ok, well, good talk this morning, my question. will a 14 year old change the world and, plus the class of 2016 gop style but first, the long, long walk to work. good morning. i'm melissa harris-perry. as unlikely as it may feel while you are comfortably settled in front of the world, america spend a lot of the time on the go. according to the department of transportation, americans take 1.1 billion trips every day. that's about four for each

person in the u.s. about 15% of those trips, about 165 million of them are taken for a daily commute. now, for many of us that weekday journey from home to work and back again has become so much a part of our day-to-day lives that we don't really appreciate the simple convenience of getting from point a to point b until that daily ritual is disrupted. especially when that disruption is caused by catastrophe. as it was tuesday night when a new york metro north commuter train crashed into an suv killing six people and injuring 15 others. the vehicle, which was stopped on the tracks at a crossing exploded on impact and set the front of the train on fire. commuter trains traveling through the site of the crash resumed running again on thursday with authorities warning commuters to expect delays in service. it was the same warning given on tuesday to commuters in boston where all lines on the city's

subway system experienced severe delays not because of a tragic accident but because of winter. the recent blistering cold and record snowfall in boston have harmed the system's infrastructure and prompted the head of the agency to get real with boston commuters when she said this this week. if you don't wind up having to use the service, that's probably a plus. i'm just going to be candid. i never said that in my life but i don't want to wind up misleading anyone. while those commuters in boston and new york have been dealing with public transit delays most of you likely just kept on cruising since the vast majority of americans, 91% according to d.o.t., use a personal vehicle to commute to work. if you are one of those daily drivers, this week's transportation news may have been a bit distressing for you too because it appears our recent happy days of refilling from the seemingly endless

fountain of cheap gas may soon be coming to an end. a new aaa report released monday re predicted that gas prices will rise again throughout the month of february. even some walk to work commuters had reason to complain when after a flash freeze swept in behind wintry weather in the new york tri-state area many walkers found themselves going through leaps and bounds to avoid being ankle deep in dark puddles of freezing slush. whatever struggles you faced on your home to job journey this week it's likely you were shamed out of complaining by the one transportation story that had us all questioning our excuses for ever being late to work. on sunday, the detroit free press profiled james robinson who has a 23-mile commute each job to his factory and walks 21 of those miles in round trips every day.

he's made the same journey five days a week monday through friday for the last decade since his old car stopped running and amazingly even through his gruelling daily commute, he's never missed a day of work. his dedication and tenacity is impressive by any standard. his story was so inspiring that readers donated more than $300,000 to a collection to help him by a car. not that he'll need it now because detroit area dealership is giving him a brand new ford for free. as much as his story is the testament of triumph of one man's spirit it's also an indictment of inadequacies of the transportation infrastructure that failed most of the people that need it most. his commute to work and home takes four hours due in large part to the walk he has to make through a community where there is no fixed route bus service and it's one of the ways like

cuts to transportation is acutely felt by low-income workers like james. according to an analysis of data hundreds of thousands of zero vehicle households live out of transit's reach particularly in the south and in the suburbs. those with transit access still cannot reach majority of jobs in metro areas within 90 minutes. so there's plenty to celebrate in yesterday's announcement that unemployment rate is at 5.7% and the economy added 257,000 jobs. those would be workers clinging to the bottom wrung of the income ladder won't share in the return of those jobs if they have no way to get to work. joining me now associate professor at the university of connecticut and contributor to the new yorker.com. and christina is associate professor of social and cultural analysis at new york university and author of "the trouble with

unity." and also the director of policy and strategy at the center for inclusion and josh who just won a big game show on "up" and national correspondent for "the new york times." so i want to start with you. this is your work. what is it about the james robertson story that tells us something about where we stand on the issue of transportation in this country. >> thank you melissa. james robertson's struggle his walk to work is a direct result of policy. so the suburban county where james' job is located opted out of the regional transit system making it impossible for people like james to get to work. this is not just a pattern we see in the detroit metro region why the center for inclusion works. we see this across the country. what's most important is understanding who bears the brunt of these policy decisions and more often than not, it's people of color and low income people. >> it also seems on one hand you

have the option for this man. it's unbelievable that he's walking. he also is able bodied and relatively young and able to walk. i guess part of what i was thinking is so what if he is a person who is not able bodied or a person who is elderly or what if he's a person who is a woman who is pregnant in her final trimester. there's a part of the story that distresses me because it's a no barrier can stand in your way story and i'm thinking some barriers can stand in your way. >> it's an ongoing story that if you can be this exceptional person you can inspire us with your ability. robertson is an incredibly inspiring person but there's a way in which the fundamental issues of infrastructure are so key here. it is interesting. i often think it's funny when you drive on the highway and they say your tax dollars at work. they do that when they're doing construction and you're annoyed and crabby. they should have that running when things are working. this is what it means that our infrastructure is our collective ability to say what we care

about. we care about clean water and good roads and the ability to get from here to there and those kind of things are something we have to value as a public. >> that last phrases as a public. i find myself surprised that here in 2015 five years after really the republican takeover in 2010 when we knew there wouldn't be common ground but here's one that will be common ground. infrastructure. everyone recognizes that individuals can't build roads and, no, still five years later it's still not a consensus item. >> it's because at the federal level the conversation has been so dominated by the deficit and not borrow more money and even democrats when they talk about infrastructure, they talk about here's how we collect more taxes in order to pay for infrastructure. nobody is talking about the idea that infrastructure is something that's appropriate to borrow for, to invest in. >> it's revenue generating over time. >> and so the political environment has not been

conducive to spending money on infrastructure even though people think infrastructure is a good thing. it's not just about infrastructure spending. there are ongoing operating costs with bus service that will be the dominant form of transportation. that's squeezed in local budgets. you have suburban budgets where most households have cars and budgets are squeezed and do they cut from education or policing or from transit? transit has weak political support because for most people in these places transit is not the way to get to work and not a priority. >> just then when you made the point about suburbs, this was part of what was fascinating to me. from january 7th, 2015 the atlantic, suburbs and the new american poverty. 88% of atlanta's poor live in suburbs and between 2000 and 2011 the population grew by 159%. the suburbs are increasingly a space of poverty. >> that's exactly -- this is a forefront of this issue.

we know transportation has been tied to these issues around civil rights for a really long time. when you see even a decade ago naacp involved in cases in baltimore, atlanta, around this because what happens is suburbanization of poverty, you have people on the outskirts of the city and you can ignore them in ways you can't when they're inside the city and atlanta is illustrative of this because just two years ago there was a bond measure. a one cent tax people wanted to float and this money would be used for transportation cost. overwhelmingly it would be funding highways and not transportation and people paying the sales tax, poor people subsidizing transportation for the middle class people who are living further and further outside that city. >> so that strikes me. it's an actual difficulty. an actual challenge. there's an ideology question but it's so important. roads don't have a good natural

constituency like education does. not that there haven't been good strong, conserveative cuts to education but people can say how dare you cut books and teachers in a classroom for children. it's so much harder to get people worked up about bridges until they start collapsing and catching on fire and that sort of thing. >> we need a broad coalition of folks and we need people to understand that roads -- they're an invisible cost. we don't often think about infrastructure that is supporting us getting to school or getting to work each day or getting to a doctor when we're sick. that's what transit and both transit and roads do. we have to invest to make sure that this infrastructure is sound. >> i wonder if there's a political story to be told. you can make a moral, ethical and policy based argument. i'm wondering if there's a political argument. we'll talk more about that. i want to go way back in history and bring up points that you

were touching on. still to come this morning sybrina fulton mother of trayvon martin, and part of my interview with eric holder, the attorney general of the united states. [ kevin ] this is connolly cameron, zach, and clementine. we have a serious hairball issue. we clean it up, turn around and there it is again. it's scary. little bit in my eye. [ michelle ] underneath the kitchen table underneath my work desk we've got enough to knit a sweater. [ doorbell rings ] zach, what is that? the swiffer sweeper. the swiffer dusters. it's some sort of magic cloth that sucks in all the dog hair. it's quick and easy. pretty amazing that it picked it all up. i would totally take on another dog. [ kevin ] really? ♪ ♪

you only know in a fire to get out, to escape and now ok you are outside and you are safe but what do you do now and that's where the red cross came in... . we ran out of the house just wearing our pajamas. at that point just to even have a toothbrush that i could call my own was so important... . ...you know it just makes you feel like a person again. every 8 minutes the american red cross responds to a home fire or other emergency. you can help. please donate now.

the public transit inequity inequities illustrated by robertson's long walk to work is only an example of a long history transportation has in a struggle for social justice. in the book "right to ride" historian blare kelly writes efforts to defeat segregation took place in the public's fear

of ideas and arguments in the press, the courts and legislatures but also in the physical -- the supreme court also delivered a pivotal victory in 1956 when following a year-long campaign in which african-american citizens of montgomery, alabama, boycotted segregated buses, the court decided in their favor and ordered the buses to integrate. even today the geographical divisions in american cities can be traced to decades old transportation policy. president dwight eisenhower created one of the greatest public work's projects but it also enabled white flight to the suburbs and eviscerated long

established communities in the inner city. i wanted to tell that history in part to remind us that it may be a public good but always a political battle. >> it always has. you can go back earlier than that which is 1883 overturning of the civil rights act, which was the 1875 civil rights act which was a specifically about an instance in which a black woman and white man were riding a train and they were ejected for being in the company of a person of another race and that case went to the supreme court and led to overturning of the first major civil rights act at the civil war. and so it's there. and ida b. wells and then filing a lawsuit about this. as long as there's been transportation, we think about this fundamental element of ability which is what slavery was rooted on. people cannot move. the ability to move freely has been linked to people's civil rights and freedom. >> there was this other moment then that emerges and it was

sort of within five years of the hurricane katrina disaster where we saw the issue of mobility actually trapping people in the city and yet bobby jindal in 2009 as governor of louisiana actually turns down federal funds for a light rail system largely because there's a politics behind it. taking that money was taking obama's money. it just feels to me like come on we have to get to a place where we can talk about an overarching public good around transportation. >> politics of this varies by constituency. los angeles has made progress on this. they passed a local initiative creating a local sales tax to fund transit improvements. partly they convince people who drive that if other people get on transit, there will be less traffic and you'll be faster driving. they also expand the light rail through the city in a way that's serving a diverse population

there and convinced people that it's worth making the public investment in. you also need to draw the line so that people feel like they are getting something in return for the thing they're paying for. we have politics in new york where local transit agencies are controlled by the governor and because it serves the city and suburbs transit policy is made for people made in the hudson valley paying for the smystem but needs are around new york city where most of the use is. >> this strikes me as being connected to this story. upstate new york downstate illinois, also are demographically different both in terms of ethnic and racial identity, in terms of class and in terms of partisanship. i guess so then part of what i wonder what happened so we talk about the ability to drive the cars on the roadways, we're really talking about public transit. has public transit become a racialized discourse?

obviously it was even in this moment. when i think about -- if you go to birmingham now, there are not a lot of white folks clamoring to get on the bus. where we are historically feels to me the way it's been racialized. >> what enabled los angeles to make those incredible strides was the ability to pursue private action against discrimination in transportation. and in 2001 we saw another supreme court case which took away the ability for the right to private action for the ability to sue for discrimination within transportation which we know takes away a big lever for a city like los angeles to continue to have the connectivity to connect particularly black and latino folks that are the most disconnected. >> one of the things is the way that suburban sprawl we talked about earlier has shaped things. in places like los angeles, you

have the fight of undocumented to get driver's licenses. it's interesting. on one hand the fight for transportation sort of exceeds and goes beyond public and private and people want access to public transportation particularly if they lack legal status but at the same time it's become so deeply privatized that without a car you can't live in those places and that's not a constituency that's necessarily able to voice its needs as directly. >> it also just feels like don't we just need earmarks back? there was a way you got -- people hate bridges to nowhere but at least we were building a bridge. isn't part of the problem that we've gone to a sort of version where there isn't an incentive for people to build these kind of public works projects. >> i don't think that's the leading issue here. i think it would be great if there was more of a federal commitment toward infrastructure. i think that's a bigger issue for roads. with transit the operating cost are a big thing and you need ongoing appropriations at the local level to pay bus drivers

and those sorts of things and you need more efficient decision making by agencies running these things. in new york we have two-men crews running our subway cars which almost every other system around the world is using one person operation. that means that we can't afford as much service as we otherwise would because we have a higher labor cost per train. if agencies were better about spending that money and if there was more political support for spending more money, we would have more operations. >> you do just point out right there by saying those words that government does make jobs. they make bus driver jobs. the department of transportation says our airports are going to be under water in 30 years. don't worry. they've got a plan and that's next. running in the morning? yeah. getting your vegetables every day? when i can. [ bop ] [ male announcer ] could've had a v8. two full servings of vegetables for only 50 delicious calories. ever since darryl's wife started using gain flings, their laundry smells more amazing than ever. (sniff) uh honey isn't that the dog's towel? (dog noise)

hey, mi towel, su towel. more gain scent, plus oxi boost and febreze for 3 big things in one gain fling. it's our best gain ever! (vo) after 50 years of designing cars for crash survival, subaru has developed our most revolutionary feature yet. a car that can see trouble... ...and stop itself to avoid it. when the insurance institute for highway safety tested front crash prevention nobody beat subaru models with eyesight. not honda. not ford or any other brand. subaru eyesight. an extra set of eyes, every time you drive. do you have something for pain? i have bayer aspirin. i'm not having a heart attack, it's my back. i mean bayer back & body. it works great for pain. bayer back & body provides effective relief for your tough pain.

better? yeah...thanks for the tip! curling up in bed with a favorite book is nice. but i think women would rather curl up with their favorite man. but here's the thing: about half of men over 40 have some degree of erectile dysfunction. well, viagra helps guys with ed get and keep an erection. and remember, you only take it when you need it. ask your doctor if your heart is healthy enough for sex. do not take viagra if you take nitrates for chest pain; it may cause an unsafe drop in blood pressure. side effects include headache, flushing, upset stomach and abnormal vision. to avoid long-term injury, seek immediate medical help for an erection lasting more than four hours. stop taking viagra and call your doctor right away if you experience a sudden decrease or loss in vision or hearing. ask your doctor about viagra. ♪ stouffer's mac and cheese with real aged cheddar now in a convenient cup.

new stouffer's mac cups. made for you to love. i've been called a control freak... i like to think of myself as more of a control... enthusiast. mmm, a perfect 177-degrees. and that's why this road warrior rents from national. i can bypass the counter and go straight to my car. and i don't have to talk to any humans, unless i want to. and i don't. and national lets me choose any car in the aisle. control. it's so, what's the word?... sexy. go national. go like a pro. this week the federal government predicted the future of american transportation and it's a terrifying place. beyond traffic, a new report from the department of transportation cautions against the dangers of failing to invest in transportation infrastructure by painting a bleak picture of the transit of tomorrow.

in d.o.t.'s vision of america in 2045, airports are already teetering close to sea level and could be consumed by rising waters. nebraska will rival los angeles as a hell scape of hour long traffic jams and commuter trains having failed to increase capacity for a growing population are too full to stop for passengers trying to get for work. all is not lost because among the report's proposals to avoid this nightmare is a futuristic solution. robot cars. really. sort of. here to give us hope to avoid this future is the head of the department that brought us the report the united states transportation secretary anthony fox. so nice to have you. >> great to join you. >> we've been reading through this report and we are all a little bit terrified about our lives 30 years from now

especially since many of us are commuting long distances. what message are you hoping to send about u.s. transportation infrastructure? >> we're headed for a clogged up future if we don't take better care of the system we have, if we don't build new capacity where we need it and make smarter choices on how to use technology and better design. all of these things are things we can do but over the last six years congress has passed 32 short-term measures which has limited the ability of local and state governments to plan and that is setting us up for failure going forward. >> secretary foxx part of what's interesting to me about your own political trajectory is you come out of charlotte, out of north carolina which was one of these kind of growing, booming southern cities that was showing us what a new economy could look like and infrastructure challenges were part of it. we've been talking about individual access. i'm interested in an argument about economic development and

how important transportation is to that big question. >> one of the things that transportation has done since the beginning of time is it hasn't just increased through put, it's improved the places that it connects and we see in many cases across the country including my hometown of charlotte where transportation improves quality of life by attracting new development, densely dispersed housing, economic development in terms of jobs and those kind of points of access are really critical and on the topic you've been talking about today, i think one of the big challenges we have in transportation is getting from one project at a time that does these type of things to getting into a system that increases opportunity for people at the margins. >> at this point about increasing opportunity for people at the margins, i want to bring in one of my other guests. given this work is what you're

doing increasing opportunity for folks at the margins and you have a secretary, a cabinet member is there a conversation you two would like to have here. >> i really appreciated this report because it kpreecomprehensive comprehensivelycomprehensive comprehensively lays out what we need to do. we need comprehensive planning to ensure that when we put new bus lines in that we look at what's around that. right now agencies don't have -- they're not using mapping and the data that they need to make better decisions about investment. i think that's a key thing we can do right now to begin to connect people. >> secretary foxx is that something that can come from a level like yours from a federal level or is it simply about creating incentives at the local level? it must be tough to be head of a federal department where most of this work is happening at a hyper local level. >> it's going to take a lot of coordination. most transit systems are locally

based. our highway system is mostly state controlled. our rail system is mostly privately owned and so you have this sort of chart of control over how our transportation system is built. at the same point, the point is right. planning is really important. and really having planning processes that meaningfully take into account public input is a critical part of the planning process. >> the president actually put forth a budget proposal here and in his budget proposal he mentions that need to connect workers. in his proposal 7.4 billion for tsa. 15.6 for faa. 41 billion for highways. 10.9 billion for transit. is there any optimism given the stalemate in washington about the ability to move forward on the kind of planning that you have been talking about but also on these budget proposals? >> i'm an optimist but i also recognize that whether you're in

a so-called red state or blue state, red city blue city red district, blue district across this country our infrastructure is falling apart. folks in congress on both sides of the aisle are hearing this back from their chambers of commerce, from their communities, from their stake holders, from their governors, from city council people and i happen to believe there's enough pressure building on the ground that something will get done. the question is whether that something is going to be big enough, smart enough and capable enough to move us forward. >> thank you, secretary anthony foxx in washington d.c. i'm a north carolinian these days. if you ever want to take a camera, we'll take a ride around the charlotte metro area and look at how transportation is working. i would love to do that for the show. >> i'll take you up on that. absolutely. for those that can't to dive in deep and comment on the department's report, let's put it up on the screen there. dot.gov/beyondtraffic.

my thanks to my panel. they'll be back later in the hour. coming up later on the program, sybrina fulton joins us to tell us what she's doing next to honor the memory of her son, trayvon martin and the 14-year-old model determined to change the entire world. can this decadent, fruit topped pastry... ...with indulgent streusel crumble, be from... fiber one. fiber one streusel. how much money do you have in your pocket right now? i have $40 $21. could something that small make an impact on something as big as your retirement? i don't think so. well if you start putting that towards your retirement every week and let it grow over time, for twenty to thirty years that retirement challenge might not seem so big after all.

♪ ♪ why do i take metamucil everyday? because it helps me skip the bad stuff. i'm good. that's what i like to call the meta effect. 4-in-1 multi-health metamucil is clinically proven to help you feel less hungry between meals. experience the meta effect with our multi-health wellness line.

♪ (playful growl)

vo: because every moment matters, so does your network. verizon. this valentine's day get $100 off a swarovski crystal battery cover or the samsung gear s. perfect with a new samsung galaxy note 4 for $0 down with edge. plus, get a $100 bill credit for each smartphone you switch. get our best deals (dog barks) for the ones you love (dog barks) this valentine's day. (dog barks) verizon. attorney general eric holder will soon step down and that day just can't come soon enough for some members of congress like senator john cornyn who apparent apparently has just one requirement of mr. holder's successor. >> the attorney general has stone walled legitimate investigations by the congress. how do we know you're not going

to perform your duties of office as attorney general the way eric holder has performed his duties? how are you going to be different. let me just stipulate you're not eric holder are you? >> no i'm not sir. >> i sat down with attorney general holder yesterday and he had something he wants to say to the senator from texas. >> let me just say to senator john cornyn i am eric holder and i'm proud of that. >> for more on my interview, turn into tomorrow's show at 10:00 a.m. eastern on msnbc but up next, the class of 2016. rned is my philosophy is real simple american express open forum is an on-line community, that helps our members connect and share ideas to make smart business decisions. if you mess up, fess up. be your partners best partner. we built it for our members, but it's open for everyone. 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. [ female announcer ] a 3d white smile has the power to captivate. that's why shakira uses... crest 3d white with whitelock technology, removing up to ninety percent of surface stains and locking out future stains. so your smile always steals the show. crest 3d white. i have a cold with terrible chest congestion. better take something. theraflu severe cold doesn't treat chest congestion. really? new alka-seltzer plus day powder rushes relief to your worst cold symptoms plus chest congestion. oh, what a relief it is. here we go!

hello! i'm a kid. and us kids have an important message for our grown ups. three grams daily of beta-glucan... a soluable fiber from whole grain oat foods like cheerios can help lower cholesterol. and where can you find beta-glucan? in oats. and, they're yummy!

i'm going back to being a kid now. thank you! your mom's got your back. your friends have your back. your dog's definitely got your back. but who's got your back when you need legal help? we do. we're legalzoom, and over the last 10 years, we've helped millions of people protect their families and run their businesses. we have the right people on-hand to answer your questions backed by a trusted network of attorneys. so visit us today for legal help you can count on. legalzoom. legal help is here. remember the official number right now is zero. that's how many people are running for president in 2016. unofficially it's more like a jillian. with all of these official

noncandidates speaking at officially noncampaign events you knew what had to happen sooner or later would be the first great debate of the noncampaign. would it be economic policy? military engagements overseas? would it be common core in education? no vaccines. i didn't see that one coming. after new jersey governor chris christie sparked controversy during his trip to london by saying that parents should be allowed to decide whether or not to vaccinate their children he and his office had to spend the rest of the week backtracking and qualifying his statements. that one instance sent the beltway press into a frenzy to figure out where the other gop presidential contenders stood on the issue. regardless of their respective positions, almost all of them had to endure days worth of media coverage on the issue. but one potential candidate managed to avoid that. while everyone else was talking about things like measles and herd immunity this gop contender was rising above the

fray to distinguish himself as a potential front runner. wisconsin governor scott walker surprised a lot of people when polls out of iowa and new hampshire found he was a top choice among republicans in the two states that hold the very first presidential nominating contest. the imaginary field has a front runner. a front runner enjoying a slew of nonmeasles related headlines speculating he may be the next great hope for the republican party. just as scott walker was having his political moment, we got a look into his governor philosophy. he released his budget for the state of wisconsin and a budget is in fact also a moral document a statement of a politician's values and priorities. governor walker's latest budget cuts deep into education, expands school voucher programs and proposes drug testing for food stamp recipients. should we view his budget into a

glimpse of what the 2016 republican agenda may be like? joining me at the table, a republican strategist. lenny, is walker now the front runner? >> no. there are no front runners in february of '15. largest, widest field in my entire lifetime. i think more interesting than who the front runner is now for your viewers is everybody in washington on the republican strategist side is looking at the number of candidates who are running and looking at how that number of candidates is changing the way we're going to run elections in 2016. with this many number of candidates, the notion that iowa the notion that new hampshire will be determinative in electing the next nominee, no more. game changer. >> i'll go even further than that. you did something interesting right there in the primaries. josh i'll go farther than that and say what republicans have right now is what democrats wish they had, which is a wide open field because what happened last time that we had a serious

contest was we had a 50-state primary and we got people registered to vote and right now if there's going to be a coronation on the democratic side and republicans are going to fight it out even if its about measles. isn't that really good for the republican base building going into the generals? >> it depends on the nature of the primary campaign. i think barack obama and hillary clinton managed to have a long, almost respectful contest. >> there were a few moments. >> there were a few moments but she ended up being secretary of state. whereas if you have a primary where people completely tear each other apart and you end up with a damaged number knee edd nominee out of it and the party isn't motivated to vote in november the competitive primary can be bad. i would take the coronation if i thought the candidate i would get would be good and most seem happy with hillary clinton as a candidate. it is possible that you could have a competitive primary that

invigorates republicans and gets people registered to vote. that's not my guess of the crowded republican field. >> so scott walker coming to the fore is fascinating. i want to talk about his proposals and what that kind of gubernatorial leadership looks like. i want to talk about whether or not that's what we want to have going on in the country. instead we are having a media fuelled frenzy about vaccinations. that strikes me just as a reminder let's go back and listen to michele bachmann talk about hpv vaccinations the last time there was a gop primary. >> there's a woman who came up crying to me tonight after the debate. she said her daughter was given that vaccine and her daughter suffered mental retardation as a result of that vaccine. there are dangerous consequences. >> i don't want to talk about this. >> hi crazy.

of all of the problems people have talked about this since the gary hart campaign, our media is focused on scandal and specktacle when it comes to looking at candidates. you have michele bachmann who is really crazy. the issue of that kind of logic when you focus on scandal and speck spectacle, someone that's conservative, because he's not sort of -- we don't look at his actual policies. the debate is centered around he seems like a rationale moderate. he becomes a moderate because he's not performing this kind of spectacle and horribly corrupt as far as we know so we're not talking about content of policies. it's important to do that. >> i like language like spectacle better than crazy.

maybe bachmann is crazy like a fox in that sense. spectacle and scandal versus substance so let's listen to rick perry. that campaign died on hpv vaccine. here he is making a different kind of claim. let's listen to perry this year. >> we look at 2016 we got to remember we're not electing a critic in chief. we are electing a commander in chief. >> so here he is trying to distinguish himself. i don't know if he could do it but walker was doing it. i'mgoverning. i'm not doing this thing down here. >> the great thing about this primary process is you'll have a much stronger group than you had in 2012 thank god. you're also going to have a very diverse series of views. you have conservatives who are mainstream thinkers who are

running governments, whether or not you agree with them. you have people like marco rubio who demonstrate a fresh, new face. then you have people like jeb bush. maybe chris christie. the real question for everybody in 2016 will be can the republican party put up a nominee who will be forward thinking on the economy, on inequity of opportunity with regard to our economics and can do so who understands the uber society and can do so in a positive fresh, new way that discards the old way of running campaigns. that's my hope for 2016. i think we'll get there. >> the guy who people thought was the answer to that was senator paul. we'll talk about him when we come back. then he did stuff this week i want to ask you whether or not that fits into lenny's category of that person being that kind of person because he made news this week on the nomination of loretta lynch.

there comes a time in everyone's life when you want more. like a new meticulously engineered german sedan. finely crafted. exactingly precise. desire for such things often outpaces one's means. until now. hey matt, new jetta? yeah. introducing lots of new. the new volkswagen jetta. isn't it time for german engineering? ♪ ♪ ♪ "here i am. rock you like a hurricane." ♪ fiber one now makes cookies. find them in the cookie aisle.

discover card. hey there, i just got my bill and i see that it includes my fico® credit score. yup, you have our discover it card so you get your fico® credit score on your monthly statements and online...for free. that's pretty cool of you guys. well we just want to help you stay on top of your credit and avoid surprises. good. i hate surprises. ahhhh ahhhh are you ok? nope. we treat you like you'd treat you. we've already given more than 175 million free fico® credit scores to our cardmembers. apply today at discover.com ♪ ♪ i love my meta health bars. because when nutritious tastes this delicious i don't miss the other stuff. meta health bars help promote heart health. experience the meta effect with our multi-health wellness line. ♪ ♪

this week a likely presidential contender, senator rand paul announced that he's

opposing the nomination of loretta lynch for attorney general. now, i know what you're thinking. a republican senator opposed to the president's nominee, that's not exactly news melissa. senator paul is considered to be one of the more right wing potential candidates of the republican nomination and there are several other senators who also plan to oppose lynch's nomination. senator paul has been doing something interesting that makes this latest move particularly puzzling because senator paul is positioning himself as the candidate to repair the party's relationship with african-american voters. over the last few years senator paul has made efforts to court african-american voters and has not been about pandering. through his positions on drug sentencing laws and criminal justice reform the senator from kentucky has managed to create some potential space for real reforms supported by african-american communities in these areas. by opposing the first african-american woman for attorney general, senator paul may be marginalizing himself in

optics among the black voters whose support he so badly wants and maybe even to help curry favor with those early state republican primary voters. so do you buy that? i don't know. maybe this is consistent. it felt like he's the one that said let's diversify the party and going after loretta lynch seems like the long way. >> there's an idea he can replicate the modest success he had among black kentucky voters and there's a recipe for this. i don't think you can balance off the kind of counter interest within the party itself. so you can't -- even with his own internal contradiction, you can't on one hand say i'm interested in broadening the base and reaching out to african-americans and say i'm opposed to the civil rights act which is something else that rand paul has said. i never have thought that this idea was as well developed as people seemed to think it is. >> i also wonder watching mr.

paul about another key constituency which is for republicans, white women voters because although there's a gender gap, white women have been majority support for republican candidates and this happened with mr. paul this week. let's take a look. >> the whole purpose of doing this is to bring money home. there's -- let me say -- let me finish. >> go ahead. i'm sorry. >> calm down a bit here kelly. >> wow. >> no shooshing. >> that's never a good move. >> rand paul is fascinating. what's interesting about him too is that a lot of his moves are not simply strategic but they are ideological. he's trying hard not to let it all show up because it's going to get complicated for the voters to make sense of him. if you really believe as a conservative libertarian that government is what thwarts men's liberty. there are interesting you'll think of. that's violence of government. that will lead you to someone in

against draconian drug law and forfeiture and will lead to you interesting politics. one of the things that's interesting is he's one of the only candidates who will say that the government can do real violence to its people. that's fascinating for african-americans and people of color to be part of an argument. >> there's a space where we don't know if those issues rise to the fore of voting in communities of color. if rand paul comes off looking crazy or marginalized in some ways do the issues that he cares about like diversifying the party, running it in a new way, ending draconian drug laws are they marginalized because they are associated with a package that's fringy in some way. >> i don't think so. the energetic conversation that we're having here at this table about rand paul the party is having that conversation.

ultimately rand paul is good for the republican party. it's also fair to say that rand paul had an awful week. and i say that not just because of the way that he came across with regard to vaccines or the way that he seemed to relish in opposing loretta lynch, i think his bigger issue is trying to marry policy with style. he's trying to become the first twitter candidate. he's kind of overreaching a little bit. >> he put them together. he tweeted out a picture of himself getting a vaccine. and mocking the general media. what are they going to say about this now? >> the frank reality is i can understand opposing loretta lynch on policy. if you're a conservative, you're looking at your colleagues like ted cruz and others you have a primary, you don't want to get outrighted, i can understand that if you think the president's views or policies were unconstitutional.

that's not necessarily a view i share. my bigger problem with him is whether or not he will become somebody who can marry policy with consistent tone to actually do what he's trying to do. this week if he continues to have weeks like that we saw someone who will have a very tough road. >> always appreciate you hanging out with us. i like consistency of tone and policy discourse. we're just getting started on 2016. you'll be back to talk more about it. i want to say thank you to my panel. josh got himself a pitch to throw. >> i have to practice. >> after his big win. they'll go practice throwing now. don't miss josh's show. it's friday's at 2:00 p.m. eastern. a high profile sexual assault case is getting even more complicated. three years after the death of trayvon martin his mother joins me live to talk about her

mission now. there's more at the top of the hour. how much money do you have in your pocket right now? i have $40 $21. could something that small make an impact on something as big as your retirement? i don't think so. well if you start putting that towards your retirement every week and let it grow over time, for twenty to thirty years that retirement challenge might not seem so big after all. ♪ ♪

we used to have so many empty rolls! (cha-ching!) (cha-ching!) (cha-ching!) it felt like we were flushing money away. mom! that's why we switched to charmin ultra mega roll. it's charmin quality and long lasting. with more go's per roll, it pays to use charmin ultra mega roll. charmin ultra mega roll is 75% more absorbent so you can use less with every go. plus it even lasts longer than the leading thousand sheet brand. for us, mega roll equals mega value. cha-ching! we all go.

why not enjoy the go with charmin ultra mega roll? curling up in bed with a favorite book is nice. but i think women would rather curl up with their favorite man. but here's the thing: about half of men over 40 have some degree of erectile dysfunction. well, viagra helps guys with ed get and keep an erection. and remember, you only take it when you need it. ask your doctor if your heart is healthy enough for sex. do not take viagra if you take nitrates for chest pain; it may cause an unsafe drop in blood pressure. side effects include headache, flushing, upset stomach and abnormal vision. to avoid long-term injury, seek immediate medical help for an erection lasting more than four hours. stop taking viagra and call your doctor right away if you experience a sudden decrease or loss in vision or hearing. ask your doctor about viagra. we come by almost every day to deliver your mail so if you have any packages you want to return you should just give them to us since we're going to be here anyway it's kind of a no brainer

several months ago we introduced you to emma who accused a fellow student of raping her in her dorm room of august of 2012. emma vowed to carry the mattress from her bed around with her everywhere she went to protest columbia's refusal to expel her alleged attacker. >> i know who raped me. i have no doubt in my mind so it's my piece. i'm going to carry it until he's gone. >> the visual arts major and it's doubling as her senior thesis art project. her compelling story made

headlines across the country. she was invited to attend the state of the union by new york senator senator. and what happened to the person accused of the attack? the school paper, the columbia daily spectator, published an article revealing his name explaining we feel that to hide or redact his name at this point would be doing a disservice to students on campus and to the truth of this story. the paper's editors went on to say we understand this decision carries significant consequences reputational and otherwise and we do not treat this matter lightly. paul has always denied the charges. he told "the new york times" in december that former friends now cross the street to avoid him. campus flyers proclaim him a rapist warning students to steer clear. this week he's again declaring his innocence in a public way. he released to the daily beast

facebook messages he says he and emma exchanged during the weeks surrounding the alleged assault. paul says the tone and content of these messages prove that nothing that happened between them on the night of august 27th changed their relationship. from august 29th paul invites emma to a party and as you can see she appears to respond with an enthusiastic yes. on october 4th after paul sends emma a birthday greeting emma responds, i love you, paul. where are you? emma did confirm to the daily beast that these messages were from her and explained that her initial instincts were to reach out to paul, someone she had seen as a close friend and try to understand what had happened. she concluded by saying i want other survivors to know that if you reach out to your attacker after you were assaulted, it shouldn't discredit your story. let's be clear. the messages do not prove or disprove whether a crime was committed nor do they give us any insight into what happened

on the night in august of 2012. they do offer another perspective on the story. one that's different from what was widely reported in media. in response to the daily beast story, an editor at the student paper had this to say. the goal to promote discussion about sexual assault and to support survivors became conflated with fear of rigorous reporting. it gets to the heart of the challenge that's inherent when you report on rape. journalists want and need to deliver accurate reporting on this emotionally charged issue. how do you do that when the story so often comes down to different sides of a story that occurred when no witnesses were present. and how do you make sure a single story doesn't distort the

story of sexual assault in america? joining me now, associate professor of studies at the university of connecticut and contributor to new yorker.com and msnbc contributor and daniel is a columbia university student and columnist and former opinion editor of the columbia daily spectator. your university is at the heart of this story now. >> yeah. >> what does it mean as a student paper to be covering issues of sexual assault on campus? what are journalistic ethics you're trying to use? >> the first thing i would say is we have opinions divide as we do in professional organizations. i was not involved with the decision to publish paul's name. i would say that the major difference is just sort of the scale of reporting you're talking about. because columbia as a university only has 30,000 people involved in it and the undergraduate

schools together are combined have 8,000 to 10,000 so you had many people at the newspaper itself who knew either paul or emma. it's a microcosm. it becomes difficult to distance yourself from this story objectively as a student journalist. i think that lends itself -- you know it goes beyond student journalist. it goes beyond people sharing the article on facebook. do you feel comfortable commenting on that. it's because it's a microcosm. everything becomes intensely personal and very difficult to be objective. >> i want to push on this a little bit. i think the language of objectivity can mask the need to be also smart and competent in talking about the realities of power, the likelihood -- to be objective does not mean that you begin each new story as though there is no context and as if there is no previous

information, right? and so the idea that we just get two sides also misses all of the ways in which every one of these interactions is happening in the context where there is also pre-existing meaningful information. >> there's two points. one to add to the microcosm conversation, it's actually the reason why so many rape survivors feel uncomfortable coming forward because everyone knows often times the per perpetrator of the assault so it makes it difficult for women and men who have been sexually assaulted to seek redress. it makes it difficult for victims of sexual assault. the second thing and i come from both as a survivor and advocate and as a literary critic so objectivity brings up a suspicion on my part because it's just not real. i understand that journalists -- >> there's always be a point of view. >> we're all shaped by our experiences and we bring interpretation to whatever we see or read or write about.

knowing that journalists strive for a sense of objectivity and under a certain mandate to be fair and objective in their reporting, my concern is that most journalists, college journalists or even mainstream journalists aren't trained in what advocates would think would be something that looks like objectivity and looks like neutrality. most of us are conditioned to be victim blaming or bias against rape victims. we have to do work to become objective and neutral. i don't see that training happening and so i just wonder what's the result? >> so let me come back to you on this. obviously this is happening in the context of the "rolling stone" story and university of virginia and the sense that reporting -- not so much in the sense of his side and her side but reporting in the sense of can you fact check certain things simply did not occur there. i want to go back to what the student wrote that campus media's goal to promote discussion about sexual assault and so i guess part of what i

want to ask them on the opinion side, is there a campus media goal to promote discussion about sexual assault and if there is it seems to be a perfectly reasonable goal does that then create a circumstance where not so much again the he said/she said framework but framework of investigative reporting on these questions. >> first of all, when you have a problem like sexual assault that no one will deny exists at columbia, it's the student journalists responsibility to cover it extensively but second of all i think there's a legitimate claim to be socially pro-active and in terms of the general issue of sexual assault. obviously that does not mean necessarily taking one person's side of the story. it does mean going forward and being thorough and really being critical of policies and telling stories and particularly from the opinion side of view it means reaching out and being

sensitive and the fact checking is very difficult. i worked with emma and her parents on the op-ed and we reached out to the university. we reached out to paul. you get no comment. >> is there any way to acknowledge that sexual assault, particularly when it is outside of this perfect victim who is clearly a virgin walking down the street at night and attacked by somebody they don't that in almost every other case of sexual assault it's complicated in ways that make reporting on it complicated. can we talk about it as complicated without becoming victim blamers? is there a way to do the complicated work? >> the complexity is difficult to represent without a lot of work and a lot of thoughtfulness and my main hesitation and my uneasiness about a lot of reporting around sexual assault is the natural human desire to have a story to connect to to have a face to connect to is at odds with talking about really

complicated policies. we put victims -- there are real victims here. we put victims through the wringer. we scrutinize everything they do in service of objectivity. we have to be skeptical. we have to check all facts. ultimately some of these facts are going to be unknowable. what we choose to put in and choose to take out really biases the reader. what we're doing is creating a climate where if you're ever going to talk about your sexual assault, you're going to be scrutinized as if you committed a crime which is what rape law reform was trying to prevent. if we are talking about due process, i think it's really important to note here that this person was found not responsible. in his view the system worked. but what happens afterwards is that communities have ways of responding to things that have to do with their norms and values. if your question is about due process, he had a lawyer and she didn't. she has serious procedural

critiques about what happened. regardless of what you think happened, one, let's focus on the law process and issues raised by that process and not focus on what did the victim do or not do and let's focus on the fact that what a community does afterwards is not the same as that process and that the community can sanction and stigmatize people based on its own values. you may not like it. that's the community's right. >> i want to point out that notion that something that is legal is good and something illegal is inherently bad. >> coats are imperfect. >> thank you so much for joining us. the rest of the panel is sticking around. also stay right there. when we come back i'm going to be joined by the writer who interviewed the accused columbia student. there's confidence. then there's trusting your vehicle maintenance to ford service confidence. our expertise, technology, and high quality parts mean your peace of mind.

now you can get the works, a multi-point inspection with a synthetic blend oil change tire rotation, brake inspection and more. $29.95 or less. ♪ stouffer's mac and cheese with real aged cheddar now in a convenient cup. new stouffer's mac cups. made for you to love. alright, so this tylenol arthritis lasts 8 hours, but aleve can last 12 hours... and aleve is proven to work better on pain than tylenol arthritis. so why am i still thinking about this? how are you? aleve, proven better on pain.

ring ring! progresso! i can't believe i'm eating bacon and rich creamy cheese before my sister's wedding well it's only 100 calories, so you'll be ready for that dress uh-huh... you don't love the dress? i love my sister... 40 flavors. 100 calories or less. [ female announcer ] we help make secure financial tomorrows a reality for over 19 million people. [ susan ] my promotion allowed me to start investing for my retirement. transamerica made it easy. [ female announcer ] everyone has a moment when tomorrow becomes real. transamerica. transform tomorrow.

we've been trying to talk about how media covers story of sexual assault and specifically the case of a columbia student. the focus was on the fellow columbia student, the one emma says raped her. that man entered the media spotlight through a lengthy piece in an online publication, the daily beast. he shared facebook messages between himself and emma with the writer of the daily beast piece in an article claiming he faced a harsh trial by media. kathy young joins us now. how did you come to report on this story? >> i have been interested in the story for a while. i'm interested in the topic of campus sexual assault. i think sexual assault is a very serious issue. i don't think anyone is questioning that. i do think there's been in recent years a kind of rush to judgment. a kind of tendency to say that

accusation equals guilt and to downplay the importance of campus sexual assault cases and in this case i have been following this. i actually when i first read the account of the case on "the new york times," it looked to me like this was a genuine miscarriage of justice. they mentioned that there were three accusations against this guy. when i started reading up on it it started looking a little more murky to me. eventually just to make a long story short, the parents of this young man sent me an e-mail after reading one of my other stories asking if i was interested. >> i hear you. i hear you about the ways in which a story can become murky. i guess what's distressing to me is things you present in the article that make the story murky. for example, you present facebook messages that paul made public between him and emma and that you characterize as flirty and chatty.

so i just want to show some of the exchanges so people know what we're talking about here. there's one facebook message where she says lol, yes. i feel like we need to have some real time where we can talk about life and things because we really haven't had paul and emma chill. another one that says now let's take a look -- i'm sorry. what i want to do is point out that emma responded to this and says i haven't faced him since he i saltassaulted me. i don't want him to avoid the conversation. there are things that can make a story murky. i don't think that characterizing it as flirty and chatty conversations between an alleged victim and her assailant are things that make a story about sexual assault murky. >> i will tell you that if any prosecutor withheld messages like these from the defense in a rape case they would be disbarred because this would be in any criminal case this would

be considered extremely relevant to guilt or innocence. >> i'm not even claiming that's not true as a legal matter. i'm asking about something different. when we look for example, at the reality of ray rice we know for certain that ray rice hit his fiance and we know she sat next to him in a friendly and flirty matter and married him. the idea that someone who is victimized by someone who they have an ongoing relationship with wouldn't continue to have that ongoing relationship is not evidence -- >> it's a little different when first of all, when you're in a marriage. >> they weren't in a marriage at that point. >> they were engaged. >> emma and paul were in a social group together where they would have to continue seeing each other and continue to manage the relationship and/or face issues within her existing social circle. i don't understand why it's weird she would want to maintain

polite relations. >> this goes a little beyond polite. >> what's the appropriate behavior for a rape victim? i'm asking what you suspect it would be. not what you think it would be. >> it seems to me that we're not talking about simply -- there are different degrees of sexual assault. there's a situation where someone doesn't stop when the person says no. this is one thing. >> so she's alleging that he not only raped her but strangled her. >> let me suggest -- i want to pause for a minute. i'm going to pause for something because something got said on my air that i just want to address. that is the idea that there are different degrees of sexual assault and that one of the lesser versions might be that you're engaged in consensual sexual activity and it goes to a thing and you don't consent to

that and that's somehow a different kind -- i want to be really -- i can't describe how much i want to be careful in responding to that. i understand that your point is there is complexity in a moment when there's initial consent but consent has to be given throughout the process. i don't see it as -- my willingness to have vaginal sex with you is not the same as willingness to have anal sex with you. >> that was my point. in this case she's alleging not simply that something noncons nonconsensual happened but there was extreme violence. she's describing not simply nonconsensual behavior. she's describing being hit on the face. >> i'm just saying people -- >> you know what? if this had been a different kind of contact where there was

evidence for instance that he apologized and said i got carried away the other night, there are in most domestically violent relationships, there's a cycle of violence followed by a show of repetntance. we're talking about allegations of extreme physical violence. >> of which he was cleared. >> i don't understand what you're asking for here. emma created an art piece from her perspective. she's telling the story from her perspective and critiquing the columbia institutions, what are you asking her to do? are you asking her to stop telling her story? >> i'm asking people to realize that there is a different side to the story. i'm kind of -- i'm flabbergasted because you say he was clear of this but you're saying we should

take it as a fact that this happened. >> i think we have to take it as a fact that -- >> thank you, kathy young. we'll continue this conversation when we come back. our "name your price" tool helps -- oh, jamie you got a little something on the back of your shoe there. a price tag! danger! price tag alert! oh. hey, guys. price tag alert! is this normal? well, progressive is a price tag free zone. we let you tell us what you want to pay and we help you find options to fit your budget. where are they taking him? i don't know. this seems excessive! decontamination in progress. i don't want to tell you guys your job, but... policies without the price tags. now, that's progressive. [coughing] dave, i'm sorry to interrupt... i gotta take a sick day tomorrow. dads don't take sick days, dads take nyquil. the nighttime, sniffling sneezing, coughing aching, fever, best sleep with a cold medicine.

♪ (playful growl) vo: because every moment matters, so does your network. verizon. this valentine's day get $100 off a swarovski crystal battery cover or the samsung gear s. perfect with a new samsung galaxy note 4 for $0 down with edge. plus, get a $100 bill credit for each smartphone you switch. get our best deals (dog barks) for the ones you love (dog barks) this valentine's day. (dog barks) verizon. ♪ ♪ ♪ "here i am. rock you like a hurricane." ♪fiber one now makes cookies. find them in the cookie aisle.

they're coming. what do i do? you need to catch the 4:10 huh? the equipment tracking system will get you to the loading dock. ♪ there should be a truck leaving now. i got it. now jump off the bridge. what? in 3...2...1... are you kidding me? go. right on time. right now, over 20,000 trains are running reliably. we call that predictable. thrillingly predictable.

[ fishing rod casting line, marching band playing ] [ male announcer ] the rhythm of life. [ whistle blowing ] where do you hear that beat? campbell's healthy request soup lets you hear it in your heart. [ basketball bouncing ] heart healthy. great taste. [ m'm... ] [ tapping ] sounds good. campbell's healthy request. m'm! m'm! good.® many sexual assaults are never reported to law enforcement. some survivors say they didn't go to the police because they didn't believe the police could or would do anything to help them. sometimes those fears are valid. according to an investigation by the new orleans inspector general, five officers in the special victims unit failed for years to investigate allegations of assault. the report released in november says the officers failed to write investigative reports for 86% of sexual assault and child abuse cases they were assigned from 2011 to '13.

now the nopd is trying to make sure that justice delayed is not entirely justice denied. one particular office is tasked with overseeing the investigations that should have been done in the first place. msnbc national report terer traveled to new orleans to learn more. >> you cold calling someone saying how are you doing? i'm assigned to investigate your sexual assault. >> paul has one of the toughest jobs in the new orleans police department. he runs a newly formed task force that's reinvestigating hundreds of sexual assault cases that were improper dismissed or simply ignored. >> we don't want them victimized again by the police investigating not conducting their interview properly or sometimes misinterpreting certain things that happen. >> reporter: last year the city's independent monitor found something strange. the number reports of forceable rape in new orleans were 43%

lower than in cities with comparable crime rates. a closer look found that nopd misclassified 46% of the offenses to anything but forceable rape. in the wake of the investigation, erin co-founded a victimss advocacy group. >> you were a woman out drinking at a bar. they were getting blamed by these officers being blamed in some regards for what happened to them and then subtly being blamed by other officers during the interview process where the officers say things like well you were allegedly raped. >> evidence show that five special victims detectives were not investigating rape reports at all or at least had left no proof that they had. in three years, only 14% of the cases these five detectives were assigned to had any documented

investigative efforts at all. those officers have been reassigned while under investigation. they could face criminal charges. some city leaders say that's not enough. have any heads rolled due to this? has anyone been terminated due to this? otherwise we're transferring that problem. i have a serious problem with that. >> an expert in violence against women is working with the nopd to retrain officers on how to deal with victims of sexual assault. what are some of the barriers victims face in reporting rape? >> it's a leap of faith to make sure that the police don't blame them and don't focus on somehow discrediting them. >> drug users can be sexually assaulted. prostitutes can be sexually assaulted. college students that are underage drinking can absolutely be sexually assaulted. >> reporter: barriers aren't just logistical.

they're emotional and psychological. >> many of them are upset about having to go over the same information they had gone over maybe two or three years ago. >> reporter: one of the things mentioned to me by the advocates is it's a good sign when rape reporting goes up. but the police want reports of crimes to go down. how do you reconcile that? >> we always talk about reducing crime and i'm not saying we want sexual assaults to occur but we want the public and victims of sexual assault to feel confidence in us if they if they are sexual assaulted they can come forward and work with us and we'll get the investigation right. >> are the people of new orleans from the investigative reporting that you've been doing, are they feeling confident that nopd will address appropriately sexual assault questions? >> there are mixed feelings in the community and with community members i spoke to. on one hand the commander who has been placed in charge has the confidence of all of the advocates that i talked to

which is pretty rare given the long history of mistrust. as you know nopd is under a federal dissent decree and long history of the department failing to address concerns. so i think they feel like if somebody is going to be on this job, they're happy that it's paul. there is a mountain of work ahead of them. coming back to these cases after several years will be really hard to get evidence. they are trying to pull dna. people are furious that there is a rape kit bag lockcklog in new orleans. >> i was thinking about the op-ed you have written about when we don't stop individuals and take seriously the issue of domestic violence we find those people become perpetrators of these other kind of gun violence for example in communities. i kept thinking huh, when you look at the murder rate in this city of new orleans and when you look at how violent crime is

kind of a deep problem that is long needing to be addressed in that city and this happening, i wonder if they're more connected than we might otherwise think. >> i think for the purposes of op-ed we focused specifically on domestic violence because it was easier to make the case but i think first indicator is violence against women. not just domestic violence but sexual assault and we can see this in a number of national cases particularly mass shooting in arizona, in santa barbara, and then maybe most obviously with george zimmerman and her cousin saying that he sexually assaulted her for years before the domestic violence he committed. violence in the home or violence against women is a primary indicator of a city or community and nation that's going to be rift with other forms of violence. >> and policing failures around

those also being indicative potentially of policing failures in a broader sense. >> the other thing we didn't include in our op-ed is an issue around police families actually having higher levels of violence particularly with domestic violence. four times more likely than other american families. we're just seeing this pattern. it's unchecked and overlooked for a number of reasons. >> we'll do good news next. when we come back i have a 14-year-old model. it's a tough subject. human trafficking. you wait until you see this young woman who is taking it on head-on. the am. new aleve pm the only one to combine a safe sleep aid plus the 12 hour strength of aleve. how much money do you have in your pocket right now? i have $40 $21. could something that small make an impact on something as big as your retirement? i don't think so. well if you start putting that towards your retirement every week and let it grow over time, for twenty to thirty years that retirement challenge

might not seem so big after all. ♪ ♪ ♪ turn around ♪ ♪ every now and then i get a little bit hungry ♪ ♪ and there's nothing good around ♪ ♪ turn around, barry ♪ ♪ i finally found the right snack ♪ [ female announcer ] fiber one.

♪ by 1914 the dodge brothers quit the ford motor company and set out on their own. they believed in more, than the assembly line. they believed driving was a holy endeavor. a hundred years later, the dodge brothers spirit lives on. new york's fashion week kicks off next week and while many models will be worried about walking that walk holding that pose and doing those quick changes, there's one young model with something all together different on her mind. human trafficking is a multibillion dollar industry with more than 20 million victims around the world. a common misconception is that

trafficking happens elsewhere but not in the u.s. according to fbi statistics more than 2,500 incidents of human trafficking in the u.s. between 2008 and 2010. 82% were classified as sex trafficking. the department of homeland security launched a blue campaign aimed at clearing up misconceptions and bringing attention to trafficking. traffickers use force or fraud to trick their victims into a kind of modern day slavery and they often prey on those who are most vulnerable. including children. one way children are lured into trafficking is through the modeling industry. underage models sometimes go to castings and photo shoots without guardians where they encounter fake agents and photographers with ulterior motives. only one state requires permits as a way to protect models. one of the advocates who helped get the new york passed is

joining me now. she became aware of trafficking when she modeled for the blue campaign. tell me about your work on this. >> they asked me to do the blue campaign in 2013 and on set there were representatives from homeland security telling us that there's human trafficking in america. i just thought, you know the movie "taken" in foreign countries and i didn't know it was in america especially in my home state, virginia and northern virginia there's a lot of brothels and it's huge. and so after hearing that and after hearing that it's big in the modeling industry how girls are lured into human trafficking through the modeling industry. i've been modeling since i was two. i felt like i needed to help. that's what i've been doing and it's been my country. >> so it's funny. i want to pull you back in here. we haven't had a chance to hear from you in a minute.

honestly when i was first learning about this and about the blue campaign and about the ways in which young people are lured through modeling this will sound silly, but the movie "fame" from our generation right, this moment when cocoa goes and she think she's pursuing an acting career and it's a sexual assault and trafficking moment. i thought, you know so if you're a parent or even a young person and, you're, like, i want to have big dreams, how do we allow people to have big dreams but not be in these circumstances? >> even just to put it out there and be specific but art kelly's situation. people attracted to the possibility of being in entertainment and the kind of predatory behavior that we see associated with him. i think these things are very real. having lived in atlanta for 11 years, let me say it's very pervasive and so people have talked about the strip club culture tied in with hip-hop

culture in atlanta but given the way the laws were written in georgia, they were more stringent prohibitions against adult prostitution than there were for juvenile prostitution at that point in time. >> how does a family find a rep at reputable agency? >> you have to be careful. there aren't really regulations for agencies. i think those need to be put into place. you know you just have to be careful and look for signs and there isn't really a way to find a reputable agency. you know the big ones. those are all known. if somebody comes with a small agency you don't know. >> you have to be careful in that sense. one last thing. what's the number one most important thing this law does? >> i think it just protects

models having them have to have a chaperone and that's very important. many models come from different countries and they might not have their parents with them. it's really important that they have to have a chaperone. >> thank you. i appreciate it. enjoy fashion week. still to come, some big news from my interview with attorney general eric holder especially for our foot soldier of the week, sybrina fulton. hey, how's the college visit? you remembered. it's good. does it make the short list? you remembered that too. yea, i'm afraid so. knowing our clients personally is what we do. it's okay. this is what we've been planning for. thanks, bye. and with over 13,000 financial advisors we do it a lot. it's why edward jones is the big company that doesn't act that way.

the exhilaration of a new engine. painstakingly engineered without compromise. to be more powerful... and, miraculously, unleash 46 mpg highway. an extravagance reserved for the privileged few. until now. hey josh! new jetta? yeah. introducing lots of new. the new volkswagen jetta tdi clean diesel. isn't it time for german engineering?

can this decadent, fruit topped pastry... ...with indulgent streusel crumble, be from... fiber one. fiber one streusel. you park your car. as you walk away crunch! a garbage truck backs into it. so,you call your insurance company,

looking for a little support. what you get is a game of a thousand questions. was it raining? were your flashers on? was there a dog with you? by the time you hang up you're convinced the accident was your fault. then you remember; you weren't even in the car. at liberty mutual we make filing a claim as stress-free as possible. see car insurance in a whole new light. liberty mutual insurance on this day in 1926, the historian dr. carter j. wilson found a way to recognize the contributions of black americans to the united states. as the son of parents who were born into slavery and the second black man to earn a ph.d. from harvard, much of the story of black accomplishments was going untold. to bring the stories forward and have the experience of black people seen as integral to the

american experience, he createsd negro history week. he chose the second week of february because it included the birthdays of abraham lincoln and instead of focusing on great individuals, he wanted a celebration of a great people. he believed that african-americans had to understand their history in order to face the obstacles they faced in the present. it was a tribute to past generations and a call to action for generations that would follow. if a race has no history, it has no worthwhile tradition. it stands in danger of being exterminated. the creation of negro history week came as black america was at a crossroads. the harlem renaissance was happening in new york and great migration of more than 6 million

african-americans from the field of the rural south to factories of northern cities was under way. also in effect the laws of the south keeping scores locked out of the voting process and locked into poverty. as the push for civil rights grew so did the observance and significance of negro history week. until in 1976 the federal government officially recognized what we now know today as black history month. over the years, it's been the target of commercialization and skeptics who question its necessity but at its heart, it remains what woodson intended. a time to reflect and recharge. nearly 90 years after that first celebration. black america is once again at a crossroads. while challenges to voting rights and economic equality remain there are now more african-americans in congress than ever and the highest office in the land is held by a black man. president obama's proclamation of national black history month he declares like countless quiet

heroes who worked and bled far from the public eye. we know with enough effort, empathy and perseverance, people who love their country can change it. president obama's call to action and his own place in history a testament to the legacy of carter g. woodson who made clear that black history is american history on this day, february 7th, 1926. i have the flu with a runny nose. [coughs] better take something. theraflu severe cold won't treat your runny nose. really? alka-seltzer severe cold and flu

relieves your worst flu symptoms plus runny nose. [breath of relief] oh, what a relief it is. mommy! hey! oh yea, that's coming down let's get some rocks, man. health can change in a minute. so cvs health is changing healthcare. making it more accessible and affordable with walk-in medical care, no appointments needed and most insurance accepted. minuteclinic. another innovation from cvs health. because health is everything.

ring ring! progresso! i can't believe i'm eating bacon and rich creamy cheese before my sister's wedding well it's only 100 calories, so you'll be ready for that dress uh-huh... you don't love the dress? i love my sister... 40 flavors. 100 calories or less. he

one week from today, activists, community members and family will once again walk under the banner i am trayvon. it will be the annual day of remembrance peace walk. as posted on the trayvon martin foundation website, the gathering is a testament to the right that all people should be able to walk freely without being pursued, chased profiled or shot and killed on their streets. helping to lead the way next week trayvon's mother sybrina fulton who lost her son nearly

three years ago. since violence took her child from the world, fulton has been transformed from a private citizen to a leader within a movement that claims as simple mantra, black lives matter. that's michael brown's and eric garner's and her son, trayvon martin's. their lives matter. in a letter to the family of michael brown, sabrina fulton wrote, if they refuse to hear us, we will make them feel us. some will mistake that last statement as being negatively provocative. but feeling us means feeling our pain. imagine our plight as parents of slain children. we will no longer be ignored. no longer ignored indeed. i'm so pleased to look back to the program, sabrina fulton live from ft. lauderdale, florida. ms. fulton, i was so moved by your letter to the family of michael brown. why do you think so many people have trouble feeling the losses of black parents when our children are taken? >> because it hasn't happened to

them. i just don't understand them not feeling the loss because i'm sure they have had people in their lives that have been taken away from them and it's just multiplied when it's a child because we all know the law of order that says our children are supposed to bury us, not us bury our children. and so it's extra painful when we have to bury our children. >> it has been nearly three years since the loss of your son. yesterday i had the opportunity to speak with outgoing attorney general eric holder about the fact that it's been three years since trayvon was killed. one year since the end of george zimmerman's trial. we still don't know if there are going to be any civil rights charges. i'd like to play you a portion of the conversation and to get your response. >> my hope is that before i leave we will resolve the matter involving trayvon martin. that is one of the things i want to get done before i leave.

>> do you want to make some news right now? is there a report that's coming. >> i will say, there's a report that's coming. but i think we have to wait until it's actually done. i've had a chance to review it. but my hope is to get it done by the time i leave. >> we're probably in the 30-day countdown before this attorney general leaves. are you aware that there may be some action on this in the next month? >> well we've been waiting over a year to hear something. we've been in contact with the department of justice. but we haven't heard either way. so we're looking forward to some type of closure. >> talk to me a little bit, while you've been waiting on that closure from the justice department, you have nonetheless moved forward particularly with the trayvon martin foundation. what is it that the foundation will be doing in the coming week? >> next weekend, which is the trayvon martin remembrance weekend, we have what we call is our peace walk and our peace

talk to let the community know especially our young people to let them know they have a right to walk in peace without being followed chased, pursued or gunned down. at the end of the peace walk, we have what we call a peace talk where we have different motivation speakers, different community leaders to come out. it's entertaining but it's entertaining with a purpose. we have law enforcement to come out because we want to help bridge the gap between our young people and law enforcement. so that's just an event that this will be our third annual. and then on sunday which is february 15th we will have our remembrance center. and all the information is on the website if anybody is interested in attending or just interested in sponsorship or just donating to the cause. they can always go on our website, which is trayvonmartinfoundation.org. >> you've said many times you refuse to accept the idea that trayvon died in vain.

do you feel at this point now almost three years since you lost your son that something is beginning to change? >> i absolutely am hopeful that things will change. we didn't get into this situation overnight. and i don't believe we're going to get out of it overnight. so i know it will take time. but it's not going to take 50 years. we're doing our best. everybody had to do their part. i'm trying to do my part. and i reach out and encourage everybody to try to do something to make a positive change in this country. >> you, in fact, do so much. i've said it many times. i just find your steadfast refusal to be anything other than -- continuing to be a loving mother to your son even though your son is not with us anymore, that you continue to be what a good mother would be. but i have to ask you this about you personally. it's been almost three years. has it gotten any easier? >> no i can't say that it has.

trayvon just had a birthday on thursday, february 5th. and i told myself that it's going to be a good day. but it started off as a rainy day here in miami. and it started off me trying to get out of the car and i still had my seat belt on. it started off me just getting aggravated with so many things. and then i end up at the middle of the day, i had to go back to bed because i was just so sad by just thinking about his 20th birthday and what he should have been here doing. he should have been surrounded by family and i just think about those things often. and so it just got to me on his birthday. >> i really appreciate and thank you for reminding us again, if they don't hear us at least maybe they can feel us to remind us that of course this is a real child and that your feelings remain difficult. we are all here and you remain

in our thoughts, in our prayers, thank you, to sybrina fulton, in ft. lauderdale, florida. >> thank you so much for having me. >> that's our show for today. i want to say thanks to you at home for watching. please come back tomorrow morning, 10:00 a.m. eastern. on the program tomorrow my extensive and wide-ranging interview with u.s. attorney general eric holder. you are going to have to find out what happens when i talk to the attorney general about the fact that here on the show in nerdland, we call him the duck. now it's time for a preview of "weekends with alex witt." >> that is definitely going to be worth the price of admission right there. the brutal winter weather, there is more on the way. but it's not just forcing you to get out there and shovel. we'll tell you what other impact it has on americans everywhere even in the sunbelt. plus the answer to the age-old question can you catch bubonic plague in a new york city subway station? some alarming finds.

we'll tell you whether it's not as bad as it sounds. and the new harper lee book it's left the publishing world shock. why some are waiting with anticipation and others with concern. rthritis like me and you're talking to your rheumatologist about a biologic... this is humira. this is humira helping to relieve my pain and protect my joints from further damage. this is humira giving me new perspective. doctors have been prescribing humira for ten years. humira works for many adults. it targets and helps to block a specific source of inflammation that contributes to ra symptoms. humira can lower your ability to fight infections, including tuberculosis. serious, sometimes fatal infections and cancers including lymphoma have happened, as have blood, liver, and nervous system problems, serious allergic reactions, and new or worsening heart failure. before treatment get tested for tb. tell your doctor if you've been to areas where certain fungal infections are common, and if you've had tb hepatitis b, are prone to infections, or have flu-like symptoms or sores.

don't start humira if you have an infection. talk to your doctor and visit humira.com this is humira at work how much money do you have in your pocket right now? i have $40 $21. could something that small make an impact on something as big as your retirement? i don't think so. well if you start putting that towards your retirement every week and let it grow over time, for twenty to thirty years that retirement challenge might not seem so big after all. ♪ ♪ you only know in a fire to get out, to escape and now ok you are outside and you are safe but what do you do now and that's where the red cross came in... . we ran out of the house just wearing our pajamas. at that point just to even have a toothbrush that i could call my own was so important... . ...you know it just makes you feel like a person again.

every 8 minutes the american red cross responds to a home fire or other emergency. you can help. please donate now. ring ring! progresso! i can't believe i'm eating bacon and rich creamy cheese before my sister's wedding well it's only 100 calories, so you'll be ready for that dress uh-huh... you don't love the dress? i love my sister... 40 flavors. 100 calories or less. if i can impart one lesson to a new business owner, it would be one thing i've learned is my philosophy is real simple american express open forum is an on-line community, that helps our members connect and share ideas to make smart business decisions. if you mess up, fess up. be your partners best partner. we built it for our members, but it's open for everyone. 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. ♪ stouffer's mac and cheese

with real aged cheddar now in a convenient cup. new stouffer's mac cups. made for you to love. jordan ratchets up the bombing on isis. might that country send in ground troops? the mystery of the american hostage. new details on how she was captured and a direct message from her parents to the militant group. what could they say? coast to coast, more stormy weather threatens the east coast this week while a deluge has already begun out west. where and when all that bad weather will hit. "fifty shades of grey" is already breaking box office records and it's not even in theaters yet. we'll explain in number ones. hey, there.