there's not one way to do something. no details too small. american express open forum. this is what membership is. this is what membership does. the gender gap on equal pay. on wednesday, republicans blocked the paycheck fairness act from coming to a vote in the senate. it's a bill that's aimed at providing more protections from pay discrimination for workers, but it fell six votes short that the supermajority actually needed to bring it to the senate floor for consideration. >> this fog of filibuster, we can't even get to a majority vote on how to make sure women get equal pay for equal work. no wonder people are fed up with

us. you know one way to help the economy is for people to make more money. you know what's one of the best ways to make more money? pay women for equal pay for equal work. >> right now, it's legal for companies to punish employees for even talking with each other about their pay. paycheck fairness act would change that. women have to know what their colleagues are making. proponents of the law point to the story of dawn soto koones, a sales woman at a jared jewelry store. she came across documents about a new salesman. he had no experience selling jewelry, but was making significantly more than the store's top seller. which was a woman. so dawn reviewed more records and almost all of the men, it turned out, were making more than the women. so she is now one of 12 women from across the country who are part of a suit against the parent company of jared jewelers, sterling jewelers. if she hasn't come across those records, she wouldn't have even known that her male counterparts

were getting paid more. sterling jewelers for its part says the accusations are not true. also remember lilly ledbetter, she is the namesake of the first bill that president obama signed into law when he came into office in 2009. the lilly ledbetter fair pay act. she worked as a supervisor as a goodyear plant in baalabama. she lost $200,000 in pay over the course of her career due to gender discrimination. she was making significantly less than her male co-workers with the same job. she didn't even know she was being discriminated against, though, until she received an anonymous tip because company policy banned the sharing of salary information. the paycheck fairness act is a bill that rosa delora has introduced to everyone since 1997, but they made the bill and the broader issue of pay equity a major point of emphasis. here's a hint. it has to do with politics, because this is an issue that democrats believe or at least hope will grab the attention of a key part of their base in a

midterm election that right now isn't shaping up all that well for them. president obama signed two executive orders on tuesday to increase pay by transparency among federal contractors. >> i think about my single mom working hard, going to school, trying to raise two kids, all at the same time. and i think about my grandmother trying to work her way up through her career, and then hitting the glass ceiling. and i've seen how hard they've worked. i've seen how they've sucked it up. but at a certain point, we have the power to do something about it for the next generation. and this is a good place to start. >> the paycheck fairness act democrats hope will activate everyone, democrats, independents, african-americans, latinos, and of course, women. single women in particular. many of the groups that they want mobilized this november, that they need mobilized this november. in 2012, obama lost men by seven points but he won among women by 11 points and therefore was re-elected president. these are the politics behind

the paycheck fairness act. democrats knew that republicans were going to vote against it, but they wanted to get them on the record blocking an equal pay bill. but it wasn't all smooth sailing for democrats this week, because when they repeatedly touted the line that a woman working full-time makes on average 77% of what a man makes, fact-checkers took issue. it's true that the typical woman earns 77% of what a typical man earns. pay discrimination is part of it. but it's also the result of other factors that put women at a disadvantage in the workplace. women take more time out of the work force to care for children and family members. men have more jobs at the top of the corporate ladder. they work at different occupations that pay differently. a more accurate measure probably comes from some cornell university economists who tried to do an apples to apples comparison. men and women doing the same job, working the same hours. they found that women in that situation make 91% of what their male counterparts make. they conclude, "so you could accurately say that women get

paid 91 cents on the dollar for doing the same work as men." there was some contention over the numbers democrats used this week and republicans did their best to make hay out of it. still, the democrats did achieve their goal of getting conservatives on the record on their views on equal pay. >> the war on women or pay discrimination against women is in the top 20 of problems in the united states is frankly ridiculous. >> this has nothing to do with actually improving the situation for women in the workplace. this has everything to do with a political show vote for the democrats. >> we really don't have a gender salary discrepancy in this country. >> and to talk about it, i want to bring in politics writer molly ball from the atlantic. eleanor cliff at the daily beast. salinda lake. and in los angeles at this very early hour out there, i want to bring in sandra fluke, a democratic candidate for the state senate in the golden state. we'll start with you since you got up the earliest for this. at least i think you did.

>> thank you. >> so, you know, we run those numbers there -- and i should maybe put this up on the screen. hannah rosen at slate had a widely circulated article this week called the gender wage gap lie. she's basically saying the 77 cents on the dollar line that democrats keep using, you know, it really comes closer to 91 cents that those cornell university economists are talk about and it really involves a lot of factors that maybe are beyond the control of government. i just wonder what your response to that is. from the standpoint of the government, what is it that the government can be doing to get true pay equity? is this something that the government should be doing? their interpretation is that the paycheck fairness act doesn't get you there. >> well, just because the paycheck fairness act doesn't get you there doesn't mean that government stops at that point. the paycheck fairness act is a big part of this, because we're arguing about the size of discrimination, not the fact of discrimination. so let's enact the paycheck fairness act and then let's do

more. let's talk about the fact that women are disproportionately the ones making minimum wage. so we need to increase the minimum wage nationally the way that we have in california and the way that i've supported a living wage for hotel workers, disproportionately women as well. but then let's also do things like address paid family leave and sick time. some of the other factors that decrease women's pay because we're more likely to be the care givers in our family. again, legislation that i've committed to introducing in california to protect jobs if someone takes paid family leave. >> so what do you -- i think it was bill crystal in that montage you were just playing there saying this wouldn't rank in the top 20 issues if you put it in front of voters. what are you -- i mean, you're a candidate for office in california right now. i know the democratic party is putting a particular emphasis on trying to drive upturnout among women, particularly single women. where does this issue fall with voters you're talking to, with women you're talking to? >> well, i think if you ask

voters anywhere in the country, they're going to say that economic issues are one of their top priorities, and for women, this is part of economic issues. the wage gap costs women on average over $10,000 a year. so it does hit people in their pocketbooks. it is important as an economic issue, absolutely. >> i want to open it up more to the panel here. salinda, you work with the numbers all the time. one thing that sticks out at me, this is from 2012. this is the women's vote in the presidential election by marital status. we know obama won women overall. but this is really the story. married women actually went for romney by seven points. single women went for obama by 36 points. seems to me that when you start talking about the mechanics of turnouts for democrats, this is where the game is. single women getting them motivated, getting them to go to the polls. do you see this push on pay equity as being -- will it help

in that regard? how does that work? >> in 2013, we had an even better example, which is terry mcauliffe, the governor of virginia, precisely because of the single woman's vote. he won the single woman's vote by 42 points. he lost married women. so absolutely critical that we get unmarried women out to vote. this is a huge issue for them. nine cents every hour, or 23 cents every hour. and actually, if you're a single mom, your wage is down to 56 cents an hour compared to your rig white male married counterparts. it is the single biggest motivating issue for single women. >> you're saying pay enforcement -- >> that's right. the single biggest motivator for unmarried women. we emphasize these two issues because this is something that has real tangible consequences every single hour that they

work. >> just following the politics of it, what do you make of the strategy here? celinda saying this is the single biggest motivating factor. we can talk about all the factors working against democrats in 2014. we're always talking about their coalition shows up in the presidential year. we haven't seen it show up in the midterm year. what do you think of the push they're seeing on this issue? is this something that could tangibly boost them at the polls? >> i do think that democrats have suffered a bit for the fact that this is so transapparently politic -- transparently political. i wonder if there's fatigue among voters who heard throughout the 2012 election obama touting the lilly ledbetter act. thinking why is congress trying to attack this problem again? didn't they tell us they did something about this? can you tout something as an accomplishment one day and go back to the well again?

if you're going to cite that 77 cents figure that includes different occupations, then it's fair to look at the white house where women are in different occupations, but do make less than men overall, and so, yurng i think there was a little bit of blowback for this overall for democrats, when you have ruth marcus calling this demagoguery. i don't think the message was as smooth as they planned and it is still an uphill battle to get democratic voters out. >> that struck me, too. we just put the chart up. female staffers in the white house making 88% of what males saying. saying there's different experience there. saying there's a reason for it. which you're hearing some of the pushback to that 77% line. ruth marcus, as molly was saying, this is how she concluded. as i said, i vote yes in the bill. but i can understand the concerns of those who worry about floods of litigation and

business decisions second-guessed by federal judges. there's a difference between opposing the paycheck fairness act and opposing paycheck fairness. politicians who choose to confuse the two may score a cheap political point, but it's not a fair one. that issue that molly is saying, is there a risk here for democrats in almost going to the well too much on this issue? >> i don't think so. there's no risk at all. equal pay for equal work is a slogan that goes back to the early suffragists. every female voter out there has a sense that they're not doing as well in this economy for lots of reasons. i think women understand it's because they do child rearing. they take time off to care for parents and so forth. they take a lot of time-outs. but hey, if there were childcare, if the gender rules were set up more equitably, maybe that wouldn't happen. so i do think there's a sense of unfairness and we use the courts as how we sort these things out. if you pass the paycheck fairness bill, women might have more access to the courts.

but since when are people worried about access to the courts? we're a very litigious society. i think women should have the right to do that, and you started this segment pointing to the women at the jewelry store. this isn't some little mom and pop store. this is a huge chain of jewelry stores, and this apparently or allegedly had been going on. so i think there is still some examples of blatant discrimination. but it's more complicated. but politics is simple. assessing what the pay gap is in every state and locale is a complicated exercise. the white house was a little embarrassed. politics simplifies things. women get this. >> let me just -- before we have to take a break here, i want to get sandra one more question. it's the question that molly raised. we've heard from democrats since 2009, the big sort of signature

achievement of president obama on this issue was the lilly ledbetter fair pay act. why do you need the paycheck fairness act? what specifically does that do that the lilly ledbetter act didn't do? >> thank you so much for asking, because i really want to clarify this. the lilly ledbetter act fixed a loophole that the supreme court opened up in a very damaging decision. it was not actually a step forward on ratifying -- on rectifying this concern. it was fixing a problem the supreme court created. the paycheck fairness act, on the other hand, would be the first legislation in decades, in like 40 to 50 years to actually move us forward. and it does that by making sure that women's access to the courts is very similar to folks who are discriminated against on the basis of race in their pay. this is not some sort of new radical litigation that women would be able to bring in the courts. this is the type of litigation and protection against discrimination that other groups have enjoyed for a long time and

that builds on the work from 40 or 50 years ago. >> i want to thank sandra for getting up so early and joining us this morning. i know molly wanted to get in and she will as soon as we come back from this break. uhhh. no, that can't happen. that's the thing, you don't know how long it has to last. everyone has retirement questions. so ameriprise created the exclusive.. confident retirement approach. now you and your ameripise advisor can get the real answers you need. well, knowing gives you confidence. start building your confident retirement today. salesgets up to 795 highwayal is the passamiles per tank.sel salesperson #2: actually, we're throwing in a $1,000 fuel reward card. we've never done that. that's why there's never been a better time to buy a passat tdi clean diesel. husband: so it's like two deals in one? salesperson #2: exactly. avo: during the first ever volkswagen tdi clean diesel event, get a great deal on a passat tdi, that gets up to 795 highway miles per tank. and get a $1,000 fuel reward card.

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we're leading an american revolution just like abigail adams encouraged us. if they forget the ladies, we're here to fight. so i say square your shoulders, put your lipstick on, and let's fight another day. >> wednesday after the paycheck fairness act failed to reach a vote in the senate, that is the second barbara mikulski clip we've shown. but molly, i wanted you to say something before the braechblg. >> i think the problem for republicans is they don't have a good answer on this. so even if there are a lot of

problematic aspects of what the democrats are saying here, you just played a bunch of clips of middle-aged white men basically telling all the ladies that this isn't a problem. and women feel this very viscerally. so to tell them that they're exaggerating, or that it's all in their head does not go over well. that sort of classic man-splaining. so i think republicans have a lot of work to do themselves and that is quite alienating. >> i know they were concerned about what you're talking about, and they made more of a concerted effort, like kathy mcmorris rogers giving the state of the union response this year, in terms of putting more female faces. but that hasn't turned into much so far, has it? >> well, they do that, but it's still going to be the case that the majority of republican politicians who are men are going to get this question and are going to have to answer it, and they need to find a way to answer it in a way that isn't oh, this isn't as much of a problem as democrats are saying,

don't worry your pretty little head about it. >> when he said it's not the number one problem, i thought yeah, but it's sure as heck the number one frustration. when you're sitting there every day getting paid less than men are. >> celinda, there was also -- there was a democratic retreat, house democrats had their annual retreat. i think this was back in february. rosa de loro, she gave a presentation, and you should note she's actually married to a top democratic pollster. >> she is. >> probably some of his data was part of this presentation, but the presentation was titled "unmarried women: they will elect you if you get it right." i showed that graphic at the start of the show, the huge disparity between married women who actually vote republican and unmarried women who are hugely democratic in how they vote. where did that come from? how long has that been a reality in american politics? >> it's a huge change in the last ten to 20 years. and now today, half of america is unmarried. so 20 years ago, when we were talking about gender gap, it was

all about everyone was married. half of women, half of american households are unmarried today. the other dramatic data is the increase in unmarried moms. in 1980, 18% of births were to unmarried moms. today it's 42% of births are to unmarried moms. so our society is dramatically changing and i think this is where molly has a good point. these white married for the most part republicans men just seem completely out of touch with modern america. the other thing i think that's extremely important is that men support equal pay. we just did focus groups a couple of weeks ago, and one of the guys said -- maybe not the most liberated language. if the little lady doesn't make a fair salary, i have to work overtime, and i can't get overtime. so the little lady and her husband are pretty upset about this lack of equal pay in this economy. >> it used to be married women in the suburbs decided elections, and that is the cohort that the republicans did very well with. but now the crown jewel of the electorate is women, and we have

so many single women, for whatever reason, throughout life. and they are -- they rely more on government. so the pro-government appeal works with these women. the anti-government rhetoric of the republicans really falls flat. >> and so that becomes the question for the year like 2014 when you look at, you know, just will those voters show up. you can ask the same question about any of these -- the coalition of the assendence. is there any reason to think that unlike 2010, single women, for instance, are going to show up in measurable numbers in 2014? >> i think in 2010, the white house took their eye after the ball and you had the whole anti-tea party government rhetoric arose. there's a whole set of issues under the heading of what the democratic party can do for you, basically.

i think democrats are hoping it will work, and the counter is obamacare. if we're going to talk about show votes. one show vote on paycheck fairness versus, what, 50? >> is there an issue -- if single women and any other voting group are really engaged day-to-day in following politics, then presumably they would see this and have the response democrats are hoping. but are they watching? that seems to be the issue when we talk about the obama coalition. it seems to be a coalition that tunes in in the presidential year. i'm not sure it's necessarily tuned in in 2014 to even hear what's going on right now. >> i mean, every little bit probably helps for the democrats. i don't see any evidence in the current polling or the current match-ups, which let's not forget are state by state and district by district. that there's some great sea change in sort of long-term turnout trends. there's some interesting work change by another democratic pollster, margie romero, pointing out that the falloff

among women or single women is not any greater than every other group. everybody falls off in the midterms, so let's not blame women. the problem is the people who come out for midterms don't vote for democrats. and so there's a persuasion that has to be done here of the people that are going to come out and vote as well as there's a turnout equation, but that turnout -- that turnout hill, so to speak, is a steep hill to climb for democrats, and there's a lot of talk about sophisticated campaign techniques, all these data tricks and sort of magic that they're going to do. i would be surprised if we see a huge departure from what usually happens. >> i think this can be -- the war on women in 2012 was the gift that kept on giving. i mean, if you had said we're going to win the elections by redefining rape, banning abortions, banning plan parenthood, i would say stop drinking on the job. now they're starting all over again. they're saying women, you've made this up, this isn't that big a problem. if this kind of war on women

continues, then you're going to see fired upturnout. >> well, yeah. >> irritation and frustration are more motivating than satisfaction. >> especially if one of these primaries ends up nominating a todd akin equivalent, that will be a powerful thing. we'll see what happens. my thanks to celinda. coming up next, the white house had a chance to take another victory lap on health reform and decided to do the exact opposite. we're still trying to figure out why. but first, the missing on the hunt for that missing malaysia airlines passenger jet. the fifth straight day no new signals. that means the batteries may have finally died. they usually only last about 30 days. flight 370 has been missing for more than a month now. once officials are confident the batteries really are gone, then underwater submersibles will be sent down to look for the black boxes. investigators also expanded the search zone today. they are now scanning more than

22,000 miles of surface of the indian ocean for signs of possible wreckage. up to 12 planes and 14 ships are taking part in today's search. we'll have more information as it becomes available and we'll be right back. up. a short word that's a tall order. up your game. up the ante. and if you stumble, you get back up. up isn't easy, and we ought to know. we're in the business of up. everyday delta flies a quarter of million people while investing billions improving everything from booking to baggage claim.

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are those great-tasting little o's made from carefully selected oats that can help lower cholesterol. is it a superhero? kinda. ♪ for a while on thursday, it seemed like kathleen sebelius was having a good day. on capitol hill, the secretary of health and human services announced that 7.5 million people have signed up for health coverage under the affordable care act. 400,000 additional americans on top of the 7.1 million that president obama announced at the beginning of the month. the new figure taking into account the last-minute surge of enrollments that came in just under the deadline at the end of the month. the announcement seemed like a perfect opportunity for the obama administration to take another loop around the track in a victory lap, touting the successful enrollment of its signature legislative achievement. but later that same afternoon, this happened. >> hhs secretary kathleen sebelius is resigning.

>> she is stepping down tomorrow. >> sebelius has been under fire. >> over the disastrous launch of the health care law. >> the not so grand opening. >> horrible rollout. >> full of problems. >> that is her legacy. that will absolutely define her for all time. >> that was the takeaway on kathleen sebelius on thursday. instead of talking about the nearly half a million more people who now have insurance because of health reform, the media was once again focusing on the shaky rollout of implementing the affordable care act. it was all the result of the white house stepping on its own message. president obama choosing this week to accept the secretary's resignation and announced he's nominating silvia burwell to replace her.ylvia burwell to replace her. >> we're going to do a challenge. i'm going to try and download

every movie ever made and you're going to try and sign up for obama care and we'll see which happens first. >> okay. okay. >> so why now? why is kathleen sebelius resigning six months later when the news about the affordable care act is suddenly worth crowing about? is she really getting the chance to go out on a high note or is her very departure reminding everyone of the law's shaky start and why does the white house seem unwilling to celebrate a hard won success? we still have molly ball with the atlantic and joining the table is beth fui, and sarah cliff, senior editor at the new website vox. so this sebelius departure this week -- look, she issued an e-mail i think to the hhs department. she spelled her successor's name wrong. she was at the press conference. turned out she had forgotten a page and had to stop her speech awkwardly. some people said this was a very fitting reminder of her tenure. i can't help but look at this and say look, if you were going to fire her, if you thought she

was screwing thins up, it would have made perfect sense to do it last october, last november. but the story now is hey, they all turned it around, they all got it right. presumably that means kathleen sebelius turned it around and got it right. so i'm just stumped. why the sudden need for her to leave? >> you're right. i think this president is very resistant to sort of having people walk the plank. last october when the glitchy rollout happened, it was like calls from republicans and democrats, to sebelius's head. she screwed this one up. he tends to really resist that kind of thing. think about the other cabinet official who he sticks with through thick and thin, eric holder who's been around forever. he was not going to clip her off then. he let her continue on, the website obviously improved. enrollment surged. it actually really turned out to be a success. he probably had it in his back pocket that she was going to have to leave at some point because of what happened. and he did sort of let her go out on a high note. let's face it, they really did have success toward the end of this rollout.

but you're right. it was a bit of stepping on the message. it was reminding people of the glitches. and then there was all the anonymous sniping in a lot of news organizations by obama's aides saying well, you know, we were really mad about the way that she kind of screwed things up. that was a bit unseemly. the woman was in the job for five years. it's an incredibly, ridiculously unwieldy place to run anyway. and then to manage the rollout of the biggest social program in 50 years, there were going to be some bumps. and ultimately, it went okay. the timing's a little odd, but she is going out on a high note. >> see, that's what i kind of wonder about. it's designed to let her go out on a high note. they can say it's in context of 7.5 million enrollments. we play the clips from fox news from conservatives who have been calling for her head for a long time. they don't care there's a six-month delay. it's another sign the law is collapsing, that's how it's being interpreted over there. the question comes to me, why did she have to go? i mean, if she viewed up in

october and november and we can all say that, but then she got it right and they exceeded the number that was their goal and things are more or less working now. if you give somebody a second chance and they take advantage of it and they do a good job, why do they still have to go? >> i totally agree with beth that there were those calls months ago. you know, that sebelius should step down and obama was very resistant to having someone walk the plank. i think the view -- and this is what i heard from some administration officials, was that by early march, sebelius felt things had taken a turn for the better and it was the right time to hand off the leadership. she's become -- and i think this would have been true of any hhs head during this time. she's become a very polarizing figure. she's essentially the public face of obamacare, and that comes with, you know, just being very polarizing at this moment. so i think the expectation was once we got through open enrollment that things were a little bit more solid footing, but she could make an exit. i didn't expect it would be so quickly after the end of open

enrollment. this is about a week after people could start signing up. but it seems like the view within the white house is that things are on solid footing. it would have looked much worse to have her step down in october when things were going terribly. now that things have rebounded a little bit, they can make this transition a little bit easier. >> so what do we know about going forward now, sylvia burwell is taking her place. is that a statement about -- is the white house confident now that fine, we survived under sebelius, but now we've got somebody who's really more capable of handling the enrollment and handling the next phase of that? is that part of what they're trying to say here? >> what you heard in the rose garden presentation of burwell is obama made sure to mention that she was nominated on a unanimous vote, reminding republicans they're going to have to come up with something new if they want to object to her now, which they will. we already have republicans foreshadowing that this is going to be their new chance to

relitigate obamacare. that they're going to get her on the stand and call her out for all the things that have already happened, get her to talk about what has happened to date. the other thing that he mentioned and that she mentioned is that she is someone who's passionate about health care. she was in a budget job, but she has spent her career looking at health care issues, working with health care issues. so i think the idea is to position her as sort of a capable bureaucrat, someone who has come up through the bureaucracy instead of being a politician. i think a lot of people in the white house were surprised that kathleen sebelius wasn't a more skilled politician in that job. she had been the governor of a very republican state who was very well-regarded, a popular governor of kansas, and yet when she got to the cabinet, she seemed completely unable to manage the politics of this, and there were questions about, you know, her management style within the bureaucracy. not to pile on someone who's out the door. but that's sort of the rap on sebelius, that maybe she didn't -- in a position that was going to be tough no matter what, she didn't necessarily help herself. >> i wonder, too, some of the

timing here since the fall over the last six months, the rules in the senate changed as well. in terms of executive branch nominations. republicans can put up a fight over the new hss secretary, but no longer can they kill that nomination w6ith 60 votes. could vermont and single payer be a game changer? we're going to talk about a very interesting experiment taking place up there after this. [bell rings] [prof. burke] at farmers,we believe what you don't know can hurt you. like what if you didn't know to get coverage

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affordable care act, is pretty complex. everything is run through the states via exchanges and the private insurance industry is maintained, it's really strengthened when you look at it. a myriad of plans all different. how good the plans that are offered are. it really depends entirely on where you live with one constant, single payer is off the table. that is unless you happen to live in the state of vermont. in vermont they passed a law in 2010 that requires that statewide -- the single payer health care program be in place by 2016. it's a law the state's democratic governor campaigned on in 2010, that he said is confident can be implemented just three years from now. as sarah cliff reported, it could provide a model for other states. but there are also huge challenges to getting this off the ground in vermont. the state's budge set about $2.7 billion. this program alone would cost two billion. so where's that money going to

come from? that's just one of the concerns. but joining the conversation to talk about this, we have chris pearson. he's a leader of the progressive party there. his party was responsible for pushing vermont and its governor in the single payer health care system. and chris, we should point out, different states have parties that sprout up. the progressive party is a separate party. a couple members of the legislature. you're one of them. so you have been behind the push for this single payer law in vermont. two obstacles that come to mind right away is the cost. $2 billion price tag on this. second, that you guys would need a waiver from washington, d.c. in order for your state to do this. can you answer those two questions? where does the money come from and how on earth are you going to get a waiver from washington to set single payer up? >> well, if i could just answer those right now, steve, i guess we'd be done already. they're big questions. particularly, how do you raise the $2 billion? the waiver is in a sense for other people to figure out. and to the extent that leaders

in washington and folks in the obama administration are interested in seeing if a state can pull this off. you know, we're told that they're watching closely, and the affordable care act has involved many pieces where states have been given permission and in fact money to experiment, so we're hopeful they'll continue that trend as they look at our waiver. >> so make your case then, taxpayers in vermont to people watching in washington, why does vermont need a single payer health care system and what would it look like? >> well, first of all, we have about 620,000 people in the entire state of vermont, and if you ran a company and you had about 600,000 employees, you would be insane not to self-insure. you would immediately go that direction, all of your economic advisers would tell you to do that. in essence, that's what we want to do in vermont. we have a small community. we are very community-minded. and we understand that you can cover everybody and save money if you go to a universal system.

the politics of doing that is difficult, but we have enormous grass roots pressure. you have people like me, progressives and others, you have bernie sanders, who have been pushing for this for going on 30 years in vermont. and a strong grass roots network that has propped that up. so the politics, those dynamics are favorable i think in vermont. the real trick is we already have a lot of vermonters who are insured. we're up in the 90 percents of coverage. i think what it means is we don't have an enormous problem with the uninsured. we like most states have a lot of underinsured people, so it's very financially difficult for them. they have insurance, but god help you if you get sick is the idea that i think we're all familiar with. so the question is what's the transition going to look like for people as we shift to a new slightly exotic sounding universal single payer system?

i think we can pull that off. but the politics of that is delicate and when you throw in a big tax bill, it's difficult. i've got to remind you, though, steve, we're spending well over $2 billion in premiums today in vermont, so when we talk about raising $2 billion in taxes, it's important to point out that we're going to save more than 2 billion when we take away premiums. >> sarah, you are the health care policy expert at the table. this is what you write about. can you try to put what's happening in vermont in context nationally? because the governor has been quoted as basically saying look, this is a test. this is like if we can pull this off, other states, the rest of the country will notice this and single payer nationally might have a chance. if we botch it, single payer nationally is probably dead for a long time. is the country looking at this? is this something feasible what they're trying to do? >> i think so. i think vermont's in a very small state.

there have been other governors who have talked about this idea, but no one's actually gotten it this far. peter shumlin was the first statewide candidate democrat to run on a single payer platform. some of the activists there were shocked that someone used single payer and they weren't attacking it in an ad, saying this was a thing we want to do. if you look at neighboring massachusetts, their experiment in 2006 with universal coverage, that's what led to obamacare. i don't think it would be as quickly -- if the massachusetts timeline held five years later, single payer country. i don't think that's happening. but i think vermont is a bit of a litmus test. if it can happen there, it opens some doors in other states. if it can't happen in a deeply progressive, very liberal state, it's going to be very hard for any other state to try and do this. so i really think they're being watched and this part about finding the $2 billion, that is the hardest part. vermont is a small state, as you mentioned. their budget is about $2.7

million. so telling people -- it is true, they are paying more in premiums now, but saying we're nearly going to double the revenue we're taking from our citizens, even in vermont, that's a pretty tough sell. that's going to be a big lift for the government there. >> we've got to squeeze a break in here, but the idea of single payer health care, this has been something on the dream list of a lot of progressives for a long time. i imagine a lot of them look at what's happening in vermont and say maybe this is part of the process that gets us there. so i want to look at it from that national perspective and find out a little bit more, because single payer can mean a lot of things. find out what that would mean and look like in vermont. we'll be right back. the conditions in new york state are great for business. new york is ranked #2 in the nation for new private sector job creation. and now it's even better because they've introduced startup new york - dozens of tax-free zones where businesses pay no taxes for ten years. you'll get a warm welcome in the new new york. see if your business qualifies at startupny.com

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how much money do you think you'll need when you retire? then we gave each person a ribbon to show how many years that amount might last. i was trying to, like, pull it a little further. [ woman ] got me to 70 years old. i'm going to have to rethink this thing. it's hard to imagine how much we'll need for a retirement that could last 30 years or more. so maybe we need to approach things differently, if we want to be ready for a longer retirement. ♪ chris, our vermont state legislator, i want to start by going back to you. sarah was talking about in vermont, the politics are one of the more liberal states in the country. maybe a little more friendly to this. but when you look nationally, you raise the idea of single payer health care, people start talking about canada. people start talking about wait times. oh, my goodness, it took me 18 months to go in and get some routine procedure done.

i mean, that's what you're sort of up against. i know there are different models. canada's single payer looks different than the united kingdom's single payer. what would it look like in vermont? do you have a particular model in mind, and how do you answer that concern that always gets raised about it's going to mean more wait times and more bureaucracy for me as a health care consumer? >> yeah, well, a couple things. there's a lot of myths out there, particularly about the canadian system. and since we're so close to the border, we hear a lot of them. but we also meet a lot of canadians and they love their health care system and think ours is insane. exactly what ours is going to look like is difficult to imagine. we have pegged it as a sort of floor for what gets covered and that would be the basic services that are in the exchange plans. but a lot of the details really are going to depend on exactly how we finance it. so is there going to be a $5 co-pay or a $20 co-pay or no co-pay. that is hard to answer without understanding exactly which

taxes we're raising and from whom. the basic idea is that if you live in vermont, you get health coverage. by right of citizenship. and also that the docs and the hospitals don't have to think of you as a vermonter with cigna. they think of you as a vermonter with strep throat and they give you what they think is best and some back office employee figures out how the bill is paid. another challenge we have is folding in medicare. folding in tricare and federal insurance programs that vermont doesn't regulate. we're not going to just say don't worry about that, we're going to pay the bill. we're going to have to incorporate them into our system. which is a challenge, but it's not insurmountable. >> just quickly, before -- one question to beth about the national politics of this. because, you know, when the affordable care act was passed, a lot of democrats were

disappointed that it didn't go farther, that it kept the private insurance industry alive. now they're saying we've got this place and it seems to be working pretty well. do you think there's still a thirst there nationally for democrats to use the affordable care act as almost like a steppingstone to single payer eventually, or do you think that -- the appetite for health care reform in the democratic side has been satisfied with what's been done? >> i think there's an appetite for single payer. at least for a public option. but i was really thinking about this during the argument around hobby lobby, the supreme court case about whether or not employers need to provide contraceptive coverage. and it struck me as really showing the fallacy of this employer-based health care. why are employers getting involved in somebody's birth control decision? i mean, it's a very strange kind of intimate place for your employer to be. and so to take the employer out of it, to make it a place where everybody can go, regardless of what they need and get the health care without somebody sort of judging what they should and could be able to purchase in that employer's insurance.

it's fundamental to our health care system, but it's really a shaky kind of ground. i think this experiment in vermont could give the opportunity for people to say look, there is another way to do it. if not single payer, at least a public option for people to consider. >> we'll be watching. the law says by 2017. might take aly longer. we're going to keep our eyes on vermont to see how it plays out. i want to thank chris pearson, sarah cliff, and beth fouhy, thank you for coming in. who's ready to see another bush in the white house? is the republican party? is america? is his own mother? we'll try to answer all those questions ahead.

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just this week, jenna bush hager was asked whether she'd like to see another bush in the white house, and she answered "not any time soon." we know where certain members of the bush family stand on the question of a jeb bush 2016 run, but where does jeb stand with everyone else? we'll try to tackle that next. see, i figured low testosterone would decrease my sex drive...

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republican mega donor ken langone suggested the baggage of the bush name would hinder jeb bush in a 2016 bid for the white house. the same interview, he touted new jersey governor chris christie as a better candidate, although he added that if christie ends up being connected in any way to the george washington bridge scandal, "i'd be off him because he engaged in something utterly stupid, and if he's that stupid, he can't be president of the united states." other top republicans may not even be that patient with christie as the scandals wear on, whereas christie was supposedly going to be his party's establishment favorite for 2016, it's now jeb who seems to be getting an audition for that role. of course, there are other issues with jeb, too. the column titled "why jeb bush is a terrible candidate," ben smith, the editor-in-chief of buzz feed wrote this week that one of the biggest marks against him is being out of touch with the party's key constituencies on immigration. smith cited this comment, which jeb made a week ago today.

>> the way i look at this is someone who comes to our country because they couldn't come legally, they come to our country because their family -- a dad who loved their children was worried that their children didn't have food on the table. and they wanted to make sure their family was intact. and they crossed the border because they had no other means to work to be able to provide for their family. yes, they broke the law. but it's not a felony. it's kind of -- it's an act of love. it's an act of commitment to your family. i honestly think that that is a different kind of crime. >> and as you probably heard, those comments sparked a bit of a fire storm with conservatives voicing outrage over bush's framing of the issue. with many on the left end of the spectrum who don't usually have much nice to say about jeb bush, pronouncing themselves surprised and delighted by his words. in another speech on thursday night, bush stood by his

remarks. after a long time follower of national politics and bush family politics in particular, maybe this episode has a familiar ring to it, because it should. calls to mind a key moment in the rise of jeb's brother, george w. to the republican nomination and to the presidency nearly 15 years ago. back in september 1999 when then texas governor george w. bush was then the frontrunner for his party's presidential nomination, criticized the budget plan of the republican house majority. this was the same gop majority that miscalculated badly in its drive to impeach bill clinton, suffered a shocking loss of seats in the 1998 midterms and that under newt gingrich's leadership racked up poisoonous poll numbers. this is the story of bill clinton's presidency. republicans seized power in congress, then they proceeded to turn off broad swaths of the country with their far right ideology and anti-clinton antics. politically, those house republicans were in a way the best thing that ever happened to

bill clinton. they gave him something to run against. something to tell americans he was protecting them from. and these are the conditions out of which the george w. bush campaign arose. the republican establishment was sick of its party coming across as heartless and extreme compared to clinton, and bush offered them a solution. he would run as a compassionate conservative. do you remember that term? so bush would be the republican who could win back the voters who had been turned off by the gop congress and he would carry the party back to a white house victory after eight years in the dark. that was the promise of the bush campaign. and that budget plan that house republicans were offering in the fall of 1999 became his chance to show the political world what he meant. the house gop had proposed delaying tax breaks for low-income families and bush issued a surprising public rebuke of the plan, saying, "i don't think they ought to balance their budget on the backs of the poor." there were plenty of conservatives who blasted bush for saying that, who branded him a traitor to their cause, just

as there were plenty of democrats who found themselves singing his praises. senate democrats like dick durbin and tom hearken even quoted him on the senate floor back then. ended up being a key moment for bush, one that sent a signal to the press and to those outside the core republican base that he was a different kind of republican than what the country had been seeing on capitol hill, that he was a republican who knew how to win a national election. reaction included praise from the media, good poll numbers, with all voters, not just republicans, and it helped to separate bush from the impeachment hysteria that designed the gingrich era gop. by the end, even commentators like rush limbaugh were onboard, too. limbaugh made his displeasure with bush's comments known, but when the primaries rolled around, bush had no bigger booster than limbaugh, and really the entire conservative opinion shaping class. bush won them over by passing most of their litmus tests, but picking just a few moments to tell the rest of the country that he was a different kind of republican. that experience may have been on rush limbaugh's mind this week when he offered a more clinical

assessment of jeb bush's immigration comment than most of his fellow conservatives. >> i think what jeb's doing in preparation for maybe running, jeb is saying things to get this conservative backlash to him out of the way. i really think when he says hey, people come in here as an act of love, that's designed to tick us all of, or tick the tea party people off now. get it done with and over with and then out of the way, and move on. >> the question is whether that same george w. playbook from 2000 will work in the republican party of 2016. it's also the question of whether hillary clinton runs, something we can't be entirely sure of at this point, especially given the thoughts she expressed earlier this week in san francisco. >> i would be -- i would be the first to say we're having a political period of frankly

dysfunction. i saw it from afar when i was secretary, and it was disheartening, and even embarrassing to see people arguing about letting us default on our debt. i mean, really. and things that were just so beyond the pale. you had to ask yourself, what kind of country do they really want? >> everyone's analyzing every word that hillary says about 2016, and you can read those words either way. is she hinting that she's so frustrated with where american politics are today that she may not want to endure another four or eight years of what she and her husband experienced in the '90s? or is she starting to lay out the justification for a candidacy, diagnosing an ailment for which she will eventually offer herself as the cure? if hillary does run, will it make republicans more likely to turn to someone like jeb bush, someone who might tick the base off now and then in the name of winning what could be a very difficult general election for the gop? if hillary doesn't run and the white house suddenly looks much less difficult for them to take, might it embolden republicans to spurn the jeb bushes of their

party and pick rand paul instead? this is what we've been hearing about the republican party forever, it seems. they're finally ready to pick a true believer. but it keeps not happening. romney, mccain, bush jr., dole, bush sr. and now here's jeb with a sudden opening thanks to chris christie's troubles, taking a page from his brother's book and reaping the same headli headlines, the same media buzz and the same rebukes on the right. yes, jeb bush hasn't run in an election since 2002. you can argue that he's been out of the arena too long. he's just not in step with today's gop. but you could also argue that for all the talk, mush of it completely valid about how far to the right the gop has moved, jeb bush is still exactly the kind of candidate his party always ends up going with. here to discuss all this is molly ball with the atlantic. she's still with us. mark mccain, a former adviser to president george w. bush. also co-founder of the bipartisan group no labels. democratic pollster celinda lake is back at the table. so we do a long setup there

about the bushes, and we obviously have to turn to our resident bush expert mark mckinnen. you can remember 2000 very well. when you look at what jeb bush was doing this week, did you see shades of what george w. bush was doing at the end of the clinton years? >> absolutely. the comparison goes back even further. when you think about what happened with gingrich. and the republican party paid the consequences for that. at that time, where i was a leaning conservative democrat independent kind of growing more conservative, there was this governor of texas named george w. bush talking about two issues, immigration reform and education reform. and that was the kind of thing that really got my attention and drew a lot of conservative democrats and independents across the bridge to join the republican party and support george w. bush.

i think the republican party has changed, but i don't think america has changed. so i think it's these kind of issues that jeb bush is speaking out on that require real leadership. and i love the idea that it's an act of love. and he went into the propellers on that, but i gave him great credit for speaking his heart. that moment reminds me a lot of george w. bush, speaking their heart on these tough issues that require leadership in the party. now, obviously, if he dd decido run, it's going to be a different primary. >> that's the question, though, i guess here. you're saying the country is still the same, but the party is different. >> yeah. >> so could a republican like jeb bush get away with what george w. bush did in terms of distancing himself on questions like that? could he get away with that? >> the answer is it will be very difficult. more difficult than it used to be. he'll have to endure a lot of pain in the early primaries. but if you look at the primary calendar, he may have difficulty in iowa, new hampshire, maybe even south carolina. but after that, the primary calendar actually gets really good for him where you have florida, michigan, wisconsin,

minnesota, super tuesday. so if he can grind it out and says he wants to be a joyful candidate, it's going to be hard. but if he can, he'll raise a ton of money, he'll have the establishment behind him. and if he can motor through, he can win a general election. and the irony is that the bush baggage, this is a race that he can run because he's running against a clinton. >> let's give you a sense of what this comment said on the republican side, what this comment would look like in the context of a republican primary. this was rand paul on friday, he was reacting to jeb bush's act of love comments. and he said, i think it wasn't the most artful way of saying something, but i think he was well-intentioned. if i were to make the same point, i would say the people who seek the american dream are not bad people, but that doesn't mean you can invite the whole world to come." we've seen how immigration, the question of immigration, when george w. bush was president kind of ripped the republican party apart. we've seen how the few republican senators got behind the reform idea last year.

house republicans are saying absolutely not. this is still an issue, the party basically refuses to budge on. in that context, what do you make of what jeb bush said this week? >> a couple things. i think jeb bush is clearly testing the waters. sending a message that he is not going to run away from the positions that he's always held. that if he is going to run, he is going to do it by forcefully defending the things that he believes in. and he knows what he's doing. he know where is the party is now. but he also knows that the party really wants to win. you know, i was in new hampshire yesterday, and rand paul was on the program, ted cruz was on the program, mike huckabee was on the program, donald trump was on the program. and he took a shot at yeb bush, saying this isn't love. what are you talking jeb bush, saying this isn't love. what are you talking about? that's out there. multiple speakers also mentioning the common core standards, which jeb bush and his foundation have been very forceful backers of. that is also a pretty big deal on the right. the question is how many of them are there and are they going to

be split between a bunch of candidates in the republican primary, the way they were in 2012 so that the establishment candidate ends up being the one that the most -- who becomes the consensus candidate, especially when he has the money. i think there's still a realistic shot for that. >> yeah. when people say look, the party has changed so much, the establishment candidate for lack of a better term can't win, i say just look at the path that mitt romney took in 2012. it wasn't necessarily pretty. there's some states that he just couldn't win, but in the end, there were enough illinoiss, michigan, florida, whatever it was, that he could pull it out. i wonder, as a democrat, we were hearing for a long time, chris christie, this would be the most formidable republican candidate. i happened to believe it. i thought that chris christie before all this would be the most formidable republican candidate. if chris christie is not a candidate or is just permanently reduced because of this, do you look at jeb bush and say this is the next most formidable obstacle to democrats holding on to the white house in 2016?

>> i do and i don't. on the one hand, certainly these positions that are such a problem in the primary are very popular with the general electorate. i mean, the general electorate believes enough. the system is broken. people move here. people move all over the country for the same reason that they move into the country. this is a very powerful dialogue that he uttered. and his education proposals are very popular with the public. that said, when you get this beat up in a republican primary and you get shaken around, you limp out of that primary with a part of your base demoralized and hard to turn out, and you have a number of opportunities to make mistakes and take wrong positions. i think the other thing that's interesting is it's not like the bush record is remembered that fondly by the voters. the clinton record is remembered quite fondly. take women, for example. 59% of women have a favorable view of hillary clinton. 31% of women today in the general election have a

favorable view of jeb bush. >> so i want to pick that up in the next segment, because there is that idea of hey, if the republicans are going to bring back a bush, democrats seem likely at this point to bring back a clinton. we'll look at the hillary side of it too when we come back. i'm m-a-r-y and i have copd. i'm j-e-f-f and i have copd. i'm l-i-s-a and i have copd, but i don't want my breathing problems to get in the way of hosting my book club. that's why i asked my doctor about b-r-e-o.

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i am obviously flattered and, you know, deeply honored to have people ask me and people encourage me, and i am thinking about it, but i am going to continue to think about it for a while. >> as former secretary of state hillary clinton speaking about her plans for 2016. so, mark, in the last segment, celinda was talking about there's this clinton nostalgia

that have played up. both bill and hillary, they've reached numbers they haven't reached before in their public lives. it's why hillary is so formidable on the democratic side. the thing i want to ask you about the bush name. ken langone, big republican donor. he said yesterday in an interview that jeb bush would have baggage. and this is what he said. you've got to take into account the bush name. his mother said it. we've had enough bushes for a while. his brother did not leave with the highest level of popularity and that comes with a burden. i can remember hillary running against jeb, what a field day the media would have. ready for another bush. ready for another afghanistan. ready for another iraq. ready for another collapse of the banking system. that's a lot of baggage. only eight years since george w. bush left office in 2016. how much is he weighted down by this? >> i think it's offset by the fact that he's running against a clinton. first of all, president bush as george w. bush's popularity has

come back surprisingly. in recent polls, he's more popular than president obama. and he's very popular with republicans. and the other thing is i'd say jeb bush is a very different guy than his brother. in tone and substance and style. he's just very different. i think that people will get that. i think he'll say i love my brother, but i'm a different candidate, i'm a different guy and i think people will recognize that. but i think there's also a great deal of good will about george h. w. bush and basically the bush family name. i think people are very fond of the bushes generally. >> a lot of people say the good will towards george h. w. is because of the mistakes george w. made. >> i think generally, there's a great deal of good will toward both the bushes and the clintons, surprisingly, with all we've been through. that's why i say there's a reflex when you talk to people and say this next election could be clinton versus bush. at first they recoil and go oh, my god, not again. we don't need more dynastic politics. but then they think about it for a beat and go, you know what, that would be a pretty great race. very high level, both very substantive, both respectful of

each other. kind of a post-partisan hew to it. the debates would be fantastic. represent broadly the middle of america. >> it's interesting, too, because that was always -- you've got to go way back 20 years, sort of an obscure political history story, but george w. bush and jeb bush were on the ballot the same night in 1994, florida and texas. there's always a talk that jeb was supposed to be the one with the national future, not george w. and sort of this accident of history that the governor of florida was able to survive, beat jeb bush and anne richards could not beat george w. and here's jeb 20 years later. but to take it back to the hillary angle, this is something we raised in the opening as well. i'm kind of wondering, the republican party looking at hillary clinton right now, looking at formidable she'd be. and then there's just this huge gap. we saw a poll this beak, i think it might have been iowa. hillary clinton, 65%. it was like elizabeth warren 12, joe biden 12. it's hillary and a gap of 50 points and then whoever else

comes next. do you think that affects republican thinking at all? strategically on who they're going to nominate. if it's hillary, are they more serious about getting a candidate who can win. if hillary's not running, do they start to think a little more creatively? >> well, look, the problem i think people have with dynasties is that these aren't regular people. right? these are people from the political class. these are people who were sort of born into it, or at least have already had a career in it, and in the case of the clintons, but that's the point. if you have someone like hillary clinton who is a mega celebrity, one of the most famous people in the world, you've got to put someone up against her who isn't a regular person either. you've got to put somebody up against her who brings something, some sort of special something to the table. so i do think she is going to make republicans think a lot more seriously about the electability argument, even people far to the right of jeb bush on some issues are going to say kind of like the democrats did in 2004 with john kerry. maybe our hearts are with howard dean, but we need someone who

looks good on paper. >> and then they found out how well that worked. >> but i do think that republicans, having lost the popular vote in five of the last six presidential elections are feeling very concerned with electability in 2016. they really want someone who's going to be able to appeal to a general electorate. you have a lot of republican candidates making their electability arguments now. rand paul saying he can assemble a new coalition and the base is going to want to hear that. >> and celinda, i just wonder -- i don't know if concern is the right word, but on the democratic side, your party clearly has a strong candidate in position if she decides to run. i would argue no candidate would be better positioned, not incumbent in modern history. if hillary clinton doesn't run, is there any concern on the democratic side that we're not quite prepared for this scenario? when you see the gaps in the polling nra ining scenarios, is anyone democrats are excited

about? >> yeah, i think it would be easy to have lots of other democratic candidates. i think that right now, no one can get any oxygen because of the real enthusiasm among democrats and the real enthusiasm among women will this country for hillary clinton. but if you asked not in contrast to hillary, but just in contrast to george w. bush, or jeb bush, for example, i think a lot of people would fare very well. we have a lot of good candidates. i think one of the things that's interesting, to go to molly's point is 2016 is going to be the first election where the majority of the electorate is the new electorate, the rising american electorate. so you have to ask yourself, who's going to appeal? on the one hand, you can argue it could be a younger, more modern candidate like rand paul coming outside the box, having some youth appeal. on the other hand, when jeb bush takes positions like a modern position, a current position on immigration and education, then maybe he's more appealing. but the republicans have a brand-new electorate in 2016 that they're going to have to

face that they've never won among. >> and brand-new electorate, brand-new world. i mean, bush vs. clinton. thanks to democratic pollster celinda lake, molly ball of the atlantic. when we come back, what's next for don draper and all his friends? we're going to party like it is 1969 with one of the actors from "mad men." our discussion straight ahead. , we have a personalized legal solution that's right for you. with easy step-by-step guidance, we're here to help you turn your dream into a reality. start your business today with legalzoom. we're here to help you turn your dream into a reality. while a body in motion tends to stay in motion. staying active can ease arthritis symptoms. but if you have arthritis, this can be difficult. prescription celebrex can help relieve arthritis pain, and improve daily physical function so moving is easier. because just one 200mg celebrex a day can provide 24 hour relief for many with arthritis pain. and it's not a narcotic

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they're scanning more than 22,000 miles of the surface of the indian ocean for signs of possible wreckage. 12 planes and 14 ships are taking part in today's search. more information as it becomes available. and we will be right back with one of the actors from "mad men." stay with us. say helto home defense max. kills bugs inside and prevents new ones for up to a year. ortho home defense max. get order. get ortho®. put it on my capital one i earn unlimited double miles. hey, you're not the charles barkley? yes i am. nah charles barkley is way taller. there's my picture on the wall. yeah that could be anyone. what about my jersey over there? oh yeah, that's your jersey. there's my bobble head right behind you. alright well let me see you bobble. yeah, i'm just not buying it man. earn unlimited double miles with no blackout dates from the capital one venture card. my brother john, he works here. john, you know this guy? what's in your wallet? ♪ you have to let me know

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♪ my mom works at ge. ♪ the long awaited new season of the acclaimed series "mad men" is tonight. i'm a big fan of the show personally, and i think one of the best things about the program is how it offers a very accurate time capsule of the 1960s, a very tumultuous decade. one of the things i liked most is peering into the politics of that time period. like in the first season, when the ad execs at sterling cooper were working pro bono on richard nixon's first presidential race against john f. kennedy. the politics of the '60s came full circle last year when the season closed with nixon winning the white house finally in 1968. we watched don draper and his wife megan reacting to the violence at that 1968 democratic

convention in chicago. >> are you watching this? >> yeah. it's hard to believe no one got killed. >> is that the only measure? can you imagine a policeman cracking your skull? that would change your whole life. >> honey, they're throwing rocks. be prepared for trouble. >> as viewers, we've experienced the '60s each character has navigated through a decade that's seen the country divided over civil rights, race relations, feminism, the war in vietnam. don draper first appears as the literal man in the gray flannel suit and could be viewed as the silent majority who helped elect nixon in 1968. his ex-wife betty probably never read "the feminine mystique", but we find her in the role that dan railed against in her revolutionary book. after divorcing don, she married henry francis, who served as an aid to nelson rockefeller, the governor of new york, before

joining us with new york mayor john lindsay, a liberal republican, who ended up running for the democratic presidential nomination in 1972. so her husband is one of those northeast republicans we mainly read about in history books these days, but it's not hard to see both betty and her husband following in the party line and voting nixon in the general election. guessing nixon's law and order message had appeal to a suburbanite like betty. and peggy olson represents the feminist struckle for equal rights in the workplace. her character provides a contrast to her colleague joan harris, who has to use her sexuality in order to win advancement at the office. the show might not exactly adhere to social consciousness or present a commentary on the pressing issues of the day, it's too well written and too subtle for that. as it enters its seventh season, set in the year 1969, it's entering the period where this nation began dividing itself between blue america and red america. quoting from rick pearlstein's book nixon land, what richard nixon left behind was the very terms of our national

self-image. a notion that there are two kinds of americans. on the one side, that silent majority, the middle class, middle americans, suburban, royal coalition who call themselves now values voters. people of faith. patriots, or even simply republicans. on the other side are the liberals, the cosmopolitans, the intellectuals, the professionals, democrats. same divide is very much alive today in the subsequent culture war is still raging. so how will "mad men" hand the turmoil of america at this critical time, the year that was ripe with woodstock, with neil armstrong taking his first steps on the moon with protesters demanding an end to the vietnam war, the modern gay riots movement. i'm anxious to see where "mad men" is going to take us. and we are lucky enough to have with us the actor who plays harry crane, rich summer. appreciate you getting up and taking part in the show this morning. i guess -- look, you guys like to keep the sort of state secrets here about what's going to happen.

as a viewer, i don't want to know too much. but is there any kind of juicy hints you could drop to fans of the show as season seven starts? we know it starts in california. anything you can tell us about this season? >> i can tell you that -- i can't tell you anything story-wise, obviously. but i can tell you that as far as pacing goes, it's sort of a different feeling season. you know, split into two halves for the first time. so the first seven episodes are going to air starting tonight, and the second seven will air spring of next year. and i think that they move at a faster clip. so we kind of hit the ground running tonight, and it kind of carries all the way through. >> it's interesting. so i wonder, we talk about the sort of the history that this show has sort of existed through so far in its universe. you've gone through the 1960s, a show that started with the hope that was embodied by john f. kennedy at the start of the '60s. the firm was working for richard nixon. but now you're at a point in

1969 where there's this real fracturing going on in america. i just wonder as an actor on the show, have you seen your character and the other characters of the show sort of shaped and changed by the sort of tumult in the country around them? have there been changes you've noticed in your character and other characters because of that? >> harry in particular sort of goes where the wind blows. i think he's -- his shaping is based mainly on what can make the most money at any given time. but certainly, you see that resonance throughout the office of how the climate of the time is affecting everyone, especially i think embodied in peggy, who clearly has benefited somewhat from a slight loosening of the strictures on women, very slight loosening that began sort of around that time. and that kind of reverberates

throughout. but yes, absolutely, every character -- whether it's roger, who's sort of railing against the changes that are happening, or peggy and joan, who are beginning to just barely benefit from them. yeah, it's prevalent. >> it's interesting, as you were talking there, we were just showing some of the pictures of your character through the previous seasons, and you can see the kind of radical changes in your wardrobe and the way you dress based on what part of the '60s you're in there. but i'll bring it to the panel here. one of the things that i sort of find interesting about "mad men," just thinking about sort of the politics of it, is just sort of like the characters in it representing certain types of people, types of voters who not only shape the politics of the period of the 1960s, but these are people who lived for another generation or two, in some cases would still be alive today and their experiences in the 1960s really shaped how they voted and how people like them voted. i noel noknow, eleanor you wrot

interesting piece where you went to set of "mad men," interviewed the actors, the actresses. you met with the actress who plays peggy olson and you told her you started out as a secretary at "newsweek" in the '60s and she said, i am you. >> she said to me, "i am you." exactly. i had never watched the show before i was given this assignment, so i did a crash course and interviewed these people. i thought, why do i have to watch the show? i lived this life. i starred as a secretary in an ad ingagency in a time when whi men were the gods of the earth. even when i started newsweek, the male writers, there were no women writers and you were supposed to do everything, make sure their pencils were sharpened to taking their dry cleaning to the office. and it took a while before women began to question that. and so it's so fascinating to watch this show, because you see the evolution. the men are kind of surprised at the changes that are happening around them, caught off guard. the women are asserting

themselves, and lo and behold, they prove to be very competent. and peggy is the epitome of that. if peggy were alive today, i'm sure she'd be in the hillary clinton camp. and she wouldn't be an out active feminist at the barricades, but she'd be cheering everybody on. >> i'm glad to know i'm not alone. i try to imagine, if they're alive today, what would their politics be? i kind of wonder -- by the way, orin joining us. welcome. i know you've written a little bit about this show. two other female characters in the show that interested me, too. there's joan who also works at sterling cooper, and she got a piece of ownership through a very difficult sort of moral decision that she had to make, and then, of course, you have don's ex-wife, who we talked about in the intro who lives in suburbia. i think of don's ex-wife as sort of the quintessential nixon

republican. i think of joan as somebody who would have gone on to be more of sort of a part of the democratic base. how do you think about those two characters and the experiences that they went through in this show? >> i think they also have different marital status. joan is divorced. betty is divorced and remarried. and peggy is always kind of single or in a relationship, and that kind of forms different political affinities, as we've seen across the board. but one of the things that's really interesting too is how you see that politics is about more than who you vote for. it's about -- it's in these everyday relationships and how they get a stake in the power game. so joan comes from a time where your sexuality is basically your best bet at getting a place. or being completely sort of asexual and buttoned up. the relationship they have with each other, is this feeling where there's only room for one woman. the ways in which african-americans are in the office, but kind of invisible.

politics is their everyday life. i mean, there are major events happening in the background. they are upset about assassinations. they're watching the dnc, and so on. but ultimately, the politics is about their relationships with each other and the power and the hierarchy. and how sometimes that bubbles to the surface and other times it's hidden behind these formal rituals. >> another character i kind of think a lot about is don draper, one of the main characters in this. somebody who lives -- i mean, rampantly cheating on his wife or girlfriend of the moment. in a lot of ways, defies the character of what we think of today maybe as a republican family values type person. but you see those comments like we played, like he's watching the chicago convention in '68. i get a sense don draper would have been a nixon guy. >> i think today he'd be a libertarian republican. he'd be a rand paul guy. roger sterling would probably be the ted cruz tea party. but hardcore republicans, for

sure. >> roger sterling had a moment in the show too where i think he was in a meeting that asked him what do you think of nixon, he said dick nixon is a patriot. >> don draper says nixon is president, that's what jesus wants before he punches the minister. so there's this idea of we're restoring the order. i think they would be on the side of what would restore formal order to the world. >> that they feel may be slipping away from him. rich somer is going to stick with us. more with him and the panel right after this. when folks in the lower 48 think about what they get from alaska,

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you're seeing already in that room of basically all republicans the fracturing of the republican party, the nixon versus reagan thing. we have rich sommers still joining us from l.a. rich, to me, the show rings true historically, at least based on what i know in the 1960s. more importantly, when i talk about people who remember it firsthand, they say the same things. i wonder if you can tell us a little bit about the process that you guys go through, that your researchers go through, that you go through as actors to make sure you get that kind of accuracy? >> i mean, from what i understand of the writers room, which i've physically been in maybe six times in my life because they're very clandestine in there, they begin each season sort of looking at a timeframe, and i think they come at it from two directions. from a story direction and from a history direction. and they lay out -- they know about where they want to start. and they say what major historical events do we have that we can sort of parallel stories to. and to find some sort of a

resonance, something that may have happened historically that they can then have reverberate throughout a story, that can personally motivate a character to carry on the actual fiction part of the show. and the way that they have married those two things i think has been pretty -- for my money, unique in period shows. they really have made it feel fairly honest, i think. >> and eleanor, again, you -- you've been writing about your own experience kind of living in that world. >> but going out there, matthew winer is the creator of the show. and he explained his creative process. he said he paces around, walks for hours, talks. he said it looks psychotic and it looks like streaming consciousness, but it isn't. he says it's all very thought out. and all of those musings,

ramblings go to the writing room and they assemble various story lines, and then they come back to him and he says he takes it from there. and then the historical accuracy, when i was out there, the costume department was trying to find rubber pants for the then youngest child of don's ex-wife, his youngest child, actually. and apparently, they don't make these rubber pants anymore because they're toxic. so they go through great lengths. apparently in this coming series, there's a lot about travel. i mean, travel to the west coast was just beginning to get more common, and the travel experience was a big deal. people got dressed up, and of course, the rooms -- the seats were a lot more roomy, so we're going to look at it today and be very envious of the travel experience back then. so accuracy. and everything, the cigarette smoking. it's hard for me to remember, but we all lived in a cloud of smoke then. smoking was healthy. >> used to smoke on planes. >> that's right, exactly.

>> you were making a point too in the break about this is set in an advertising agency, and the idea of sort of the myth making that comes out of ad agencies, and just sort of the myth making that is sort that sf the american tradition about how we tell our own stories. how politicians tell their stories. you have the exchange about dutch reagan and nixon. and they both has carefully cultivated images that were different than who they actually were. >> every time he's been in a pinch, he reaches back for some sort of hazy dream. in the finale of the last season, he's pitching and says my dad would buy me a chocolate bar and then finally he can't deal with it because it's a lie and he goes up and says i was raised in a whore house he said it's from being an outsider to becoming an insider. he said don draper was modeled on those stories.

this idea of a dream, these guys were the center of selling the bill of goods. just as this throw consensus is falling apart, people like don are standing saying it was all built on fiction and everything was broken. at that point you can see it's a product of white flight. it's foregrounding the fact this racial change is happening. >> rick, i want to end with you. not asking to give anything away here. i always wonder what ends up happening to those characters. can we expect this is what will end in 1982. don draper passed away.

>> the good news for me is we haven't shot the final episode yet. i honestly don't know. that stribs me as on likely that we'll get to know anything that satisfying. i think matt winer seems to be good as leaving the viewer with an image at the end of an episode. the only hint i can give you about the finale, again, not having read it. each of the first four seasons, the finales were written not knowing if there would be another season after them. we knew after five and six there would be another season. after one, two, three and four we didn't. however you felt at the end of those episodes. that may be a feeling you may be left with after the finale of this season.

what kind of life would you have liked him to live past 1969? past 1970. >> i root for harry. i think i know him better than anyone. i would like to see him be successful. i think of the same thing many people think of which is he can be a bit of a douche bag. it's hard to root for someone like that all the time. i hope for harry to find some social footing to maybe learn how to be a normal human being and also find some is success. >> all right, we take the point. i want to thank rich summer for getting up this morning. the first half of the final season returns tonight on amc. we'll be right back. put it in second. (dad) slow it down. put the clutch in, break it, break it. (dad) just like i showed you. dad, you didn't show me, you showed him.

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we are out of time. i want to thank my guests.

for getting up this morning and thank all of you at home for getting up. we'll see you next weekend, saturday and sunday at 8:00 a.m. eastern time. everyone stay here right now. up next is melissa harris-perry. new york magazine writer jonathan chait will join her for a frank discuss about race, politics and the obama presidency. do not want to miss that. stick around. ng in a $1,000 fuel reward card. ng in a we've never done that. that's why there's never been a better time to buy a passat tdi clean diesel. husband: so it's like two deals in one? salesperson #2: exactly. avo: during the first ever volkswagen tdi clean diesel event, get a great deal on a passat tdi, that gets up to 795 highway miles per tank. and get a $1,000 fuel reward card. it's like two deals in one. hurry in and get a $1,000 fuel reward card and 0.9% apr for 60 months on tdi models.

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this morning my question, is race the real story of the obama presidency.growing heroin epidemic in american. plus, hip-hop and mental health. but first, this week in voter suppression takes us to the ultimate battleground. good morning. i'm melissa harrer