his very johnson time of way? >> i think he would have looked favorably at what he did. during the 1950s when lbj was in the senate, it wasn't just the civil rights bill he worked on. he tried to change the leadership for those ho who blocked legislation. when he left the senate, the majority leader of the senate had a lot more sway than he had when lbj started. so i think what reid did is not so different from the kind of tactics that lbj was obsessed with. the rules mattered in congress.

he understood that. and that was a key part of his insight into how the institution worked. >> on this question of the rules mattering, i'm always of multiple minds about the filibuster in part because i feel like you should always expect in a democracy to eventually be in the minority, especially in a country as balanced as ours is in terms of partisanship. it's going to go back and forth. you want protection of minority voting rights within the context of the senate. on the other hand, the actual filibuster of how it's used is mostly ugly and racist. the anti-lynching laws to what we're seeing under president obama. is getting rid of this aspect of the filibuster the right thing? >> it's almost as if -- i don't see what other political options there are, procedural options there are, and given the time frame, one thing i think is an important distinction here is the extent to which the kind of district-by-district safety of

seats makes it very difficult for people to say well politically we're going to make deals with people in the house or things are kind of structurally gridlocked. i think this is more a symptom of that than anything else. but the other thing, too, is when we look at lbj, we tend to think about two things with him, which is '64 and '65, the civil rights act and the voting rights act. but this is really about the arc of his career because he does this in '57 and does it again in 1960, like the little remembered 1960 civil rights act, and then the 1964 and then '65. >> yet this was a guy who had been part of some of these anti-lynching filibusters earlier, who certainly in his discourse still sounded very southern. you know, i don't want to repeat how he sounded, right, on air. and i wonder, raul, in part as i was spending time with carroll's book and thinking about it, if there is something that has been lost in the art of brokering and if part of what has been lost is

something that we should be happy about. in other words, part of how he can broker is because he is a good old boy. he is a southern white man who uses the "n" word even as he's trying to get the '57 civil rights act passed. we just live in a different time now. you're not allowed to do that sort of cultural buddy buddy club byness, overall is good but may have taken away the basis for some of these. >> we live in an era of greater transparency, so we don't have the back room deal, the unofficial arrangements we did back then. as you said, he knew power. he used it any way he could. i think part of it did stem from the fact that he served in the senate and the house of representatives. you know, he was connected with everyone. and also the way he reversed i think early in his career, he voted with the segregationists. it was later when he started charting out what was politically viable for him and

started to think of where he wanted the country to go, that he reversed course. it's definitely a tradeoff. i have to agree with you, julian. i think for someone who was obsessed with the power and the instruments of power he absolutely would have done something like the nuclear option. >> harry reid grabbed power in a way -- sort of crying out, coming from the republicans. what will the senate democrats and the obama administration do with this little bit of power? not a lot of power but some marginal power that they have. >> quite frankly, i think the obama administration is going to spend most of its time looking at what it can do administratively, not in congress. even after this filibuster reform, you have a congress what's gridlocked on the farm bill. the farm bill is one of the pieces of legislation rightly or wrongly that has usually been a strongly bipartisan bill. >> yep. >> so we're not just talking about filibuster reform. what it's really going to impact for the obama administration is

things like judicial appointments. >> yes. >> because remember the whole fight and the whole reason harry reid finally felt pushed to this decision was because for the first time, maybe not the first time in history, i won't speak for the historians, but certainly in recent memory, the fill bulser was being used not to block a judicial nominee on merit. >> right. >> but to just say we think there are too many people on the d.c. circuit court and the reason we think there are too many people really, because we would not be having this debate if romney had won the presidency, is because the d.c. circuit is the most powerful circuit in the country and makes decisions on the administrative choices of the obama administration. >> i want to talk about the d.c. circuit and the mel watt nomination. just in thinking about power, though, this week, also reminded about what power looks like on thursday night when the saints, you know, whooped the falcons. that said -- that was from my

proo pro-deucer who's from from atlanta. i live to make fun of her. stay right there. as we discuss the legacy of impact on lyndon johnson this morning. i like a clean kitchen. i don't do any cleaning. i make dirt. ♪ very, very heavy. i'm not big enough or strong enough for this. there should be some way to make it easier. [ doorbell rings ] [ morty ] here's a box, babe. open it up. oh my goodness! what is a wetjet? some kind of a mopping device. there's a lot of dirt on here. morty, look at how easy it is. it's almost like dancing. [ both humming ] this is called the swiffer dance. ♪ by the end of december, we'll be delivering ♪ ♪ through 12 blizzards blowing ♪ 8 front yards blinding ♪ 6 snowballs flying ♪ 5 packages addressed by toddlers ♪ ♪ that's a q ♪ 4 lightning bolts

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that was president lyndon johnson in a 1965 recorded phone

call schooling his vice president, hubert humphrey, on how to use the art of political persuasion to convince congress to pass his bills on education, health care, and poverty. joining me now is someone who knows a lot about moving the levers of washington power, texas style. former republican senator from texas kay bailey hutchison, who's currently a cnbc contributor and senior council for the law firm bracewell and giuliani. nice to see you. >> thank you, melissa. good to be here. >> i'm interested in getting your response to what happened in the senate this week and whether or not you see this rule change around the filibuster as honoring the best of what the institution is meant to be or whether or not it actually undermines what the institution is meant to be. >> well, melissa, i feel very strongly that it would undermine -- it will undermine what the senate has been able to do over 200 years. and the reason is that the senate operates very differently

from the house and therefore is able to push things through that sometimes cannot originate in the house because their rules are so stringent. but the senate has always honored minority rights and therefore has always had to get some minority support usually to get things through. and i think now you're going to lose the notion that we've always had that your adversary today is going to be your ally tomorrow. so you have a comity many the senate that has allowed the senate to be thoughtful and sometimes bring all the sides together because they always have to work together. you're going to lose that now, and i think senator reid has done something that is going to cause more tension, not less. >> so in theory, i am in such great agreement with what you've

said in the sense that i am an optimist about sort of our initial framing and the ways in which the senate was meant to be a protector of minority rights and was meant to be a bit removed from sort of the public opinion of congress. but in terms of this how we've seen them behave, including ted cruz, as much as i would love to agree with you in principle, in practice, that notion that your enemy today could be your friend tomorrow is no longer true, it is an entirely partisan body now. >> well, it isn't, and i think the record is very different from what's being portrayed. for instance, president obama has had 215 judges confirmed, two denied of his executive appointments, over 1,700 executive appointments have been approved, four have been denied.

and in five years president obama has had in his second term more judges approved than president bush did at this time in the second term. >> but former senator hutchison, i mean, that's because of openings. we're talking about one of the most influential courts in the u.s. currently having a large number of openings and the president not only being unable to make those judicial appointments but also -- and this to me i think is maybe even more key about the question of dysfunction, the inability to even get people like, for example, congressman mel watt, who is a sitting member of congress, was filibustered. that has not happened since reconstruction. and that's a senate that is no longer operating, perhaps the way it was when you were there or former president johnson was there. >> i don't think that's right. i think that it's been very few

times that there have been the kinds of hiccups that we have seen. for instance, the leader, mcconnell, i think was very much against the government shutdown and so were the majority of republicans. but they got through the process and i don't think it will happen again because i think the house members learned how destructive that can be, and i think some of the senators have as well. and i think that -- i think it does function, the senate does, in a way that will move things forward. and i think there's a negotiation that will always be going on and probably has been until thursday about both mel watt and the d.c. circuit appointees and what the problems are and frankly i don't know what the issues are, but there usually are issues behind the

very few that have been held up. >> senator kay bailey hutchison, i appreciate you joining us this morning. when we come back, we'll talk a bit more about these questions and also specifically about who is trying to be the new champion for the court. here's a hint -- he has a code name and it starts with fish. ♪ ♪ you get your coffee here. you get your hair cut here. you find that certain thing you were looking for here, but actually you get so much more. when you shop at these small local businesses, you support all the things that make your community great. the money you spend here, stays here. in this place you call your neighborhood. small business saturday is november 30th. get out and shop small. yep. got all the cozies. [ grandma ] with new fedex one rate, i could fill a box and ship it for one flat rate. so i knit until it was full.

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add brand new belongings from nationwide insurance and we'll replace stolen or destroyed items with brand-new versions. we put members first. join the nation. ♪ nationwide is on your side ♪ trying to rebrand himself on a poverty lawyer. >> this is why i'm focused on poverty. we have the 50th anniversary of the war on poverty coming up next year and not much to show for it. we have 46 million people in poverty, the highest in a generation. i think there are better ideas we'll use to approach causes of poverty and as conservatives we

should not cede the moral high ground on this issue. >> i don't know if you all owout many the audience could hear my guests were all like, uh! this week, "the washington post" took a closer look at the details of paul ryan's better ideas and found that -- his idea of a war on poverty so far relies heavily on promoting volunteerism and encouraging work through existing federal programs including the tax code. promoting volunteerism and encouraging work all far short of an lbj standard of marshaling the full force of government to e rad kate the crisis of poverty. it's those very protections ryan has targeted with bung et plans that help the ploor. even as it gives massive tax breaks to the wealthiest of americans. paul ryan is no new lbj. >> paul ryan's even -- paul ryan, you know, we're familiar with his policies. for him to even invoke lbj in the context of poverty, i'm sorry, that is offensive to me. that is -- he is the antithesis of what lbj, you know, looked at

when he tab led this problem. lbj did not look at poverty as a black/white issue. there was not that racialized element. and, you know, in the time when america was different, lbj believed we are america, we can do everything, let's tackle it. and the country responded. so many conservatives like to say that it was a failure because we did not eradicate poverty. but there was a success. poverty rates dropped dramatically. i just want to -- >> people lived longer. >> i want to underline your point with data here because paul ryan is empirically wrong when he said it did not work. >> right. >> when you look at poverty rates, that is the war on poverty you see, that big decline. you see some up and down, but those are almost always cycling with resessions. basically after the implementation of the war on poverty, we have never been as poor a nation ever again. >> when lbj instituted medicare, at the time, 65% of all people 6

65 and older paid three times as much for hash. he did two things that were really important. one was he said that there is a relationship between race discrimination and poverty. and we're actually going to recognize that link and we're going to see not just the civil rights act and the voting rights act is important, we're going to see it needing to be coupled with give, and i quote, the full blessings of america to black people. >> what's important is i think your point is right. the war on poverty wasn't just the community action program which people know about. he had a very holistic vision as all democrat who is supported this did about how you eradicate poverty. and the one area they agreed with, ryan, the war on poverty was to make people ultimately self-sufficient. >> yes. >> it was a conservative idea. >> yes. >> but it included eradicating

health poverty for the elderly. >> yes. >> included education money, which passes in 1965, to bolster the schools and medicaid is another part of this. it was a much grander vision. and if you measure it not just by poverty rates but all these different issues, i think the impact is much more dramatic. and so when tea party republicans defended medicare to combat obama's health care, you see how ingrained those programs have now become. >> again, i want to mention there was a job corps, vista, the volunteer service, upward bound, head start, a neighborhood youth core, the community action program, college work-study, neighborhood developments and small business loans. rural programs, migrant worker problems, local health care centers. all of this. it was this notion of the comprehensi comprehensive. this is part of what irritated me about paul ryan, the community action aspect of it, part of what johnson's great society understood is people had to have a voice in it.

it wasn't just top-down. it was people sitting on local boards and speaking about the problems in their community. paul ryan won't even listen to people who are in poverty during the conversation about food stamps. >> right. i think this is -- it's cynical. we've become kind of immunized to cynicism. but it's cynicism in a way that shocks our conscience now in the same way martin luther king can be deployed to say if he was alive now he'd be a conservative. he's advocating the exact opposite of what lbj did. when he's elected to congress in 1937, he is involved in rural issues and rural -- you can see visibly he's witnessed to the transformation that happened when he says government is going to do this. but he also recognizes this and probably the first time we see

this in the oval office on that level of recognition is that he sees the impact of what fdr did when he cut these deals with southern democrats that effectively cut black people out of the main benefits of the new deal. >> yep. >> he's saying we can actually close this loop. >> yep. >> we see what this difference is. >> i love you made the point about infrastructure. as we go out, we'll stay on the topic, but i want to listen to lbj making the point that several of you have made about that connection between poverty and race as he's talking about the question of education. it's worth just hearing lbj make that connection. let's listen to that as we go out. >> i told martin luther king, i said hell i'm for voting and we're going to get voting. that's not your problem. the big thing, dr. king, with you is a billion nor negroes only. who makes less than -- 2,000 a year if it's negro. [ coughs, sneezes ] i have a big meeting when we land, but i am so stuffed up, i can't rest.

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take a look at this this graphic. see all those dollars in gray? they represent the 14.5 million dollars in average retirement money held by each member of a group of ceos in a lobbying group called a business roundtable. now, see that teeny, tiny single red bill in the upper right-hand corner there? that's the $12,000 in savings held by the average u.s. retiree. the guys with all those gray dollar, and there's about 200 of them, hold about 1,200 times more in retirement savings than the average social security beneficiary. and they will never have a single worry about how they're going to survive after retirement. but they, those guys, are pushing to cut retirement benefits for those who do business roundtable and another ceo lobbying group called fix debt are pushing congress to

slow the growth of social security, raise the retirement age to 70 and cut social security benefits for seniors. maiya, is this anything other than just, like, disgusting? guys with this much wealth are showing up in washington not to say let's extend our great society, but instead let's take even more from the people who have so little. even though we've got plenty. >> disgusting. one of the things to lift up here, 50% of black americans, might be a larger number for latinos, are actually going to retire into poverty. and the reason is because low-wage jobs, right, i mean, how do we pay for social security? we pay for social security, we pay it forward. >> workers today are paying for retirees today. >> we've got -- and one of the things that these ceos got that the rest of us don't have is guaranteed benefits. those same kinko's are in

corporations that have undermined the defined benefits plans that used to guarantee a retirement income to employees. well, now, people don't get that anymore. >> the pension system is gone. >> one interesting thing is the conservative voice of the moment, southern democrats, they were often in favor of programs to alleviate poverty. guy who pushes the war on poverty in the house is a guy named phil landrum, a conservative anti-labor guy but committed to eliminating rural poverty and still had that ethos. the second thing i would add is the politics of that period were very different. so we have a romance with lyndon johnson, which is fine, but we have to remember the civil rights movement was very forceful and they forced his hand, as much as he forced congress' hand and organized labor was a huge presence in this time. >> yes. >> lobbying for all these bills, not just labor-related issues but everything from health care to poverty. they were a liberal lobby that

doesn't exist. >> julian, i'm so glad you brought us there. i was reminded as we were having our lbj love affair putting the show together today, of that moment of the 2008 elections when hillary clinton, then a candidate against then senator obama was asked about sort of, you know, the successes and said that dr. king's treatment only began to be realized when president lyndon johnson passed the civil rights of 1964, when he was able to get through congress something that president kennedy was hopeful to do. presidents before had not even tried. it is not just about lyndon johnson, some great, smart guy, but he is being pushed by an active, organized, at this point decade-long movement of ordinary people on the bottom to say he will not come and take everything that we have. >> he was also -- he was so machiavellian. he was not afraid. he went to the business community and said it is in your

interest that we e rad kate poverty and fight poverty, that it would benefit them. you know, he used every tool, he made every case even if it was purely in these other groups' only self-interests. he was not afraid to go there just to do it. >> let's be clear about one other thing here. in addition to the internal domestic pressure, that all of this is being played out in the context of the cold war. and it is the external pressure of the soviet union ridiculing the united states, that these embassies in west africa, the soviet union has billboards that they post of children being attacked by police dogs. and so in the context of -- >> this is supposedly freedom. >> this is the american version of freedom. so lbj is the cold warrior talking about vietnam, they understand there are consequences for this internationally. so it's not as if he simply takes a president to get done, it will take a president and soviet premier and -- >> if only we could get putin to make fun of paul ryan, then, in

fact, maybe we could get this done. >> understood this more. that's the magic. he understood the limbs of his power, not just the size of his power, and he depended on these movement to lobby congress and a new kind of congress to pass these bills. >> stay with me. i have the letter of the week. do to not worry, first lady obama. i got your back. [ molly ] honey. whoa! sweet mother of softness. paws off pal. just one squeeze? just enjoy it with your eyes. [ female announcer ] new charmin ultra soft is so soft, you don't even have to squeeze it to believe it. for the first time, you can actually see the softness with our new comfort cushions. new charmin ultra soft is still so much softer and more absorbent, you can use up to four times less. i believe it, but i still gotta squeeze it. [ female announcer ] used by more plumbers, charmin is now clog-free or it's free.

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nation's attention. her work led to the passage of 50 bill prospecting national parks and removing billboards and junk yards from the highways. her work was more than just wildflowers. but i was reminded of the inability of some commentators to see the real work of first ladies this week when i read a piece in politico magazine calling first lady michelle obama a feminist nightmare. and that's why my letter this week is to the washington reporter who wrote that story, michelle coddle. dear michelle, are you serious? you and your handful of feminist sources claim that first lady obama is not a feminist because she says her most important job is being mom in chief to her two daughters. in a week when right-wing hatred of the president forced a nuclear change in the very rules of the senate, your advice to the first lady is to come roaring out of the white house battling for reproductive rights? you wring your hands about the first lady's, quote, safely and

soothingly domestic issues, and you quote a feminist who marvels that someone of the first lady's capacity of education has done so little of substance. given how simplistic your piece is, let me make this very simple. you are wrong. you're wrong to right off the first lady's priorities as fluff. she's fighting childhood obesity, one of the biggest public health crises of our time, she's not just flexing her biceps. her let's move campaign has helped thousands of child care programs offer healthier food and more exercise. and for the first time in years the cdc says there's a significant decline in obesity in preschoolers. the first lady is not playing it safe with this war. she's drawn plenty of right-wing criticism. no, ms. coddle, not everyone loves a vegetable garden. you also dils missed her effort to more low-income students into higher education by saying it's

not exactly climbing out on a political limb. but a college degree has everything to do with economic mobility and who gets to be in the middle class. and right now only about third of students in the poorest families go to college and only about a tenth graduate. now, the president has been ridiculed as an elitist for suggesting that more people go to college so, if you think there's no political risk, maybe you haven't been paying attention. also, you misunderstand the place that michelle obama occupies as the first african-american first lady. you seem to think she's trying to steer clear of the angry black woman stereotype. when she calls herself mom in chief, she is rejecting a different stereotype, the roll of mammy. she is saying that her daughters, her vulnerable, brilliant, beautiful black daughters are the most important thing to her. the first lady is saying you, miss ann, are going to have to clean your own house because i will be caring for my own.

and instead of agreeing that the public fear is necessarily more important than sasha and malia, she has buried mammy and embraced being a mom on her own terms. you can call that your feminist nightmare, but for a lot of us it is our black motherhood treatment. also, on a strategic note, miss coddle, before we enter the 2016 election ike l and the feminists ask blam women for our support for your candidate, you might want to read up about black women and our feminism. i'm happy to send you a sylla s syllabus. sincerely, melissa. ♪ ♪ you get your coffee here. you get your hair cut here. you find that certain thing you were looking for here, but actually you get so much more. when you shop at these small local businesses, you support all the things that make your community great. the money you spend here, stays here. in this place you call your neighborhood.

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. president johnson's legacy is evident in our acts for immigration and the civil rights act.

the bill signed by president johnson in the shadow of the statue of liberty abolished quo toes based on national origin and instead gave preference to relatives of immigrants already in the u.s. and to workers with needed skills. president johnson did not expect the law to have a major impact. he was wrong, giving newcomers from every corner of the globe an equal shot at u.s. citizenship created demographic changes and now nearly 50 years later washington once again be on the verge of making history by offering a path to citizenship for millions of undocumented immigrants. the senate has already passed comprehensive reform. so far house republicans are refutzed and house speaker john boehner has ruled out any action for next year. those pushing for change are not waiting to make their voices heard. one of those voices is julietta, legislative affairs associate of the united dream network. we were just talking before the break about the fact that

whatever johnson does he does in the context of a civil rights movement that's pressuring him. talk to me about you nighted the dream and about the other immigration rights movements pushing this administration and this congress. >> well united we dream is the largest and first undocumented network in the nation. we have more than 51 affiliates in 25 states all led by undocumented immigrants. many of us are dreamer who is, yeah, we came here when we were young, grew up in the u.s., call it our home, and now we're fighting to get immigration reform passed. that doesn't only benefit us as dreerms but also our families. we know very much like if it had not been for my mother who brought me here when i was 12, i wouldn't have a master's degree from ut, austin, and wouldn't be where i am right now. we have to fight for our fam is. >> you talked and wrote about the in the past the sense of vulnerability you felt when you were young that you might be separated from your mother. >> correct.

it's something that every single child in a mixed family leaves, every single day is my mom going to pick me up from school, are we going to have a job. as i grew up, i needed to get a job because i needed to pay my bills. so i'm wondering am i going to get caught. will there be a raid at work. it's a fear we live every sing dale. it's not american. we shouldn't worry about is my mother or father going to be deported tomorrow. >> raul, if there's any reasonableness in the system, igs's immigration reform. it benefits both parties to do immigration reform. and there is a social movement doing the kind of pressure she was talking about earlier. >> right. >> you off reason so optimistic at this table. are you still optimist sncc. >> yes, i am. and part of this the reason is being here with julieta. what start out years ago is now

a movement. they were hesitant to come out in public. now they're chaining themselves to the white house. there's a hunger strike in d.c. they're blocking buses. now it's expanded to their families and inspired the latino community. i truly feel these are the foot soldiers. that's where the movement's going to come because they are not going to yield. and we're all saying or many in the political world are saying immigration reform is dead, it's not happening. it's happening. things are going on. the civil disobedience is up. >> it makes me wonder if where we are is basically in like the 55, 56 moment. if you think about those initial boycotts in the south, in the past '57 civil rights, but it takes another decade before the really big stuff happens. is it sustainable for another decade of activism? >> definitely. >> yes. >> i know for united we dream specifically, we know this is a long-term fight, that even if we were to get immigration reform right now, when we get it, which we will, we will continue fighting for the other issues

that affect our communities, for better access, higher education, a better system that provides pre-k through 12 for everybody that's the best america deserves. >> it's very much like the civil rights movement because as you know with the civil rights movement you had some of the elders and the many established people saying, wait, take it easy, don't, you know, too fast. but right now this movement, if anything, these young people, they are more emboldened than ever and are not giving up. once the jeannie is out of the bottle in that sense, i think they're not going to stop. >> we're short on time, but one second, raul. what can the president's administration free from congress do? is there anything that the administration knew free of that? >> yes. what he can do right now totally within his power, totally constitutional is expand the classes of people who are eligible. he did something a week ago friday where he gave some relief and deportation to people who

are veterans or people, active military. he can continue to expand classes of people who are eligible for that type of relief. he can't grant anyone citizenship but can offer slow, incremental relief. >> so to us it's very important, he has the power to stop the connie de bie poration. it's a same the first african-american president of the u.s. has deported more than 2 million people. >> the pausing of deportation and the expansion of -- i am bringing the both of you back in as we'll continue to talk even more on this question of lbj and how some of his biggest accomplishments were achieved over the dead bodies of kennedy and cane. thanks for joining us. more nerd ne"nerdland" at the t the hour. this is the quicksilver cash back card from capital one. it's not the "limit the cash i earn every month" card. it's not the "i only earn decent rewards at the gas station" card. it's the no-games, no-signing up,

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if you are just joining us, we have been talking about the remarkable legacy of president lyndon johnson, what it tells us about america today years after his first full day on the job. johnson first made his mark on this nation as a senate majority leader. and as a senator, johnson earned a reputation as a man who used any means necessary to pass legislation. he twisted arms, he described, he sweet talked, he demanded, he found the weaknesses of his opponents and he exploited them. the identified the strengths of allies and he bolstered them. when the assassination of president kennedy handed the reins to president johnson, he did not hesitate to use every tool at his disposal for a vigorous and historic policy ageneral ka d.a. that changed the face of america in just a handful of years. it began with landmark kriblgt legislation. after being pressed by a decade of tireless activism by black communities in the south, president kennedy had proposed a civil rights bill mere months

before his death. but it was president johnson who devoted extraordinary energy to ensuring the act of 1964 became law. johnson did not shy away from using the memory of the slain president as a weapon in the fight. ensuring that his predecessor would end up being the one remembered as the great civil rights leader, he said no memorial or eulogy could honor president kennedy's memory than the earliest possible passage of the civil rights bill for which he fought so long. in july of 1964, johnson signed the bill that outlawed discrimination in public accommodations, made possible by a slain president. another assassination gave johnson what he needed to pass his final critical piece of civil rights legislation four years later in 1968. the day after reverend dr. martin luther king jr. was assassinated on a memphis balcony, johnson sent a leet leather to speaker of the house of representatives that read in part, when the nation so urgently needs a healing balm of unity, a brew wall wound on our

conscience forces upon us all this question. what more can i do to achieve brotherhood and equality among all americans? the most immediate is to enact legislation so long delayed and so close to fulfillment. that legislation was the national fair housing act. johnson signed it into law just one week after dr. king's death. johnson did not shrink from using the tragedy of a political assassination to advance a political agenda. it was the buried bodies of kennedy and king that gave johnson leverage in '64 and '68 and it was the broken bodies of civil rights protesters like current congressman john lewis who in the spring of 1965 gave johnson a wedge to pass voting rights legislation reform. what happened on the bridge during the bloody sunday march was the martyr moment that allowed the big texan with the distinctive southern drawl to stand in the well of congress and say this. >> because it's not just negroes but really it's all of us who

must overcome the crippling legacy of bigotry and injustice. and we shall overcome. [ applause ] in this country, civil rights and voting rights have been purchased with the precious cost of blood and the fearlessness of a leader willing to spend the moral capital those martyrs provided. but today that legacy is in jeopardy. just this week the republican-controlled state senate in ohio passed the bill to shorten early voting, a move that limits the ability of poor people, black people, the eld ler i to cast their votes. that bill goes to the republican-controlled statehouse and presumably to republican governor john kasich for signature. joining me now from ohio is state senator nina turner, candidate for the ohio secretary of state and maybe the next lbj. and my panel here in new york, giuliani cobb, maiya maya wiley,

civil rights attorney and founder of the center for inclusion, julian zelizer, history of public affairs and valerie core from auburn seminary. nina, always lovely to have you. ? thank you, professor. >> it does feel to me these days we're trying to strip away some of the accomplishments that were bought with the blood sacrifices i was talking about p what happened do you say ta to that in ohio? >> i think reverend dr. otis mau summed it up saying the strug sl forever with us so we are forever in the struggle. that is what's going on not just the state of ohio but across this country. there is a lack of consciousness that the president spoke about it is gone. these acts are being conducted by republicans who control statehouses across this country to regress us as a nation. and everybody, as president johnson said, all of us bear the burden of making sure that that

does not happen. it is disgusting. i can't even find enough words to articulate how painful this is because you are absolutely right, professor. all of these freedoms, all of this access to the ballot box was purchased by people's blood, sweat, and tears. >> in ohio at the same time, but the voting rights purchase with blood our being sort of pulled back. the other house bill that went through this week, 203, is about potentially adding stand your ground to your law books. is that right? >> it is, professor. i got to say that the ohio legislative black caucus fought gallantly. over 10,000 signatures were delivered to the speaker of the house and the president of the senate and the governor and to no avail. they passed that bill. but i want your viewers to understand, this bill was introduced while the trial was going on, while the parents of trayvon martin and this country was mourning what happened to a young man, a boy, in fact.

they introduced that bill. they are absolutely heartless. and not only does stand your ground, they give reciprocity to other states. people can just come in here with any of their gun licenses and it doesn't matter whether they're up to the standards of ohio. that reciprocity will be there. they've cut back the training hours that one needs to even get a concealed carry from 12 hours to 4 hours. heartless. >> let me back it up to the table a little bit because julian, part of what i find surprising is there's that moment after the signing of '64 that bill moyers reports that president johnson says i sign aid way the south. >> yep. >> right? and yet the strategy was in part a recognition that you had to move forward because of demographic changes and because you may find a way to the white south but you gained the black south. in 2012 these efforts have seemed to cause a backlash, more people showing up in part

because they felt their vote was potentially being suppressed. why, then, continue with these efforts from '14 into '16? >> it's hard to totally grasp the logic of overturning voting rights. it was such a fundamental in the mid-61960s. the interview was in ohio. there was a republican bill mccull en in the house, on the judiciary committee, and he pushed a lot of the civil rights bills and voting rights -- he was conservative on most issues but this was something we assumed should happen by the mid-60s and i think the suppression could have a very strong backlash effect. >> it's interesting, julian. you've said this a couple times now where you've said there were conservative who is nonetheless were for poverty, conservatives who were for voting rights. i remember about that, valley. why did this move so much to -- like i can determine everything i need to know about where you stand on all these issues just by knowing your partisan identification. >> the unspoken political rally in states like ohio and across

the country is democrats do better when more people get to the polls. republicans do better when fewer people get to the polls. and it is deeply troubling to me that this has become a partisan battle, that the right to cast your vote is a moral imperative, it's sacred to what makes our country's democracy work. my family is celebrating 100 years in america this year. our centennial year. thank you. it's remarkable when i think about my grandfather who sailed by steamship from india, arrived in california wearing a turban and beard as part of his sikh faith. he faced laws that prevented asian-americans from becoming american citizens, from casting their vote, as alongside african-americans because of the color of his skin. he waited for decades to win that right. once he won that right, he never missed an election, even when he was old and frail. so it's come down to me as the sacred right and the fact that my generation still needs to

fight this battle, that we have already won with black and brown bodies, bruised and broken. it's -- it's saddening. it's morally outrageous. but it also means that we can go back to history to remember what's important. and president johnson said -- one line so beautiful -- the right to vote is a basic right without which all others are meaningless. it gives people as individuals control over their own destinies. that's what we have to take up now in ohio. >> let me come back to you far moment on this because there is something a little odd about it. i'm not talking about my state, louisiana, or even about the madness that is north carolina these dais, but ohio, free country. you know, our people were crossing into -- we were trying to get to ohio. >> right. absolutely. >> so talk to me. do you think there are republicans with whom you can form coalition in ohio to push back on this? >> well, i'm not sure. i wish. in the legislature, there are very few.

i know there are half a dozen bills pending in the senate, half a dozen pending in the ohio house that would totally upset the very foundation of this democracy when it comes to access to the ballot box. on two of those bills i will say one republican voted with the democrats. but there are super majorities in both chambers and they are out to use their political power, their political might to suppress, oppress, and regress the vote. they are doing this. so our appeal has to be to americans of good consciousness. the voters in the state of ohio and north carolina, florida, wisconsin, wherever this is happening, we the people are going to have to bind together regardless of our party affiliation to say that it is unjust. it is unfair. you remember dr. king talked about the whole notion of just laws and unjust laws. and these laws that are being passed under the cloak of making sure that there is integrity in the election process forgets the fact that integrity in the elections is very much rooted in the fact that all eligible

voters have the right to cast their ballot, to exercise their right to vote. in many ways ohio is the new south in the 21st century, and there is no cloak, no cloak that they can use to try to cover up what they are doing, which is to take the one great equalizer that we all have and that is one woman, one man, one vote. but we are going to continue to fight back in the great state of ohio. there will be a day of reckoning and it's called 2014. >> if ohio is the new south that makes ontario the new north, and you know we can't go there right now. nina turner, thank you for your time. always welcome in "nerdland." >> thank you, professor. >> up next, how the roberts supreme court was prevented from trying to undo one of johnson's most accomplishments. customer erin swenson ordered shoes from us online

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we're back and talking about the continuing legacy and the rollback on issues of civil rights and voting rights here in america. sort of if we're still living in what was left of johnson's america. these days we talk a little about the voting rights. the other piece is the civil rights questions. specifically sort of housing and sort of how we are or not together in a more equal country. >> we're a more equal country in the sense we don't believe it's okay to be racist. we are not a more equal country if we look at being able to share in the benefits and burdens of public policy. that's what we're talking act when we talk about things like house, even voting rights. we're saying it's okay if -- we were talking about the safety net earlier and one of the

primary drivers of poverty right now is the high cost of housing. >> yep. >> and one of the things we're doing is tearing down mt. holly, the case that did not go to the supreme court represented was actually tearing down affordable housing in a predominantly low-income black neighborhood but not rebuilding affordable housing for anyone so there was going to be a net loss of housing. if you think about what lyndon baines johnson was trying to do, he was trying to connect the issues of economic opportunity with racial -- with racial minorities actually being able to get those opportunities. these are laws that are actually having the opposite impact even though nobody is saying we don't want those black folk or those latinos or those south asians to benef benefit. so we've confused what race means in america today. it's not about whether we've got a bull connor, not because we don't still have some bull connors but that we can actually perpetuate this type of economic

and political exclusion without saying anything about race, just by making bad policy decisions. >> i actually like living in a country where people don't want to be racist. that does seem preferable to me an america where people say, yeah, i'm racist, i'm equal. but on the other hand, we end up subverting all of these various levels of inequality and sometimes the places where we would have common cause across racial divide. >> that's right. one of the thing wes talk about lbj today, one of the things that was most notable from the speech he gives in 1965 and, you know, the speech he gives at howard university and also the speech that he gives notably the we shall overcome speech is that he actually says explicitly in there how many white people have suffered because we've diverted our resources into maintaining segregation. and he takes that direct -- that is what w.e.b. dubois was talking about in "black reconstruction," saying there is

an economic cost to maintaining these kind of ideas and segregation that we pay a certain tax for it for racial inequality. talking during the break, numerically there were more white people disadvantaged by sharecropping in the south than there were black people but those were kind of disposable white people to that order of that day. so when we're talking act, it's like what is the implication of this and it seems hokie and maybe feel-goodish but to say that we're all bound in this certain way, but certainly socioeconomically we absolutely are. >> part of what happens is after 1966 johnson is not as successful anymore, the midterms empower the conservatives in congress, controversy over civil rights in the north is flairing and a lot of the issues we're talking about, the fair housing bill of '68 is considered toothless, the weakest of the civil rights bills and in dealing with housing, residential issue, even in dealing with crime conservatives really take over the law and

order argument and then obviously vietnam starts to cause cuts in johnson's spending pap lot of the issues that today are front and center, not the bull connors but the underlying dynamics that perpetuate racial and economic inequality are not fulfilled. those last two years are really critical as johnson starts to lose his mojo. >> i'm reminded that king writes the text where do we go from here. he writes it after the '64 civil rights act, after the '65 voting rights act, after the moments we think of as the great legislative accomplishments of the civil rights movement and king is asking will we go to community or chaos and in fact as we see your point about vietnam, about the shifting sort of sanlds politically and all of those things that king was trying to work on in the end where he was fighting and failing, he goes to chicago and he goes back, right, he's standing on -- it's memphis is organizing around labor. right? these are the stickier points.

>> and it colors the war on -- >> oh, yeah. >> but transportation part of what he's talking about. >> one thing we have to remember about lbj right now because this month, in 1965, my father joined a meeting at the white house that the president called to discuss how to take civil rights to the next level. right? and one of the things that happened in that meeting is that -- and my father had just been to south carolina on voting rights looking at how still 50% of blacks were still disenfranchised in south carolina, complaining to katz and beck that we weren't doing a sufficient amount when forced and that given the civil rights law of 1964 there was a powerful tool that the federal government had and still has today, which is to say we're going to take back those federal dollars p if you continue to segregate and discriminate. and one of the things that -- a clear deal, and i think we have to call out democrats and northern democrats on this, mayor dailey wanted to keep his anti-poverty programs and keep his school segregation.

>> you brought me to exactly where we are going which is to dailey's chicago. that is where we are going next. thank you both for being here. when we come back, we're going to talk about three years in riker's for the crime of being young, black, and male. with 50% more animal protein than other leading brands... ...to help keep his body as strong as his love. iams. keep love strong. there's new iams woof delights. some wet food has gluten and artificial flavors. iams has real meat and eggs in our tasty chunks. now that's real love. new iams woof delights. see, i knew testosterone could affect sex drive, but not energy or even my mood. that's when i talked with my doctor. he gave me some blood tests... showed it was low t. that's it. it was a number. [ male announcer ] today, men with low t

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this is the creamy chicken corn chowder. i mean, look at it. so indulgent. did i tell you i am on the... [ both ] chicken pot pie diet! me too! [ male announcer ] so indulgent, you'll never believe they're light. 100-calorie progresso light soups. despite lyndon b. johnson's historic policy agenda, it was foreign policy that dictated his decision not to seek re-election in 1968. public support for the vietnam war hit an all-time low in 1967 with only 27% of americans approving of his handling of the war. but according to his former chief of staff, james r. jones, the polls weren't the reason president johnson decided not to run again.

rather it was his concern the politics of running a campaign could interfere with any opportunity to end the vietnam war. jones told "the new york times," quote, as an active candidate, he, president johnson reasoned, he might miss or postpone an opportunity to achieve peace. what if we're late in the campaign and i might have have to make a decision that might result in a peace settlement but will be politically risky? i want my hands free to do what's necessary to deal with this thing. the party was left grappling on a candidate when they met nor the democratic national convention in chicago in late august 1968. but the most enduring images from that week were not the convention itself but from the streets outside. that's where more than 10,000 people from around the country gathered to protest the war in vietnam and they were met by 25,000 police officers, national guard members and army troops under orders from chicago mayor richard dailey.

nbc's huntley brinkley report covered what happened next. >> demonstrators have filled the streets in front of the conrad hilton hotel. police held them back. tensions were high. >> stand back. stand back. >> policemen were on the line as it happened. now national guardsmen came in. the streets had been cleared, guardsmen came in to manage defense of the hotel. now and then someone in the hotel would throw something down on them wushgs aside from that, after the guardsmen got there there was no more. this volunteer medical group, many medical students from around the country said they handled 300 victims of tear gas,

mace, and nightsticks. ? they hit me. i went down. trying to fend off some of the blows. i came back up and they said get out of here and i said i'm trying to, in which case they hit me again and hit me again. there must have been at least a dozen of them. >> it was about 4:00 in the morning and several delegates from the convention joined the demonstrators in a candlelight parade down michigan avenue. end? >> whitney young, director of the urban league, said today in new york that last night's police action against anti-war demonstrators in chicago should prove to whites that the use of excessive force and brutality by the police is not something negroes imagine. young pointed out that most of the terror demonstrators were . >> 45 years after police violence against peaceful demonstrators marked the end of johnson's great society. we are still living with the legacy of a nation that is still afraid of its young people and still willing to overuse the

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just last week, the city of san francisco was celebrating 5-year-old miles scott battling leukemia by fulfilling the young man's wish to spend the day at batman! numerous san fran sis cans came out to cheer on young miles, including 20-year-old d.j. harris-williams, who was allegedly assaulted by san francisco police on his way home from the event. williams wutz arrested and faced four felony charges of misdemeanor and in one misdemeanor his bail was set at $143,000 but the d.a. dropped the charges pending further investigation after the lease of this video showing williams screaming in pain and unable to walk. there's also this unnamed 14-year-old who was arrested for shoplifting on tuesday at a walmart in bucks county, pennsylvania. police say they hit the teen in

the face with a taser while he was running away and he fell over face first. his face seems to hold a more complicated story. over in grosse point park, michigan, police allegedly force black men to sing and dance like chimps. videotape it, and share the footage with their friends and famili families. in miami gardens, police have stopped 28-year-old earl sampson 258 times in four years, search himd more than 100 time, and arrested him 62 times for trespassing. nearly every citation occurred outside of a convenience store, where he works. and i can not forget about 20-year-old kahleaf browner. he was arrested at age 16 for allegedly robbing someone. his family was unable to pay his $10,000 bail. so he spent three years in the rikers island correctional facility here in new york before the charges were dropped. five stories with one disturbing similarity -- in the shadow of

lbj, instead of existing in the true state of equality, many of rus living in a police state where brutality and violence are committed against american bodies conveying that some of those bodies still don't belong. joining me from washington, d.c., is eugene o'donnell, a professor of law and police study at john jay college, also a former officer at the nypd. at the table, alan jenkins, the executive director of the opportunity agenda, also raul, valerie, and maya are still with us. officer, these stories, they do begin to feel like they're indicative of a set of police forces around the country who just seem incapable of doing the work of protecting and serving and instead are in this almost military relationship with communals. am i get eing that wrong? >> you're not. i think the police are just overused in america. the criminal justice stm is too broad, too much power, too many crimes, too many offenses, punishments are too harsh and

bluntly police departments are not as aggressive as they should be in isolating bad actors in the organizations. it's far too common that one or two people in a much larger group are allowed to run amok, causing damage not only to community relations but also to people in the organization that are there for the right reasons. i also think it's important police work unfortunately spend so much time on sort of technical training, sort of rules and regulations training and not enough on the human equation, putting human dignity at the center, which is what policing should be all about. too much training and education is just an ends analysis and how you get things done without the human factors involved. >> alnd, it does feel to me like the impact, then, of these kinds of stories, when i tell them, we read them, pass them around to each other, is a deep distrust particularly of communities of color and the police in ways that undermine any good. i mean, these communities also need policing in the sense of wanting safety, wanting security

for property and for person. but these stories undermine everything that could happen in those relationships. >> that's right. i mean, i think these stories -- and we know there are many more where they came from -- they speak to the multiple ways in which the criminal justice system is broken right now. these are events that should not happen to any human being anywhere in the world. it's also simultaneously unsellable that they only happen to low-income people of color or certainly broadly disproportionately. and then they don't keep us safe. so when you think about the goals of any justice system to actually be just, right, equal protection of the laws but also public safety and prevention, all of those goals are undermined as well as the trust certainly of communities of color but really of everyone. these are not practices that are geared towards human dignity or public safety. >> i'm reminded, valerie, that, you know, so we've been talking about this ark of lbj and of course it ends in those long, hot summers of civil unrest and

protest that occur particularly after the assassination of dr. king, we think about chicago and detroit and philadelphia and other cities. and police in those cities went from being, you know, carrying one sidearm and being officer friendly to having the riot gear and being really sort of military occupying forces in these communities. can we start to dig out from under this in any way? >> yes. there is good news. in connecticut, i had the privilege of working for several years with latino residents who had pulled back their sleeves to show me their scars at the hands of local police officers who were harassing, profiling, and brutalizing this community. they joined with lawyers and with faith leaders to march into the streets to tell their stories to the public. they caught the attention of the u.s. department of justice. and just this month the officers who were responsible for the most violent crimes were put on trial and were convicted. it's possible if people put their feet on the ground atz

they did in selma, you know, 50 years ago to effect change. >> i want to ask mr. o'donnell about this point of holding accountable those who commit the bad acts. so i wonder in part about that sort of -- the fraternity of the police that often ends up closing ranks instead of sort of punishing the bad actors and clearing the ranks. >> it's a bad dynamic obviously sometimes police departments are not as aggressive as they should be. it is worth noting a lot of what we're seeing here is not just individual acts of police officers. the criminal justice justice is broke on the core. it's broken by legislators, by prosecutors. there's lots of people here that get a pass. these laws proliferate, the profilers proliferate. while i talk about individual ausmsers on the ground we don't spend enough time talking about something like false convictions of people. that could not be accomplished without aggressive prosecutors

doing what they do. some of these laws, again, there seem to be thousands of laws in some jurisdictions for the most minor offenses. yet if you ask people do you want them repealed very few people will say yes, i want them ree peeled. you can't have it both ways. you can't constantly be adding these law, these penalties into this brutal system, this scary system, and then say to the police, well, we're just going to leave it at your doorstep. again, not to diminish the responsibility of individual police people. >> stay with me. we're going to stay on this issue of the continuing police state.

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african-americans and latinos in this country. there are solutions. >> there are. it's important to lift up the point it's not just about -- we should crack down on officer who is do wrong, but it's significantly more impactful to make sure that we're instituting police practices that keep people safe. one of the exciting things that's happening is a there's actually for the first time we've never had a baseline of data that tells us how people are being stopped and treated by the police and disaggregating that by race. we actually have now, not we, but dr. phillip at ucla actually is now creating this baseline, has a grant from the federal government, and, and importantly, has the cooperation of 40 different police chiefs to actually start instituting practices to prevent this kind of beshooifr we don't have to talk about cracking down on individual cops. we can actually change the culture of policing in a way that will keep us safe. >> we need to change it to do

more effective policing because, you know, all these instances that, you know, you showed in the clips, many of them did happen in high-crime neighborhoods, thing where is there are all these illegal activities going on, but it just shows the police are obviously going after the wrong people, stopping this one guy continually outside of where he works and on a broader scale, the very troubling thing is we have created as a society a cycle. people like that young man are repeatedly stopped by the police or the teenager who was sent to rikers island so they end up with records for detention or arrest. down the line they can't get a job because they have some type of police record, which leads to them hanging around, which leads to, again, the police constantly stopping them. they're criminalizing these young people at an early age and closing off their options in the process. you know, it's so -- there's a reason why new york city alone paid out in 2011 $185 million in lawsuits against the police for all sorts of complaints. so it's also time to look into the -- i think they call the cop cams, the body cams they're

experimenting with in california. it makes not only the police act better but also members of the public tend to act better. >> alan, i feel like, you know, i almost hate to bring it up but i feel like we can't eve haven't this conversation unless we talk a little bit about the new sort of viral narrative about young people beating up, you know, unsuspecting pedestrians, right. and so that's been the new -- you know, these -- this language that -- and they're horrifying. there's no way to look at that image and feel anything other than awful. yet it's almost as though on the heels of the de blasio win and the idea that we're going to stop stopping and frisking and going to have some real conversations about police accountability that the response of at least some in the media is to immediately begin the fear mongering around young people and particularly young people of color. this is what will happen in de blasio's new york sort of. >> that's right, and yet we know crime has been going down in new york city for 25 years. it's actually at -- it's at

levels that are lower than when jfk was assassinated in 1963. but it's not that crime doesn't happen. it's that policing needs to be focused on preventing crime, on evidence of wrongdoing or intended wrongdoing and not on what someone looks like, what accent they have and the like. what's both frustrating but also encouraging is we have a lot of commonsense solutions. we actually know that when policing systems use clear rules, very good training, accountability and assessment, actually looking at how policing is happening using data but also listening to communities, we see changes, colorado, for instance, has a very good program that's produced some real change. and the obama administration gives out, as have prior administrations, a lot of money for community policing under what's called the cops program. something they can do tomorrow is begin to implement some best practices and rules and accountability. no federal taxpayer money should be going to a police department

where these kinds of things were going. >> eugene, let me come back to you for a moment. what do we know about best practices -- i want to come back to a point valerie made earlier about faith communities and the communities engaging with the police. are there communities that you've studied or seen where we have some best practices of actually moving from that sense of police state to a more collective process of building public safety? >> well, the best practices to acknowledge is that race is at the heart of so much policing and that often gets skirted. and beyond that the best practices for the cops to buy this themselves. we have too much imposed rule-oriented stuff. the cops have to see in this their souls. i think since we're talking act good news, one piece of good news in new york is stop and frisk. the police union played a very good role in that issue by repeatedly saying stop and frisk should not be numbers driven. if we can only get police political analyst now to go to the next step since almost all of them are part of labor unions to start seeing themselves as

working-xlasz people, to start seeing themselves having things in common with hotel workers, hospital workers, that would be to me a much more effective way than any sort of set of rules you could start imposing or ordering or requiring for from top. it really has to be something that people get instinctively internally. that's i think a big mistake in police practices is that there's so much time spent on stuff that's a facade, basically. it has to come from inside. >> i so appreciate that insight, the idea of seeing yourself as working class, just like the folks that you are policing. thank you for being in washington. i hope you will come and join us at the table. some of the things you said, i know you can't see the folks at the table but there was some cheerleading here at the table. alan jenkins, maya wiley, raul reyes, thanks for being here and valerie core who got a standing ovation this week when she addressed the white house on questions of fairness and

equality. i'm sure you can see why. when we come back, our foot soldier of the week is next. she's done something quite interesting. she's found folks labeled as drug dealers are actually, you know this, great entrepreneurs. we just have to direct that entrepreneurial energy to something else. when we come back. ♪ [ male announcer ] for a love that never fades over any amount of time, there's iams. with 50% more animal protein than other leading brands... ...to help keep his body as strong as his love. iams. keep love strong. there's new iams woof delights. some wet food has gluten and artificial flavors. iams has real meat and eggs in our tasty chunks. now that's real love. new iams woof delights. now that's real love. if hey breathing's hard.me, know the feeling?

copd includes emphysema and chronic bronchitis. spiriva is a once-daily inhaled copd maintenance treatment that helps open my obstructed airways for a full 24 hours. spiriva helps me breathe easier. spiriva handihaler tiotropium bromide inhalation powder does not replace fast-acting inhalers for sudden symptoms. tell your doctor if you have kidney problems, glaucoma, trouble urinating, or an enlarged prostate. these may worsen with spiriva. discuss all medicines you take, even eye drops. stop taking spiriva and seek immediate medical help if your breathing suddenly worsens, your throat or tongue swells, you get hives, vision changes or eye pain, or problems passing urine. other side effects include dry mouth and constipation. nothing can reverse copd. spiriva helps me breathe better. does breathing with copd weigh you down? don't wait to ask your doctor about spiriva.

recidivism rates are so high in the united states, that our prison system is often said to have a revolving door. according to the bureau of justice, 67.5% of a sample of 300,000 prisoners released in 1994 were the rearrested within three years. that's more than two-thirds. our foot soldier this week is helping people in new yorking with criminal histories beat those odds. catherine hope is the founder of

defy -- since officially launching her program in 2011, catherine's program has seen a rate of zero. joining me now is founder and ceo catherine hope. also jose vas questions a program associate as well as one of the program's first graduates. catherine, why the insight about business as a way and entrepreneurship as a way to address re-sidism? >> my past life was working in venture capital. i was invited on a prison tour. and when i went there for the first time not knowing it the first thing about the drug game or gang leadership, in asking the men in prison about their stories i realized immediately that will many of them understand the principles of business and that many of them are. >> profit, organization building, running staff. >> yep. and so i wondered what would happen if they were equipped to go legit with their skills. >> one of the ethics of being equipped to go legit has to do was having funding.

many people with criminal histories are unable to get sba loans or any kind of initial capital. where does the capital come for the businesses for folks who work with you? >> we are connectors between people with criminal histories and the private sector. business leaders, venture capitalists, investors. we run business plan competitions where our people compete for up to $100,000 in microloans. it's our private support network that funds and invests in their businesses because they believe in these entrepreneurs. >> jose, you are an entrepreneur, one of the folks to come out of defy. tell me about your experiences. >> my experience has been amazing. i was able to launch my own company and give back to individuals in the same position i was when i first got out of prison. it's been life changing for me. >> what do you do. >> i'm a program manager and recruiter. i go out. i hit all the parole offices, other organizations and spread the word, right? if i'm able to do it, a young kid from rhode island can be

come to new york and make something happen, anyone can do it. i get them into the training >> there is this kind of multiplier effect as part of what made defy so successful. some of the businesses that your clients have started are things that also give back to other folks with criminal histories. >> yes, a bit over a year, our graduates have started 44 companies and already created 35 new employment opportunities for defy grads and other people hard to employ in their communities. >> i will say, i totally get the insight that people engaged with black market or criminal activities are also the ones who have entrepreneurial skills. they're just not directed in the right way. i wonder if you're only looking at prison, aren't you getting the once who made the mistake? is there a way to get the folks who haven't gotten caught? they might even be better entrepreneurs? >> yeah, actually, we recruit leaders hoping that they are going to have impacts on others, impact on other people in their communities. jose is a good example of this. after he got out, his past home

boys are looking to him and saying how can be they look at changing their lives. but also the generational impact that this has in my opinion, one of the biggest problems in the communities that we serve is that there's a lack of positive male role models. 70% of children who have an incarcerated parent end up following in their foot steps. if we can equip men we serve, we also serve women, to become great entrepreneurs, they are changing the family legacy. >> jose, thank you for being one of the people changing the family legacy. i love you see the good in folks and give them a way to do their own fishing. that is our show for today. thanks to you for watching. i'll see you tomorrow at 10:00 a.m. eastern. malcolm lee will be to talk about his blockbuster movie "the best man holiday." hi, alex. >> i can't wait to see that movie. it looks so good. let's get to the this. cell phone calls while flying?

new reaction to one of the biggest potential changes in airport history. you're walking along the street minding your own business and assaulted. new developments on this real life attack game known as knockout. yikes. as the nation marks the 50th anniversary of jfk, i went to dallas and look at the stigma that city still bears. and a new article suggests car travel is waning. all not due to the economy? we'll explain coming up. don't go anywhere. y do the measg and get a head start on delicious homemade cookies. visit bettycrockercookies.com for fun holiday ideas. betty crocker cookie mix. just pour, mix...love.

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