these are patriots. and whatever the report says, if it diminishes their contributions to our country, it is way off base. >> patriots or not who we are, good day to you. i'm ari melber. as we come on the air this afternoon, fallout from the cia report on torture and interrogation still coming from multiple angles. it's happening on the senate floor. >> torture just didn't happen, after all. contrary to the president's recent statement, we didn't torture some folks. real, actual people engaged in torture. some of these people are still employed by the cia and the u.s. government. they are right now people serving in high-level positions at the agency who approved, directed or committed acts related to the cia's detention and interrogation program. >> reaction also pouring in on the world's largest stage, the united nations now joining with

human rights groups to call for the prosecution of any u.s. officials responsible for torture. they say there should be no statute of limitations. the white house now finding itself in the uncomfortable position of both condemning torture, while at the same time, urging closure, as we heard from the president on "the rundown" this morning. >> that does not excuse all of us from recognizing our responsibilities to look squarely at what happened and to make sure that it doesn't happen again. and, you know, not only did i order that we don't engage in these practices in the future, i also and am pretty diligent about trying to make sure that we've created the kinds of accountability systems inside our intelligence agencies. >> and on "morning joe" today former cia director michael hayden fired back at critics. >> let me be very candid, mika, we thought we were doing the nation's will. in fact, having lived through

the period, and even looking back on it now, i think this was indeed about the nation's will. and what you've got here is a small group trying to say, oh, oh, it was never about us. it's not us. it's not us. it's them. they did it. frankly, that really is hypocritical. >> greg miller covers national security for "the washington post." his new article exposes how the cia is pushing past this report, and fred burton, vice president of intelligence at stratford and former counterterror official. good day to you both. i want to start by playing something new from attorney general eric hold other this, in a discussion he had with msnbc's joy reid. >> what we saw in the use of these enhanced interrogation techniques is not consistent with who we are, who we say we are as americans. if you look at the use of waterboarding, for instance -- one of the first questions i was asked in my confirmation, the

use of waterboarding by japanese, used against our soldiers in vietnam, to think agents of our government would use a technique like that to try to illicit information when the possibility existed that you could have used less abusive techniques. >> you see the attorney general there talking about the fact, greg, that when he came in and when the president came in, this was a very live controversy. he's on his way out. in is the last two years of the obama administration. still clearly a live controversy. what do you think the senate report helps establish on the factual side what we know now a day into this? >> well, i think it goes a long, long ways on the factual side. this is by far the most detailed account of this program from beginning to end that we've seen. i have to say, we already knew a fair amount about it, so that's saying something. this was a program investigated by the cia's inspector general. we got to see parts of that report. and it's been picked over by "the washington post" and other news organizations for years and

years. but still we learned a lot more about it. about its inception, about the alleged deception, and the abuses that went beyond our understanding going into this week. >> yeah. and, fred, hindsight is always 20/20. as you think about where we were right after 9/11, the country lived in fear about another big terror attack. and there was sort of a sense of don't ask, don't tell, really wanting the cia to do whatever it took to prevent another attack. and the reality is, is the cia was not fully prepared for this. they did not have the intelligence that they needed in that effort to combat this, real mistakes were made. so, here you have this report out that's out in the open. what impact is this now going to have on the cia? not just in terms of how they move forward from here, but also in terms of the morale within the agency. >> well, these kinds of events certainly have a collateral

damage effect inside the agency, but remember, too, that one of the points in the 9/11 commission report was that the cia was too risk adverse. and i think that's the challenge. when you go back in time, can you never recreate the atmospherics that we experienced. i can tell you from several different bombing investigations and terrorist attack cases that i've worked, that as the years go on, the details and just the general perceptions of the constant threat streams diminish. >> fred, to me that's part of why this report is so important as a touchstone, even if we are faced with another environment like that, we don't go back to this dark period and repeat the same mistakes. on that point, senator mark udall gave a strong speech on the floor, critical of the cia and also of the president and this administration. let's take a listen. >> it's bad enough not to

prosecute these officials, but to reward or promote them and risk of the integrity of the u.s. government to protect them is incomprehensible. the president needs to purge his administration of high-level officials who were instrumental in the development and running of this program. he needs to force a cultural change at the cia. >> on the piece of accountability, we're not going to see criminal prosecutions here. should we see people being fired? isn't that one way we can have accountability, to help ensure that we don't repeat these same mistakes in the future? >> well, i doubt that -- >> for fred. >> okay. >> go ahead, fred. >> i think for the most part, most of the people engaged in the enhanced interrogation have left the agency or have transitioned out. but for the most part, i think the agency through their inspector general oversight has

done a pretty good job of self-policing the internal mechanism to ensure that something like this doesn't happen again. >> you know, greg, fred saying most of these folks have cycled out, but that's not what senator udall said at the top of this segment, the spot we played, that some of these folks are still employed. torture doesn't just happen. people tortured and people above them okayed torture. as krystal said, no real accountability is happening out of this report. rachel maddow talked about this last night. >> torture is a crime. and it ought to be seen as a crime. as long as it is documented and admitted to openly in this country, but nobody gets prosecuted for it, well, that weakens the sense in which realistically it is illegal. if nobody's going to prosecute these guys for torture, then at least pardon them so america is on the record naming what they did as criminal. >> greg, if no one is held

accountable, then how dou we knw torture won't happen again? >> two things. i think that is the underlying intent of this report. i mean, this has been senator feinstein's main objective from the outset. it wasn't to try to put new pressure on the justice department to, reopen the criminal investigations it closed a couple of years ago. it was to lay down a massive marker for history on these allegations of abuse. and in her floor speech yesterday, to -- she reiterated that point. this is the purpose of this report, is to document this so that it is a reminder that this didn't work and it shouldn't happen again. i also want to say, on the point of accountability, i mean, one thing that got a little lost yesterday was the agency itself and its rebuttal to the senate report, admitted it made some big mistakings along the way over the past decade in not holding some of its people accountable, including a case early on when a prisoner died,

froze to death overnight in a cell in afghanistan. and that employee, the employee who was in charge of that base, was never sanctioned despite recommendations that he be sanctioned. and never of his superiors ever were. the agency's own account now sort of acknowledges that that was a problem. it shouldn't have happened that way. >> yeah. if you listen closely to a lot of the cia rebuttal, it's not so much that this was a great operation but, rather, that everybody was in on it. greg miller and fred burton, thank you both for your time today. we do have some breaking news to tell you. nfl owners are agreeing to a major change in how the nfl handles those controversial domestic violence cases. we have the latest on that ahead in our show. plus, is a major change coming in our fight against isis. congress reaches an agreement on a budget. wait until you get ahold of all the extra goodies they have hidden in there. we've got it for you. "the cycle" rolls on december 10th.

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the white house is calling that congressional agreement a positive step forward. but we still have not heard definitive word about whether the president will sign off on it. that is, of course, an important point. the agreement is a combination of nearly a dozen appropriations bills to keep the majority of the government running through next september. this is not an actual budget but about as close as congress has gotten since the '90s. they did so under the cover of night, as our first team notes, like sending out a press release right before the weekend because you're hoping no one reads it. in this case, because of all the cia headlines, tuesday at 8 p.m.

became the new friday at 5 p.m. one who did read it is luke russert, who's on the hill for us. i saw something you tweeted earlier how romneyb -- cromnibus fired up the cruz. >> reporter: thank you for showing my tweets. very interesting developments here in the last two hours on this bill. last night we assumed it was a rubber stamp that would pass. negotiated in a bipartisan fashion by democratic senators and house republicans on the appropriations committees and their staffs. in the last two hours, though, real outrage from the left about this cromnibus bill for two reasons. one, without any hearing, without any public vetting, the amount of money an individual

could donate to the rnc or dnc goes up to $324,000. that is something that's caused a lot of consternation on the left. the other thing, a change to the dodd/frank law. something slipped into this spending bill would, in fact, allow for banks that are federally insured to be involved in credit default swaps. that's a financial instrument a lot of people blame the 2008 recession on. that is something that has upset a lot of people on the left. i counted three e-mails that nancy pelosi's press office has sent out in the last hour and a half coming out against this bipartisan bill. on top of that, elizabeth warren, in the democratic leadership, said if this bill were to pass, it would confirm the suspicions of the american people that the system is rigged. >> luke, we -- >> reporter: why is this important? why is this important? because john boehner is going to lose between 40 and 80 republicans who are upset about

this bill regarding immigration. we knew that. it funds homeland security till march. the idea that immigration will be refought then. they were not expecting this much liberal outrage. that comes from these special interest provisions. republicans say, hey, you guys negotiated this. if you have such a problem, be mad at your negotiators, not us. can nancy pelosi supply john boehner the needed democratic votes to 218 by tomorrow? this doesn't face as many problems in the senate because harry reid is behind it and they should get to 60, but how many votes will pelosi supply to boehner, we don't know the answer and the clock is ticking. it wouldn't be a shutdown because they would do a three or four month extension. but on this large bill that's been negotiated for months and months and months, could be coming apart because of outrage from the progressive left. >> as you're mentioning elizabeth warren, not too impressed with the provisions undermining dodd/frank. she spoke about it earlier. >> we put these rules in place

after the collapse of the financial system because we wanted to reduce the risk that reckless gambling on wall street could ever again threaten jobs or livelihoods on main street. we put this in place because people of all political persuasions were disgusted at the idea of future bailouts. and now, no debate, no discussion, republicans in the house of representatives are threatening to shut down the government if they don't get a chance to repeal it. >> elizabeth warren really flexing her muscle here, i think, luke. >> reporter: oh, yeah. and think about this, elizabeth warren is a member of the senate democratic leadership. she is somebody who, in theory f you're part of the leadership, you're supposed to toe the party line. there was a lot of question when she took that job whether or not she would be within agreement with chuck schumer, who's more involved with the wall street

interests of the party and harry reid, who's known to cut deals. so, for her to say that, not only is it symbolic, it's very significant because you're now starting to see progressives get angry and get fired up. we always knew conservatives were going to hate this bill because in their minds it did not do enough against immigration. but for elizabeth warren to take that stand, you're going to see a lot of progressives who ordinarily would have gone along with this maybe saying, you know what, not so fast. and on top of that, nancy pelosi, she's actively undermining -- >> is she whipping against it? >> reporter: she's not whipping against it but undermining it by what her press team is sending out. sending out statements from barney frank saying it's incorrect, sending out elizabeth warren's speech. she's not actively whipping against it. >> luke, just a reminder to people, this is not an actual budget. you've told us what's in it.

what is missing from this? >> reporter: what is missing from this? well, you can say what's missing is funding for department of homeland security all the way throughout the fiscal year, september 15th. but this has been the closest the government has gotten in years because you've had 11 of the 12 appropriations committee basically have all their work wrapped up into this bill. now, i would say what's missing is a lot of the wish lists from both sides. health care bill is still funded, so republicans would say, that's being defunded and missing. democrats would say there's no jobs bill in here. there's no plan for infrastructure. so, the big overarching ideas seem to have gone to the wayside. they're not within the bill. i have to tell you, in terms of my six years here in covering these guys, this is the most comprehensive spending bill they've been able to put forward with input from both parties. but, as you see, when you do these big bills, they oftentimes can blow up. >> one thing the bill is doing in a rider is it is overriding

d.c.'s vote to legalize marijuana. people jiggle like they got a contact high when you just mention marijuana. this is a is he veers issue. the crux of the war on drugs, states and cities are moving away from criminalizing small amounts of marijuana and here congress is saying no. what are they doing? it also makes me think d.c. doesn't have the same level of jurisdiction over itself that most other cities have. >> reporter: toure, what you're seeing here is another example of taxation without representation. i've been a--long d.c. resident. the i pay federal taxes but when my city votes 7 out of 10 for the legalization of marijuana, the federal government can take it away sort of by hand. we've seen a history of this. republicans look to washington, d.c., and their control over it to meddle and institute their social ideas and social policy.

i remember a few years ago there was controversy about whether or not to allow folks who worked in the sex trade access to contraception through a van provided by city funds. it's amazing how a city with over 600,000 people, many of whom don't have anything to do with the federal government, who simply enjoy living here, love the beautiful parks, love the river, the airports, the sports teams, are just automatically beholden to the special interest of a narrow few republicans in congress. there's a lot of outrage in washington. not just because people who cared about the marijuana law, but because of this constant just sort of ability of congress to stomp all over the constitutional rights of the city. i think it's a huge problem. and it's going to anger people for a while. >> and that anger goes well beyond washington. luke, thank you for joining us. up next, buried in the headlines, a new request by the administration in the fight against isis. it could have a major impact. speaking of impact, market alert right now.

cheap oil and gas costing investors on wall street. opec announcing today it's cutting production as the u.s. and other countries move closer toward energy independence. the dow is down triple digits on that news. we'll keep an eye on it for you here and, of course, over at cnbc.

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you know, there's something lost in the news of the cia report. a potentially major expansion in our fight against isis that we're hearing about now. it started on tuesday with secretary of state john kerry going to congress and asking for new and more flexible war powers. basically, leaving the door open to expanding u.s. military actions outside of iraq and syria. in other words, where isis goes, maybe we go. tom sanderson back with us. good day to you. >> you, too. >> this comes out of chairman menendez drawing up a plan to authorize the ongoing campaign there against isis. and his authorization is pretty

broad. talks about fighting them in syria, fighting them in iraq. here you have john kerry coming in and saying, that's not good enough. we don't want a time limitation and we don't want a geographic limitation. sounds like a blank check. >> well, let's look what's happened in the area over the last four weeks. you had al shabab out of somalia going into kenya and attacking the individuals on the bus and in the quarry. you had the talks by the female suicide bombers in nigeria with boko haram. the attacks in chechnya. i'm not suggesting we're going to chechnya, but the woman, the american teacher killed in abu dab. and you have the report that isis has a training camp in eastern libya. so, all of these areas of concern that are flaring up, so you can understand why the administration wants greater flexibility in approaching the threat. >> but isn't it problematic to have a government that can go anywhere and declare war at any time on anybody they say? isn't that why we have the check

and balance? >> absolutely. of course, senator -- secretary kerry is a former senator and he understands that. but nonetheless, we have to understand that the president needs some flexibility in conducting this battle with isis and with groups that are allies to isis. that's another factor. you do have groups that have pledged allegiance to isis that are in different parts of the world and will likely heed the call of the isis spokesman to hit america wherever and whenever they can. >> and that's why john kerry yesterday on the hill was urging congress not to get in the way of what the administration is trying to do here. he said, quote, don't micromanage us. let's listen to what he had to say. >> the president has been crystal clear that his policy is that you u.s. military forces will not be deployed to conduct ground combat operations against isil. it doesn't mean that we should preemptively bind the hands of the commander in chief or our commanders in the field in responding to scenarios in c

contingencies that are impossible to foresee. >> why ask for this now? null. >> well, perhaps he's not talking only about expanding beyond the area but expanding activity in the area where we already are. so, maybe he's asking for understanding in laying the groundwork for potential use of u.s. forces even though he says right there, we're not going to. again, leaving open the possibility. you have to -- >> just in case. >> we want to, but we're not going to. >> i mean, the part i don't understand is don't they already have essentially unlimited flexibility? they're doing everything they want to do right now without having this authorization. >> i don't think they're doing everything they want to do. i think the special operations community and the president and others -- not the president, the special operations community and others would like to do more engagement on the ground in syria and iraq. i don't think they're getting that go ahead just yet. so, i don't think they have all of the ability to do everything they would like to do, but have

you to understand that at some point, conditions on the ground change. in fact, they change every day, so you have to be prepared. >> isn't the counterargument that when the conditions change -- >> like congress. >> like we have an imminent threat in chechnya, go back to congress? >> that's when the micromanagement comes in. every time there's a change do have you to go to congress and debate while events build, threats -- >> menendez is basically saying, new country, come back to us. that seems like a reasonable -- >> for a new country, yes. >> are you comfortable with that when we have a commander in chief we voted for and we like. when we have a commander in chief we voted for and don't like, whoa -- >> absolutely. for a new country, that would seem reasonable. if we decided we wanted to go into libya because of this new isis camp we found there, doesn't have apparently a lot of foreign fighters but libyans in it, that would seem something you would want to go to congress. >> while we're on this, we're getting into details, but rand paul has a counterproposal, they had a big fight about, but part

of what it would do is take back one of the declarations of war, authorizations of force. your view on that counterproposal. >> well, i'm not familiar with it in great detail, but i do think as long as the president forms the gang of eight on the hill and other key lawmakers of what's happening, i think that opens the door to cooperation and a reduction in micromanagement. again, we're not dealing with a big state that takes months or even longer to move forces. >> that even has borders. >> they have no borders. >> they've established their own -- their own land. again, this is not going against russian forces, even though they can move fairly quickly. these groups can move very, very quickly. you need flexibility in approaching them. >> we've been talking about the torture report. surely, isis folks are aware, but surely they didn't learn anything in this report, right? >> about? >> about the things we did. did isis learn anything about what we've been doing or surely they already know what we've done. >> certainly, some of these isis

members may have been individuals who went through some of the prisons or were in touch with u.s. forces or the intelligence community. i don't know what they've learned, but certainly these are well-seasoned fighters. that's also part of the problem. these are people with very distinct long-standing experience against u.s. forces, against coalition forces, who have been through different prisons. many of them were broken out. so, these are people who are very savvy. they know how to operate. >> trained for situations like this. >> sure. and this points to the necessity of having that flexibility. again, i'm not suggesting the president should be able to go anywhere, conduct any air strike, but let's point out how deft and clever these actors are. they need to be approached very carefully. >> tom sanderson, bringing the knowledge, as the kids say. thank you for being here today. still ahead, the nor'easter bringing the snow, heavy winds and snow to the east coast. we're tracking it all. up next, "time's" person of the year with an important reminder on how much we have to do to fight ebola all over the world.

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the ebola outbreak may be contained here in the u.s., but the epidemic is still raging overseas and spreading. with more than 17,000 people infected and 6,000 dead so far. in november, president obama asked congress for $6.1 billion to fight the outbreak. in that new spending bill we talked about earlier in the show, they authorized $5.4 billion to fight ebola here and abroad. those will be welcome support for those on the front lines, the doctors, nurse, ambulance drivers, willing to go into the hardest hit regions of west africa to risk their lives and to help. it's no surprise "time" just announced these brave ebola fighters as their person of the year. joining us now our "time's" deputy editor and director of the national center for disaster preparedness, dr. irwin

redlenner. thank you for being with us. so, tell us why you chose the ebola fighters as "time's" person of the year. also, as i was looking at this, i was reminded of the fact that we didn't always treat the returning caregives here in the u.s. with, perhaps, the respect and the deference they ultimately deserve. >> that was one complication of a very complicated story. with we were talking about who the person of the year would be and looking back at this newsy year, it really struck us the arc of this epidemic was very singular. we as a planet have the capacity to fight this kind have infectious disease, but what we saw were a lot of missed opportunities at the beginning by global organizations, you know, who just weren't willing to act. the people who were willing to act, the doctors, the nurses, the ambulance drivers, those are the people you'll meet in our story. and we wanted to shed light on their work. we also talked to scientists who have been working, you know, with relatively little reward on this virus and on cures and

vaccines for upwards of 20 years. >> wow. >> when you put those people together, you come out with a very, i think, compelling and necessary story about the kinds of cooperation it takes to fight an epidemic like ebola. >> doctor, it's hard from afar to read about what's going on and get a sense of what it's like to fight ebola on the front lines. i mean, i read a story today about a caregive who beyond just working with the patients, one of his duties was to stand outside the hospital door in africa, because there were not enough beds and actually turn people away that were sick because there was just not enough room for them to be there. give us a sense of what it's like just one day in the life of a caregive. >> well, first of all, i think it was just an absolutely brilliant and compassionate choice "time" magazine made. hats off to them. what many people don't realize is the extent to which people put themselves at extraordinary amount of risks to go into an area and deal with especially ebola patients.

what happens is you get up in the morning and you're hoping that you're going to do a lot of good and you're hoping that while doing good and doing what you need to do as a medical professional, you're not creating a situation that would be irreversible for yourself. so, just thinking about every detail that has to be covered to make sure you are safe and you're able to maximize what you're able to do and lives literally that you're able to save is a very, very extraordinary experience. and having people come from all over the world to pitch in here and do what they can do is something really worth applauding. i'm so glad "time" magazine did that. >> doctor, the president had talked about a request for more money on this. where does all that stand? what should we be focused on now? >> so, the president requested a little over $6 billion. i think what's now in the combined agreed to proposal on the congressional side is $5.4 billion, about half of that will go to u.s. agencies to help improve readiness of our own

health workforce and hospitals and so forth. and the other half is going where it's desperately needed to stop this problem at its root. and i think one of the things recognized by this proposal and the incorporation into the larger budget bill, is we're now finally understanding that we're not going to eliminate the threat and the risk for americans or europeans until we've gotten this disease under control where it started, in west africa. so, this is a bill that will benefit the world, literally, by dealing in africa and also dealing in the u.s. one other point about the money that's going to be designated for u.s. readiness for ebola, that it will have a spillover effect and really do something that was desperately needed, which is helping bolster our readiness for -- it may not be ebola next time. it could be something that we never even heard of yet. but the more we could do to invest in the readiness of our health systems, the better and more resilient our whole country will be, to ebola and whatever

else might be coming down the road. >> i think the doctor has it perfectly right, this is the perfect choice. sometimes "time's" person of the year is a controversial one. this time no one can dispute, this is the right choice. it's a beautiful image, the central image of the doctor all wrapped up. beautifully photographically there. congratulations on that. i want to talk about the runners-up, especially the ferguson protesters. a really controversial group of folks, especially because the violent few overshadowed the peaceful masses that were out there, arguing and agitating for justice. why are they on the list? >> well, they are on the list partly because our feeling was this was the preeminent national story of year. and we've called them the ferguson protesters. it's not a perfect nomination. these protests have spread around the country and that's a very important part of our story and what we're trying to represent. you know, the protests that broke out after the killing of michael brown, there was nothing

to say that these were going to be anything more than a one-off, but somehow they persisted and at times they descended into violence and they have, therefore, there's a lot of controversy around them. but we wanted to recognize the persistence and we wanted to recognize the necessity of the conversation around some of the issues that have been raised, whether it's about race equality or the militarization of police force or, you know, simply the idea that the lives and voices of black and brown people in america need to be more recognized, more heard than perhaps they are today. >> absolutely. thank you both so much. >> thank you. up next, breaking news this afternoon. nfl commissioner roger goodell announces major changes in the league's handling of domestic violence. we'll have more on that next. here's a question for you: if every driver in the u.s. kept their car's tires properly inflated, how many gallons of fuel could america save each year? up to 2 billion gallons? 4 billion?

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and seven beautiful benefits in one. for younger-looking skin. so while your life may be ever-changing... ♪ ...your beautiful skin will stay beautiful. total effects from olay. your best beautiful. this is the storm cycle. looking outside, rockefeller center, the tree looking quite festive. winds are whipping and we have flurries coming down in the city. that's going to last for the next couple of days. the heavier snow, though, that is up through the cat skills and poconos. the big weather story, though, is out to the west. this is a blockbuster of a storm that we're going to be dealing with for the next 48 hours as it rolls on. this is the latest in a series. they've been getting hammered by the rain. well, this storm, not only does it have drenching rains with it, but it is also going to have

blizzard conditions, high winds and the possibility for mudslides and flooding. here's the storm coming on the coast. the heaviest rain right now is up to the north. so, from belling ham down to seattle and olympia, they're starting to get in on very heavy rain. san francisco, the heavy rain moves in for tonight. here's a look, this is our european model showing our five-day rain total. look at this. as this storm rolls in, we could be looking at some isolated amounts of 6 inches of rain that will fall and the duration of this storm, which will be about 48 hours. so, we're talking this is as much rain as they've seen in about ten years with a single storm. so, this is really one for the ages. and the winds certainly going to be a big deal over the next couple of days, too. wind gusts, 40 to 60 miles per hour. gusts, in some cases, especially in the sierras, could exceed 80 miles per hour. we could be looking at wind gusts of 100 miles per hour. that is like the big daddy of

storms, guys. it doesn't get any bigger than that. so, pretty outrageous out to the west. we'll keep you you updated over the next couple of days. >> dominica, we want to know more about that big daddy of storms. breaking news, nfl owners have unanimously passed a new personal conduct policy at their quarterly meeting in dallas. that new policy could significantly change the way the nfl deals with players who are charged with committing domestic violence. players accused of d.v. will be placed on immediate paid leave while their case is independently investigated. an outside panel will be levied for an investigation. what's a much more extensive list of prohibited conduct. the nfl will hire someone with a criminal justice background to levy initial discipline. this ends commissioner roger goodell's place as the sole arbitrator of justice. the commissioner spoke with nbc's peter alexander this afternoon. >> we would like to prevent

these incidents from occurring, and we are providing resources to do that. when they do occur, they have to be dealt with firmly, consistently, quickly. and we also need to make sure that we're doing the right things for the victims and survivors. that's the key thing for us. >> you can see more of that exclusive interview tonight on ""nbc nightly news."" is this enough? many erupted when they realized how lenient the nfl was when players committed d.v. now that they've constructed a new policy, have they done enough? we'll spin on that. the devil will be in the details. what happens when these independent look into these cases. will we have penalties that makes us feel like the nfl takes the crime seriously, sufficiently enough? i'm glad the nfl will no longer be deferring to the criminal justice system. they've been behinding behind it and saying, until this is adjudicated in a court of law, we can't say anything about it. it's insane to have players who

we can prove did something violent playing out their nfl careers even as the case winds its way through the courts. d.v. is a difficult case, difficult thing to prove and it is a privilege to play in the nfl. it's not a right. >> one of the big things, i think, that is coming out of this is roger goodell admitting that mistakes were made. maybe not saying it exactly like that, but now bringing someone in to help deal with the punishment is basically him saying that. i think you're right, the devil will be in the details here. the question is, is this enough? i don't think we're going to know. i think we'll know that it's enough when we see a real cultural change within the nfl. what i mean by that is, when players start thinking before they act. thinking because they know that there will actually be punishment for them doing a certain thing. i don't know, krystal, i'm skeptical about there being a real change. i know they want to do this before the super bowl. >> one thing we can say for sure, it's infin italy better

than their original policy, which was not to have a policy at all. the standard i'm judging it by is, okay, after the media eyes leave, after we the media's eyes leaves and we move on from this story, do we have a process set up where we can reasonably expect appropriate action to be taken when we have another situation like what we seen with ray rice in particular. and the piece to me that is most troubling, it used to be commissioner goodell had control of the entire process, he still maintains control over the appeals process. he ultimately maintained that power for himself. >> yeah we played some of the interview with nbc and wall street journal had a good interview, there was a damming part he stopped talking. let's play some of that. >> since 2000 there have been

135 domestic violence cases involving nfl players, the harshest penalty a one game suspension. >> that's where they are coming from, a less than 1% rate of punishment. some of the recent punishment was over turned because they bungled it so badly. we can't say what is in his mind and heart. what we can look at with the numbers is a completely insufficient approach to this. and then when they get caught not catching anyone else, not holding anyone accountable, what looks from the outside like a lot of damage control and saying here 'a memo and new people we're appointing. i don't want to prejudge those people. ifs it's my hope as an observer and non-fan who thinks this whole thing looks ridiculous from the outside. this is an institution that is so beloved and that becomes an excuse.

i hope people would help but that's not the point, the point is to punish. >> there's a new structure in place that takes into account the idea that we're not going to just wait until the criminal justice system acts, that's powerful. i don't want to see due process staken away from anybody. the nfl association will make sure that doesn't happen. >> you can have a different standard. >> they should have a different starred. >> now they do have a different standard and you're absolutely right. that is a crucially important piece of this process. it is progress. the very fact that they have a policy in place is progress. we'll have to see -- and we have to continue to hold their feet to the fire. that's the real bottom line here. up next we cycle back to where we began, the most important take away from the torture report. ♪ push it.

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release of the torture report and much of the initial reaction is focused on just about everything but what's in it. last night wolf blitzer led with what terrorists might think of the report. >> doing this these days, you are really hyping it to a point zwl we're just reporting what the pentagon and department of homeland security and the fbi are telling law enforcement and military personnel around the world. that's their words, not ours. >> do you have a question? do you have a question? >> do you have a question? this is no time to be distracted

by terror threats. in fact it was an over reaction to those threats that some used to push torture in the first place. this should be a new time to look at the evidence in the report. how america violated law. here are key findings. this is not about behind sight. the evidence shows many people in the government knew at the time that this torture was inhumane and illegal that's why cia leadership flipped out when bush suggested we were treating detainees inhumanely and agencies officials were so concerned their interrogations were so inconsistent they suspended approval for those enhanced interrogation

techniques while waiting for affirmation in 2003. that's in the report. second this is not about the cia versus everybody else. this was highly controversial within the cia. in fact some cia members revolted at the time. here's how they revolted in august 202 02 . >> you can bet it takes a lot to make a cia operative cry, let's keep that in mind when we keep hearing torture defenders talk about context. they knew about context and still objected it at the time. finally while many are debating

whether torture is effective, the most crucial evidence enforces why torture is wrong, why it illegal and why it is not something our nation should do. even terrorism itself has a major impact on foreign policy. that kind of talk risks normalizing the deviant and presenting illegal imhumanity has another policy option. terrorists like al qaeda and isis not only for their beliefs but their actions like breaking the basic protections of the geneva conventions, you don't defeat that kind of enemy by dabbling in their evil or by moving on without accountability. that's it for the cycle. "now" starts right now. the cia tells its side. will the american public listen.

>> we took some steps, contrary to who we are and to our values. ♪ ♪ >> the highly controversial senate torture report. >> every single page had something that shocked me. >> absolutely devastating to read. >> the study says things that cia and other government officials don't want the american public to know. >> coming clean about what happened. >> sexual humiliation. >> keeping them sleep deprived for 180 hours. >> do you think what took place was torture. >> no i do not. i disagree you're claiming it to be news. >> i think history has proven that torture doesn't work. >> we got to shut this down. >> we are going to end up with a central intelligence agency that t