"the rachel maddow show" starts right now. >> thanks to you at home for joining us this hour. we are expecting more election night results from a bunch of really different really interesting races across the country tonight including kentucky which chris has been talking about. the "associated press" has called the governor's race for republican matt bevin in kentucky over democratic state attorney general jack conway. we have more on that kentucky race ahead including what the kentucky results tonight might mean for rand paul's presidential race and specifically for all the people in kentucky who have been telling hip to quit that presidential race and instead start focusing full time on trying to hold on to his u.s. senate seat next year. we've got that story ahead and also president obama tonight on the record about something that he previously had not been on the record about. just a fascinating answer from president obama tonight to a very, very pointed question.

we've also got tom brokaw here in studio tonight to talk about what is so strange about the presidential race this year. we are 90 days out from the iowa caucuses as of tonight. and it's of course, the first tuesday in november. it's election night 2015. mr. brokaw will be here live in studio to talk about what really is new unprecedented about our strange strange politics this year, particularly the presidential race. really looking forward to that conversation. in terms of the latest headlines in that presidential race tonight, former secretary of state hillary rodham clinton got some very good polling news on the democratic side. she's up over bernie sanders by 31 points nationally in the new nbc/wall street journal poll. in the latest new hampshire poll, where bernie sanders has sometimes recently been holding the lead, hillary clinton is actually up by three points in the latest new hampshire poll from monmouth.

in addition to that polling news today, secretary clinton today also announced her support for a $12 an hour federal minimum wage. minimum wage right now is $7.25 an hour. it has been that for six years now. president obama has proposed raising it from $7.25 to $10.10 an hour. today hillary clinton in iowa proposed should be going to $12 an hour. she said that would make the minimum wage today roughly equal to what it was in 1968 in terms of purchasing power. hillary clinton out today for a $12 an hour minimum wage. her opponent bernie sanders, of course, is up for a $15 an hour minimum wage. bernie sanders also got his good polling news today. nbc polled on how hillary clinton and bernie sanders would do against some of the leading republican presidential contenders in a hypothetical general election match-up. and in those hypothetical match-ups you see the hillary ones on the left side, the bernie ones on the right side of your screen in what the poll was

able to tell about these hypothetical general election match-ups today, hillary clinton as you see, she either beats or ties all of the republicans they matched her up against in this new polling. bernie sanders also beats the people he is matched up against in the new polling but if you look at the point spreads there, against donald trump, bernie sanders actually beats donald trump by one point more than hillary clinton does and when it comes to marco rubio, bernie beats rubio by two points more than hillary clinton does. there was nos bernie sanders, ben carson match-up. we don't know about that one yet. overall these numbers are happy making for democrats and particularly happy making for bernie sanders and his supporters. those are headlines on the democratic side. on the republican side of the race today, there are a couple of small developments. and one development that i think might be a really big one i think you probably have not heard about yet.

in terms of the smaller stuff, first is the news that the effort by all the republican presidential campaigns to join together to negotiate debate terms directly themselves instead of going through the republican party that effort which formed late last week after the cnbc debate and crested over the weekend, that appears to have crashed and fallen apart today when jeb bush's campaign today announced that they would join the campaigns of carly fiorina and chris christie and john kasich and arguably the donald trump campaign in saying they will not sign onto the other candidates' list of demands about the debates. so i think that kind of settles it. we'll see. any leverage that the campaigns might have exerted on the tv networks or on the republican party to basically mutiny as a group and blow up the debate process and instead start their own debate process on their own terps that, does sort of appear to be falling apart now as the candidates decide they don't

really want to stick together on this. with this many candidates peeling off from that group effort, it looks like that group effort is not necessarily going to go forward. what does that mean for the debate process going forward? i don't know. we still don't know how that's going to resolve. but there is one other big development today and it's on the republican side. it concerns a candidate who's already teetering on the brink of not even making the next debate. the last date for national polls to come in to qualify or disqualify candidates from making it onto the main stage in the next republican debate next week, that deadline for new polls coming in is tomorrow. and depending on how the fox business network is going to count those polls which they won't say which polls they're counting but depending on which polls they decide to count, arguably, chris christie is not on track to make the main debate stage next week. so we'll see how fox business network counts the polls, which polls they count.

but just as chris christie teeters on the edge of not making it into the debates anymore, just as that is happening for him as he's on the eve of finding out if he's even in the next debate, something is happening for chris christie right now that is mostly off the radar of the beltway press. but i think it is real and i had i it's potentially a big deal. it is a videotape and it's not a scandalous videotape. it's a pretty remarkable videotape that was shot recently by "huffington post" of all places. they shot video of chris christie in new hampshire. he's at a meet and greet event at a bar in new hampshire. and he's talking to a relatively small crowd in this bar about the issue of addiction. and what happened here is ha "huffington post" kind of quietly posted this video online without much fuss and attention to it, but it has taken off like a rocket since they have posted online. almost entirely driven by facebook alone with no external

traditional media drivers for this at all. this video really has as they say gone viral. that is an annoying term that is overused which is why you never hear me say it, but it absolutely applies this in this case. this is the five-minute video that "huffington post" has put on facebook where it's had most of its views all of a sudden with no attention to this, this has had more than 2.3 million views. more than 2.3 million views just on facebook. yes, chris christie has terrible poll numbers teetering on the edge of political existence because of those bad poll numbers. but just watch this. if you want to know why people think even with his terrible numbers, if you want to know why people think he is still a contender, this is a very good indication of why. >> my mother was a smoker. she smoked her whole life. she was addicted to nicotine.

she started when she was 16 years old which was 1948. but by the time 1964 came the surgeon general's report came out, and she was in her mid 30s, she knew that smoking was bad for you. and i'll tell you, i watched her as a kid growing up, she tried everything she could to quit. she had the gum, the patches, hypnosis, she tried everything. she couldn't quit. now, when she turned 71, a little after that, she was diagnosed with lung cancer. no one came to me and said, don't treat her because she got what she deserved. we know the lung cancer caused by smoking. we know it was, but no one came to me and said your mother was dump, she started smocking when she was 16 and we're not go to give her radiation or chemotherapy because she's getting what she deserves. no one said that no one said

that about someone who had cancer. yet, somehow if it's heroin or cocaine or alcohol, we say, well, they decided they're getting what they deserved. i'm pro-life. and i think that if you're pro-life, that means you got to be pro-life for the whole life. not just for the nine months you're in the womb. all right? it's easy, it's easy to be pro-life for the nine months you're in the womb. they haven't done anything to disappoint us yet. they're perfect in there. but when they get out, that's when it gets tough. the 16-year-old teenage girl on the floor of the county lockup addicted to heroin, i'm pro-life for her, too. her life is just as much a precious gift from god as the one in the womb. and we need to start thinking that way as a party and as a people and the president needs

to say those things. >> new jersey governor chris christie campaigning in new hampshire recently. what happened here is that "huffington post" shot this video quietly uploaded it to facebook and it has taken off. it has been viewed more than 2.3 million times. in the few days since they have posted it. and on the issue, i mean this issue of addiction is something christie is not alone in tackling even on the campaign trail this year. hillary clinton has made it a centerpiece of her campaigning both in new hampshire and in iowa she explained she didn't expect to be talking about addiction as a centerpiece of her campaign till she went and did her listening tour and families kept bringing it up over and over and over and over again with her anytime anybody got a chance to talk to her. other candidates have talked about it. and in those remarks you just saw, you heard chris christie raise the issue of abortion rights at the end. maybe this talk, maybe that's a signy fire that this talk was

aimed at a republican audience. but other than that, aside about abortion rights, you can tell this is sort of a least partisan thing imaginable. whether you like chris christie as a candidate or not, whether you like him as a politician or not, his kind of skill at communicating the way you saw him communicate on an issue like this, that's why he still seems like he could be a contender despite all the numbers, everything on paper saying otherwise. that piece i just showed is the first half of his -- of these remarks that have these millions of views online. just watch the second part of it here. this is sort of the more personal part. this is -- i think that just as a political observer, this is pretty compelling no matter what you think of chris christie otherwise. watch. >> give you a second example. i'm a recovering lawyer. thank you.

and so i went to law school and for any of you who went to law school, if there's anybody here who is a lawyer too, you can admit it privately if you want later, but the people that you're closest to from law school are in your first year study group when you're nervous as heck, you dote know. you don't know what is up and what's down. are you going to make it or not. you have this small group of people that everybody puts together. there were eight of us in my group and we studied together. and you get to see everybody at their absolute worst. these are your best friends in law school. one of the guys that was in my study group give you his profile. we went to law school at seton hall university in new jersey. he came from an ivy league school to seton hall. he was the smartest of all of us. he became an editor of the law review. he was the first one of us who got a job. out of school. he got it at a big prominent law firm in our state and making more money than any of the rest

of us. he married a beautiful woman who is a doctor. they have three gorgeous daughters. one cuter and happier and more talented than the next. he was the first one among us to become a partner at his law firm. he bought a great house. he had great a great car and worse yet, he was really good looking. and and in perfect shape. the guy used to run 10, 12 miles a week every week. so we loved him but we hated him. because the guy had everything, right? he was running one day in his normal routine. he hurt his back running. he was in his early 40s. and was not giving in to age. and he was running his normal time and he hurt his back. and so he went to the doctor because he was having trouble working, really hurt. so he said listen, we're going to give you some treatment. in the meantime to help get you through, we're going to give you percocet to help numb the pain.

well, about a year later, i get a call from his wife. and she said, he's addicted to these painkillers. and he won't listen. and i kicked him out of the house. and he's living at his parents' house and you guys need to have an intervention with him, those friends from law school. get him to go to rehab. so we all went over there and had an intervention and it started a ten-year odyssey of him being in and out of rehab. during that period of time, she divorced him. he lost his right to see his girls. he lost his license to practice law. he lost his driver's license. he lost his home. he bought himself a condo and she kicked him out. he lost that. he lost all the moin, spent all the money he had saved and spent through most of his retirement. when a year and a half ago on a sunday morning, mary, pat and i got the call we had been

dreading forever that they found him dead in a motel room with an empty bottle of percocet and an empty quart of vodka. 52 years old. by every measure that we define success in this country, this guy had it. great looking guy. well educated. great career. plenty of money. beautiful loving wife. beautiful children. great house. he had everything. he's a drug addict and he couldn't get help and he's dead. and when i sat there as the governor of new jersey at his funeral and looked across the pew at his three daughters sobbing because their dad is gone, there but for the grace of god go i. it can happen to anyone. and so we need to start treating people in this country not jailing them. we need to give them the tools they need to recover because

every life is precious. every life is an individual gift from god. and we have to stop judging and start getting them the tools they need to get better. >> everybody's looking for the jeb bush comeback in the presidential race. the jeb bush turn around. well, if that discussion by chris christie on the issue of addiction moves people in general as much as it has already moved millions of people to watch that and share that online since it was uploaded by "huffington post" just a couple of days ago, if that has as much salience as it does online, it may not be the jeb bush comeback we should be watching for. it may be the chris christie comeback we should be watching for. tom brokaw is here next. we'll be right back. want to survive a crazy busy day? sfx: cell phone chimes start with a positive attitude... and positively radiant skin. aveeno® positively radiant moisturizer...

with active naturals® soy. aveeno® naturally beautiful results®.

tonight we're going to be joined by legendary "nbc nightly news" anchor tom brokaw to talk about the 2016 election and more.

we've got more on the big republican victories tonight in kentucky. that's all ahead. stay with us.

30 years ago, the democratic party broke one of the really big glass ceilings in this country. it was 1984 and for the first time ever, one of the major political parties in this country nominated as their vice presidential contender somebody who was not a dude. the democrats in 1984 picked congresswoman geraldine ferraro as the vice presidential running mate for their presidential nominee walter mondale. that was a landmark decision by the democrats and strategically, it was interesting. presented some totally novel

challenges for the republican side. nobody had ever run against a female presidential or vice presidential contender before and the republicans were pretty confident about their chances in that 1984 race overall but did worry about the ferraro factor. they worried specifically if there might be hidden risks in going up against her. and famously, that year, 1984, the advice to george h.w. bush, ronald reagan's vice president, the advice to him getting ready for the vice presidential debate that year against geraldine ferraro was he should be very careful to not talk down to her as a woman. whatever you do, don't be patronizing. women can see it a mile away. it's not a good look. famously george h.w. bush was warned about that in advance of the debate. and then the debate happened. >> i think i just heard mrs. ferraro say that she would do away with all covert action. and if so, that has very serious ramifications as the intelligence community knows.

this is serious business. and sometimes it's quiet support for a friend and so i'll leave that one there. let me help you with the difference, miss ferraro between iran and the embassies in lebanon. >> congresswoman ferraro. >> let me just say first of all, i almost resent vice president your patronizing attitude that you have to teach me about foreign policy. >> in that vice presidential debate in 1984, george bush did not follow the don't let nina accuse you of being patronizing advice. but vice president bush still thought he did pretty well in that debate. he thought he did great in that debate. >> good evening. i'm tom brokaw with "nbc nightly news." and today it was round two of the vice presidential debate between george bush and geraldine ferraro. everyone was arguing about who won last night, bush offered his own judgment and it immediately got him into trouble. he said "we tried to kick a little s last night."

roger mudd tonight on the bush comment and who won, who lost dispute. >> everybody claimed victory today and in various ways. george bush claimed victory on the docks in elizabeth, new jersey, using anything he could get his hands on to prove it. but bush then let his victory claims get out of hand when he bragged that "we kicked ass last night," an inelegant phrase he would not rebate but said he stood behind it. >> it's an athletic expression. i stand behind it. i use it all the time. i just don't like to use it in public. >> that was 1984. and that year ronald reagan and his vice president george bush did win re-election against mondale and ferraro. but when reagan and bush won that '84 election, they won ronald reagan a second term in office. you only get two. when it came time to pick another nominee four years later it was george bush's turn to try to win in 19 8 without ronald reagan.

for better or worse, he was not seen as having the same gift of communication as ronald reagan had. so improving that aspect of george bush as a candidate became a major priority for the republican party and for the white house tuning up george bush for television, getting him to lower his sometimes high pitched voice, teaching him to speak in a way that demanded command and ease. getting him to speak in a way that just worked better on television. then vice president george h.w. bush worked for years. he worked for two solid years when he was vice president in advance of his presidential campaign, he worked with two media gurus with two republican experts in the art of how to appear on television. and one of those gurus was a man named roger ailes who went on from being a republican operative and a media consultant to becoming the creator and head

of the fox news channel in the 1980s, george h.w. bush had his only manner of speaking and campaigning and appearing on television overhauled by roger ailes who is now the president of fox news. but alongside roger ailes, he worked with a man named jon kraushar. and today in 2015, roger ailes is obviously still very busy running the fox news channel. but jon kraushar is still around too and jon kraushar today is also back in the news because jon kraushar reportedly today all these years later just got himself a new client in the bush family. according to a report today in new york magazine, the jeb bush for president campaign has just hired jon kraushar to overhaul the debating and tv skills of the latest of george h.w. bush's sons to make a run for the presidency. ailes and kraushar were seen as critical to getting bush into the white house in 1988.

can the exact same guy and the exact same type of training also do it for jeb 30 years down the road? if the jeb bush for president campaign is going to turn around, the place they are at now from which they are trying to execute this turn is much farther off course than they imagined it to be. latest polling his him in fifth place. latest iowa polling has him in seventh place. the latest iowa number includes him losing in iowa to bobby jindalal who has been seen as sort of a lost cause candidate in that none of the last three presidential debates have even let bobby jindalal onto the main stage. he's a permanent fixture at the kids table but he right now in this latest poll is ahead of jeb bush in iowa. jeb bush has been in single digits in 21 of the last 24 polls in the republican race, in single digits in the last nine straight national polls, not in

double digits in iowa since august. and maybe bobby jindal beating jeb bush in iowa, maybe that shows this year the debates don't really matter or they're unpredictable in their impact. if so, that would not be the first supposedly reliable political metric to fail us this year. and the jeb bush campaign and its unexpected failure to thrive may be a part of this, it may be a microcosm for the larger story. the larger story feels like the old results and old expectations don't apply anymore this year because this year, there is some movement up and movement down after the debates, but the candidates who continue to do the best in the polls now that the debates have started they're two candidates who have had unmemorable debate performances from ben carson and donald trump. this year money and poll numbers seem to be uncorrelated either in terms of how much money the campaigns and their super pacs

have or how much money the campaigns and super pacs spend. donald trump spent more than 100 days at the top of the polls there summer and into the fall without spending one dollar on any advertising whatsoever. conversely, scott walker decided his chances were hopeless and he quit the race while he still had over $10 million sitting unused in the bank accounts of his supporting super pacs. that said, scott walker is one of only two republican candidates who have gotten out of the race. another political rule or expectation that's gone out of the window this year is the idea that anybody who persists as the zero to 2% in the polls can't possibly remain viable for long and they have to quit. but there have been multiple candidates hanley simmering between 0 and 2% in the polls for months now with no sign any of them are getting out or there's any pressure increasing on them to get out. of course, there is the magna carta of all political rules which is ultimately it's the establishment that chooses and protects and anoints the next

nominee particularly within the republican party. this year, the ballot ballad of jeb bush seems to be disproving that rule every day. maybe it disproves it once and for all. but this year feels like the year when all the political common wisdom is flying out the window. it was earned over a period of years and decades by watching campaigns and elections happen the way had he always do. nobody invented this political wisdom. it's the lessons of political history. is this year that different? is this year as unpredictable as it seems? is this year really breaking as many rules as it feels like it is breaking? is it fair to look at jeb bush's tough times on the campaign trail and beak see him as a canary in the coal mine for the collapse of our modern political norms? how weird is this year. >> joining us now is tom brokaw, former "nbc nightly news" anchor, now special correspondence for nbc news. thank you for being here. >> good to be back.

>> is this in fact a weird year or does every year feel this weird? >> no, and i'm not sure i would choose weird as the word. i think what is so unconventional. we have never seen anything quite like this, two leading candidates, no political experience what soever say very provocative things out there. many of them don't add up necessarily but they bring a certain amount of charisma each in his own way, that is donald trump and dr. carson to the campaign and the big overriding message here is the country is fed up with politics as usual. they're fed up with people who held office. jeb bush thought very successful governor of florida, he comes out on the campaign trail, he's got a lot of policy positions. he goes not just nowhere, he is in retreat at had point. big difference between now and what his father went through. his father had one opponent in each of those cases. his father was running against geraldine ferraro and michael dukakis and there wasn't be social media.

when he got in trouble, they him in a lot of photo ops and brought in ted williams who is one of his plows. they made him the guy's guy. and he began to turn that around. but he didn't run against the tsunami of commentary that goes on 24/7. so you know, it's going to be tough for jeb bush i think at this point. we'll have to wait and see. >> one of the things i feel like has made me sort of worse at my job or explaining what's going on, i feel like campaigning doesn't have a predictable effect anymore. having donald trump be at the top of the polls for so long without running any ads, having ben carson have a style of campaigning that doesn't extrapolate to anything else, we were just talking about that chris christie tape we played at the top of the show and how remarkly effective is he in a small room like that. that's usually the sort of thing that translates to big numbers. >> that's not the first time this has happened. remember that ross perot didn't

get to where he was with ads. he got to be where he was because he was perot, he was unique. he got a lot of time on television. it was that kind of i'm going to go to washington and get under the hood kind of thing that caught fire for him. and in this case, both trump and dr. carson are on television without ads 23 hours out of 24 hours almost pre day. >> for free. >> you cannot escape them. and we cannot overlook the digital world. social media. everybody's on their iphone or on a computer all day long and sooner or later trump or carson are going to pop up. they're saying the things that tap into a lot of frustration in this country in my judgment. what jeb bush was a successful governor of florida. he thought he was going to be able to take that and his family's name and the extraordinary kind of court he has behind him advising him and the money he had and he was playing by as someone said 1996 rules.

the rules have changed enormously. i've never seen anything quite like this. >> we may have to rewrite some of the rules after this campaign when we will see how it settles out particularly on the republican side. >> it depends who wins. if the guys who win have gotten there by these rules, they're not going to let you change the rules. it worked for me. >> does the republican establishment, a, does the republican establishment exist? is it fair for me to assign that value to a group of people that i imagine in my mind and if they do exist, do they have options for exerting control over who the nomination goes to? >> not in the way that they once did. i mean there was a time when the kind of bare bones of the republican party would get together and say this is going to be our best hope here and we're going to go forward with that. you know? the great phrase of pat buchanan, these are peasants with pitchforks as he described his constituency. there's a lot of that going on out there.

there's the essence of a democracy. people are coming in who hadn't before because they want to shake their fist and say this is what i want. whatever law of physics you want to apply to this doesn't work because there's a whole new set of rules being established out there. the one thing that i've always liked is that it does cause people to pay attention and when we have these debates you see how their minds work. you have an idea where they are and where they want to go. that's a good thing. >> to see 24 million people tune into a debate, don't assume the worst why people are watching. we just got surprising political news out of kentucky tonight. would you mind staying with me to talk about that in just a moment? >> i would. >> we'll be right back with former "nbc nightly news" anchor tom brokaw with reaction to some of the kentucky news in just a moment. stay with us. [ horn honks melody ] well, well. if it isn't the belle of the ball.

gentlemen. you look well. what's new, flo? well, a name your price tool went missing last week. name your what, now? it gives you coverage options based on your budget. i just hope whoever stole it knows that it only works at progressive.com. so, you can't use it to just buy stuff? no. i'm sorry, gustav. we have to go back to the pet store. [ gustav squawks ] he's gonna meet us there. the name your price tool. still only at progressive.com.

happy first tuesday in november. happy election day. there has been a shocker tonight in the results of the election for governor in kentucky. polls closed in kentucky a few hours ago. and voters in kentucky have just elected republican matt bevin to be their new governor. the reason this is a shock is because all of the polls coming in to tonight showed this going the other way. so the democratic jack conway leading by a pretty good margin. he's already won statewide office in kentucky but the polls showing him leading were

apparently wrong. matt bevin has won this race tonight in kentucky about i a pretty good margin. the outgoing governor who is term limited is steve bashir, a democrat. that means overall, this is a pickup for the republicans. the republicans have taken control of that state house. matt bevin becomes only the second republican governor of kentucky in the last 40 years. still with us is former "nbc nightly news" anchor tom brokaw. thank you for staying. what do you make of these kentucky results? >> the terror for the democrats is that a metaphor for the national election because bevin ran a tea party classic race against the establishment down there, driving around the state in a gold cadillac. he had run once before as a hard tea party guy. the democratic governor had expanded medicaid and adopted obamacare. guess what, the new governor says we're reducing medicaid. we'll see what happens to obamacare. if that is template for what's

going to happen come the fall, these are big issues that are put in play tonight by what happened in kentucky. charlie cook was said if it goes this way, he said it's radioactive for the democrats because it's a rejection again of obama and what the democrats are standing for at this point. >> definitely a nationalized campaign in terms of way bevin ran against the democrat. he basically ran against conway as if conway was obama. >> that's right. that had worked before for mitch mcconnell for example when he seemed to be in trouble when he was running for re-election down there but they made the race all about obama. >> one of the interesting calculations democrats made about obamacare was once it went into effect and hundreds of thousands and indeed millions of people got health insurance who didn't have before because of this law, it would become something that became politically impossible to take away because it would have a dil tierious effect on people's lives. if bevin follows through,

something like 400,000 to 500,000 people in kentucky will lose health insurance they've already got. that's what kentucky just voted for. >> that's right. and if you look at the big picture on obamacare, there are those who say look, it's working. it's working in some areas. the fact is premiums are going up. fewer people are signing up. they had real trouble this last time when it came time for eligibility about how many people are going to show up. the fewer people in the pool, the more the rates go up. >> there are millions more people covered than there were before. >> there's no question about that. there is that. but it's not any kind -- there's no light at the end of the tunnel yet. how is this thing going to wind up? where will we feel secure as individuals that we've got a program that's going to last for us and there's been a consolidation issue of these insurance companies. moreover, a big consolidation in community hospitals in america.

community hospitals are going out of business because only the big ones can survive and manage this. what really always aggravates me as much as anything, look, i think the obamacare was imperfect from the beginning but i didn't hear anything from the republicans here's what we ought to be doing. just say get rid of that. still 18% of our national economy is spent on health care in this country as someone who's just been through the system. i know how tough this is and i had all the gold plated advantages. if i'm out there in the middle of the country and worked hard all my life and got two gas stations and a convenience store, if i get hit with what i've got at age 45, man, they're at sea. that shouldn't happen. it's a national security issue to find a way to make health care work for everyone. >> and to have millions more people added to the roles is a good thing but the political precariousness. >> it is very politically precarious. >> kentucky underscored that like nothing else. former "nbc nightly news" anchor tom brokaw.

>> it's a big evening. i've been doing this for a long time. my blood still runs hot when it gets to the elections. >> thanks, tom. >> my pleasure. thanks very much. >> it's an honor to have you here. we'll be right back, stay with us on the. resolve to turn heads this holiday season. starting now with roc® retinol. it's up to two times stronger than imitators. try roc® retinol correxion® night cream... after 1 week, fine lines appear to fade, 1 month, deep wrinkles look smoother... and after one year, skin looks ageless. make you roc retinol resolution today and put your best face forward in 2016.

high performance skincare only from roc®.

the notion that the united states should be putting boots on the ground i think would be a profound mistake and i want to be very clear and very explicit about that. >> that was president obama a little over a year ago saying what he has repeatedly said about syria over the past few years, that he would not put boots on the ground in syria, it would be a mistake to put boots on ground in syria. of course, we got word last friday the president was sending several dozen operations troop into syria. the white house played down the announcement as not that big a change in policy but it is boots on the ground in an ongoing way not just for a raid here and there. now for the first time president obama has been asked directly and personally about this break and he gave these remarks in response. this was in as interview with nbc's lester holt.

watch. >> we haven't heard from you since last friday when the decision was announced to put a small number of u.s. special operations forces on the ground in northern syria. many will look at and say you've broken your promise about boots on the ground. have you? >> well, keep in mind we have run special ops already. we captured a high value target actually. he was killed but captured his wife. we're able to gather up enormous intelligence that helped us to further constrain isil's operations both in syria and iraq. so we have been opportunistic where necessary, and really this is just an extension of we were continuing to do. we are not putting u.s. troops on the front lines fighting fire fights with isil. what we can do is in addition to the training and advising that

we do, there are going to be select situations in which there is an isil leadership camp or there is a particular isil leader that we can capture quickly. that the iraqis don't have the capacity. in syria, we don't have anybody on the ground who can execute those kinds you have complex operations and what this really amounts to is us prepositioning some additional select assets for us to be able to engage where necessary. but i've been consistent throughout that we are not going to be fighting like we did in iraq with a battalions and occupations. that doesn't solve the problem. >> no battalions and occupations is definitely part of what president obama promised about the conflict in syria but he also props nod boots on the

ground. maybe this will be made out to be just a matter of semantics but it certainly seems like we have had a dramatic change. that's president obama for the first time on the record about it in an interview with lester holt. much more of that interview will air right after this show. stay with us.

addition to the republicans' big win tonight in kentucky, we've been following a number of races and ballot measures across the country. tonight, for example, the great state of ohio had a chance to vote on legalizing the recreational use of marijuana. and in ohio, they have voted to reject that by a pretty big margin. one thing to note, this could have something to do with the actual literal production of pot in ohio. the odd ohio-specific business model that they were also voting on tonight would have only allowed ten rich investors to grow and dispense all of the legal pot for the whole state.

ohio tonight said no to that. and in the state of virginia, control of the state senate has been up for grabs. this is how the balance of power looks in virginia. there are 40 seats in the virginia senate. right now, republicans control the senate by a slim 21-19 advantage. democrats had desperately wanted to take the senate back. tonight, all of the seats in the virginia senate were on the ballot. democrats only needed to pick up a couple of seats to reclaim the majority. results are still coming in from those virginia races, but the ap is reporting that from their projection, they believe republicans will remain in control of the senate in virginia. they're projecting republican victories in 21 of 37 districts. election night, still happening. we'll keep you posted as we go along.

>> the nation of yemen usually gets around four of five inches of rain per year. today they got that, in some cases, maybe up to ten times that much in one day. a rare tropical cyclone ripped through the nation of yemen today. it carried winds as high as 100 miles an hour. but more importantly, perhaps, it dumped huge amounts of rain on a country that is usually parched. it caused major flooding around the country. in some parts of the country, floodwaters reached four or five feet high. at least three people have been killed in theed flooing so far. hundreds more people have been injured. yemen, of course, is right in the middle of a violent civil

war right now. but this huge cyclone made landfall on an al qaeda strong hold. this has been some very scary scenes in yemen today in a flas place that doesn't have much reserve to take care of people in the best of times. those death tolls and injury tolls may go up in yemen. stay with us. we stop arthritis pain, so you don't have to stop. tylenol® 8hr arthritis pain has two layers of pain relief. the first is fast. the second lasts all day. we give you your day back. what you do with it is up to you. tylenol®. it's a housewife who's in control of the finances. actually, any wife, husband, or human person can use progressive's name your price tool to take control of their budget. and while the men do the hard work of making money,

she can get all the car insurance options her little heart desires. or the women might do the hard work of making money. [ chuckling ] women don't have jobs. is this guy for real? modernizing car insurance with -- that's enough out of you! the name your price tool, only from progressive. where is your husband?

the name your price tool, only from progressive. yothat's lactaid®.k! right. 100% real milk, just without the lactose. so, no discomfort? exactly. try some... mmm, it is real milk. lactaid®. 100% real milk. no discomfort. today the republican-controlled house of representatives put out their work calendar for next year, 2016. just wrap your head around this. the days highlighted in blue are the days they're planning on work. anything not in blue is a day off. if that looks like it's not a lot of days working that's because it's not a lot of days working. the house is planning to work a grand total of 111 days next year. there are only two weeks in the

entire year where they're planning to work a full five days. in each of the last five years republicans have been in control, the number of days congress was scheduled to be inform session dropped. if all goes according to planned, next year's calendar will shrink by more than 20 days from last year. next year they're going to come out of the gates hot in january, ready to work a full ten days over the course of the entire month. then they ramp it up to 13 days in february. in march, they're tired. they go back to ten days for the whole month. it's 12 days total in april, may and june. look out, they're on a roll. but then look at the date we circled here, july 7. they're so gassed after that seven days of work in july, they're going to begin their august recess this year on july 16. august recess this year starts july 16 and it ends in september. they're planning on working a

total of 111 days for the whole year. these guys should literally just get a second job and come to washington and work on sick days from their other job. it's amazing. nice work if you can get it. on six days from their other job. it's amazing. nice work if you can get it. "first look" is up next. it's wednesday, november hadth. right now on "first look" the voters have spoken across america from marijuana in ohio to the rio election of an ex-con. new clues adds investigators focus in on what brought down the russian airliner that claimed 224 lives. enough snow has fallen to force some ski row sorts to open up for business. the $650,000 parking spot and the shifting fortunes of 2016 presidential candidates. "first look" starts right now. good morning and happy hump day