tv The Reid Report MSNBC March 25, 2014 11:00am-12:01pm PDT
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or if you have any allergic reactions such as rash, hives, swelling of the lips, tongue or throat, or difficulty breathing or swallowing, stop taking cialis and get medical help right away. ask your doctor about cialis for daily use and a 30-tablet free trial. good afternoon, reiders. this is "the reid report." i'm joy reid. this is what we have planned for today. in a moment, the affordable care act goes back to the supreme court. this time, the question is can a for-profit company claim an exemption for paying for contraception. and later, know that malaysian officials have announced that all aboard flight 370 were lost, what comes next for the families of the passengers and crew? but we start in washington
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state, where searchers today say they found no additional victims from saturday's mud slide. just a few hours ago the, in the netherlands, president obama opened his remarks at the conclusion of a two-day nuclear summit on the tragedy in washington state. >> i would just ask all americans to send their thoughts and prayers to washington state and the community of oso and the families is and friends of those who continue to be missing. we hope for the best, but we recognize this is a tough situation. >> authorities say at least 14 people are dead. what's less clear is exactly how many are missing. officials say they're working off a list of 176 names, but that many of those names might be duplicates. >> the 176, i believe, very strongly, is not going to be a number that we're going to see in fatalities. i believe it's going to drop dramatically. why did it increase today? because we were successful in pulling the information. it's as simple as that. >> the mud slide occurred about
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55 miles north of seattle saturday morning, while most people were in or around their homes. conditions since then have hampered the search and rescue operation, with more rain expected all this week. and the threat of a second landslide deterred efforts on monday. overall, the conditions in the area which cover nearly a square mile have further hampered relief efrforts. >> it's muddy. in areas, it's like quicksand. the debris feels like big berms of clay and quicksand. gasoline, oil, contaminants, those type of things, propane tanks. it's a very challenging environment to work in and move around in and it's very tedious and slow going. >> nbc's jennifer bjorklund is in arlington, washington. jennifer, what's the latest from officials there? >> reporter: joy, we have heard from officials this morning who have calls for a state mortuary team. of course, they're hoping that they won't need it. but with that number of missing
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people, even if there are duplicate names, they do expect as the search has intensified today, that they will be able to identify more victims in the rubble. when we say the search has intensified, what we're saying is they have now 50 very highly trained state national guard troops coming in to help with the search. they have also enlisted some volunteers from the community who are knowledgeable about the terrain. not everybody, but a few people who are in the loop that will help with the search. so 96% trained professionals, several dozen residents who are helping look for their neighbors. and they are hoping to do some work on the rubble pile and into the mud today. some of the high-tech things they're doing, they're looking with electronic probes and trying to ping cell phones. because where cell phones are, potentially, that's where people are. as you said, a lot of people were home because it was saturday. there are 200 people that live
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in that small community. and they are hoping that most of them got out alive, but they are doing a very, very thorough search and they're in it for the long haul. they say it could take weeks. joy? >> tough news. nbc's jennifer bjorklund, thanks very much. and from washington state to washington, d.c., now, where some drama is playing out at a snow-covered supreme court, with high-profile and controversial issues at stake. the affordable care act, contraception, and religious freedom. now, as protesters from both sides rallied outside on the steps, supreme court justices began hearing oral arguments this morning in a sort of two-for-one case brought by a pair of family-owned companies. national arts and crafts chain hobby lobby and pennsylvania-based cabinet makers both claim their companies should be exempt from a portion of the health care law requiring employer-based health coverage to include birth control at no charge. specifically, the companies are opposed to covering methods of birth control they say work
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after conception, think the morning after bill. the companies believe providing what they say is tantamount to an abortion is against their beliefs. for the record, churches and other houses of worship do no have the to comply with that requirement and other religiously-affiliated organizations can opt out. but others say even the process of opting out violates their religious freedom. and the court's eventual decision could address that issue too. the question the supreme court is being asked to answer is this -- are corporations people? and therefore covered under the religious freedom restoration act? here's how that law, signed into law by 1993, reads, in part. government shall not substantially burden a person's exercise of religion, except in the furtherance of a compelling governance interest. lower courts have split, including on the question of whether a corporation is a person. in hobby lobby's case, a divided
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tenth circuit court of appeals ruled that some secular corporations are persons that can have and exercise their own religious beliefs under the law. in the conastoga case, they found the office. laura was inside the court and joins me now. i want to start with a couple of tweets you sent out, talking about what went on. talk about the arguments tor questions that were being posed. let's start with justice scalia and what he said in court today. >> justice scalia was questioning whether these corporations should have to pay for what he calls abortafations, contraceptives, that they consider to be abortions. and of course, medical experts agree that birth control prevents pregnancy and does not cause abortion. and so, therefore, the
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government has a compelling interest in making sure that employers provide this benefit to women. >> now, beyond that question of whether the morning after pill, et cetera, are abortfacients or not, the question was whether or not this kind of case can be transferable. they had specific questions about what else can be implied by a ruling in hobby lobby's favor. and you tweeted that they asked specifically whether they can refuse to cover things like vaccines and blood transfusions. how did that exchange go down? >> this case has really brought implications beyond just contraception. sotomayor, before hobby lobby's lawyer even finished the first sentence of his opening argument, jumped in and said, what else? how many religious objectors are going to come up if we allow hobby lobby refuse to cover birth control. what if you want to refuse to comply with vaccination requirements, minimum wage laws, social security taxes, hiring discrimination laws, family
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leave laws. this could affect so many things beyond health care. we recently saw that case in arizona where they were considering a law that would allow employers to refuse to serve lbgt people, because they believe homosexuality is a sin. you know, should corporations have the religious right to refuse all these different things, to refuse to comply with federal law? can a corporation even exercise religion? and that's what -- sorry. >> no, go on. i'm just curious what was the response from the attorneys for hobby lobby? >> they said, that's not what we're talking about here. we're not talking about vaccinations. hobby lobby's lawyer says, maybe in the case of vaccinations, that would be a different situation, because the concept of heard immunity, maybe it would pose a danger to society if we didn't vaccinate people and the concept of birth control, it's different. >> laura, you've got a piece up at "the huffington post" in which you talk about the public perception. you say 68% of the female voters
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who would be affected by the supreme court decision disagree with hobby lobby, according to a new poll, more than half say they disagree strongly. and we have our own new nbc news/"wall street journal" poll that says, as far as employers that object to covering birth control, 53% say they should not be exempt, 41% say they should be. how dispositive are public opinions about these cases inside the supreme court. and does that even come up or did it come up? >> it didn't come up at all. the only way it came up a little bit was when kennedy said, what if the religious beliefs of the employees don't line up with the religious beliefs of the employers. don't employees have any rights? what about the women that are going to be denied this coverage because of the religious beliefs of their employers? it kind of came up in that sense, but public opinion right now about this case is not going to influence the supreme court's decision. >> laura bassett, thank you very much. >> thanks for having me. breaking news now from downtown houston, where a massive three-alarm fire is
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consuming a residential building under construction. firefighters are on the scene. it's not clear yet if anyone is injured. we'll bring you more on this story as it develops. and coming up, the lawyer representing hobby lobby will be here to explain why her group is trying to make massive changes to the health care law, all in the name of religious free. but first, the search for the missing plane is on hold. the families are angry and confused and today new questions about the malaysian government's official story about what happened. i've always kept my eye on her... but with so much health care noise, i didn't always watch out for myself. with unitedhealthcare, i get personalized information and rewards for addressing my health risks. but she's still gonna give me a heart attack. that's health in numbers. unitedhealthcare. you want a loan to build you can't do that.ica? nobody builds factories in the us anymore... you can't do that. using american raw materials makes no sense... you can't do that. you want to hire workers here in the states? they're too expensive, you can't do that. fortunately we didn't listen to the experts.
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we're keeping an eye on breaking developments out of houston, where a massive three-alarm fire has consumed a residential building under construction, just west of downtown. firefighters are on the scene. it's not clear yet if anyone is injured and we'll keep following it for you. now to the missing malaysian
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airlines plane. in just a few hours, flight 370 search crews based in australia will try to do what they were unable to do on tuesday, search for the missing malaysian jet. gale force winds and heavy swells prevented crews from searching the area, where malaysian officials confirmed on monday the flight likely went down in the indian ocean. however, there's no certainty the search will resume today. >> we are concerned about the weather also over the next couple of days. so it may be some time before we can get aircraft back into the search. >> meanwhile, in china, home to more than two-thirds of the missing passengers, the perceived incompetence of the malaysian investigation has provoked a rare protest in that country. dozens of angry family members and their supporters tried to storm the malaysian embassy in beijing, throwing water bottles and chanting liars. chinese officials and families are critical of, among other things, the initial missteps in the investigation, as well as the failure to turn over satellite data recorded in the
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course of the investigation. others are critical of how malaysian officials initially appeared to complicate the pilots. as "the daily beast's" clive irving asked, have the malaysians finally stopped trashing the pilots? they were going through precisely the steps they were in an emergency. nbc's keir simmons has been following the plight of the families from kuala lumpur, malaysia. >> reporter: hey, joy. the search for that debris off the coast of australia has been suspended today, so another day wasted. families as furious as they have ever been, particularly in beijing, with a group marched to the malaysian embassy to protest. incredibly emotional scene, following the emotional scenes yesterday in beijing, after the families were told about the news that the malaysians believe that the evidence shows that the plane ended over the ocean. now, the families say that they
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don't believe it, they want to know where the debris is, they want to see that there is evidence that that debris does belong to flight 370. meanwhile, the australians telling the malaysians, according to the malaysians, they will not issue visas for families to go there until that positive identification of debris from the flight is made. so, again, another wait for the families for news, for some kind of closure here, and so many more questions. >> joy? >> all right, nbc's keir simmons from kuala lumpur, malaysia, thanks very much. robert headric teaches aviation accident law at seattle university, school of law. okay, so let's talk about the potential for the airline to have to pay liabilities. could the pilot and the co-pilot, in theory, seek additional legal remedies against the airline or against the malaysian government?
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because it did seem in the beginning, they were being blamed. >> well, the pilot's families have separate claims, if they have any claims at all, against the airline, possibly for defamation of character, et cetera. you know, it seems that a lot of information flows out of these accidents very quickly. the press gets ahold of it quickly. but i think, a lot of people have learned very hard lessons not to jump to conclusions with very minimal facts, and unfortunately, 18 days later, we're still at that stage today. >> so only 18 days, as you said, into this, which has been an extensive amount of time for the families, but is this normal for the airline and the government to already be talking about payments to the families, 18 days in? >> actually, no. why, it is normal. they have a responsibility to make initial payments. my concern with what malaysia airlines, in fact, is doing is
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offering a mere $5,000 per passenger to take these families into the next stages of their life. i view it as ridiculously low. i think they should get up to the plate. what these families have been through, just in the past 2 1/2 weeks, is beyond what most of us can imagine in losing a loved one, and the airline and its insurance carrier should stand up to the plate and offer them fair compensation up-front. >> and we're obviously dealing with loss outside of the united states and obviously, multiple countries that the families are from, so dealing with different laws in different countries. but in theory, let's just say, ultimately, some or all of the plane's wreckage is found and it's determined what actually caused the crash. could, then, in theory, families go back and make additional claims based on that? >> yes, they could. what would happen is, most of these claims, at least, against malaysia airlines, will be dealt with in the countries of
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malaysia and china, under the montreal convention, an international treaty. however, if there's other potential third parties at fault, such as the aircraft manufacturer, the engine manufacturer, et cetera, those claims could be brought, for instance, in the united states,s and pursued here, for additional compensation. >> now, obviously, the vast majority of the people that were on that flight were not from the united states, but there was at least one, i believe, three u.s. citizens on the flight. talk about how those claims might work differently, potentially for a u.s. citizen versuses, let's say, a citizen of china. >> well, we break damages up into two types. first of all, what damages are recoverable. i think both countries will recognize a certain minimal amount of economic loss to the family is recoverable. the loss of support to the wife, the children, and possibly parents. in the united states, you get the addition, in most states, depending on what law applies is
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the loss of love, care, companionship that these surviving family members also suffered. and that can be very significant in this country. assuming that the aircraft did crash on the ocean and in the high seas, the federal act, the death on the high seas act would apply, and that would govern as far as compensable damages in the united states. >> and then, lastly, i mean, obviously, it's much more important, and what's much more pressing is the care of these families and what they are going through personally. but i am curious, in terms of the airline, obviously a high-profile disappearance of a 777 that actually had a good safety record, but something this so high-profile for malaysian airlines, what is their future looking like economically given such a high-profile disaster? >> well, i think, initially, people may not knowing what caused it may somewhat fear flying on malaysia airlines, but as we've seen in the past with other airlines, these accidents tend to -- we never forget them,
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but, as far as safety concerns go, they do fade in history. where we leave it here in the united states to the regulators actually to really get on the airlines to ensure solid safety record and practices and i imagine that the malaysian government and the regulators there will be all over the airline if there's any type of safety issues caused by the airline. >> all right. pilot and aviation accident attorney, robert hedrick, thanks very much. >> you're welcome. now to the netherlands, where president obama has just wrapped up a two-day nuclear summit as part of a week-long trip to europe. the summit ends as the united states and its allies effectively kicked russia out of the g-8, which for now is the group of 7. now, current u.s. sanctions are focus on individuals close to russia's vladimir putin. the president says if russia goes further in its actions, sanctions could include the all-important energy sector. noting the difficulty of the
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task beforehand, president obama also said today it would be dishonest to suggest there's a simple solution to the current crisis. >> history has a funny way of moving and twists and turns and not just in a straight line. so, you know, how the situation in crimea involves, in part, depends on making sure that the international community stays unified. >> president obama's next stop is brussels, belgium, where he's expected to visit nato headquarters. and coming up, what you have to say about the controversial supreme court case regarding health care, contraception, and religion. who would thought those would be controversial issues? it's all in we the tweeple, next. here's a word you should keep in mind "unbiased". some brokerage firms are but way too many aren't. why? because selling their funds makes them more money. which makes you wonder. isn't that a conflict? search "proprietary mutual funds". yikes!! then go to e*trade. we've got over 8,000 mutual funds
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native american cosign. but first, it's time for the stories you can't stop buzzing about on social media, in a little segment we like to call, we the tweeple. former tv judge joe brown tre trendingitrend inging on google for all the reasons. he was held in contempt of court and held in jail for disrupting a juvenile court. he told the presiding judge, now you want to get into this, let's get into it. this sorry operation needs to stop. you need to straighten yourself up. brown was known for his fiery takedowns on his show, but in a real courtroom, not good. nick cannon, meanwhile, is also causing a firestorm online for wearing white face. watch. >> connor small, that's name, bro! >> that's his altar ego, connor, created to promote his new album, which really is called white people party music. long with an instagram photo and video, canon posted some hashtags including good credit,
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farmer's market, and cream cheese eating. not everyone's laughing and some you accused cannon of stereotyping white people. he responded by tweeting, just relax and have fun. you're also taking sides as lawyers in a supreme court debate whether hobby lobby has the right to deny contraception. hashtags not my boss business and religious freedom for all are trending big. nancy pelosi tweeted, healthcare decisions must only be made by a woman and her doctor. meanwhile, speaker john boehner weighed in on, with hobby lobby case, proud to stand up for those with what's right and sacred. you're tweeting photos like this, with crowds from both sides gathered outside the supreme court. and up next, we'll have more on our supreme court showdown, with a lawyer who represents with the firm representing hobby lobby. as always, you can join the conversation with fellow readers on facebook, instagram, twitter,
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back now with a battle over religious freedom. attorneys for the u.s. government and attorneys for two family-owned companies made their cases in front of the supreme court today. hobby lobby and conestoga woods specialty corporation claimed part of the nation's health care law violates their religious freedom. the u.s. government argues the law covers people and not corporations. lower courts were split, so now it's up to the supreme court to decide. lori wyndham is senior counsel with the beckett fund for religious liberty, representing hobby lobby. lori, thanks for being here. >> joy, thank you for having me on today. >> thank you. okay, let's start with this idea of corporations being people. do corporations, if they are people and have religious views, do they have a soul? >> i think the question here isn't about whether corporations have a soul, i think the question here is about whether people, who absolutely have a soul, lose their religious freedom, just because they open a family business, as many americans do. >> but, however, a business, a
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corporation you form, is separate from yourself, meaning that if your corporation, for instance, were to violate one of the ten commandments. if it were to covet another corporation's products or if it were to steal another corporation's patent, it could not suffer the wrath of god, right? so how is it possible for a corporation to somehow violate the religious tenants of its faith if it is not a person and doesn't have a soul? >> well, you know, i think that really gets into a theological family. the green family believes that they are going to be responsible to god and that they have to answer to god for the things that they do through their family businesses. and so for them, it's not so simple as saying, oh, well, the corporation's doing it, it's okay. and i think that many americans would really pull back from the idea that, hey, if i'm just doing this as part of a corporation, if i'm just doing this as part of my job, i don't have any moral agency here. i think that's a very difficult argument to make. >> except the christians that own businesses, let's say lay people off around christmastime, right? people do things all the time, that they may personally find
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morally sort of questionable, but they do them for the business. people lay people off at christmastime. >> i think that what we want to encourage here in the u.s. is people who are willing to have social consciences and who are willing to consider their beliefs in the way they run their business. that's what the green family has done. they have raised their minimum wage, every year for the last five years. they're now nearly double the federal minimum wage, because they said, you know what, that's the right thing to do. i think that's the kind of behavior we want to encourage rather than discourage. >> let me ask you about another business that thinks that the federal minimum wage is usury and they don't want to comply, because it violates their religious tenants. or what if you had another business who believes that women's place is in the home, so therefore they don't feel they should be compelled to consider women for employment? >> we've heard all of these wild hypotheticals and congress has already answered that. what they've said, when there's a compelling government reason, like protecting the minimum wage or stopping discrimination or protecting life, that the government can win in those
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cases. the question isn't who gets to exercise the rights. the question is, how strong is the government's interests? here, the government's interest is really weak, because they have already exempted plans covering tens of millions of americans from this same mandate. so how can they exempt so many millions on one hand and yet fine the green family on the other? >> well, i think people would argue, because those are church and i want to talk to you, you said the government's compelling interest could be about life. some women use birth control to fight things like endometriosis. they're taking birth control not for birth control, but for health benefits. how can they deny her that coverage when she's using that birth control to save her life? >> i want to emphasize here that hobby lobby does cover birth control. there's only four specific drugs and devices they object to. so that situation wouldn't even apply here. but, back to your point about churches. it's not just churches who have been exempted from this law. it is tens of millions of
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employer plans that are grandfathered. and those don't have to be religious plans. i would ask, what about the grandfathered plans. what is the government doing to provide coverage and insure coverage for women who are exempt from this law. we think that there are a lot of other options the government has to ensure that women get coverage. and that they can accomplish that goal without forcing the green family and hobby lobby to be part of that. >> first of all, the people who are exempt under plans that have a waiting period, that's not forever. that is saying that, until the law kicks in for certain businesses that are exempt for, say, 14 months, that's not the same as forever, which is what you guys are seeking. let me ask you this question, with one of justice scalia's retorts to this question of should the employer have to do it versus some other means, and he suggested that maybe the taxpayer should do it. wouldn't that mean that every single american taxpayer, including the religious, including mennonites and people from all religious faiths are then paying for the contraception anyway? >> you know, the government is already doing these things. it's doing it through medicaid, it's doing it through title x
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programs, which exist, specifically, to provide family planning services. so the government is already doing these things. to say that now the government cannot do that in the case of four specific drugs and devices for hobby lobby, i think, is a little bit far fetched. start whether taxpayers would object, i would say that that's something that they can take up with congress, take up with their representatives if they object to the way that tax dollars are being spent. >> well, i'm not sure that that's very practical, right? if everybody's paying into the tax system and then you're saying that people should essentially get medicaid when they already have a job that provides insurance, i think that's a complicated and difficult argument to make. but i do appreciate your being here, lori windham for the beckett fund for religious liberty, thank you. >> thank you, joy. all right, now to the growi growing controversy over the nsa. president obama is planning a major overhaul of the nsa's data collection program. the new law would prevent the national security agency from bulk harvesting calling records from phone companies. instead, companies would keep the data and the nsa would have to request it using a new kind of court order. president obama said this morning he's confident the new plan would keep the u.s. secure
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while addressing privacy issues. the proposal still faces a tough vote in congress. we'll talk more about what that could mean for the government's domestic surveillance program tomorrow on the show with colonel larry wilkerson, former chief of staff to colin powell. from the nsa to the aca. the deadline for signing up for the affordable care act is just days away. we're calling out the people spreading misinformation about the health care law. ucing oliv's pronto lunch starting at $6.99. an entirely new menu created with your busy schedule in mind. handmade italian sandwiches, flatbreads, and our signature soup and salad. starting at $6.99. and all served "pronto!" at olive garden. (agent) i understand. (dad) we've never sold a house before. (agent) i'll walk you guys through every step. (dad) so if we sell, do you think we can swing it? (agent) i have the numbers right here and based on the comps that i've found, the timing is perfect.
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back to houston now, where as many as 175 firefighters are responding to this massive fire consuming a residential building under construction. our nbc affiliate, kprc reports one construction worker had to be rescued from the third floor, but there's no word on his condition. now to the looming enrollment deadline for the affordable care act. with just six days to go for people to sign up for health insurance plans for this year, the push is on to get as many people enrolled as possible before time runs out.
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>> reporter: across the country, there's a push to get americans insured around obamacare before this year's signup window closes at the end of the month. >> to doors inside of michigan hall opened at 9:00 a.m. sharp and right on cue, people poured in. >> don't wait until the end. >> reporter: we caught up with marilyn sobolessky. the self-employed woman is enrolling to avoid the penalty. >> $95, okay, but if it goes to 1%, who knows. >> the site had issues, so that prolonged a lot of us from getting the coverage we need. >> you are covered. >> reporter: the most recent number shows the state has signed up more than 165,000 people, well above their intended goal. 62,000 received private insurance. 102,000 enrolled in medicaid. >> the health and human services department reports nationwide, almost 5 million people have signed up so far. there's also evidence that the
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affordable care act is saving money. politico reports the congressional budget office reports that people who gets insurance through the market places are paying premiums about 15% lower than projected. after those warnings that the aca would be a job killer, quite the opposite. politico adds that more than 8.5 million private sector jobs have been created in the four years since the law passed. now, see what we did just there? those are facts. this is fiction. >> as everybody knows, the affordable care act requires anybody that employs 50 or more people to provide health care for them that includes contraceptive services. contraceptive services means contraception, euthanasia and abortion. >> now, as media matters points out, everybody doesn't know that. in fact, the affordable care act specifically bans abortion coverage from being required in the basic benefits packages in the exchanges. and last i checked, euthanasia isn't even legal in the united states, although four states do have physician aid in dying
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laws. now, clearly, there's a lot more misinformation where this came from. so today we're separating fact from fiction in the affordable care act. and i have two experts with me now. elizabeth rosenthal is a medical doctor who writes about health care for "the new york times," and dr. casey a. bear is a professor at louisiana state university, health sciences center, cory, i'm sorry. thank you both for being here, and get your names right. elizabeth, i'll start with you first. so matt drudge had a tweet that went around the world yesterday, in which he claimed that he's already paid the penalty for failing to sign up. is that possibility? >> uh, only through a lot of convoluted math and advanced payment of taxes. i mean, it is true that next year, people who don't sign up will pay a penalty. but they will also probably save a lot more money overall by signing up for health insurance. this is a good thing for most people. >> but the irs hasn't billed him yet? >> no, no, no. unless he pays his taxes a year in advance. >> in 2015, people will see
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that. >> let's go to the second one. you have until march 31st to sign up for care -- sorry, remember the uproar over the president saying if you like your plan, you can keep it. that was sort of one of the big talking points that the right has been really hot on, and i want to ask you, cory, what's the truth, actually, behind that statement? >> well, you know what? it's a smoke screen. and i am glad that this actually happened. that's right, i said i'm glad. and the reason why is because it's a canary in the coal mine. people didn't know they had junk insurance. women were paying $300 a month for insurance and didn't even know they didn't have maternity care. you can't keep your insurance, well, you know what you couldn't keep? junk. because junk is going to make everybody else pay more when you dona don't have the insurance you're supposed to have. the reality is, that was a smoke screen for the right to say, obamacare is not going to work. and guess what, every day i get a new patient that tells me,
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obamacare is working for me. so it is what it is. >> elizabeth, what happened if you had one of these junk plans, as corey describes them, and you get a letter in the mail saying, this plan is no longer complies with federal law, what happens? >> then you have to start looking at the exchanges. and i agree, that letter is in some ways a godsend. i have spoken to women who thought they were insured and got pregnant and read the fine print and realized, uh-oh, my great insurance policy isn't going to cover my $25,000 pregnancy. that is kind of an i letter to people that they didn't have real insurance. >> and they find out now. i want to move on, then, corey, about a question i was asked when i was on c-span a couple of weeks ago. and one of the callers said that he gets medicaid and claimed that his costs for prescription drugs had actually gone up and he's blamed that on the affordable care act. does the affordable care act -- is the impact on medicaid recipients to increase the cost of their prescription drugs?
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>> two words for that caller -- pilot error. there are so many things that go to the cost of a medicine. when a pharmacy decides they want to use one generic as opposed to another generic, when your doctor writes the prescription for a nongeneric, people don't have any idea how many things go into factor a drug cost. so, the medicaid, medicare, no drugs will be going up, because of the affordable care act. as a matter of fact, in the affordable care act, it makes it so that drugs will come down, especially for medicare. >> elizabeth, did you want to weigh in on that? >> well, i think that we have to deal with drug prices as a whole in this country. and one thing that the affordable care act didn't do, because it wasn't allowed to, is to allow medicare to negotiate drug prices on our behalf. >> so medicare we're talking about now? >> yes. >> that's the next step, but once medicare does something, it opens the door for everyone else to start doing it. we really do need to deal with this issue of drug pricing and the affordable care act doesn't finish that, but, you know, one act can't do everything.
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it does a lot of other things really well. >> corey, with i want to quickly get in a question we got from somebody at google who called himself hip senior, love that. they said, if you currently live in a state like minnesota and have a medicare plan for yourself and your family, and you move to, let's say, florida. so minnesota being a state that actually has its own exchange and you move to florida, a state that does not, how does that impact the care that you're getting or the plan you enrolled in back in the state that did have an exchange? >> that's a very interesting question. and every state is different. so when they are moving to a place that has a non-medicaid expansion, which is a whole big, you know, problem, because the governors in the south just don't want to agree with president obama with this thing, but that's a whole another concept. you're going to have to really get to that state and enroll or transfer that insurance, because medicaid is very different than medicare. so you must get to that state and enroll and then you will be able to see. but there's really no way to tell, because your state, the governor was smart and decided
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to accept the medicaid expansion, which is the cornerstone of the affordable care act. so that's good thing. >> thank you, corey a. bear, as well as elizabeth rosenthal, thank you very much. and join us today after the show at 3:30 eastern for a live google plus chat. we'll answer your questions on the healthcare law. you can still submit your written or video questions on twitter, facebook, and on our home page, there thereidreport.msnbc.com. next, what's in a name? we'll read between the lines on the washington redskins' latest attempt to put the mascot controversy to rest. ♪ [ girl ] my mom, she makes underwater fans that are powered by the moon. ♪ she can print amazing things, right from her computer.
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[ whirring ] [ train whistle blows ] she makes trains that are friends with trees. ♪ my mom works at ge. ♪ candice... my mo(door-hey) ge. you said in a focus group you'd "like to have a product that eliminates odors and doesn't just mask them." could you give us access to maybe the smelliest room in your house? -sure come on in. the trash is bad... oh yeah. ...and we just took it out. febreze doesn't mask odors, it actually eliminates them. it smells really nice. like fresher. another success story. (laughs) don't just mask odors; eliminate them with febreze air effects. and to continuously eliminate odors in small spaces, try febreze set and refresh. breathe happy.
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the year was 1890. the country was in the midst of what were called the indian wars. and in december, units of the seventh cavalry cornered a band of sioux at wounded knee creek. on december 29th, the sioux vend surrendered, but the cavalry opened fire, killing between 150 and 300 mostly women, children, and unarmed men. baum responded to the massacre at wounded knee and with a pair of editorials, one of which read, "the proud spirit of the original owners of these vast prairies inherited through centuries of fierce and bloody wars for their possession lingered last in the bosom of sitting bull. with his fall, the nobility of the red skin is extinguished, and what few are left are a pack of whining curs who like the hand that smites them. the whites, by law of conquest, by justice of civilization, are masters of american continent.
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and the best safety of the frontier settlements will be secured by the total annihilation of the few remaining indians." that same year, 1890, they first included the word redskins to refer to american indians, and a few years later, they updated to include the words, often contem contemptuous. not much different that the sambo characterization of black americans. in the 1930s, at the same time the zulu cannibal giants kris kris crossed the country, the boston braves football league changed their name to the redskins. in the 1940s, the cleveland indians first started using their mascot, chief wahu which got in the 1940s. this was the mascot the
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washington pro football team tried and thankfully scrapped in 1995. the history and the fact that the name of the washington football team offends people is not in dispute. but washington team owner dan snyder's doubling down in a long letter to fan, cherry-picking a couple of native american supporters, hanging on to heritage and promising charity for native american communities in the team's offensive name is about as convincing as putting code talkers on the 50 yard line, draped in the name, which snyder has repeatedly vowed to never change. here's the oneida nation's response. "we're glad that after a decade of owning the washington team, mr. snyder finally says he's interested in native american heritage. but this doesn't change the fact that he needs to stand on the right side of history and change his team's name." that wraps things up for "the reid report." i'll see you back here tomorrow at 2:00 p.m. eastern. and don't forget to join us at 3:30 eastern for a live google
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plus chat on the health care law. for more info, visit us online at thereidreport.msnbc.com, but coming up next is "the cycle." what's going on today? >> hey, joy, as a washington sports fan, i really, really appreciated your commentary. i think it's so important. >> thank you. >> and coming up today, we're looking at that plane from all angles, digging into the story, saying, what's the latest in the sear search? and we're going to take a look at the hobby lobby case in the supreme court today, it's that challenge to the affordable care act's birth control mandate. taking a look at that as well. >> sounds like a plan. "the cycle" comes up next. that's all it is. eye on the ball. that's a good tip. i'll try it. by the way, bill... this is delicious! so many grilled tastes and textures. and all the nutrition i need. go on. no really. top notch. (laughing) there it is - there ya go. new american grill from kibbles 'n bits... go together like... food 'n family.
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predibut, manufacturings a prettin the united states do. means advanced technology. we learned that technology allows us to be craft oriented. no one's losing their job. there's no beer robot that has suddenly chased them out. the technology is actually creating new jobs. siemens designed and built the right tools and resources to get the job done. the news cycle is unrelenting this week. thankfully, so are we. right now, the search for malaysian airlines flight 370 is halted because of a violent storm system. searchers welcoming a little moment to reset as time runs out to find those black boxes. we've got it covered from all angles. a muddy disaster out west. more than a dozen people are
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dead, nearly 200 others may still be missing in washington state and the weather is turning once again. there's a new warning this afternoon for those in mother nature's path. and where's george clooney? because the perfect storm is bearing down on new england? can you believe it? some areas will pick up a foot of snow tonight, from a system the strength of a category 3 hurricane. weather is the news and the news is in "the cycle." for safety concerns today, we had to pull the assets off the search and put success to the south. we're not searching for a needle in a haystack, we're still trying to find where the haystack is. >> a needle in an undefined haystack. in the past 24 hours, malaysia airline flight 370 has gone from an active search and rescue to a stalled search and recovery. search teams wil
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