this morning, my question -- just what do we mean by diversity? plus, 382 days and one very determined president. and, the complications of politics, marriage and misdeeds. but first, bill cosby's latest lesson for america. good morning, i'm melissa harris-perry. by now you have seen the unlikely images from every possible single angle. bill cosby in a perp walk as he

entered montgomery county courthouse on wednesday to be charged with aggravated indecent assault, a felony, and if convicted he could face prison time. this is the first time he's ever been charged with a crime after dozens of allegations of sexual assault and other sexual misconduct going back several decades. cosby and his attorneys have repeatedly denied the allegation. now, america's dad has a mugshot. that fact is jarring. it causes a kind of cognitive dissonance to see this one-time revere figure being ushered into a courthouse just miles from philadelphia. where his image in a mural that was painted over in 2008 three years after the alleged victim first brought claims to police. the alleged victim claims that cosby whom she considered a friend and mentor, drugged and sexually assaulted her in 2004. when she brought the claims to

police in 2005, the local prosecutor declined to press charges because he said there was not sufficient evidence. cosby told police the encounter was consensual. more than ten years later and just days before the statute of limitations ran out the newly elected prosecutor in montgomery county filed the charge. district attorney elect kevin steele says he decided to charge cosby after deposition by cosby from a civil suit the plaintiff filed and settled out of court became public earlier this year. in the deposition cosby denied any sexual assault bru acknowledged obtaining drugs with the intent of giving them to women he wanted to have sex with. constant is 1 of 57 women who have come forward with claims that cosby sexually assaulted them or engaged in other sexual misconduct. 57 women. 57 women. the number of alleged victims in as staggering as the images of mr. cosby's arrest.

on thursday the "new york daily news" cover, all those "she saids quarterback" echoed the sentiment of july's ""new york" magazine" cover which featured a 35 of the women accusing cosby of misconduct and the empty chair to represent survivors of sexual assault by anyone who have not come forward. 57. i've been thinking about this number a lot. the sheer weight of the possibility that dozens of women have silently endured the trauma and shame of surviving sexual assault at the hands after single assailant. even the remote possibility that we as a nation were complicit in the silence, that we turned away from allegations because it was just too painful even to imagine seeing exactly what we saw this week. "ebo "ebony" mag zeer cazine capture perfectly. no matter what legal outcome of the case the national rupture of

mr. cosby, evenly if only one accuser has a day in court, even if mr. cosby is not found guilty -- 57 is just too many to ignore. 57. but here's a lingering request he for me. why is it so often true that one woman is in fact so easy to ignore. joining us now, gloria allred an attorney who represents 29 women who have accused mr. cosby of sexual misconduct. she does not represent the woman in the pennsylvania case. joy reid. gloria, i've been thinking about this number a lot in part because if you spent any time on social media, despite 57, you will still see all of this language about these women are gold diggers and mr. cosby is just being brought down by a media or by a kind of conspiracy to take him down.

you yourself have been called all sorts of things. i keep thinking about the chill of reluctance that creates for all survivors to come forward. >> and that's a statement, melissa, about why many women do not come forward when they become victims of any one of sexual violence, of rape, sometimes of child sexual abuse. it is the fear. sometimes there are actual threats by people. sometimes it's just the feeling that there is an imbalance in power, and that in a sense is a threat. now when you come to celebrities, for example, like mr. cosby who has fame, who has money, who has power, in addition, has that image of a very well respected and honored father figure, then an individual who's not known to the public fears, well, they won't be believed, and they will be criticized, and as you very well point out, more than 50 women have come forward and still that's not enough for some people to believe women. so why would they have believed one woman?

the good news is -- that was the bad news -- is that women have now broken out of that fear. they will not remain silent. they will come forward. and that is where we are today. i think that's really a sense of empowerment that they have, understanding there are risks, and some of them, by the way, have been sued by mr. cosby, but also deciding that they're going to speak their truth and i'm very proud of them. >> i've been thinking about in a little bit in the context of, we've talked about some of the policing in the black lives matter movement, the part of the discussion about the perfect victim. if you think about the fact that dabble holtzclaw -- mr. cosby is not a convicted rapist, former officer holtzclaw is a convicted rapist. we know that his strategy was in fact to find women who would be unlikely to be believed. that was actually the perpetrator's strategy. i keep wondering if in the case

of sexual assault if perfect victim almost exclusively means the sheer number of victims. it is not any one individual, it is that you must have dozens of people in order to look believable. >> especially when you have somebody like bill cosby who also had on his side in addition to all the things that gloria mentioned an aggressive public morality. essentially he was the arbiter of morality for millions of americans, self-declared arbiter of morality for decades in addition to having a ground-breaking career that gave him this sense of a shield, haven't broken so ma having broken so many barriers himself as a black man in hollywood. these women were all so young, just over teenagers, in early 20s, who a lot of these allegations are during a period in american history, a period in hollywood when drugs and sex were a part of the conversation. so he could hide beneath the shield of the sort of immorality of the general world around him

and his sort of -- the -- his sort of morality in context of that. >> my single favorite piece of good news here is the nevada law change and this idea that in recognition of how long it sometimes takes survivors to come forward, nevada has changed their law so that now instead of a five-year statute of limitations we're now at 20 years. >> i want to give credit to my client, one of the alleged survivors. because they went to a nevada legislator. they decided they wanted to change the law. then i came with my client and we testified before the nevada legislature and were with governor sandoval when he signed the bill. we are now going to work -- that is, other women -- in california to do that. you'll be hearing more about that this month because we're going to work to eliminate the statute of limitations for

victims v of rape in california. federal judge edward moreno called him a public moralizer. it was one of the reasons he decided to unseal the deposition which then of course we see mr.s would r cosby under oath testifying about giving quaaludes to a woman. having said that, i just want to say that all women that are coming forward are not necessarily the ones who were involved with quaaludes. my client, judy huth, who was only 25 years old, claims she was victimized by mr. cosby at the playboy mansion. we're litigating that. it may not be that only andrea constand has her day in court. >> the other piece of that 57 women piece is just if you are early on in that, there is this kind of guilt that also exists, even though -- because carrying

guilt is a part of the story of surviving. but this idea all of these folks later -- it should be shared by all of us that we don't believe one and so we have to go to dozens of people. thank you to my panel. much more from them over the course of this morning. you stay right there. up next, the latest controversy lighting up the twitter sphere. driveway. the lexus december to remember sales event is here. lease the 2016 es350 for $349 a month for 36 months and we'll make your first month's payment. see your lexus dealer. [ sneezing ] a cold can make you miserable. luckily, alka seltzer plus cold and cough liquid gels. rush liquid fast relief to your tough cold symptoms. fast, powerful liquid gels from alka seltzer plus

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the hashtag black lives matter was one of the most tweeted news hashtags in 2015, thanks in part to the influence of black twitter. that cultural phenomenon that we all know and sometimes love that includes some of the 18% of u.s. twitter users who are

african-american. so twitter users are in fact more racially diverse than other social media networks including facebook and linkedin. as a result of their user demographics, twilt etwitter had its commitment to the vast backgrounds of their users around the world. in august 2015 the company made a few diversity related 2016 new year's resolutions including increasing its percentage of women employees to 35% overall, as well as increasing women in leadership positions to 25%. likewise, the company hoped to increase minority employees to 11% and those in leadership to 6%. that's why many were surprised last week when the company announced its pick for the new vice president of global diversity and inclusion. jeffrey siminoff is a white man currently ending his tenure as apple's director of worldwide

diversity. he will be replacing the woman who was vp of diversity for six years. this hire comes a few months after leslie miley, then the only black engineer at twitter in a leadership position, stepped down from his post during a series of layoffs at the company. he publicly attributed his decision to leave twitter to issues with diversity. but, as twitter and other major social and tech companies continue to think through ways to increase employee diversity we also have to examine what diversity means and what company leaders can do to improve it. joining me, you a tore of "doch"do u." and raul reyes. so mark, why is this an issue? >> i don't believe that there is a problem with a white guy being in this leadership position but you're talking about diversity

at a company that lacks black and latino employees at the same degree as white male employees. so to have this very public role and have it led by a white man is to users, they're like what's going on? because you said, hey, we want more black people, we want more latino people. the person who is in charge of that is a white male hire. people are sort of taken aback by that. >> i am so of two minds on this. on the with unhand, if we use the language of diversity and not of racial justice, lgbt questions, women, that does constitute diversity. when what we mean is racial justice, maybe we ought to say that. >> we have to remember people's idea of diversity comes from our own lens. for example i tend to see diversity in terms of people of color, african-americans, latinos. other is look at it in terms of gender, lgbt inclusion. that said, what i find so confounding about this situation is we know that latinos an african-americans over index for

usage of twitter. forget arguments about diversity with be just from a business sense. wouldn't you want someone who's tied in to these networks, who has connection with these communities? just as we have black twitter with hashtag black lives matter, hashtag i can't breathe, it is the same thing among latinos. christmas week aloaning there was hashtag mexican christmas. these are communities that are heavily engaged. why wouldn't you want someone with roots in these communities? that's the part that is puzzling to me. >> there is a part of moo he that thinks -- i can remember when i first started in the academy, which is what i still think of as my real job. i never want the job ever being the dean of diversity or the dean of black students because there is a way in which that -- and let me be very careful -- ghettoizes, but actually generates a space that's only for race questions, that is only governed by people who are racially marginal.

i'm down for the white folks running the diversity stuff. right? >> yeah. i guess you can make a counter intuitive argument that maybe if it is a white person running, they'll be less marginalized in the organization. but i do think it is the bare minimum. if you already have a problem with diversity and there are many qualified candidates who are people of color who specialize in this issue, you did have a lot of people to choose from. but you are right, there was a wonderful piece by a female engineer this week who said the real head of diversity and inclusion should be -- creating a position is almost, it is a good way to create a committee that we're going to study it that maybe somewhere along the line they'll be changes. i think the bare minimum is they could have found a person of color. but we have all been in institutions that pay lip service to there's -- let's use the word diversity for now, or inclusion. but until you actually see power and leadership throwing their energies behind this and saying this is important, nothing is going to change. >> you worked in places where

they use lip service to diversity? i'm just stunned to hear that. mark, talk to me about the idea that there is -- there are a lot of qualified candidates. right? i think part of what we hear all the time is, it's not racial choices being made at the top, it is in fact pipeline problems. even the white house was doing these really kind of over the past three or four years focus on s.t.e.m. diversity for girls and women as well as for people of color. is there a big wide population of potential leaders to choose from? >> there's not necessarily the widest population but they certainly exist. what's happened in tech is that black and latino people and women are seen as less qualified automatically. what happens is, oh, we had a black person, we had a latino before. we're not going to hire any more because that person did poorly. it's already set in their mind that we need to stick with someone who's a white male in

these instances. >> it's also the mindset i think many people in the tech industry feel their idea of diversity is we have asian-americans. it is just the lens they are looking for. they can check that box. >> diversity is kind of the language left on the table, for example in the affirmative action debate and higher education. we'll all just be different with each other as opposed to saying black and brown people use twitter, they use it in very specifically racialized way around racial justice concerns and therefore you need people of color in those positions. >> i feel like tech is sort of the widest lane where we are discussing this right now but is certainly is not the only place. i'm reminded of the same debate happening in politics right now where you have a democratic party that's super dependent on people of color but where suppliers of color, people who are consulting, people who are pollsters, people who work in the field of campaigning can't get a second look from the party when it comes to the contracts.

then the other interesting thing, this hair. african-americans are in the '90s. there was this big debate whether or not the debate african-americans are such super users of certain sort of industries in the hair world we're not at the other end profiting from it at all. twitter is something that is so endemic now to the communication of african-americans in terms of black lives matter but just every day social networks. the idea that you don't want to have people in place who understand one of your most important markets just is inviting that market to go elsewhere. >> the thing with the hair thing, the idea that the natural hair market now, that the products are dominated by not by sort of the black-owned companies but by companies that are mainstream companies. there is the one diversity person who works there. i don't know, i have many, many other feelings about that. thank you to the panel. up next, the latest on the new turmoil in the middle east. i'm like, huh? aren't they all the same? you know, i had to see for myself.

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in iran overnight angry

protesters stormed the saudi arab arab arabian embassy in iran. they threw molotov cocktails and set fire to the building, all in reaction to saudi arabia's execution of a prominent shiite cleric and 46 others yesterday. to our knowledge, no one was hurt in the tehran protests and the iranian student news agency reported 40 arrests. the executed sheikh was a critic of saudi arabia's treatment of its shiite minority. saudi arabia is defending the executions as part of the war on terrorism. for the very latest, let's go right to tehran, nbc's ali arouzi is there. thank you. tell us what you know. >> reporter: that's right, melissa. hard-line protesters raided the saudi embassy in tehran last night angry over the execution of the prominent shia cleric, sheikh nimr al nimr. protesters shouted "death to

saudi arabia," threw molotov cocktails at the building before pouring inside and ransacking the premises. flames and smoke could be seen billowing from the windows. protesters last night also ransacked the saudi consulate in a city northeast in iran. iran's ruling establishment today were very quick to condemn the execution. the supreme leader, ayatollah khomeini said in a tweet saudi arabia will face divine revenge for al nimr's execution calling the execution a huge crime and wrong deed. the country's huge revolutionary guard also vowed revenge. they said nimr's execution violates human rights and values but the damage of the saudi embassy was by no means justifiable. rowhani said iran's interior

minister has been asked to identify the attackers and bring them to justice to stop these sort of things from ever happening again and guarantee the full safety to countries who provide diplomatic missions. there is no love lost between rivals and foes, saudi arabia and this latest foe is sure to fan the flames of tension further. up next, new questions about what it means to solve homelessness. to take chantix to shut everybody else up about me quitting smoking. i was going to give it a try, but i didn't think it was going to really happen. after one week of chantix, i knew i could quit. along with support, chantix (varenicline) is proven to help people quit smoking. chantix definitely helped reduce my urge to smoke. some people had changes in behavior, thinking or mood, hostility, agitation, depressed mood and suicidal thoughts or actions while taking or after stopping chantix. some had seizures while taking chantix. if you have any of these, stop chantix and call your doctor right away. tell your doctor about any history of mental health problems, which could get worse or of seizures. don't take chantix if you've had a serious allergic or skin reaction to it.

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rush liquid fast relief to your tough cold symptoms. and they outsell mucinex liquid gels 2 to 1. alka seltzer plus liquid gels. don't let it conquer you.. with the capability and adaptability of lexus all-weather drive. this is the pursuit of perfection. the federal government declared last week that new york city has effectively ended chronic homelessness among military veterans. it is a milestone in the fight against homelessness, one achieved by the city in part by giving more than 1,000 beds into permanent housing in 2015. but the city has not claimed to end episodic homelessness among veterans and there are still more than 700 homeless veterans living had shelters. the biggest caveat is that new

york remains far from eliminating homelessness for everybody else. a problem which in recent years has reached its highest levels since the great depression. about 58,000 new yorkers sleep in homeless shelters on any given night. most of them are families with children. the city says an additional 3,000 sleep on the streets and the subway. although advocates say the number is far greater. reducing homelessness has become a focus for mayor bill de blasio's time in office with the "new york post" claiming he's ushering in a new era of street homelessness and public violations. the biggest initiative is to build 15,000 more units of supportive housing which is heavily subsidized and comes with a range of social services attached over the course of the next 15 years but it may be too little. homeless advocates say the city needs at least twice that much

new housing. joining me now, a board member with vocal new york, a community organization serving low income people with hiv and aids. to your knowledge raul reyes. donna lieberman, executive director of the new york civil liberties union and new york city councilman richie torres who chairs the council's committee on public housing. thank you all for being here. you have spent time in your life inside and outside of new york public shelters, homeless shelters. i want you to help us understand what the experience is. what is it we misunderstand about the experience of homelessness? >> well, the whole stigma about it is people who have a roof over their heads don't really know exactly what it is all about. you can't imagine what it feels like not having your own roof over your own head. especially when your immune system is compromised, like

myself. housing is therapeutic, stable and affordable house something actually therapeutic. it will allow me to take my medications, make all my doctor appointments, and i can eat well. these are things lacking in shelter system. >> that feels to me then why we need these supportive housing units. it is so important to hear from you that housing is this kind of foundational first step. but it is also about access to medication and access to all kind of the whole range of things that again those of us with resources often take for granted. >> to the mayor's credit, he's taking a humane holistic approach to addressing homelessness so he's investing $2.6 billion in creating 15,000 units of supportive housing. that's affordable housing with on-site built-in supportive services and supportive housing is both good economics and good morals. it is much more cost-effective and much more humane than shelter or incarceration or

hospitalization and it is the best tool that we have for ending chronic homelessness. >> is homelessness getting worse in the city? the "new york post" would tell me it is. >> it is deeply unfair to blame the mayor for homelessness without putting the problem in its historical context. homelessness is largely a consequence of our affordability crisis drib by a perfect storm of falling incomes and rising rents. when it comes to apartments renting a the $1,000 or less, new york city's lost 400,000 units of affordable housing since 2000. but it is also the product of public policy. there were a series of public policy decisions made well before the mayor came into office under the bloomberg administration. homeless families were syst systematically cut off, whether section 8 vouchers, public housing or the elimination of work advantage. >> one thing that's important, you had this long history that has real impact on real lives. then i feel like the kind of

good news that we started with was this idea that the federal government through its initiatives that were in part led by the first lady and by dr. biden was to attempt to end veteran homelessness and we saw in tons of cities, several dozen cities across the country, that once you had like a deadline and some resources and some focused detention in fact they were able to make huge strides. is that what we need for homelessness overall? >> it is what we need for homelessness overall. this is a subject i feel deeply conflicted about because there is a first step, and i think it is great that mayor de blasio is doing this. but the fact is, look at the way action occurs around homelessness. it usually occurs when the general public reaches this level of discomfort -- >> we don't want to see it. >> it is not really about them, quote, unquote, it is more about us, that we don't want to see them so much. many solutions tend to be reducing homelessness in reality

turns out to be reducing the visibility of homeless people. as much as this effort for veterans i think is terrific, we're also getting into that categorizing say good homeless and bad homeless. 18% of homeless people have jobs. they just can't make ends meet in our low-wage economy. so it is a very difficult issue that i think the mayors are starting to do heroic work but we need more buy-in at the federal level. >> if we have to end up staying in a shelter overnight, what's it like? >> wow. it is a very, very sobering event. i mean i was in -- i started in the shelters during the giulia in i era. giuliani ear ya. he proposed people in hivs were living in luxury hotels when actually they were rat infested, substandard, dilapidated, poorly kept. these were all commercial sros that people were living in.

i find that the non-profit organizations that sponsor homes for people that can't afford an apartment were the best because they cared about people. the commercial sros are only for profit and that's all they worry about. they don't worry about people. >> everybody stay with us. you and i are going to talk about the question of policing homelessness when we come back. it's a fact. kind of like mute buttons equal danger. ...that sound good? not being on this phone call sounds good. it's not muted. was that you jason? it was geoffrey! it was jason. it could've been brenda.

and i'm jerry bell the third. i'm like a big bear and he's my little cub. this little guy is non-stop. he's always hanging out with his friends. you've got to be prepared to sit at the edge of your seat and be ready to get up. there's no "deep couch sitting." it's definitely not good for my back. this is the part i really don't like right here. (doorbell) what's that? a package! it's a swiffer wetjet. it almost feels like it's moving itself. this is kind of fun. that comes from my floor? eww!

this is deep couch sitting. deep couch sitting! and this year, look at whate he put in our driveway. the lexus december to remember sales event is here. lease the 2016 es350 for $349 a month for 36 months and we'll make your first month's payment. see your lexus dealer. three homeless new yorkers say that the police and city sanitation workers stole and illegally destroyed their possessions all while they were trying to stay dry on a rainy night in october. new york civil liberties union which represents the men in a lawsuit against the city released video of the incident. it appears to show officers waking the men up with flashlights followed by sanitation workers in hazmat suits dragging their things into a waiting garbage truck. the city said in a statement to mhp show this incident involved individuals trespassing on school grounds.

it is illegal for individuals to trespass on school grounds and we will not tolerate it for security and safety reasons. we will review or protocols concerning can the seizure and disposition of personal property and will make sure it is reclaimed by its rightful owners. what's happening? tell me about the suit. >> well, the city in a coordinated effort by the police department and sanitation department, in the wee hours of the morning, october 2nd, stole and confiscated and threw out the -- all the worldly possessions of these men who, down on their luck, not a roof over their head, had to sleep on the street. and they had previously been sleeping on the street under the tracks and were shooed out of there to near the school by the police. so, you know, whether they were

trespassing or not, the police department has absolutely no right to steal their worldly possessions. and you know, it's chirshocking me that the city has yet to disavow this kind of harassment. when you lose your birth certificate or social security card or your medications, it is a hassle to replace them. >> help people understand. when you say worldly possessions. for folks who haven't encountered homelessness, what is it that people are carrying with them on the street? >> they carry with them their birth certificates. their social security cards. their medications that they need for whatever illnesses plague them. they carry the only photos that they have of their families. this is like everything that we take for granted that we can access all the time and the police stole it. they gave them no opportunity to

retrieve anything that was valuable. they threw them into the sanitation trucks that were ready and waiting. and the monetary value of what was taken is not that great. but the human value and the affront to their dignity that happened is just like -- you can't measure it. >> i think, i read where it says we're going to have outreach workers, go and have these connections with people who are living on the streets, we're going to make sure people are in shelters. if i read it just sort of with little context, it sounds great. if i read it after having read about this incident i think, oh, outreach worker sounds like a euphemism for a police officer taking your things. >> it's a fair point and we should monitor how talk about it. make sure home-stat is not a

pretext for minimalizing the homeless. mayor bill de blasio is as far from rudy giuliani as one could imagine and i have a hard time imagining this city under this mayor reversing back to the 1990s. >> many of us are not dependent on de blasio but many of those same police officers. it is the force. in theory home-stat is a good idea but when you look at the fact they are adding all these police officers in reality will bring us right into the criminalization of homelessness. and in this case for example in this lawsuit even if homelessness were a crime -- it is not -- trespassing, at most, is a misdemeanor, the proper procedures would be to take their belongings,ing that it as possible evidence. if you go to prison, they tag your belongings and it can be returned to you after decades. the fact they did this to these men and that's all they had in the world, these very inhumane. so there are aspects of

home-stat that are very troubling. >> it is not whether mayor de blasio is good, tbs tit is the system. when you call the police to deal with a mental health crisis and two folks end up dead, not because -- whether or not mayor rahm emanuel is a good mayor is a separate question -- but in part because police are trained to do certain types of things. sanitation workers are trained to throw things away when they show up. when you hear that story how does it resonate for you? >> we definitely support the lawsuit. this is not the first time this has happened. it actually creates a paradox with the mayor offering 15,000 units of affordable housing and on the other hand allowing the police to break up homeless encampments. it is a sad day in new york where we actually criminalize homeless people. i believe that if police officers want to build a house for homeless people, that's the only involvement that they should have with homeless people. because the police element or

the law enforcement element has no business in dealing with the homeless. >> in fairness to the mayor, this happened prior to the announcement of home-stat and i think that city hall has finally woken up. at least i hope that they have. we're going to be watching like a hawk to make sure that they have. the announcement that they will instead of relying primarily on the police, rely on social workers and trained individuals to provide services and coordination for homeless people and get them into shelters, and the fact that the city announced a policy -- reversed the policy that shelters could kick people out during the day -- i mean why would they kick people out when it is cold out? that's all progress. but you're right, it has to -- we have to monitor this closely. we have to make sure that the city does what it has promised, which is coordinating social

services and supporting homeless people, not criminalizing them. homelessness is a tragedy, not a crime. and they have to finally build housing that's affordable for all new yorkers. >> it's also obviously not just exclusively a new york problem. it is a question facing us across the country. thank you. we're going to talk politics a little later but coming up, why a california woman is suing a hospital just weeks before she's due to give birth. do yous keyboard more than certain family members? is your success due to a filing system only you understand? does printing from your tablet to your wireless printer give you a jolt of confidence? if so, you may be gearcentric. someone who knows that the right office gear helps you do great things. and there's one place that has it all. office depot officemax. gear up for great.

tuesday the aclu filed a lawsuit against dignity health hospital network accusing the system of denying basic reproductive health care to its patients. the suit was filed on behalf of a dignity health patient and an organization of doctors dedicated to proving quality reproductive care.

it is a catholic hospital redding, california, the only hospital in her city with a delivery ward. her doctor agreed to perform a tubl ligation for her but the hospital refused to allow the procedure. dignity health's procedure followed religious health guidelines which bans catholic health care organizations from actions it considers "intrinsically immoral," including sterilization and other contraception. the aclu argues that the hospital network illegally withheld pregnancy related medical care for reasons unrelated to medicine. according to the aclu this lawsuit comes just a few months after mercy medical center refused to perform a tubal ligation that another woman rachel miller wanted to have after her scheduled c-section. after miller around the aclu threatened to sue the hospital, they performed the procedure.

the two women are 2 of 3 women who sought help from the aclu after the hospital refused to permit post-partum tubal ligation. they said, in general it is our practice not to provide sterilization. the case is scheduled in superior court a little over 2 weeks before she's set to give birth. so tell me a bit more about this case. so that folks can understand exactly what's at stake here. >> sure. so this case is a challenge to a hospital chain, a catholic hospital chain, for denying women -- for discriminating against women and denying them basic reproductive health care based on its application of the

religious directives. as you mentioned, dignity health hospitals is a large corporation, along with the general expansion of catholic hospitals in the u.s. over the past 15 years, dignity health has also grown significantly. it's an enormous corporation. it describes itself as the fifth-largest health care provider in the united states and it's the largest hospital provider in california. yet in its catholic hospitals it follows the religious directives put out by the catholic bishops and that means that they don't provide most reproductive health care which are characterized in the directives as intrinsically evil. >> it is my understanding that not only is there a refusal to provide certain kinds of procedures like tubal ligation, but also sometimes information so that patients cannot get information at catholic

hospitals about reproductive care, for example. >> in certain states women have no right to sue if the doctor withheld information from them about their pregnancy. for example if there were birth defects. because of religious reasons, because they think it might lead to an abortion. she is actually lucky she's had time to sue because other litigation has been brought on belaugh of litigation that sought emergency life saving care. for example, during the course of a miscarriage at the catholic hospital and because of the interpretation of the religious directives these women's health were placed at risk. >> help us also understand a little bit. are we talking about the individual physicians, nurses, p.a.s? or the interstustitution itself? are all the providers in the hospital also catholic? >> no, they're not and that's a great point. this is really about the hospital actually interrupting

the doctor-patient relationship. so in our case, our client and her doctor decided that it was in her medical best interest to get a tubal ligation immediately following her c-section. her doctor is ready and willing to perform that procedure, and it would just take him one to two minutes immediately after he delivers her baby. but the hospital itself is refusing to authorize the doctor to provide that care. and really, it is as if the catholic bishops are standing in the operating room and staying the doctor's hand and preventing him from providing our client with the care she needs. >> i think for me that's part of what creates a distinction here that is distressing. it is one thing to ask kind of portrayed off for individuals. but when an institution does it, it feels like precisely the

thing we hear from people who are about religious freedom is a problem. >> right. but when we talk about this corporation, not only is it a very large corporation in the state of california, they receive so much government money. they receive taxpayer funds in 2012 i think they received $23 million in government grants. over $3 billion in medicaid/medicare. so they are using our funds and imposing their own viewpoint. to be honest, every time we have these types of discussions about the interference of the doctor-patient relationship, it just feels so wrong so this should be between her and her doctor. it is not something that should be out there. it is a shame that it had to become a lawsuit and that she's even in this position. it is very unfortunate. >> it is interesting because the language of conscience i think has really become very associated with conservatives. but if you look at the early fights for reproductive health access it was really the what we would now call pro-choice people were making the argument that individual doctors have to follow their conscience and provide this care to the patients that they see fit.

i also think it is really interesting that this hospital provides some tubl lal ligation and not others and under what criteria? are they making the individual determination as opposed to the woman herself in consultation with her doctor? how do they pick and choose? >> it seems arbitrary. and from our perspective, we did write on behalf of a client this summer and potentially because she was represented by the aclu, the hospital backed down and allowed her doctor to perform the tubal. but for any women, the decision of whether the ability to access this incredibly common form of birth control -- i'll just say that 30% of married women of reproductive age get tubal ligation as their chosen form of birth control. it happens in about 10% of hospital deliveries. for a woman hob able to access

that should absolutely be a decision that is between her and her doctor. and whether she's -- whether her doctor is able to actually perform the procedure should not turn on the views of the catholic bishops and -- >> if you don't have it during the c-section or during the delivery then you have to go back in for a second procedure, then all of the things that become risk factors for any medical procedure begin to obtain. it is a question of increasing risk for health. thank you from san francisco. we'll be watching this case very closely. here in new york, thank you to my guests. coming up, no lame ducks here. president obama plans for a fantastic finale. and a tale of two clintons. should bill's past hurt hillary's future? there's more "nerdland" at the top of the hour. t is here. lease the 2015 gs350 with complimentary navigation

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today, president obama will shake hands with the next president and exintt the oval office and begin his post pr presidential life and the obama administration will move deeper into its golden year, potentially liberating with be a moment where if a leader is brave and bold enough he just might be able to go ham while giving no damns, a moment perfectly captured with my favorite fictional character in "the west wing." let's watch. >> time we have left, we have the ability to affect more change in a day at the white house than we'll have in a lifetime once we walk out these doors. what do you want to do with them?

>> it was a moment dramatized for tv but for good reason. deadlines tend to focus the attention and concentrate effort so the final year after presidency can be productive, something president obama clearly understands based on his riff at the white house correspondents dinner in april. >> i am determined to make the most of every moment i have left. after the mid-term elections, my advisors asked me, mr. president, do you have a bucket list? and i said, well, i have something that rhymes with bucket list. take executive action on immigration?

bucket. climate regulations? bucket. right thing to do. >> and there you have it. fourth quarter obama going on a tear because, well, bucket. which explains a lot about the games we saw in 2015. most notably the 12-nation transpacific freed trade pact, land mash international climate accord and historic keel to limit iran's nuclear program and the opening of diplomatic ties with cuba. doesn't mean the president's checking out. no-dams obama is nowhere near done. he said he's never been more optimistic and he'll "leave it all out on the field" in 2016. it's the no dams president obama we've gotten to hear at the state of the union, i have no more campaigns to run.

i know. because i won both of them. a no-dams president obama who now occupies a less consequential space on capitol hill. he's now promising to sprint to the finish line of his presidency with an aggressive push for 2016 because, bucket, it is the right thing to do. on the top of that bucket list for 2016, a new resolve on gun control. president obama set to meet with attorney general loretta lynch tomorrow to figure out what he can do by executive action. and that may be just the beginning of his grand finale. joining me now is joy reid, national correspondent here at msnbc. raul reyes, co-host of "changing america" on msnbc. john carlo prusuti, former president secretary for george h.w. bush and amy meredith cox assistant professor at fordham university. guns, just start there.

since that's -- that's where the president has started. we'll talk about what else is possible but start the wiwith ts initiative. executive action he's planning to talk. >> i think if you ask folks in the white house the two things that the president has felt the most frustration over not being able to accomplish would be on guns which i think would be number one. if the bill that he worked on with some high-profile senate help last night was not able to get through, i think the president understands the only way to get any meaningful gun control is through executive action so he's going to take it on monday. >> there is an argument that a president's actual greatest legacy isn't even in their policy but in part on whether or not they leave the white house to someone of their own party. it does seem to me that this is the kind of thing will also have political meaning. listen to candidate bush for a sesh second and have you respond.

>> this first impulse always is to take rights away from law abiding citizens and it is wrong. to use executive powers he doesn't have is a pattern that's quite dangerous. it's not a surprise that people don't believe that our government's working on their behalf anymore when you have a president that recklessly uses executive authority that the constitution doesn't provide him. >> no surprise i agree with jeb on that one. what i would say is if the president truly wants to make a lasting impression and leave a lasting legacy he should focus on violence for which gun control might be a part. but it is not the sum total of the effort that he should make to combat the overall issue which is reducing gun violence and violence in this country. >> what -- just not that i need you to have the solution to gun violence in the country in the next 22 seconds but what might that look like that's different than gun control? >> i think that this president would be well served to convene a national conversation on all of the elements that we have heard are contributing factors to the violence, the epidemic of shootings that we have in this

country. if this president does that and if he is seen as being expansive in pursuit of a solution to the issue i think he and his legacy will be well served. >> this interesting idea of big national conversations, convening, that's very to me presidential term one. in fact we did see that with this president on a variety of different issues. we are now in countdown, we have 382 days. i have no time to convene nothing. i guess do you see other pieces of what he might be up to here? >> what's so fascinating about this president and especially in this fourth quarter this second term is that we are really faced with the fact that no one man, no one administration can transform or even uphold the social order. that's so clear with this presidency, with this black man in office. we are face to face regardless of your politics with the fact that our entrenched systems, our historical legacies are what we the people -- and this phrase has never been more important than in this presidency. we the people are the foundation

of the democracy that we want to see. so unfortunately, at this point in time in this second term, with 2015 being the year where we've seen the most mass shootings. i think the number is 372. it is unfortunate that it takes this sort of high visibility egregious acts for us to see an opening in the way that we think about violence. in some ways i agree that we need a finer definition of violence. i think the opening comes with gun control with these mass shootings. unfortunately, allows us to have a broader conversation about the violence that happens in the criminal justice system, about the violence that happens on a daily basis in people's lives. we can't just talk about sort of gun control without talking about poverty, without talking about systemic racism. >> criminal justice reform in particular is the thing that he put on the agenda really last year that if 2015 were kind of the penultimate year before this final push, if one thing indicated what that year has

been really about, it was criminal justice reform. >> he's already made it a focal point. i admire that you think he can convene a national conversation. i truly believe the president feels the "kumbaya" time is over. it is time for executive action. the danger i feel on gun reform is that it will end up the same way as executive action on immigration, it will prompt a lawsuit, it will be tied up in courts and there won't be any movement until he's out of office. >> to me, that's in part the question here about whether the use of executive authority on one hand is this kind of wait and make a thing get done, but also has this -- the final year of a president's term is also the year of a presidential election. it has real consequences. the grio asked whether 2016 would be president's blackest year yet. and i presume that they're talking in part with a -- i'm presuming they're talking about

stylistic type of thing? the president's willingness to do a cultural representation of blackness piece in a way he's been unwilling to do before? >> there is a thing about your confidence in your final year to get your successor elected and that you would leave either a democrat with these executive orders to enforce or a republican in a very awkward position of attempting to retract rights which is a good political reason to do it. i think the democratic party had better hope that this is the blackest year of president obama's presidency because they need something to get black folks to line up for presumably hillary clinton or bernie sanders or whoever gets the nomination. they need something to energize african-american voters. i think from a purely crass political standpoint, doing things to energize african-americans and say this is what you must defend, i'm going to put these things on the table, whether it is gun control, criminal justice reform, immigration, i'm going to put these things on the table and black and brown voters, defend it at the polls.

>> we'll take a break but i'm going to make you an offer. >> yes, ma'am. >> i actually think the question of having a big national conversation is an important one. just don't know if the president does in this moment. i on the other hand have a talk show and if you want to work with me to do some bipartisan week on this show over the course of the next year to talk about violence in a broader sense, i'm giving you the forum of "nerdland." up next, the president's accomplishments on 2015. we'll talk about president obama riding with jerry seinfeld. >> i do really well with the zero to 8 demographic. >> oh, really. >> yeah. they love me. partly because my ears are big and so i look a little bit like a cartoon character. little kids love saying my name. but it's all one big name. it's barackobama.

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president obama calls the iran nuclear deal one of his administration's biggest accomplishments of 2015, both for the diplomatic achievement of the deal and getting it through congress. "washington post" calls it the most determined strategy success of his press. iran's october surprise ballistic missile test were called a violation of the deal by the u.n. and the "wall street journal" says the because was said to slap sanctions but the move the "wall street journal" said could open iran to test the boundaries for the violations it can get away with and iran's leader appeared to do just that tweeting he was ordering the missile program sped up. i got to say, this does not seem

good for the president's foreign policy legacy. >> not even a little bit. there are those of us who were extremely wary, to. you the it mildly, at the onset of this deal. now we hear perhaps the reason for the delay is we want to make sure we don't empower rowhani's enemies so we respect left with a more conservative leader. essentially that says we can't abide abide by or enforce any rules of the agreement because if we do row handny gets deposed and we're left with something worse. that's an awful justification for not -- >> i think the administration understands that the road to solving a lot of the microproblems in the middle east meaning the yemeni situation, syria, sets, goes through getting iran and saudi arabia's sort of back door war to end. i do think that what you're going to see over the course of this year is a lot of background diplomacy. i think standing down on those sanctions is part of a strategy to try to get tehran and riyadh into talks. that would actually be probably the biggest and most important

thing that the administration could do to try to solve many of the other issues from isis on because that proxy war is a lot of what isis is about. it is a lot of what's going on in the middle east. it has to get solved. i think they're going to try to do it. >> i want to do in the foreign policy realm the same basic question as domestic policy, this is happening in the world under this president and there is an election going on. one of the front-runner is this man's former secretary of state. i wonder about the ways in which if this falls apart or if this looks as though there's weakness, it then impacts a potential clinton campaign. >> i think part of -- i think it is a longer game. i think ultimately president obama sees this longer game and is really invested in it and is less concerned with what this does in terms of the typical detractors of the democratic party which is there will y're standing together internationally and domestically. i think we need to focus on the

ways in which what happens in the domestic sphere is sort of this false conflation with domestic issue. i think it is important to bring that up. the perception of how we sort of fight these battles or are weak in these international battles are the same perception as how people look at domestic policy, who is the enemy, both at home and sort of abroad and how does someone like a figure like barack obama or even potentially sort of clinton fall into -- easily fall into this role of someone who's not protecting america's borders both inside the nation state and beyond. >> i think what you just said also reminds me legacy is also complicated by the viewer of the legacy. from the left there is the question of praising many of the president's domestic policies, whether ac. a or sort of a new way of thinking about criminal justice

that's lessening the impact of the criminal justice system. at the same time there is a lot of critique from the progressive side about his foreign policy actions which often include things like drones and -- just thinking about sort of if i'm reading "the nation," on any given day, yay, aca, boo, drones. >> i think part of the dichotomy is he's thinking long term but the reality is he -- it is 11 months, nine months. he has to get his approval ratings up to situate hillary clinton or whoever is the democratic nominee, most likely hillary clinton, to situate her to carry on. i believe one thing he could do in terms of iran is to just clarify what -- to the public more of what this iran deal is. because these ballistic missile tests were not covered by them. they're not nuclear weapons, they weren't covered by the deal. they are violation of the united nations security council resolutions. it is like a weird position,

removing some sanctions and put on other sanctions. but that's iran, they will always test us. that's how they work. they're also playing to their own domestic audience. i think he needs to expand to our home audience just what this iran deal is about. the reality. >> your point about the communication of the iran deal is actually not unlike what had been said about aca and various points, there needs to be more communicati communication. be explainer in chief. let me ask you, when you worked for h.w., it was in the context of his post-presidential life. i do sort of wonder if in fact the president is maybe selling himself a little bit short on a bucket list because in part as a young man there is going to be a lot of time left for this president to continue to influence public policy. >> 100%. i think he will keep doing that. there are a variety of ways he can do it. just like former president george h.w. bush did, he influenced in the political rea realm, he influenced in the

private sector, certainly in the charitable and non-profit sector. your dashboard is much more vast and broad as a former president. he someone once said if only you could be a former president without ever having to be president it would be the greatest job in the world. right? it's really true because everywhere you go people love you. you don't have to go to places where people don't love you. you can be monumentally impa impactful. with all due respect to the iran deal which i think is a complete disaster, i hope it works out. but as a former president he'll have a unique soap box. >> i think if you think about the immediate past presidents, the president i see as the most similar to barack obama in his of his pragmatic outlook on the middle east particularly is george herbert walker bush. it is almost a shame he's not robust and healthy again because he would be a good partner. this president loves the bipartisan outreach, it could be someone he could dispatch into

this world. because no president had a more robust relationship with the saudi royals. either way, no matter who wins thene ne next presidential election -- unless it is bernie sanders -- there is going to be a more hawkish person in the white house. i think this president wants to lay down the marker of pragmatism in the middle east and trying to get the saudis and iranians together. that would be a good marker to lay down to move that ball a little to the left because we know after next january it is going to move a lot to the right. >> you make the point about bipartisan. before the break i laid out an offer that if you want to help me out we can make a national conversation on violence what we do over the court of the in next year on "nerdland." >> melissa, i think it will be fun. up next, president obama he a years in know toes.

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house. a first daughter drops by the oval office to see her dad. the president with an aide's twin sons, mom wiping away a tear. the year-end gallery of white house photographer pete souza, there with mr. obama day in and day out from the start, giving nbc news an exclusive first look. >> i probably take between 500 and 2,000 a day. probably about a quarter million a year. somewhere in that. >> over seven years. so we're talking -- >> so i'm -- yeah. a lot of pictures. >> reporter: part of souza's mission is to document history. president obama and the first family greeting pope francis. a handshake with cuba's castro. a big smile after the iran nuclear deal. mr. obama there for vice president biden at his son's funeral. >> he is the president of the united states but he's also a human being. i try to show his personality as best i can. there is obviously a lot of pictures with little kids in my year-end gallery.

he loves babies. >> that's deputy national security advisor ben rhodes' daughter, ella, before the halloween party. >> have you ever seen a president lying on the floor in the oval office before with a kid in an elephant suit? >> definitely not. definitely not. >> reporter: the gallery reveals the obama administration wide-open door policy for staff children. >> a lot of them are children of working moms and he knows what a sacrifice they make. in terms of being at work a lot. >> reporter: this year's gallery has 111 pictures. what's souza's favorite? >> my favorite picture will hopefully be the one i make later today or tomorrow. that's what keeps you going. you're trying to get a good picture tomorrow. >> reporter: ron allen, nbc news with the president in honolulu. >> up next -- he's back. bill clinton on the campaign trail. could his past hurt hillary clinton's future?

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whether it is a personal e-mail server or the benghazi attacks, hillary clinton's political opponents have kept their busy dodging their attempts to level her with a scandal. but over the last week, donald trump has taken a different tactic by attacking her for being scandal adjacent. on monday, trump tweeted, if hillary thinks she can unleasher had husband with his terrible record of women abuse while playing the women's card on me, she's wrong. tuesday the three-time trump followed that up on the "today" show with this. >> you look at whether it is monica lewinsky or paula jones or many of them and that certainly will be fair game, certainly if they play the woman's card with respect to me, that will be fair game. >> trump warns that if hillary clinton continues to deploy bill clinton on campaign trail she should be prepared for attacks involving her husband's sexual history, a history that includes bill clinton's first denied but

finally admitted affair with monica lewinsky, bill clinton's non-consensual sexual contact with several other women as well as at least three women who -- i'm sorry, at least three women who have accused bill clinton of unwanted sexual encounters but it is also a history that does not as far as i can tell involve hillary clinton being involved in any of those accusations other than being married to the man who stands accused, which raises the question of the extent to which hillary clinton's political future should be determined by bill clinton's scandal-plagued past. >> this is such an ill-advised attack. i can't imagine that trump's advisors would even condone this. it makes no sense. it looks badly on trump. first, it is old territory. these are old issues. we've been here before. if the goal is to somehow make hillary look like a fraudulent feminist because she's supporting her husband, this hasn't work in the past. i just don't see it as -- >> we actually started the show

with cosby. for me, old itself is not sufficient if there is alleged bad sexual -- >> but we also have to look at trump's history. you can't be sort of accusing someone and take yourself out of the equation. by "old," i don't mean to imply that's sexual transgressions are older or old news but the fact that we have seen hillary sort of face these attacks before and it hasn't really landed on her. it hasn't really disrupted -- i don't think, her political acumen. >> i don't disagree with you at all but i think some political context. you are the subject of a taunt by donald trump it either means that you're perceived as a threat or it means that the entirety or sum element of trump's base of support really wants this. i think this is an example where you get both. there's no question that trump feels the heat and knows that if, god forbid, he is the nominee, this is a line of attack on him and the polls prove that out. he has a problem with female voters. he knows that.

he also knows that playing the bill clinton card is red meat to many, most all of his supporters. so he's going to try to ride this as long as he can. i agree with you, i don't think -- but there is one more element that we didn't discuss here that we need to get into and that is hilly does have a problem in terms of how she responded and reacted recently to monica lewinsky's emergence. and if -- pardon me, but if a man had done that, it would have been a completely different reaction. >> so i -- this is where i think there really is a vulnerability. in part because there still exists around hillary clinton a question about so who is she really. i'm not saying whether that's fair or not nafair. just strategically kind of the management of her deployment of things like feminism or race politics, mr. trump bring --

>> trump opens this door completely at his own peril. trump had allegations from ivana trump in the past there was some sexual assault. he said men and women serving together until the military contributed to sexual assaults in the military. he defended mike tyson. he has his own -- his own individual questionable sexual harassment claims and allegations. so i think he could be very vulnerable going back to this. not only that, it is just that it is old news, it is that it is news -- the way it is different from cosby, for example, cosby, those are old allegations but they were never fully unearthed, explored, discussed under the magnifying glass. for a certain generation everything of the clinton years has been discusseded a ed ed ad again. >> there's been a lot of conversation about camile cosby, is she complicit, what did she know? now she'll have to testify. i think it is profoundly

shocking and bizarrely unfair to hold women accountable, spouses -- yet it is what we do as a public discernment strategy. >> i understand from a political standpoint you want to take away your potential opponents, whatever their weapons. if i say -- if the republicans could get bill clinton off the table, meaning that you get everything about him off the table, his economic record, his popularity, if you could terrify the clinton campaign out of using him for their political benefit that's a good thing for the republicans, if they can scare her and bully her out of doing it. but the problem is that number one, you did have litigation of this during the 1990s and hillary clinton for the first time really is running right down that zone of i'm running to break that glass ceiling as a woman. i think for women of her own generation, the problem is going to be that she's now in the eleanor roosevelt position meaning that if eleanor roosevelt had run for president -- that's her hero -- would we have said eleanor had roosevelt must be discounted because of the peccadillos and

indiscretions of franklin delano roosevelt? any woman would be offended. her core base of support, white women over 60, this is going to be such a destructive strategy to donald trump because his own past is going to be brought up and, b, because she is running for them. for that group of women who are going to be her core supporters with be this strategy will backfire mightily. >> but they cannot get her elected. but if you want to actually win the u.s. presidency, she is going to have to activate the folks who elected president obama twice and that's actually young women of color. and young women of color might feel very differently about this story. >> i think, too, there's something that you brought up. i'm not going to backtrack but what i do think is important to think about is the way that sexism plays out in this sort of different way. we look at donald trump. there is a way that he could be

b bombasted, but we don't allow hillary that same leverage. there is a way that we are constantly trying to figure out this space between who she is as a person. right? as an individual and her policy. so there is a way that she's always sort of labeled a feminist, then we question her personal actions as a feminist, can she defend herself against the allegations against her husband, how does that reflect her record. when we talk about the type of feminism young women of color are interested in, yes, we can name all the ways hillary stood for reproductive rights for certain women, also for equal pay. but when we talk about feminism, there is not just one dimension to feminism. there's ways that she has supported corporations and supported policies that are detrimental to low-income women, to women of color. so there's -- there are these contradictions. >> quick break because we got to pay bills or something. there's more when we come back. stay. just stay. we'll be right back.

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on friday, an al qaeda affiliated terror organization released a video that included a sound bite from donald trump to make its case to political recruits. the 51-minute video is from shabaab, a group of militants who operate as an al qaeda branch in somalia. it includes a clip of trump announcing his proposal to ban muslims from entering the united states. and it makes hillary clinton appear particularly prophetic because of this comment she made at last month's democratic presidential debate. >> we also need to make sure that the really discriminatory messages that trump is sending around the world don't fall on receptive ears. he is becoming isis' best recruiter. they are going to people showing videos of donald trump insulting islam and muslims in order to recruit more radical jihadists. >> the main thing to be reminded of there is she does not need anybody to protect and stand up

for her, she seems just fine and competent in pushing back against whatever critiques may show up. it seems to me that there is still yet -- we talked about the kind of unleashing of president obama. there still is of yet not a full unleashing of the hillary clinton -- i like her best in a moment like that, yet we so rarely see that on the campaign trail. >> she's more hypermanaged. i think part of her problem is she's been so managed throughout her political career that even after basically living with the clintons for better or for worse for 30-something years people don't have a full sense of her really because she tried to run not as a woman in '08, she tried to run as a tough international, interlocutor and stay away from the woman card until the very end. and also she's been so many different people. she's been a rockefeller republican, then the super feminist, she's been all over the place so i think she does need to get her persona out. that said i think their strategy to let the republicans have the stage and to swoop in at the end and try to take advantage.

>> my favorite place for learning things about hillary clinton is actually in her e-mails. there are these huge e-mail dumps. everybody's just like combing them for benghazi references. but if you are in a highly nerdy mode and you want to like go into it, it is fascinating. there's this one where she's talking about -- remember the sunglasses balackberry photo. they're telling her the picture has gone viral? she's like what? why would people even have a feeling about that. another thing is they're saying nice things about your hair and clothes. she's like i ain't complaining. she's more friendly and enjoyable in her context of e-mails. >> i think their strategy now is to remain scripted and to remain disciplined until the republican field sorts itself out. when it does there will be plenty of opportunities for hillary to show her human side like she did -- i believe it was after her bad loss in iowa eight years ago where she had that moment where she allegedly teared up. >> man, i hate that moment.

>> i know. >> man, you -- >> but it worked for her. it was a turning point. >> it was a turning point right up until the president loses in new hampshire, then gives the -- you know, gives they he, we can. right? which i think we constantly forget. it was a speech given in defeat. she's up there i found my voice, she's like yes, we can. it turns into like -- new hampshire, '08, we can't even talk about it. >> the fact that the feeling was that she had too weep in order to show she was actually a woman was really troubling. just the whole set-up of that thing that the person she was talking to was not really a neutral voter, really a hillary voter. there was a lot about it that was, again, very managed. >> i think we should stop waiting for the "authentic" hillary to emerge. after all these decades this is who she is, hillary clinton is

hypermanaged and sudisciplined. how many times have we seen the new hillary, the grandma hillary. it is stale the same old hill tri, li hillary. like it or not, that's who she is. whenever she is the subject of great attacks, that's when her popularity rises. that's when she goes up in the polls. >> when her back's against the wall. >> they love to swing. >> that lebanon-benghazi infomercial was the high point of her campaign. >> this question of when you show your humanity is based on things like race and gender and class. who has the ability to always be their full lives and when is it a strategy if you are of color, if you're a woman, it is a strategy for you to show your full self. think about the timing of that you have to think about when it happened to you in conversation, what the context was. it is always this very methodical process of being human in public. >> saying the president's going to have his blackness weighed,

you have to wait until the end of your presidency. >> we're talking even in the break about the fact that for hillary clinton perhaps the grate e greatest peril on that tissue of race if african-americans decide to relitigate something she was involved in -- >> don't bring up '08 because i can't hold my face together with that. >> that is her biggest vulnerability. i don't think it is so much on issues of women because i think women want to white house badly enough to look past whatever they have to. if it is a woman in the white house you want but on issues of race it is the thing that's holding back particularly young women of color from fully embracing this idea. not only is there no diversity, no racial diversity on the democratic side of the aisle, you also have somebody who when she and her husband get up there and start to make their case are the same two people who got into a very negative racial discourse with barack obama. >> remember that there is no gender gap. white women vote a majority for the republican party. a gender gap is a gender race gap. you've got to get women of

color. thank you to my apparent new co-host on a national conversation about violence. up next, good in u.s. to start us off in 2016. lease the 2015 gs350 with complimentary navigation system for these terms. see your lexus dealer.

and i'm jerry bell the third. i'm like a big bear and he's my little cub. this little guy is non-stop. he's always hanging out with his friends. you've got to be prepared to sit at the edge of your seat and be ready to get up. there's no "deep couch sitting." it's definitely not good for my back. this is the part i really don't like right here. (doorbell) what's that? a package! it's a swiffer wetjet. it almost feels like it's moving itself. this is kind of fun. that comes from my floor? eww! this is deep couch sitting. deep couch sitting!

2016. and there is no way to know just what the year will bring for each individual. as a nation, we have a few things we know. we're going to compete in the su summer olympics, elect a new president and start live with new policies. oregon workers benefit from the new mandatory paid sick leave, and california's women's workers will have a somewhat easier path for showing wage discrimination. workers in arizona, california, colorado, connecticut, hawaii, maryland, massachusetts, michigan, montana, new jersey, ohio, rhode island, south dakota, vermont and west virginia will all enjoy higher state minimum wages. it's going to be easier to carry

a gun openly in texas and harder to smoke in hawaii where the legal smoking age is now 21. virginia improved access to voting for students but in north carolina where i live, 2016 is the year when it becomes harder to vote. here's one other thing we can be sure of in 2016. you, the viewers of nerd land will be letting us know what you think about our show in tweets, posts and snail mail. no doubt that you will let us know when you think we have succeeded or failed. and we hear at mhp will keep working together to make a show worthy of your engagement. as hnic -- head nerd in charge -- i have the overwhelming privilege to work with a team of deeply committed and passionate individuals without whom this show certainly would not go on. in fact, come to think of it they are so good, so hard working and thoughtful, it's almost like they have superpowers. here's a look at the heroes and

she-roes who make "mhp" show every week. happy nerd year, everybody! ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪

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this is the pursuit of perfection. hello. it's high noon in the east. 9:00 in the becwest. i'm ayman modine. >> you're being used in a recruitment video. >> hear how donald trump respond after his words were used in an apparent terror video. he's saying a lot more about that today. >> a takedown of a federal building takes up overnight. what's behind the protest and could federal authorities get involved soon. turmoil overseas. a live report from tehran after the saudi embassy is attacked. could this spark more violence in the region. the dream is alive if you're hoping to catch one of the biggest lottery prizes in history. it's still out there for the