good morning. it's it's wednesday, november 16th. welcome to "morning joe." with us on set, we have veteran columnist and msnbc contributor mike barnicle. hello, mike. you look very nice today. >> thank you very much. >> usually it's the rumpled jacket. >> and managing editor of bloomberg politics and host of "with all due respect" mark halperin and in washington, columnist and associate editor of "the washington post" the very elegant -- willie, joe and me are here. joe is back to the fleece. >> i think steve schmidt said yesterday that america gets nervous when they see me in a coat and tie. >> we get nervous. >> that's exactly what i was

thinking. >> i wanted to comfort everybody. i've been saying that a lot lately. >> i know actually. on a serious note people are unnerved. >> on edge. >> still on edge. lot of people on edge. got a couple people behind the camera saying we're fine. we're not on edge. >> okay. fine. >> in a camo hat. we're good. >> it's cool. i'm fine. >> so donald trump received his first presidential daily briefing yesterday. on the front page of "the new york times," this headline. firings and discord put trump transition team in a state of disarray. after chris christie was booted off the transition team last friday, yesterday mike rogers announced he's out too. rogers is a former fbi agent and house intel committee chairman and thought to be high on the list for cia director. sources are describing a "purge"

in the transition. >> boom, boom, boom, you're out. aimed at ousting christie and his allies. that purge included christie's pick to run the department of justice transition. the person christie picked to manage the transition effort and all out yesterday. a trump campaign staffer tells nbc news that it has complicated things. "the wall street journal" reports this morning that mike pence who has taken over the transition has ordered removal of all lobbyists from the team. donald trump tweeted yesterday very organized process taking ace as i decide on cabinet and many other positions. i am the only one who knows who the finalists are. >> finalists. >> i knew you would catch onto that. >> not a truer word was ever

spoken. the thing is -- >> people are all scrambling. this is what happens. >> what i noticed over the last 48 hours, you have all of these people going out saying i'm going to be secretary of state or i'm on the short list or i'm going to be -- no. at the end of the day we know this, anybody that knows how that campaign is structured, it's donald trump. we also know that donald trump takes his time and it's been maddening throughout the course of the campaign. how many people have leaked out i'm doing my best to help this guy but he's a moron. he's a moron. i'm doing everything i can. he takes his time. he plays people off each other. i'm not saying it's right. it's not the way i would run a transition. it's not the way you would run a transition but anybody shocked that this is how it's going, wasn't paying attention during the campaign. as far as chris christie goes, you know, chris christie was out the second his top two aides were indicted and sent the message you have to clean that

mess up first before we can move forward. >> mike rogers indicated not only was it that chris christie had to go but anybody he brought along with him had to go. i think others might lament that he went out with the trashith chris christie. >> i understand that. i'm a big mike rogers fan. let's talk generally about setting things up. i became chairman of the civil service committee. a small committee working on long-term health care for federal employees. i decided to hold over people from the last staff and every time i tried to move closer with the clinton administration and get a deal done, there were leaks and tom delay's office would call and say you can't do that. dick army's office saying that's not going work. i hated doing it. i ended up having to fire all of the holdovers and get my own

people in there to stop the leaks. it's not that shocking that if christie is out, all of christie's people are out, too, right? >> transitions are always messy. there's jockeying for power. this one seems a little more messy than others i've covered. and talking to cabinet officials of the obama administration who really are waiting to have discussions with the transition team. it's a complicated process. say they haven't had anybody approach them yet. i think that's because the internal fighting on the trump transition side hasn't completed yet. the mike rogers case was an interesting and troubling one because mike rogers is a very well known and respected person. he's a very conservative republican from michigan. he managed to run the house

intelligence committee in a generally bipartisan way so it worked for the first time in a decade it was passing authorization bills and agreeing to legislation. a committee that worked. and rogers was seen in the intelligence community if you walk the halls of the cia or others say, he would be a good leader for us when rogers was pushed out over the weekend in favor of nunez, perhaps pete, another conservative republican on that committee, there was a lot of concern in the intelligence community about what this means. >> a lot of concern not only intel community but also a lot of concern a couple nights ago about john bolton who and rudy giuliani who is temperamentally and ill equipped in every other

way to be secretary of state, just a pure knowledge base. i could pick 30 other jobs in the federal government he would be better at than secretary of state. but, mike, at the end of the day, if people want to figure this out, there's not a lot of intrigue. jared kushner, steve bannon, to a lesser degree reince priebus. he just got in there. will take a while to figure it out. they talk to donald trump. that's what it is. they've known they were going to get these christie people out for a while. that's just the way it goes. i want to talk about leaking. i heard barack obama's name. you told a story off the air yesterday. you may not want to give all of the names on the air but talk about what happened after barack obama was elected when rahm emanuel heard people speculating in the press that they might have a job. >> rahm emanuel was appointed chief of staff within three days of barack obama's victory in 2008. love him or hate him, rahm is a

very strong personality, a very strong individual. he let it be known that, you know, any leaks about potential cabinet nominees, that was it. you were gone. you were out. joe, the problem right now has less to do with leaks, i would think, and has to do with the four people that you mentioned. look, they won. donald trump is the president-elect of the united states. four people you mentioned have never even been close to the apparatus of government and what david wrote about today, there are people in the intelligence community who for the past week or so have been posing the potential, more than potential, very quickly once donald trump raises his right hand and takes the office of presidency, a combination of either isis or al qaeda are -- it's almost guaranteed that they will try something to test a reaction and now the news according to mark

halperin, gets even worse for those who were wary of what's going to happen. >> before we get there, mark, we'll let you talk about that. here are the spots. i kind of feel like if you're going to experiment, there are a lot of cabinets domestically you can experiment with, you fire them the next day. you don't have markets across the globe shake up. when you talk about secretary of state, when you talk about secretary of defense. when you talk about cia director, and when you talk about the person -- your nsa director, you don't get rookies for that. you don't get ideologues for that. donald trump needs very boring, very middle of the road, very washington-type people, steady. not boring, steady. mike pence is the perfect example of calm the waters. they see with these leaks -- i

don't believe all of the leaks -- they seem to be going in a different direction. experiment at home. abroad, you can't lurch to a john bolton. you think that steve bannon appointment got negative press? you think that's bad. pick rudy giuliani as your secretary of state or john bolton as your secretary of state and watch everything meltdown. internationally. >> i couldn't agree more. the transitions are messy as david said. they have plenty of time in the scheme of things to get this sorted out and getting rid of christie and his team is going to set them back. the domestic appointments will be driven by paul ryan and mitch mcconnell. some of the names beingloated for these national security jobs would be a catastrophe symbolically and substantively.

reports that a former reagan official is involved in the transition on foreign policy should send tremors through any responsibility person thinking about what the tone and substance of this administration is going to be. it's been widely reported that he's involved. >> is he at trump tower? >> he's heavily involved in staffing. >> why is that frightening? >> his record on judgment and activities is not part of what any administration should look for to bring in. he's engaged in conspiracy theories and deluded theory. i don't know that he's involved. but names being floated for secretary of state are troubling because this is not the kind of reassurance that the world needs, the intelligence community needs. when he takes over on january 20th, he needs good people in place. >> you're not saying he's got to pick a liberal. he has to pick a moderate.

like a bob corker or even a jeff sessions. >> jeff sessions or tom cotton. >> mainstream guys. they'll get appointed. >> there's opportunity in the big national security job, still, he hasn't made picks, to pick people that would send reassuring signals. this is not an area where he can simply reward people who are loyal to him. it's not an area where he can have fun picking interesting people. >> he doesn't need to listen those not with him at the beginning. there seems to be an element inside there and maybe it came in with reince's crew, an element that says we'll repay the paul seniors of the world. we're going to repay by talking about john bolton. no. he doesn't owe any of those people. if you're going to try to be friends with them, you don't do it with the secretary of state position. you don't do it with the cia

position. you don't do it with defense. >> it's a question of who has his ear. who genuinely has his ear? who is he listening to? the people that just came along? the people with him from the beginning? or is it that great sense of loyalty we feel that he knows and he talks about. he's loyal to his guys. rudy giuliani was his hatchet man throughout the "access hollywood" tape. he took a lot of flak for him. it's the only job rudy wants is the problem. >> rudy is not the president. rudy tried to run for president and he sucked. he got destroyed on the campaign trail. his staff couldn't wake him up before 9:00 in the morning. who is rudy giuliani to tell donald trump what he's not going to do? >> as i said yesterday, i suspect his approach to this was not appealing to donald trump going publicly and put him in a corner to give him the job. >> and revealing that he's been

talked about these things. you don't turn down -- what is going on with him? >> also, if he gets selected, just like the steve bannon pick, and that's trump. trump's guy. that's up to trump. that's a different conversation. but when you're talking about secretary of state, you bring some of the same problems to that position that hillary clinton brought as far as judgment and did he trade in on his experiences to make a lot of money. >> my reporting is the problem is no one who wants to stop it being bolton or giuliani has been able to come up with a name that has put in trump's head to say, okay, that's a better choice. no one has come up with a name and put it before him. >> that's stunning. there are several. that's stunning. >> by the way though, people that really know donald trump say that that's the deal. you just say no to him, that

does nothing. you have to say no and then give him somebody that he can work with. >> there's about 15 names. >> the corker example is great one. he's mad at corker because of the way corker handled the vice presidential selection. >> get over it. >> even though corker might be more qualified -- >> i don't think he's that silly. >> i don't think he's mad at worker. i think it has more to do with just do you get along with a guy? is there a fit there? is there a chemistry there and therein lies a big problem with a lot of picks. >> david has a piece why michael jackson rogers departure from the trump team is alarming. take a look at that and the thought of rudy giuliani as front runner for secretary of state, let's go over why it hasn't maybe gone over well with some political reports he was paid as a lawyer and consultant to work for foreign governments including groups from qatar and venezuela and made hundreds of thousands of dollars off paid

speeches. >> qatar and venezuela? they're the ones that turned a blind eye to terrorism across the middle east and venezuela has been our sworn enemy for years. >> "the new york times" reports -- >> did he get paid money from those countries? >> just a tad bit. a financial disclosure report that he made 124 speeches for as much as $200,000 each and had earned a total of 11.4 million. he often made extravagant demands in return for making speeches. >> he made more than hillary clinton made for speeches? >> yeah. >> that's crazy. >> he had an extravagant demands including making sure the private plane that flew him to these engagements were a certain size. according to "the wall street journal," giuliani regularly -- >> you don't want to go in a cessna. >> he didn't get involved with iranian groups or anything. >> he appeared at events for iranian --

>> what? >> that was my next -- >> are you kidding me? what if hillary clinton were doing that? >> howard dean appeared befor the same group. >> that's the group that's on the state department's foreign terrorist list. >> that's on a terror list. >> yep. >> so he spoke to a group that was on a terror watch list? and he got paid by those people? >> just a little. >> are you kidding me? >> just a little. >> so you're telling me a group that was on the terror watch list and hillary clinton probably gave a speech there too. she probably took off so bill clinton could give a speech there. you're telling me that he spoke in front of a terror group and made money? >> yes, sir. >> no. somebody is making this up. >> giuliani and others -- >> joe, do you think they're making this up? >> i don't know what to believe now.

>> i don't know what to believe now. >> that's insane, right, joe? >> america's mayor. >> that's why we're here today. >> what in the world is going on here? >> they need to hire people that know what they're doing. >> i can't believe it. >> and joe wearing the camo hat saying he's not nervous. are you nervous about giuliani? >> i'm not nervous about giuliani, no. i think what you're saying -- >> because he got a lot of money. >> not because he has a lot of money but what you're saying is going to taint anything from him becoming anything -- >> let me tell you more. >> how can he get it if he gets money from terror groups? >> let me add more to this so you have the whole picture. >> he got money from qatar. millions. millions from venezuela. our sworn enemy and then money from a terror group. >> a lot less. giuliani and others reportedly paid just 25,000 to 40,000 to speak to that group.

>> the terror group only paid $40,000. you say terrorists gave him a deal. a terrorist discount? >> he wanted the bar filled. a number of high profile former u.s. officials have spoken as well including former u.n. ambassador john bolton and former dnc chair howard dean. the treasury department launched a probe into the legality of former officials being paid by that group while on the state department's terror list. seems like a conflict. >> they're probing this right now. kind of like the hillary clinton probe is still going on. >> so giuliani says his ties to the iranian group have been open and that his work with qatar included training qatari police among other things and "the new york times" highlights giuliani's ties to try global strategic venture.

>> that's a bond movie. not a real name. >> the paper writes the company has provided image consulting to russia with deep kremlin ties. >> they have included russia's oil pipeline giant which is the target -- >> who says the guy doesn't have international experience? >> he has a lot of global experience of helping fill his pockets with criminal money. >> david, seriously, how could rudy giuliani after the hillary clinton debacle on paid speeches, how could rudy giuliani ever be secretary of state? >> hillary clinton was crooked hillary. rudy giuliani is a different person. >> is he going to call him crooked rudy now? i appoint crooked rudy.

>> he won't do this, right? >> i think we need to take a week to let this settle out. the thing that is striking to people in washington is that it really looks as if trump and his team did not expect to win. they were not ready in the way that a transition team usually is that thinks it may have a shot at organizing the government. they're scrambling like crazy now. you are having these palace intrigue wars. that sort of stuff usually happens in the summer. this time it didn't. i think it's partly because they really didn't think they were going to get here. >> trump also very superstitious. it's like he was about to win. i was on the phone with him. he would not talk about being the next president. game is not over. >> do you think he was surprised when we won? >> no. you know why? it's what his wife said at the very beginning of the campaign

when he said i'm going to run. she said if you run, you're going to win. i don't think he was surprised. i think he always thought he had a chance. this is not a guy that gets excited but he's very superstitious and while we would have had a transition team after we won south carolina in the primary, he doesn't think that way. he's superstitious. he said i'm going to wait. there is time to right the ship. i think rudy is causing an extraordinary amount of problems inside. shooting his mouth off to "wall street journal" and putting trump into a corner even though they wouldn't even mention donald trump's name throughout much of the republican primary as someone that could win until after he won new york. >> i think this is somebody making trouble trying to get himself the job. i think we're talking about something that's not going to happen. i can't imagine. >> i hope there's someone with imagination up in trump tower right now.

richard haass will be in a few minutes, he could give us five to six names. you don't need a screaming lefty to run your state department but there are smart, experienced sensible choices. >> david, let's go to you, again, nobody here -- i'm very conservative guy. i don't want left wingers. i think what the obama administration has done in foreign policy over the past eight years has been disastrous. i want to move forward. that said, there's nothing left of center about tom cotton running your pentagon but that wouldn't jolt washington. harvard guy. there are republican picks, there are moderate conservative picks that wouldn't jar washington like rudy giuliani, right? >> absolutely. mike rogers, let it be said, was

a conservative republican. a republican that wanted to make his committee work. bob wocorker has a lot of respe within the obama administration. they disagreed with him on iran but never stopped talking to him or feeling he was a sensible person. i think the question is as trump gets his mind around the reality of governing, is he going to identify people who actually can run these big departments? these are tough jobs. i tell you, watching secretaries of defense, that's the hardest management job in the world. you need somebody really good. secretary of state, same thing. >> you know washington better than anybody. certainly on the defense side of things. is it safe to say that the secretary of defense position and the director of the cia are probably the two toughest jobs in town as far as getting your arms around the bureaucracy? >> yes. i think absolutely. i think the pentagon above all is just so enormous. i was talking with one of the

top t officials at the pentagon this week about the transition. he said i sure hope the trump people understand the management side of this. they need to choose a secretary of defense on a particular model but then they need to decide the number two guys. a chief operating officer, a chief financial officer? is it a chief management officer. different models. those are the kind of questions the transition teams need to focus on. otherwise the agencies begin to sputter in the first six months of an administration and then you are really stuck because you can't get your program through. donald trump wants to govern effectively but he needs a team and clear sense of how the place works. if he had been screaming about draining the swamp, that's tough. >> the first four maybe to six announcements, appointments, those define. >> you have to get somebody that knows how to run the pentagon. that's done it before or been close to somebody that's done it before. same thing with the cia.

you put an ideologue in there, you will die a thousand -- you'll be bled out. they both leak. >> you need an executive. >> you will get killed. you need an executive. you need a ceo that's run a massive company before. you need somebody that's already there that's run the pentagon before. >> look at what some people are saying that if trump makes a mistake and picks bad cabinet secretaries, the way he'll be bailed out is strong deputy secretaries. you can't recruit those people under those circumstances. >> this rudy thing, he's been running his mouth. it's not happening. he's not going to do it. >> if the trump team wants to look at what their first six months could look like, the real warning sign, go back and see what happened to bill clinton. bill clinton came in, swept in, it was going to be a new day. his selections tortured him for the first six months. he never got on his feet really for another two or three years. he put les aspen at defense.

a guy that didn't know how to run defense. >> blackhawk down. >> he had two people going for a.g. that didn't pass the test. they better get professionals. trump is, again, the disruptor. he's the guy. he doesn't need disruptors around him. trump is disruptor. he needs people that will go out and actually do what he tells them to do. >> still ahead on "morning joe," senator rand paul who is openly opposing donald trump's potential picks of rudy giuliani and john bolton and congressman tim ryan who made challenge nancy pelosi to lead house democrats and senator mark warner on his party's plans to counter the gop's control of washington. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back.

so what's your news? i got a job! i'll be programming at ge.

oh i got a job too, at zazzies. (friends gasp) the app where you put fruit hats on animals? i love that! guys, i'll be writing code that helps machines communicate. (interrupting) i just zazzied you. (phone vibrates) look at it! (friends giggle) i can do dogs, hamsters, guinea pigs... you name it. i'm going to transform the way the world works. (proudly) i programmed that hat. and i can do casaba melons. i'll be helping turbines power cities. i put a turbine on a cat. (friends ooh and ahh) i can make hospitals run more efficiently... this isn't a competition! i've spent my life planting a size-six, non-slip shoe into that door. on this side, i want my customers to relax and enjoy themselves. but these days it's phones before forks. they want wifi out here. but behind that door, i need a private connection for my business. wifi pro from comcast business. public wifi for your customers. private wifi for your business. strong and secure. good for a door. and a network. comcast business. built for security. built for business.

>> were you troubled by any of the rhetoric on the campaign trail? >> of course. nobody wants to listen to all that and clearly things were said that we've never heard said in a presidential campaign. but the election is over. donald trump is the president-elect and i'm looking forward to his inauguration. >> what type of president do you think he'll be? do you think candidate trump will reemerge in the white house or is it going to be a different donald trump?

>> nobody really knows. donald trump is not an ideologue. i said yesterday, he's barely a republican. he could be barely a democratic as well. so nobody really knows where he's going. he made it clear during the campaign of what his issues are. >> who is happier john boehner or paul ryan? anybody? boehner is at pebble beach. we have a trump tweet. >> first tweet of the day of the president-elect. i'm not trying to get "top level security clearance" for my children. this was a typically false news story. >> let's talk about the one who does need a top security level clearance is his son-in-law, jared kushner. >> technically that's not his child. >> his son-in-law does need it. he's at the center of everything. he's the one that is sort of the

moderating voices for everybody all around yelling. he's the guy that keeps everybody on the level plane. he does need security clearance based on everything that i've seen and heard. you want him in there in the briefings so he can -- >> if he has a hand -- according to everything you hear and read, he does have a strong hand in the selection process. he would sure be benefited by getting security clearance because then you're going to see the gravity of what you're dealing with. >> you would be able to have a conversation that he might not have if they walk into a briefing and he's on the outside. >> as you guys know well, it's remarkable the extent to which donald trump listens to and trusts jared kushner. a story of a young businessman, really smart guy, who bought a newspaper and runs a newspaper from a very young age and now swept with donald trump as close as you can be to power and has real access and influence there.

>> i have to say that jared for people that know him, he's conservative with a small c. let's keep this in the middle of the road as much as possible. again, he's -- every experience i've had with him, mark halperin, i know you have to, he's a leveling wind in there. >> and he's going to be an adviser to donald trump from outside. that's just a given. the question is how does that get handled? all presidents have outside advisers. jared doesn't have experience at this level but he didn't have experience at the campaign either and performed well there. he's also a relative. i thinthey need to be careful here about how they frame this. there's a reason why if you're in government you have accountability. ethics requirements and all that. they'll have to figure out how to make this work in a way that's transparent. >> we have a lot to get to. we have some really extreme or large reaction to the steve bannon pick we need to get to and leadership fights. not just for the republicans but for the democrats as well. we'll be right back.

with my moderate to severe ulcerative colitis, the possibility of a flare was almost always on my mind. thinking about what to avoid, where to go... and how to deal with my uc. to me, that was normal. until i talked to my doctor. she told me that humira helps people like me get uc under control and keep it under control when certain medications haven't worked well enough. humira can lower your ability to fight infections, including tuberculosis. serious, sometimes fatal infections and cancers, including lymphoma, have happened; as have blood, liver, and nervous system problems, serious allergic reactions, and new or worsening heart failure.

before treatment, get tested for tb. tell your doctor if you've been to areas where certain fungal infections are common, and if you've had tb, hepatitis b, are prone to infections, or have flu-like symptoms or sores. don't start humira if you have an infection. raise your expectations. ask your gastroenterologist about humira. with humira, control is possible.

he wears his army hat, he gets awalks aroundliments. with his army shirt looking all nice. and then people just say, "thank you for serving our country" and i'm like, that's my dad. male vo: no one deserves a warmer welcome home. that's why we're hiring 10,000 members of the military community by the end of 2017. i'm very proud of him. male vo: comcast. >> washington has been dominated

by lobbyists, powerful special corporate interests for decades and it is time that we rid washington of their influence. unfortunately, what we are now beginning to see is what i feared, and that is a lot of what mr. trump was saying to get votes turns out to be not what he intends to do as the president of the united states. >> what is the trump transition/administration do that it's not doing now in your opinion? >> it doesn't start by hiring a bunch of lobbyists to run the transition. it doesn't start by floating names of people who have run giant hedge funds or been part of that to be able to run the treasury or people who come from industry to be able to run the regulatory agencies. you know, the american people understand about the revolving door, and i think they're really sick of it. >> i kind of understand the whole lobbying thing. i kind of wouldn't mind somebody

that's run a really big corporation running the pentagon. what does she want? a bunch of professors? again, i'm not talking about lobbyists. we kind of want people that have run things that know how to run things instead of professors and think tank specialists. >> you do kind of want people that know a little bit about the business that they're running, running the business. i think where she's coming from is she's been legitimately outraged by what happened in 2008 and 2009 and that affects everything that she says and does right up until today. it's going to be interesting to see who is treasury secretary. >> that's key. >> by the way, someone may have been listening there. mike pence as he took over the transition team said no lobbyists on the transition team. >> which is great. >> mike pence is influential in what's going on right now. >> talking about jared kirchner

being the level head, he beat back a lot of other recommendations and said mike pence is who you need. >> and manafort did also. >> and of course donald trump was the one who made the decision. you know, it was a wise choice. >> joining us now from capitol hill, julie pace. good to have you on this morning. >> thanks for having me. >> so, you know, president obama continues to be the real kind of calming force behind all of this. >> he is being a calming force. we had heard, julie, about republican leadership fights that were certain to come. paul ryan basically -- they threw palm leaves at his feet as he drove down to his speaker role. on the democratic side though, it's a little different. we're having some infighting,

aren't we? >> absolutely. that's to be expected after these really sweeping defeats that you saw democrats have up and down the ballot in the election. you know, it's so striking when you hear bernie sanders right now. he's saying the things that he said throughout this campaign. i actually go back to the things that joe biden said when he stepped out into the rose garden to announce he was not running for president. he was hitting a lot of these same economic populist notes talking about people who had been left behind and you see a real reckoning in the democratic party right now that perhaps the leadership that they've had across the board has missed what's happening in the country. now, whether that group of people, the bernie sanders wing, the warren wing, is able to remain influential going forward and really drive the party i that direction, i think is to be determined. you're certainly seeing them sort of having that i told you so moment right now.

>> david ignatius, for democratic leadership in the house and even the senate, you don't have great record to run on. three out of the last four elections have been disastrous. 2010 record setting. 2014 i think even worse. 2016, democrats by all accounts should have taken over the senate. and 2018 is going to be even worse with all of the democrats. it seems like the democratic party on the hill needs to be shaken up. they have failed time and time again to elect democrats. >> it's going to be a really difficult job for the democratic leadership because so much of what they'll try to do is save existing programs. they'll be fighting rear guard actions on obamacare and climate change, on the basic structure of programs and it's very hard to define a positive, pr progressive agenda when you try

to put out fires. leadership choices will be important in that. it gives the democrats an opportunity to set the agenda, reset the table for the country in the midterm elections. >> julie, it's willie. we've all said around this table that president obama has done a great service to the country over the last week the way he's carried himself and nducted himself in trying to turn down the temperature a little bit on this transition. lindsey graham himself said yesterday i cannot thank him enough for behaving the way he is. talking about president obama. can you talk a little bit about how president obama is walking that line between a guy he obviously has disdain for he said as recently as eight days ago but also respecting that transition of power? >> president obama has used this one description of the presidency a lot that is interesting. he talks about it being a relay race. you have the baton as president for four or eight years and then you hand it off to someone else.

i think it's really guided how he's viewed this transition. i can't emphasize enough how much it meant to obama and to his staff to have this smooth transition that george w. bush helped enable eight years ago. i think he remembers how difficult it was for obama to come into office relatively young and inexperienced and take over this massive operation. and he's putting aside at least publicly his feelings about donald trump and his readiness for office. i think that in this moment where you do have a lot of americans who are worried right now or you have a lot of people in washington who are uncertain, it is a great service that you have the president of the united states essentially saying i'm going to put my personal feelings aside. this is something that's much bigger than me. much bigger than donald trump. >> actually, president obama did not get that from republicans when he started. i think he also sees the value of support from all sides and how much that would have helped him if there was a little bit

more of an openness of mind from the other side because if you remember, repuicans were in someays as hair on fire as democrats are being right now. i'm surprised there isn't a little bit of a growth curve here. we have to give it a chance. we do want it to be successful, i would think, if i were a democratic in leadership. and we have to -- we have to put the past behind us and let us this start anew or it will be more of the same. donald trump likes to keep people guessing. this is one thing we know about him. the one thing we're 100% sure of is he keeps people guessing. he'll talk about everything else for an hour and talk for two seconds about what the deal is. we'll find out. we don't know so why is everyone judging so quickly right now? >> the thing to remember also is mike barnicle, i talked about bill clinton was a good example of transitions gone wrong. let's just go back to barack obama.

here's a guy that had a bunch of professionals around him. washington insiders. remember the stories we told for six months here. i always made jokes that tim geithner was alone. barack obama had a hard time filling all of those slots. this transition, if you really want to do it right, after you win like new hampshire or south carolina, you need to start planning your transition. this is extraordinarily tough even for the most seasoned washington crowd. >> one of the interesting things is you mentioned the clinton transition in 1992-1993. and the obama administration. a lot depends on who the chief of staff is. bill clinton's chief of staff is a really nice person who was in way over his head. it was chaos for the first six to nine months. clinton administration as a result. so in addition to staffing these positions and under secretaries,

you really need a strong chief of staff. >> there's another problem. i don't know if it -- >> he's done that. >> i don't know if bill clinton had the same type of maddening personality in a sense that donald trump has. >> you are absolutely right. >> you know, bill clinton is going 1,000 miles an hour. everybody that worked for clinton said it was always clinton. just hundreds of people. >> clinton chaos that's like what trump has and trump needs to learn from clinton's mistakes. >> you're absolutely right. i think people remember the clinton white house as being chaotic until leon panetta, a real washington hand, came in and panetta said to the president, look, i'm not going to take the job of chief of staff unless i really control access to you.

i know how you're using your time. his first week somebody tried to go around him. panetta said that's it it i'm walking unless i have that control. trump needs that. disorganized. lots of ideas. clearly president obama believes the more you talk to donald trump, the more he understands things. you can just hear that in the president's voice as he talked about his conversations. i heard that from other cabinet officials. there's got to be something who budgets that time at the top. >> all right. julie pace, thank you very much. our next hour, the man who may challenge nancy pelosi for house minority leader, congressman tim ryan will be our best and must read opinion pages. "morning joe" is coming right back. permission to indulge. o is for out of this world. l is for loving the seasonal cuisine. a is for access to everything, including the aisle.

r is for reclining in tailor-made bedding. and i, must be dreaming. s... so long, jet lag. polaris, from united. [burke] hot dog. seen it. we know a thing or two because we've seen a thing or two. ♪ we are farmers. bum-pa-dum, bum-bum-bum-bum ♪

he wears his army hat, he gets awalks aroundliments. with his army shirt looking all nice. and then people just say, "thank you for serving our country" and i'm like, that's my dad. male vo: no one deserves a warmer welcome home. that's why we're hiring 10,000 members of the military community by the end of 2017. i'm very proud of him. male vo: comcast.

still ahead -- >> you're saying we're going to survi survive? >> we'll be okay. >> we're the united states of america. >> i told conservatives to work for trump. one talk with his team changed my mind. we'll dig into that ahead.

are you on medicare? do you have the coverage you need? open enrollment ends december 7th. so now's the time to get on a path that could be right for you... with plans including aarp medicarecomplete insured through unitedhealthcare. call today or go online to enroll. these medicare advantage plans can combine your hospital and doctor coverage with prescription drug coverage, and extra benefits all in one complete plan for a low monthly premium, or in some areas

no plan premium at all. other benefits can include: $0 co-pays for an annual physical and most immunizations, routine vision and hearing coverage, and you'll pay the plan's lowest prescription price, whether it's your co-pay or the pharmacy price. or pay zero dollars for a 90-day supply of tier 1 and tier 2 drugs, with home delivery. don't wait, call unitedhealthcare or go online to enroll in aarp medicarecomplete. i thodid the ancestrydna toian. find out i'm only 16% italian. so i went onto ancestry, soon learned that one of our ancestors was eastern european. this is my ancestor who i didn't know about.

proud of you, son. ge! a manufacturer. well that's why i dug this out for you. it's your grandpappy's hammer and he would have wanted you to have it. it meant a lot to him... yes, ge makes powerful machines. but i'll be writing the code that will allow those machines to share information with each other. i'll be changing the way the world works. (interrupting) you can't pick it up, can you? go ahead. he can't lift the hammer. it's okay though! you're going to change the world. ♪ >> welcome back to "morning joe." it's just before the top of the hour. mike barnicle is still with us. david ignatius still with us as well. joining the conversation, the president on the council on foreign relations, richard haass

author of "a world in disarray." look forward to reading that. and on capitol hill, political reporter for "the washington post" and msnbc political analyst, robert costa. >> let's underline it quickly. you had breaxit. the german elections. a lot of things happening. and so of people rising all over the place. it's not quite 1848, but it's going to be a year that people will be circling. >> the next thing will probably be in italy. december 4th you have the vote with the prime minister of italy put his government's future on the line about constitutional reform there. it's almost like the brexit vote. he could realwell lose it. >> let's talk about the concept

of rudy giuliani as the front runner for secretary of state is not going over well with some. >> he's been putting himself out there and saying that he's going to be secretary of state for the most part and the reaction has been pretty staggering. >> we're taking a look. he says he's the top guy. >> the information about him which i found out for the first time last hour is pretty shocking. >> political reports he was paid as a lawyer and consultant to work for foreign governments including groups from qatar and venezuela. >> venezuela obviously has been a sworn enemy of america for a long time. qatar, it's been problematic at best in cooperating with us, right? >> at best. qatar has been, shall we say, spreading money around in the united states trying to buy some influence and to curry some favor. qatar tried to have it both ways. supportive of the west but hedged their bets with iran and

certain groups. >> before i get to the money -- >> venezuela, hugo chavez and now it's almost like a failed state. it's a hostile state. anti-democratic state. violently anti-america. close to cuba historically and could be one of the crises mr. trump faces as president because it's not far from the brink of collapse because of low oil prices. >> rudy giuliani made hundreds of dollars off paid speeches. "the new york times" writes "in 201 2006, mr. giuliani revealed he made 124 speeches for as much as $200,000 each and earned $11.4 million." >> is that as much as hint made off speeches? >> for a single year, yes.

>> for a single year. >> and then bill had a series of 20-minute meetings, four of them that added up to $1 million. i don't know if that's a speech or more like a chat fest. >> it's a good living. >> and to foreign interest which is disturbing for someone to be secretary of state. >> rudy giuliani regularly appeared at events for an iranian option group. >> we understand they were on the state department's terrorist watch list? getting money from a group that's on the state department's terror watch list. do you know about this group? >> they are against the current government, islamic republic of iran, carrying out various terrorist actions against them. they invited a lot of americans to speak at some of their events and they invited me at one point and i simply said no. i advised the people who work for me who are also invited, several other people -- >> you can't go because they're terrorists.

>> they're a state sponsor of terrorists. >> don't worry. they were taken off in 2012 when hillary clinton became secretary of state. >> i'm not sure they should have been taken off. the fact that they oppose the islamic republic of iran, i understand there's lots about what this government is doing that ought to give americans pause but there's right ways and wrong ways of opposing government. >> giuliani was paid $25,000 to $40,000 to speak to this terror group. a number of high profile former u.s. officials have spoken including john bolton, which is interesting. the treasury department launched a probe. he talks about crooked hillary. does this sound like crooked ru rudy? >> let's all question the source right now. i don't know what's going on with him, but i don't think -- i'm sorry. i'm going out on a limb. i don't think donald trump would

appreciate anybody doing this. if he was considering him, that would kill it right there. >> going out there and basically announcing "the wall street journal" in a way i've never seen anybody do that before and now we find out because he brought this attention to himsel that former terror groups are paying him to give speeches, sworn enemies, venezuela paying him. qatar doing the same thing. >> whenever the speaker bureau calls and says we have an offer for you, how big is the crowd? will there be q and a and are they on a terror list? three things you want to ask. >> david ignatius, you've done this before. that's like on your punch list? are they currently or have they ever been on the state department's terrorist watch list? >> i try to never speak to or interview terrorist groups. i hate to say this to my friend

but it is possible that criticism of these people and their records if you're steve bannon looking at this saying my gosh, the mainstream doesn't like these people, it's conceivable that that makes them even more favorites for these jobs. >> i don't think so. not terror watch list. not when you make money from terror groups. and again, he got elected running against crooked hillary. he is not going to pick a guy that people can call crooked rudy because they've got right now investigations going on. they've got probes going on according to what we just read. help me out, richard. let's talk about conservatives so people don't go they just won't -- i think the last eight years of the obama foreign policy has been disastrous. it's been a nightmare. i want the opposite of that. so i'm not talking about let's hold hands and do kumbaya.

name some good conservatives or some sort of disruptors. >> let me make one general point. there's a space here for donald trump's foreign policy. some thought that what george w. bush tried to do was too transformational and led to iraq and barack obama will be judged by what he didn't do. there's a space for this new administration to get it right. some of the people, richard had worked for rand paul. bob close aide to jim baker when he was secretary of state. you mentioned senator corker. you mentioned senator lieberman to bring in a democratic. >> joe lieberman agrees with a lot of what donald trump has said. >> there's a space there for what i would call -- it's realists. there's a space on the political spectrum for people if you reject to use the label overly

ambitious policy and if donald trump wants to have a world which is somewhat calmer so he can focus on things more domestic, which what he says he wants to do, there's a foreign policy that could actually help him do that. >> totally. >> and donald trump is a realist to the -- from what we've seen. we're not going into syria. we're not dealing with that. we can't save the world. we need to rebuild america. >> have to be careful it's not too narrow. there's a space there. where did he give a speech during the campaign? at the center for national interest? that's the place that used to be called the nixon center and that's a place that embraces foreign policy realism and tries to reject two extremes of too little foreign policy and too much. it seems to me that is where he ought to be and enough people of that school he ought to be able to achieve that.

>> you're a realist. >> i've been called first. >> you know donald trump? >> i briefed him once during the campaign. this is not about me. there are people out there that are experienced hands who in their careers for decades have not only served in government but embraced foreign policy that seems more or less consistent with -- >> john bolton's foreign policy could not have been more opposed to everything that donald trump said he stood for. bolton was crazy ideologue. some of these names that we hear just don't make sense. they don't match donald trump who is a realist who says let's pull back and are more restrained. >> that's not bombs away bolton's position on the middle east or anywhere else in the world. he was for dropping the big one on tehran several years ago in

2004-2005. but the larger point, at least from my view -- i want to ask you about this. each morning now we wake up and we read discord in the transition team. firings taking place. confusion taking place. what is the status, the time line, for these appointments according to what you have found out or no? >> or historically. >> another name we need to put into the mix is senator sessions of alabama. he has taken a hold of this transition working of course with the president-elect and with the vice president-elect. with christie moving out, he was a hawk. he was a mainstream republican. you now have sessions who is known mostly for his views of domestic policy being a populist conservative but on foreign policy he is more of a realist. he comes out of that donald trump more center ground. not a hawk. he has his people highly

influential working alongside steve bannon and who is going to get these positions. >> sessions is probably the most powerful guy other than pence in there regarding the transition, robert? >> i think three most powerful people next to donald trump right now are senator sessions, steve bannon and jared kushner. >> i think so. and sessions -- is sessions up for attorney general? is he up for secretary of defense? what are you hearing? >> that is the questi. i spent all day yesterday at the capitol and i met with some senators and got their feel for it all. there are some private concerns among republican senators about what exactly senator sessions could be confirmed for and so they think defense could be the better fit even though some of the hawks are not entirely comfortable with sessions at the pentagon. they think that would be an easier confirmation battle than perhaps putting senator sessions as attorney general or another

position. >> two things. it's going to be a real difficult inbox. what this president is going to inherit if you look at the middle east and asia and you look at europe. it's hard to imagine more difficult inbox in a long time. and so you really need people there who are experienced. the others you have to think of it as a team. we have been talking about this individual or that individual. the president needs a national security team. you have to look at whether they have abilities to complement each other. whether there is a decent likelihood they can work together without everything being worked out in newspapers. everyone wants to see the appointments. it shouldn't be rushed. it's important to get it right. >> i don't want to underline this. everybody is freaking out. you told me right after he got elected that he was going to feel the pressure to move fast and you said he needs to take his time. he doesn't need to make any pronouncements. everyone will push him hard. he needs to just take his time. >> personnel is policy at some

point. he has to -- better get it right a week later than get it wrong. >> you don't share the press' consternation? >> of course not. >> you know whose hand can be seen in these maneuvers is general flynn. he's been at trump's side as well. he's someone that's controversial within the national security community. some people think he's too combative and don't like obama administration record. others think he's a perfect fit for trump. when you see mike rogers getting pushed out and christie getting pushed out, who is still there? mike flynn. >> on that note, let me bring in this concept put out by a former national security official in george w. bush's administration. he writes in "the washington post." i told conservatives to work for trump. one talk with his team changed my mind. i am a national security never trumper who after the election made the case that young conservatives should volunteer to serve in the new

administration. their undated letters of resignation ready. that advice was wrong. the tenor of the trump team from everything i see, read and hear is such that for a garden variety republican policy specialist, service in the early phase of the administration would carry a high risk of compromising one's integrity and reputation. it's not even clear that he accepts that he should live in the white house rather thanis penthouse in new york. conservative political types should not volunteer to serve in this administration at least for now. at the very least, they should wait to see who gets the top jobs. i hope that i am wrong. i hope that the administration will settle down and i can

temperate criticisms when it is wrong but the auspiceses here are disturbing. >> if you're going to say that, who did you meet with? he didn't meet with reince. >> you're bellowing into the air. >> i'm sure he didn't meet with pence. who did he meet with? >> the family, rudy giuliani there? the people -- rudy giuliani maybe as secretary of state. >> i don't know. he said they shouted at him saying we won, you loss. i don't know. >> is david ignatius still here? >> yes. >> david, the tone of elliott's letter, what do you hear among his peers in washington? same sort of thing? >> i think there's a lot of anguish among republicans about

whether they should serve, consider serving. elliott is a very principled person. i heard one of my heros, close friend of mika's dad this week at a special lunch in his honor turn to a crowd of former top officials in the government and say i know you have reservations. i know you have concerns. i do too. you must help this man somehow to govern the country. it was an appeal from the person who more than anybody else represents our tradition of bipartisan foreign policy saying somebody is going to have to help him run the country and run the world. very moving moment for all of us. >> senator ted cruz was seen entering trump tower yesterday. his name has been reported as potential attorney general choice but a source close to the senator said he was just there to show support. >> that's not going to happen. >> frequent trump surrogate ben carson will not be serving in

trump cabinets. >> did you hear about this? >> this is from a guy that ran for president. his business manager said he would serve only as an unofficial adviser. this guy ran for president. adding this, "dr. carson feels he has no government experience and has never run a federal agency. the last thing he would want to do is take a position that would cripple the presidency." >> but you wanted to be president? are you kidding me? i can't run the small business association because i am ill qualified. i will destroy america, but i would love to be your president. >> perfect. >> that's a perfect end. wow. >> bob costa, help america trying to figure out all of this. i must say, i am with richard

haass in that i'm not freaking out right now. they do have time though they need to get moving. help us out in all of the maneuverings that are going on. what do you see in trump tower? do you see chaos or do you just see a system that trump thinks worked for him in the campaign that's being employed now? >> just about that senator cruz nugget. i was at the capitol and senator graham, who has been a longtime -- he's clashed with senator cruz. wouldn't senator cruz be great on the supreme court. it looks like some senators may be okay with ted cruz leaving the upper chamber. i think there's a joke going around the senate, not among graham but a joke that he would be confirmed 100 to nothing. >> just to get him out. >> that's a running joke in the senate. with ben carson i spoke to him briefly. i asked carson yesterday what's it like when you're meeting with trump? he says trump is being kind of

besieged by all of these calls, phone calls, and papers and meetings and he's really relying on this tight knit inner circle. it's not really trump himself from what i'm told who is doing this purging of christie and others but he's putting his faith in the three, four people, flynn, bannon, kushner, sessions to figure things out and he's trying to still adjust. he went out last night to the 21 club for a steak dinner with his family. he kind of ditched the press pool. he wanted to have time alone. you see a president-elect still adjusting and fnavigating the scene. >> how about walking down to the 21 club as president. donald trump has been in there thousands of times. >> it raises an interesting question. how is he going to deal with fact that he has no more privacy? obama's ideal day would be to take a walk down to the store. >> donald trump cannot walk down fifth avenue without getting 200 people around him.

we've seen that. he has lived like this. >> not like this. >> he has. >> this is different. this is vastly different. >> the security part is different. >> the biggest problem is going to be where he lives right now in trump tower. he loves trump tower. he loves living there. all you have to do is see a scene from "24" to see where the fictional president got shot in a skyscraper. there are windows all of the way around. this is going to be a security nightmare for him. his life is going to change. >> the secret service and new york police department cannot wait for him to leave because it's a nightmare in midtown manhattan. >> he's going to have to shuttle more between the white house -- >> it's in the middle -- couldn't be more central in manhattan in terms of traffic

and people going around. then as you said you put him in the top three floors of a giant skyscraper. >> being mobbed and people -- >> it disrupts my getting to the airport. >> do we have a graphic? i saw it early a picture of trump tower with all of the other -- extraordinary view. >> sanitation trucks filled with sand. streets blocked off from madison avenue to 6th avenue. >> we'll get it. for his protection, it's just extraordinary. >> a big change. robert costa, thank you. david ignatius, thank you as well. still ahead on "morning joe," donald trump ditched his press pool to grab steaks. there is a reporter he wasn't able to shake and that's nbc's hallie jackson. hallie joins us next and congressman that could challenge minority leader nancy pelosi as a top democratic in the house. representative tim ryan of ohio joins "morning joe" in just a

moment.

♪ ♪ ♪ is it a force of nature? or a sales event? the season of audi sales event is here. audi will cover your first month's lease payment on select models during the season of audi sales event. (bing)

he wears his army hat, he gets awalks aroundliments. with his army shirt looking all nice. and then people just say, "thank you for serving our country" and i'm like, that's my dad. male vo: no one deserves a warmer welcome home. that's why we're hiring 10,000 members of the military community by the end of 2017. i'm very proud of him. male vo: comcast. >> the president-elect's penthouse is on the top three floors of trump tower. the trump web side says there are 263 apartments in the building each worth millions. below that, 26 floors of offices and on the first few floors, a variety of stores and restaurants including starbucks, an ice cream shop and nike and gucci. still open to the public but

today more police than shoppers. move outside and the problems multiply from street level discussions under way on whether fifth avenue will be shutdown when mr. trump is in residence. the side street is already closed. >> this is what we're talking about right there. we're building up to it. >> we'll get it later. >> the point is the security challenge is not only on street level but up at the top. >> that's what we wanted. hello. in three. >> three, two, one. >> now we'll go up and now they'll show this. there it is. that's the challenge right there. look at all of the windows facing it. >> surrounded by other skyscrapers. >> and then this guy right there,s have mischi-- >> hallie, talking about the scene with the press pool yesterday. >> she's out 21 right now.

>> we are at the 21 club right now indeed. the street is clear. everything looks back to normal after the motorcade and street was shut down outside this restaurant last night when the president-elect came to a dinner with his family. sorry guys. wrong microphone. here's the situation. is that better? this is my first time doing television. >> if you define better by us being able to hear you, yes, it's better. >> sorry. >> go ahead. >> thank you. that's helpful. my only point is the street is back to normal outside of the 21 club after the president-elect came to that dinner last night without these small pool of journalists who typically follow his movements and by the way follow the movements of president obama as well. both president obama and president-elect trump. there are a lot of people who hear this story and are seeing headlines this morning saying so what or good for him. he should be able to go out and enjoy a private meal with his family. that's a right that the president-elect should enjoy. doing so solo without that pool of journalists breaks long

standing protocol for presidents and president-elects in the event of a potential worse case scenario as has happened in the past. that's where some of the concern comes in. i want to tell you what a spokesperson for the president-elect's team said this morning. this is from hope hicks. they are still in the process of normalizing a protective pool structure and look forward to implementing that as soon as possible. i think what this does is underscore changes in the president-elect's life and habits from candidate trump to president-elect trump and underscores we can expect the unexpected from him. first excursion out publicly in days. it was tweeted by someone that happened to be at the restaurant at the time which is how the rest of the pool of journalists who typically follow the president-elect learned that he was in fact at this particular restaurant. >> all right. nbc's hallie jackson. great report. may we say the audio was

perfect. >> phenomenal. >> very good. >> i'm sorry. >> hold on a second. i need to know. part of me says good for him. he needs to get out. he's been trapped inside of his tower now since he got elected. i don't think he's gone out at all. doesn't want the press -- so that's my -- i think that's great. let him slip out. don't lie to the press. slip out. go there on your own. is there a real problem with that? >> there is. >> so i was sure there was. explain to everybody why that's a problem. >> it's hard to be accepted now by a lot of people in the country given the current climate toward the media and demonization of the media during the course of the campaign hasn't helped. everything changed for the presidency in the afternoon of november 22nd, 1963. you need a protective press pool. it's not like hovering around him shouting questions just to follow the movements of the

president where he's going. >> are you talking about is it the whole press corps or do they get two or three people? >> it's a pool. >> it's a small representative group of the media. we are going to have as an institution on behalf of the american people not because we're special interest fights with this new administration about coverage. there's a reason why there's a protective pool. there's a reason there's not black listing. first amendment is important. while we fight with trump people about this, we need to make public understand we're doing this in the public interest. it's vitally important for the democracy. he should just play by the rules. not going to have camera on him. it's required. not for fun. it's required for democracy and openness and accountability. >> i get that. i'll challenge it slightly. that trip to the 21 club, did you really think nobody was going to see that in the world of iphones and facebook live and

i'm just saying -- >> it's not about -- i come from this. >> bloomberg people there otherwise i'm not sure it would have been reported. the point is when he leaves and he's in public, there has to be a protective pool because of accountability. there just does. >> we wouldn't have seen him there. >> it's not about seeing him inside. it's about what might happen to him as he travels from point a to point b. it's uncomfortable to talk about. this is an important fight but much more important fights coming about press freedom on behalf of the public interest and not on behalf of the media. on behalf of public interest. they need to understand why the rules exist. >> the press pool at a meal is not intrusive in any way. you travel with them. you stay outside. he goes and eats in privacy. they know where he is. what he's doing and god forbid if something should happen, the

american people would know it. >> president obama goes golfing every weekend. the press pool works at the burger king. they're not following him around. >> no cost to donald trump to adhere to the way things work. he tweeted again attacking "the new york times" while we've been talking. a series of three tweets. >> they had a story today suggesting transition was a disaster. >> is that the only one? >> there's a series of three. the third one mocks coverage and says the reason they are writing bad stories about him is they are upset that they look like fools in their coverage of me. >> got the phone back. with us from capitol hill, tim ryan of ohio weighing a challenge to nancy pelosi for house minority leader. thanks for being with us. so you are officially challenging nancy pelosi for the top post in the democratic party in the house? >> no. we're having conversations now.

you know how this process goes. just yesterday we were able to get this process extended a couple weeks to have these kind of conversations. some people have approached me but there are a lot of people having conversations right now about what direction we go in. we think with the presidency being held by a republican, house and senate republican, we may have a unique opportunity in 2018 but we have to go into red states, red congressional districts and persuade trump voters who are democrats, many of them, to come back home. >> tim, you're from youngstown, right? >> just outside of youngstown, yes. >> mr. chairman, he would call everybody mr. chairman. everybody was mr. chairman. i loved jim. youngstown, ohio, it seems to be we were just talking democrats got slaughtered in '10. they got slaughtered in '14. they got beaten in '16.

probably going to lose badly in '18. seems to me having leadership from place like youngstown, ohio, kind of makes a lot of sense since the party lost wisconsin, michigan, ohio, and pennsylvania. is that part of your pitch? >> that's the conversation about who can do the blue firewall and who can make the argument. we have a diverse coalition in the democratic party. we have to have some reach out as well to the blue collar voters. they got to vote blue if we'll take the house back. there will be an opportunity. if there's a repeal of the health care bill and privatization of medicare, if there's gutting of medicaid for example, a lot of people who are receiving benefits now are going to lose those benefits. we got to make the argument to them that democrats are the party for them. >> congressman, goodyear, firesto

firestone, blue collar workers, black and white and hispanic, make the argument right now why they should remain or go back to the democratic party that's been with them since 1932. make it. >> i think we've got to stop talking to them about running computers and start talking to them about running backhoes and that manual labor is okay. we want to rebuild the country and put them back to work. we talked to thembout job retraining. no one wants to hear about job retraining. they want a job. they want a good job. they want to take a shower before work and not after work. they like what they do. they want to build things. we have to get back to a strong manufacturing base. how do we use a renewable energy economy to improve our manufacturing base? how do we use defense industrial base like we have in akron which is also my congressional district, spend our defense money here in the united states to make these things. the tier 1, tier 2, tier 3 suppliers. democrats have to grab that idea of making things in america

again and talk to these people about we want real jobs, not job retraining, not running computers but running backhoes. >> why don't you run just to make that argument more public? >> we're having that conversation right now. you know, we'll see what happens in the next couple of days. >> congressman, it's willie geist. there's been an argument coming out of the election of last week that in fact democrats should double down on being more progressive. nancy pelosi is the leader we need. we need to hear more from elizabeth warren and bernie sanders' argument was the right argument and may have beaten donald trump. how do you walk that line between keeping your base home as a national party but talk to those voters that you're talking about? >> i think on the progressive issues i'm in line with the progressive caucus and progressive people. i think it would be progressive to have an economic message for blue collar workers. you know, what unites democrats and what unites the country really is an economic message about opportunity.

how do we create opportunity. how do we grow the pie so that it can help us with our debt and deficits and also help us grow new sectors of the economy and i think talking to millennials is very important as well. the maker movement. growing businesses. portable health care. portable benefits. portable pensions. there's a new economy out there. in five years, most of the workforce is going to be millennials. we need to create programs and policies that are going to allow them to grow to create a new economy and if we show that initiative, what's america 2.0 look like? what's the next iteration of america? the democratic party needs to align itself with policies that are going to get us there and that includes advance manufacturing and high tech jobs and all of the above to make that happen. i think there's a real appetite in the country for a new democratic party. the obamas are gone.

clintons are gone. bidens are gone. the house leadership race is going to be an important signal to many democrats, independents and moderate republicans of what the new democratic party looks like. >> congressman tim ryan, thank you. >> thank you very much. still ahead, if you buy a prepaid cell phone -- >> this is unbelievable. did you hear about this? >> we talked about this yesterday. >> my dad was right about this. >> they are eavesdropping. china, russia. israel. they're listening in on everything. >> for the past four years he's been saying this. >> reading e-mails. >> we're back in a moment. liberty mutual stood with me when i was too busy with the kids to get a repair estimate. liberty did what? yeah, with liberty mutual all i needed to do to get an estimate was snap a photo of the damage and voila! voila!

(sigh) i wish my insurance company had that... wait! hold it... hold it boys... there's supposed to be three of you... where's your brother? where's your brother? hey, where's charlie? charlie?! you can leave worry behind when liberty stands with you. liberty stands with you™ liberty mutual insurance

the markets change... at t. rowe price... our disciplined approach remains. global markets may be uncertain... but you can feel confident in our investment experience around the world. call us or your advisor... t. rowe price. invest with confidence.

he wears his army hat, he gets awalks aroundliments. with his army shirt looking all nice. and then people just say, "thank you for serving our country" and i'm like, that's my dad.

male vo: no one deserves a warmer welcome home. that's why we're hiring 10,000 members of the military community by the end of 2017. i'm very proud of him. male vo: comcast. >> fascinating stat from "the wall street journal." why don't you share it with all of the kids. >> might have been "the washington post." nancy pelosi's constituents average annual income $136,000 average. >> a little different than youngstown. >> different than tim ryan's district. >> his is 57,000 according to that same report in "the wall street journal." big difference with that. >> we've talked about it before. i mean, there's a reason why donald trump, you drive from new jersey west.

you drive through trump states all of the way until you hit oregon. >> so this next story is from the column of my father is always right. in this morning's "the new york times," americans might be carrying cell phones installed with software that is monitoring thr personal data. cyberwar is what i'm thinking about. "times" reports american security contractors discovered preinstalled software on android phones sending user data including call logs and text messages to china every 72 hours. the company that developed the software installed on an unknown number of android devices said the feature was not intended for u.s. phones. they will remove the feature. american authorities say it's unclear if information gathering is being used for advertising purposes or an effort by the chinese government to collect detailed intelligence. >> if the chinese government wants it, the chinese government

gets it. i just wonder, iphones, you know, they are assembled in china. what are they doing to make sure the chinese government isn't doing this? >> it's just an add-on feature. >> it's bad. >> if they have my text messages, i'm out of here. >> let's talk about paranoia. i have had washington people tell me in the defense industry that there's nothing -- >> forget it. >> it's an open book. >> other governments listen, hear, texts. >> doesn't it make sense? >> my father won't talk on the phone about anything. he won't -- he is incredibly -- he's been for about five years very sort of militant with me about conversations we have on the phone. i kept thinking he's being so paranoid. this is ridiculous. he's not ridiculous. he was right. >> when you go to china for business purposes or travel purposes but largely for

business purposes, some companies make you get a portable phone as soon as you arrive and you throw the portable phone away after you leave. >> burner phone. >> up next, what do conservatives want from president trump? we'll talk to the head of the club for growth next on "morning joe." same toughness. and since he's had moderate alzheimer's disease, the same never quit attitude. that's why i asked his doctor about once-a-day namzaric. (avo) namzaric is approved for moderate to severe alzheimer's disease in patients who are taking donepezil. it may improve cognition and overall function, and may slow the worsening of symptoms for a while. namzaric does not change the underlying disease progression. don't take if allergic to memantine, donepezil, piperidine or any of the ingredients in namzaric. tell the doctor about any conditions including heart, lung, bladder, kidney or liver problems, seizures, stomach ulcers, or procedures with anesthesia. serious side effects may occur, including muscle problems if given anesthesia; slow heartbeat, fainting, more stomach acid

which may lead to ulcers and bleeding; nausea, vomiting, difficulty urinating, seizures, and worsening of lung problems. most common side effects are headache, diarrhea, dizziness loss of appetite, and bruising. (man) dad and i shared a lot of moments. now we're making the most of each one. (avo) ask about namzaric today.

>> the comments that the president-elect made about obamacare which we just

discussed, the other ones he told "60 minutes" that he's fine with same-sex marriage, those were his words, that the wall could be a fence in some spots. how is that going to play with the alt-right? the far right that helped push him over the top. >> they understand that donald trump is barely a republican. when it comes to social issues, he doesn't agree with where a lot of people in the party are. >> does he need to be more of a republican now? >> i think donald trump needs to be donald trump. >> joining us from manchester, new hampshire, the chair of the state's republican party, jennifer horn and here on set, president of the conservative political organization club for growth, former republican congressman david mcintosh. >> always good to see you. you saw the list of things. are you as a conservative concerned about what you're seeing right now? >> i think it's all up in the air right now. i think he's carefully adjusting where he's going to be and for example on obamacare, we're back on track to repeal, replace it

with a free market version of healthcare, which i think is great. trade, i'm somewhat more nervous about. i think if we go into the tariff areas it could undermine the whole economy. there are ways he could make real improvements. do a bilateral agreement with great britain and show that he can really negotiate a great deal and china we need to have free trade with china. there are ways you can push back on them without getting us into a trade war. >> so jennifer, you obviously are the chairwoman for one of the most important republican parties in the nation. what are you seeing out of new york and washington so far and what about republicans in new hampshire? do they like the direction that things are going or are they concerned? >> well, you know, what, good morning. it's great to be with everybody. i think folks up here in new hampshire are pretty pragmatic. we're pretty practical. and i think that most folks are looking at what's happening right nownd saying, gosh, give

the guy a minute to breathe. nine days since the election. he's barely begun to put his team together. you know, some of these -- for example, the quote about obamacare repeal and replace has always been the republican message including for donald trump. i think most folks are looking at this saying let's all just give him a minute and get his team together and give him an opportunity just like every president-elect before him to kind of get through this transition period and see where it takes us. >> very tough on donald trump throughout the campaign. ran a couple million dollars of ads against him and said he wasn't really a conservative. do you believe he can be a conservative? what's your best hope for him? >> my best hope is he doubles down on conservative things that let him win. push the tax bill through congress. surround yourself with some very good conservatives. i've heard some good names being

mentioned. peter teal, a big supporter of his, would be wonderful at usdr because he would push back on these trade deals but he wouldn't get us into a tariff w tariff war. >> jennifer, i'm wondering how it's translating in new hampshire and in the party there. the first two picks, reince priebus and bannon. >> reporter: well, i think that reince priebus is an outstanding choice, and i think it sends a really strong message, not just to republicans but to the american people that the president-elect is taking this very seriously and he's bringing good leaders. reince has a reputation not just for the outstanding work that he's done at the rnc but of being a bridge builder and a leader. i think what folks are looking for is for the president-elect to make good on the promise that he made on election night when he gave his speech very early, actually, the next morning when he said he wants to be a president for all-americans and i think that they're going to be

looking for a team surrounding him that kind of represents that. obviously we all want him to go forward and lead as a conservative. we think that's what's best for the country. what we see from donald trump is a mix of folks around him that represent the full spectrum of the american people. >> okay. david mcintosh, jennifer horn, thank you both very much. >> great to be with you guys. up next, ceo of google says fake news stories that have been spreading on social media may have been enough to swing the election? nbc's miguel almaguer reports live from silicon valley next. ♪ mapping the oceans. where we explore. protecting biodiversity. everywhere we work. defeating malaria. improving energy efficiency. developing more clean burning natural gas. my job? my job at exxonmobil?

turning algae into biofuels. reducing energy poverty in the developing world. making cars go further with less. fueling the global economy. and you thought we just made the gas. ♪ energy lives here. [burke] hot dog. seen it. we know a thing or two because we've seen a thing or two. ♪ we are farmers. bum-pa-dum, bum-bum-bum-bum ♪ of a different drummer... beat i say, i just dance. be up for anything with boost. it's intelligent nutrition. with 26 vitamins and minerals and 10 grams of protein. and i'm just getting warmed up. boost. be up for it. is depressio♪ more than sadness? it's a tangle of multiple symptoms. ♪ ♪

trintellix (vortioxetine) is a prescription medicine for depression. trintellix may start to untangle or help improve the multiple symptoms of depression. for me, trintellix made a difference. tell your healthcare professional right away if your depression worsens, or you have unusual changes in mood, behavior or thoughts of suicide. antidepressants can increase these in children, teens, and young adults. trintellix has not been studied in children. do not take with maois. tell your healthcare professional about your medications, including migraine, psychiatric and depression medications to avoid a potentially life-threatening condition. increased risk of bleeding or bruising may occur especially if taken with nsaid pain relievers, aspirin, or blood thinners. manic episodes or vision problems may occur in some people. may cause low sodium levels. the most common side effects are nausea, constipation and vomiting. trintellix did not have significant impact on weight. ask your healthcare professional if trintellix could make a difference for you.

afoot and light-hearted i take to the open road. healthy, free, the world before me, the long brown path before me leading wherever i choose. the east and the west are mine.

the north and the south are mine. all seems beautiful to me. some of silicon valley's biggest companies are seeking pressure on news from their website. miguel alma fwur, what are we talking about here? >> we're talking about facebook. more that 60% of americans get their news from social media websites. the biggest platform. they're not doing enough to take down those fake news stories. the headlines are as shocksing

as they are fake. isis oil paid off hillary clinton. pope francis endorses trump. now growing concern these fake stories may have had real influence on voters. google announced it's taking steps to ban fake news stories from its site. facebook clarified it already prohibits them adding our team will continue to closely vet all prospective publishers and monitor existing ones. but just days ago ceo mark zuckerberg said he didn't want the company to become the arbiter of truth and downplayed the influence of fake news. >> the idea that fake news on facebook of which, you know, it's a very small amount of the content influenced the election in any way i think is a pretty crazy idea. >> there's a lot of skepticism among facebook employees that the top sort of echelons of the company are taking this

seriously. >> reporter: now buzz feed partially owned by our parent company nbc universal is reporting the existence of a secret renegade task force of facebook employees. buzz feed spoke to five of them. they believe they're only paying lip service to the problem. >> when you mark something for nudity or violence and it's taken down almost immediately, they haven't applied that same rigorous standard to fake news. >> reporter: while facebook had no comment about the existence of a task force, hillary clinton's campaign is lashing out against the site. teddy goff is telling politico, they blame facebook saying they saw zero percent chance facebook was going to be compliant or work with us during the election. there were fake news stories against trump as well. asked for comment, his campaign did not respond. >> you don't want to move down the slippery slope of deciding what's false versus what's an

opinion versus what is sarcasm versus what is parody. >> reporter: buzz feed tells us the facebook employees they have spoken to have not been told how they'll take those fake news stories off their website. twitter and google are also dealing with similar issues, illegitimate stories that are being circulated. willie. >> interesting to hear mark zuckerberg himself saying he doesn't think the fake news influenced the election. the next hour of "morning joe" starts right now. donald trump is reportedly asked for his adult children to get top level security clearance so that they can see classified documents and explain them to him. that's right. trump is trying to get top secret security clearance for his kids, which explains why today vladimir putin asked for donald trump to adopt him. good morning. it's wednesday, november 16th.

welcome to "morning joe." with us on set we have veteran columnist at msnbc contributor mikebarnacle. >> hello. >> you look very nice. managing editor of bloomberg politics and co-host -- doesn't he look sharp? >> he really does. i like that. >> with all due respect that airs at 6:00 p.m. on msnbc, mark halpern and in washington, d.c., the washington post -- >> looks spectacular every time. >> joe and me are here. joe's back to the fleece. oh, well. >> what do you mean? >> it was good for a while. >> steve schmidt said yesterday america gets nervous when facing me in a coat and tie. >> that's exactly what i was thinking. >> i wanted to comfort everybody, let them know it was going to be okay. i've been saying that a lot lately. >> i know, actually, in a very serious note, people were unnerved. >> on edge.

>> still on edge. a lot of people on edge. >> well, you had a couple people lying to the camera saying, no, we're fine. we're not on edge. >> okay. fine. >> in a camo hat. we're good. >> we're good. >> wearing a camo hat. phil has the camo hat. >> joe's like, it's cool. i'm fine. >> so donald trump received his first presidential daily briefing yesterday. on the front page of "the new york times" this headline, firings and discord put trump transition team in a state of disarray. after chris christie was booted off the transition team last friday, yesterday mike rogers announced he's out, too. rogers is a former fbi agent and house intel committee chairman. was thought to be high on the list for cia director. sources are describing a, quote, stalinesque purge. >> really? did they shoot people? >> no. >> because stalin killed people, right? >> boom, boom, boom you're out is what they mean.

>> did they have show trials, they shot them. >> descriptive writing, joe, aimed at ousting christie and his allies. that purge included christie's pick to run the department of justice transition, the person christie picked to manage the transition effort and christie's pick for all the transition's general counsel all out yesterday. a trump campaign staffer tells nbc news that emerging thiefdoms have complicated things. "the wall street journal" reports this morning that mike pence who has taken over this morning has ordered the removal of all lobbyists from the team. donald trump tweeted yesterday, very organized process taking place as i decide on cabinet and many other positions. i am the only one who knows who the finalists are. >> and finalists, not a truer -- >> i knew you would catch on to that. the apprentice. >> not a truer word was ever spoken. you know, the thing is -- >> people are all scrambling. this is what happens. >> what i've noticed over the past 48 hours. all of these people going out saying, i'm going to be secretary of state.

>> that should not happen. >> i'm on the short list of secretary of state. >> that's a mistake nk. >> no. at the end of the day anybody who knows how that campaign is structured, it's donald trump and we also know that donald trump takes his time and it's been maddening throughout the course of the campaign. how many people have leaked out, oh, i'm doing my best to help this guy but he's a moron. he's a moron. i'm doing everything i can. he takes his time. he plays people off of each other. i'm not saying it's right. it's not the way i'd run a transition. it's not the way you would run a transition. but anybody shocked that this is how it's going wasn't paying attention during the campaign. and as far as chris christie goes, you know, chris christie was out pretty much the second his two top aides were indicted and basically sent the message, you have to clean that mess up first before we can move forward with you. >> and mike rogers indicated not only was it that chris christie had to go, but anybody he brought along with him had to go. >> right. >> and i think david ignatius

and others might lament the fact that mike rogers, a guy wh such great -- experience and is an fbi agent had to go out with the trash. >> i understand that. david ignatius, big mike rogers fan but let's just talk more generally about setting things up. i was -- became chairman of the civil service committee, a small committee, but we were working on long-term health care for federal employees guaranteeing that all federal employees had federal health care. i decided to hold over people from the last staff and every time i tried to move closer with the clinton administration and get a bill done there were leaks and tom delay's office would call me. dick army's office would call and say, no, that's not going to work. i hated doing it. i ended up having to fire all the holdovers and getting my own people in there to stop the leaks. it's not that shocking that if

christie is out, all of his people are out. >> this one seems a little more messy than others that i've covered. >> yes. >> a little more of a cord of the bourgeois feeling as we watch this early bloodletting. talking to cabinet officials. obama administration who really are waiting to have discussions with the transition team. it's a complicated process. >> right. >> say that they really haven't had anybody approach them yet. i think that's because the internal fighting on the trump transition side hasn't completed yet. the mike rogers case was an interesting and i think for a lot of people troubling one because mike rogers is very well known, respected person. he's a very conservative republican from michigan but he managed to run the house intelligence committee in a

generally bipartisan way that worked for the first time in a decade it was passing authorization bills, it was agreeing to report out legislation. it was just a committee that worked and rogers was seen in the intelligence community if you walk the halls of the cia or other agencies, i think he would have heard people say this is the kind of person who would be a good leader for us. so when rogers was pushed out over the weekend in favor i think of devin nunes, his successor, pete hofstra, another very conservative republican on that committee, there was a lot of concern in the intelligence community about what this means. >> a lot of concern in the intel community and a lot of concern a couple of nights ago about john bolton who is the neocon, also rudy giuliani, who is temperamentally and ill equipped in every other way to be secretary of state. just a pure knowledge base. the guy, i can think of 30 other jobs in the federal government he would be better at than

secretary of state. but, mike, at the end of the day if people want to figure this out, there's not a whole lot of intrigue. jared kushner, steve bannon, to a lesser degree reince priebus. he just got in there. it's going to take a while for him to figure it out. they talked to donald trump. i mean, it's -- that's what it is. they know they were going to get the christie people out for a while. that's just the way it goes. but i want to talk about leaping because i heard barack obama's name. you told a story off the air yesterday, you may not want to give all the names on the air, but talk about what happened after barack obama's elected when rahm emmanuel heard people speculating they might have a job. >> rahm emmanuel was appointed chief of staff in three days of 2008. love him or hate him, rahm is a very strong personality, a very strong individual. he let it be known that, you

know, any leaks about potential cabinet nominees, that was it. you were gone. you were out. joe, the problem right now has less to do with leaks, i would think, and it has to do with the four people that you mentioned. look, they won. donald trump is the president-elect of the united states but the four people you mentioned have never even been close to the apparatus of government and what david ignatius wrote about today and we're talking about right now, the intelligence apparatus, there are people in the intelligence community who for the past week or so have been posing the potential, more than the potential that very quickly once donald trump raises his right hand and takes the office of presidency, a combination of either isis or al nusra or al qaeda, it's almost guaranteed that they will try something to test the reaction and now the news, according to mark halpern, gets even worse for those who were weary of what's going to happen. >> mark.

>> before we get there, mark, we'll let you talk about that. listen, here's a spot. i kind of feel like if you're going to experiment, there are a lot of cabinets domestically that you can experiment with. if things blow up, you justifier them the next day. it's easy to cleanup. it's a story in the washington post for a week but you don't have markets across the globe like shaken. but when you talk about secretary of state, when you talk about secretary of defense, when you talk about the cia director and when you talk about the person that's your nsa director, you don't get rookies for that. you don't get ideologues for that. donald trump needs very boring, very middle of the road. >> experienced. >> washington type people. boring, not steady. mike pence is the perfect example of somebody calm the waters. they have seen with these leaks, i don't believe all the leaks, but they seem to be going in a different direction.

experiment at home, but at home -- but abroad you can't lurch to a john bolton. you think that steve bannon appointment got negative press? >> oh, my gosh. we have some of that. >> you think that's bad? >> we have some of that. >> pick rudy giuliani as your secretary of state or john bolton as your secretary of state and watch everything melt down internationally. >> i couldn't agree more. all transitions are messy, as david said. they've got plenty of time in the scheme of things to get this sorted out and getting rid of christie who has been the one on his team laying the groundwork is going to set them back. the domestic agenda is going to be driven to some extent by paul ryan and by mitch mcconnell and as you suggested, if you make a mistake there, you can fix it. some of the names being floated for the national security jobs would be i think a catastrophe symbolically and substantively. reports that frank gafney should

send tremors through any responsible person thinking about what the tone and substance of this administration is -- >> how do you know -- how do you know -- >> it's been widely reported that he's been involved. i've not gotten anyone -- >> at trump tower? what are you hearing? >> reporting that he is heavily involved in the staffing. >> why is that frightening? >> because his record of judgment and activities is not part of what any administration should be looking forward to get in. he is engaged in conspiracy theories and diluted behavior. i don't know that he's involved, but as you said, the names being floated for secretary of state are troubling because this is not the kind of reassurance that the world needs, the intelligence community needs. when he takes over on january 20th, he needs good people in place. >> by the way, by the way, you're not saying, oh, he's got to pick a liberal. >> no. >> oh, he's got to pick a moderate like a bob corker or even a jeb sessions.

>> no, jeff sessions or tom cotton. >> tom cotton, mainstream guy. don't get appointed. >> there's opportunity in the big financial security jobs. still, he's not made any of the picks yet to pick people who will send reassuring signals. this is not an area where he can simply reward people who were loyal to him. it's not an area where he can have fun picking interesting people. >> also he doesn't need to listen to willie, neocon contributors that weren't with him at the very beginning. there seems to be an element inside there, maybe it came in with reince's crew, an element that says we're going to repay the paul singers of the world. we're going to repay the sheldon adelson's by talking about john bolton. no, he doesn't oni of those people. if you're going to try to be friends with them, you don't do it with the secretary of state position. you don't do it with the cia position. you don't do it at defense. >> it's a question of who has his ear. who genuinely has his ear.

who's he listening to? is it the people that just came along? is it the people that have been with him since the beginning? or is it that great sense of loyalty that we feel he owes. rudy giuliani, though he wasn't there at the beginning, wasn't his hatchett man throughout the "access hollywood." >> fine. fine. give him something at home. >> it's the only job rudy wants. >> rudy's not the president. rudy tried to run for president. he sucked. >> okay. >> the campaign trail, his staff couldn't wake him up before 9:00 in the morning. who is rudy -- willie, who's rudy giuliani to tell donald trump that he -- what he's not going to do? >> as i said yesterday, i suspect his approach to this was not appealing to donald trump going out publicly and trying to put him into a corner to give him the job. >> revealing that he's been talked to about these things and that he's turned down one -- you don't turn down -- what is going on with him? >> he also, mika, if he gets

selected -- >> i'm open to that. >> just like the steve bannon pick, and that -- that's -- that's trump. trump's guy -- >> that's for conversation. >> that's a different conversation, but when you're talking about secretary of state, he brings some of the same problems to that position that hillary clinton brought as far as judgment and did he trade in on his experience to make a lot of money. >> i just say my reporting is the problem is no one who wants to stop it being bolton or giuliani has been able to come up with a name that has put in trump's head to say, okay, that's a better choice. no one has come up with a name and put it before him. >> that's kind of stunning, actually. >> and -- >> stunning. i'm not sure who's helping him. i don't know the community. >> people that really know donald trump say that's the deal. >> you just say no to him, that does nothing. you've got to say no and then give him somebody that he can work with. >> there's about 15 names.

>> the corker -- the corker example is a great one. he's mad at corker because of the way corker handled the vice presidential selection. >> get over it. >> even though corker might be more qualified -- >> i don't think he's mad at corker. i don't think he's mad at corker. i think it has more to do with just do you get along with the guy? is there -- is there a chemistry there? >> still ahead on "morning joe" we'll talk about jared kushner's role in the trump administration and we'll hear his check on the forecast. >> got a little snow and a little fire. first, the snow forecast. first major snowstorm of the season. first blizzard watch of the season. friends from aberdeen north of sioux falls. winter storm watches in the cascades and central rockies. this isn't going to be like a huge event. with the wind blowing, it will make for drifting possibilities from sioux falls northward

through northern minnesota. this is 6 to 12 inches. also near yellowstone, jackson hole, the ski areas are going to love this. 6 to 12 inches of fresh powder. now let's talk about the fires. north carolina and south carolina and tennessee. numerous blazes are still going. now a lot of them have gotten a little smaller in size. firefighters have been out there in full force and doing some air drops but we need the rain to put them completely out and that's not in the forecast. here's a look at the current drought situation. extreme and exceptionals in the red. northern alabama and northern georgia, so dry since the first of september. they're on a stretch i think it's 57 straight days in a row of dry weather. this is how the percentage of normal, very low. everything is all grass, the trees, everything needs the rain in this area. there's just none coming. to get out of the drought in the southeast they need 12 to 15 inches of rain in the purple and 15 inches of rain. they're not going to get that. they need a hurricane to come.

the only thing they have is dry weather, warm weather, sunshine like today in the southeast. expect the fire situation to continue in the days ahead. leave you with a shot of new york city after the heavy torrential rain today. beautiful shot of our freedom tower. more "morning joe" when we come back.

nobody wants to listen to that. enough is said in a presidential campaign, but the election is

over and donald trump is the president-elect and i'm looking forward to his inauguration. >> what type of president do you think he'll be? do you think candidate trump will reemerge in the white house or is it going to be a different donald trump? >> nobody really knows, but donald trump is not an idealogue. i said yesterday, he's barely a republican. he could be barely a democrat. he made clear during the campaign what his issues are. >> looks happier right now. john boehner or paul ryan, anybody? >> boehner. >> boehner's a -- >> all right. so we have trump tweet. >> first tweet of the day. >> yes. oh, my goodness. >> i am not trying to get, quote, top level security clearance for my children. this was a typically false news story. >> so let's talk about the one and i think we all said it at the same time, the one who does need a top security level clearance is his son-in-law,

jared kirschner. >> that's not his child but his son-in-law does need it. he's at the center of everything. he is sort of the moderating voice for everybody that's all around yelling and he's the guy that keeps everybody on a level -- there's jared right there. he does need a security clearance based on everything that i've seen and heard as far as you want him in there with -- you know, in the briefings so he can -- >> well, if he has a hand -- >> be a leveling wind. >> i guess according to everything you hear and read, he does have a strong hand in the selection process. he sure would be benefitted by getting security clearance because then you're going to see the real gravity of what you're dealing with. >> oh, sure. i think he would be able to have a conversation that he might not have if they walk into a briefing and he's often the outside. >> as you guys know well, it's remarkable the extent to which donald trump listens to and

trusts jared kirshner. story of a young businessman, really smart guy, bought a newspaper and runs a newspaper from a young age. now swept with donald trump as close as you can be to power and has real access and real influence. >> i have to say also jared is, for people who know him, he is conservative with a small c. let's try to keep this in the middle of the road as much as possible. let's -- you know, again, he's -- every experience i've had with him, mark halpern, i know you have, too, he's a leveling wind in there. >> yeah. and he's going to be an advisor to donald trump from outside. that's just a given. so the question is how does that get handled? all presidents have outside advisors. what's distinctive here is jared doesn't have experience at this level but he didn't have experience at the campaign either and he performed pretty well there. he's also a relativ they need to be careful here about how they frame this. there's a reason why if you're in government you have accountability. there are ethics requirements and all of that. they're going to v to figure out how to make this work. senator mark warner joins us

and we'll hear from senator rand paul as well. he has deep reservations about some of the people on donald trump's short list for secretary of state. "morning joe" is back in a moment. i'm only in my 60's. i've got a nice long life ahead. big plans. so when i found out medicare doesn't pay all my medical expenses, i got a medicare supplement insurance plan. [ male announcer ] if you're eligible for medicare, you may know it only covers about 80%

of your part b medical expenses. the rest is up to you. call now and find out about an aarp medicare supplement insurance plan, insured by unitedhealthcare insurance company. like all standardized medicare supplement insurance plans, it could save you in out-of-pocket medical costs. call now to request your free decision guide. i've been with my doctor for 12 years. now i know i'll be able to stick with him. [ male announcer ] you'll be able to visit any doctor or hospital that accepts medicare patients. plus, there are no networks, and virtually no referrals needed. see why millions of people have already enrolled in the only medicare supplement insurance plans endorsed by aarp. don't wait. call now.

one of the first things donald trump has now done is he has brought steve bannon in as a senior strategist. this is a man who has white supremacist ties. i mean, that's what he does. this is a man who told his ex-wife that he didn't want his children going to school with jews. this is a man who ran a news organization that ran headlines like, would you rather your children have feminism or cancer? this is a man who says by his very presence that this is a white house that will embrace bigotry. >> we have responsibility to say that it is not normal for the kkk, ku klux klan, to celebration the election of a president. if trump is serious about seeking unity, the first thing

he should do is rescind his appointment of steve bannon. as long as a champion of racial division to step away from the oval office it will be impossible to take trump's efforts to heal the nation seriously. >> find myself sitting here listening to the latest tirade by the democratic leader against the president-elect and his team. surely he's entitled to his opinion, but he does nothing to contribute to the healing of our country after a very polarizing, hotly contested election. to come here after the election, after the american people have spoken and made that choice and continue to disparage their choice for the next president as well as the leadership in the house and the senate really just smacks of -- well, we used to call people like that sore losers. >> yesterday buzz feed news published a transcript of

comments steve bannon purportedly made during a 2014 conference inside the vatican. he speaks about the quote enlightened capitalism of the judeo christian west. he touched on the birth of the tea party movement saying, quote, the people who ran the banks and ran the hedge funds have never really been held accountable for what they did. has fueled much of the anger in the tea party movement in the united states. he apparently said, russian president vladimir putin was very, very intelligent and that the united states needs to be on guard about how putin attempts to appeal to social securitys in the u.s. >> conservatives in the u.s. >> and he called state sponsored capitalism like russia and china's disturbing. bannon also reportedly addressed the issue of racism and the far right saying, quote, i'm not an expert in this, but it seems that right wing parties have had some aspects that may be

anti-semitic orational. my point is that over time it all gets kind of washed out, right? the transcript and audio have not been authenticated by nbc news. joining us the news and finance anchor from yahoo! news. >> there are so many things to dig through here. it's a fascinating speech if you look at the transcript and sounds a lot like what jimmy peaters said yesterday, that he didn't see white nationalism and steve bannon's words or world view but he sure saw economic nationalism and you look at some of the things that he said. elizabeth warren or occupy wall street could have said them. >> it's hard to pick and hole. this is a man many americans are getting see. the question is which position does he have on these issues? is it a position where white supremacists and nationalists

come forward or is it a position where we have to take a global approach to the world and realize that changes are changing and not everyone is getting a share of the pie in the u.s. specifically on an economic standpoint. >> mark, what was your take on the bannon speech? >> there was a lot of troubling things, not that he said but that he published. i don't think he can say things were published by my website but i'm not responsible for them. i wish he would speak out more. he's mostly in a vacuum on all of this stuff. even the new york sometimes that got an interview didn't get him to respond. he believes these things or he doesn't. does he repudiate things he said himself? does he repudiate things he published or not? >> yeah. and what specifically that he has said that he needs to repudiate. >> he does or not. if he wants people not to misjudge him. the things that we read that we played earlier, using language that's insulting.

i think that it's unfair to take everything he said and put it in a negative light. there are some things that he said that have been published that are troubling to people because of what they reflect and certainly things were published on the website under his name. they're his headlines, his content that he published. >> and breitbart. >> by not coming out it makes you wonder whether this is his quest to be the sort of enigma. not saying i complely disavow or here's where i stand. it may seem to give him more gravitas to be constantly questioning what his intenses and stances are. >> there's nothing for being for changes in america or being for america first in terms of the economy. he has views that are maybe not popular with the east coast elites. that's not what people are focused on. you see it in what we played earlier. mitch mcconnell doesn't seem comfortable with him. paul ryan doesn't seem comfortable with him.

he should defend himself and say what he believes and talk about the most controversial things that he's published. >> yeah. i agree with mark. i think as someone who for four years ran breitbart you can't anymore than "the new york times" can disavow, we don't write the articles or the headlines as the publisher of the new hampshire. -- newspaper. i don't hire the writers, you're giving them a platform. you own the things that exist on the website. it doesn't mean it's all white nationalis nationalists. >> i think that's a question that needs to be addressed and he should address it, he should be asked about it. he owns his content. he owns his past. but in terms of his plan that he wants to push through, that's not -- i can tell you from the -- from the contact that i have had with some of these people, they're waiting for their mandate from donald trump as to what exactly aspects of his talent he wants trump -- trump wants to tap into. and that's, i think, the mistake people are making when they jump

in a very heated upset way. oh, my gosh, he's going to do this, he's going to do that. he's not doing anything unless trump wants him to. he has a lot of talent in the media world whether we like how it's been used or not, and i'm not sure exactly where trump is going to go in terms of using his abilities. >> talk to jeremy peters, he needs to keep talking to other reporters. >> he should come right on here. >> he can come on here. he can explain himself on here. he can talk, i mean, you name it, he can go out and do more more interviews. jeremy peters, after he talked to jeremy peters, obviously not vouching for him but he said there's not white nationalism here. it is economic nationalism. i will say, too, this is one of the things that i've seen over the past say month or two. what's interesting about steve bannon is he's painted as the fire breather, i want to destroy the government.

he is like jared kirschner. those two are the ones fighting the extreme voices, the erratic voices that are trying to get in close to trump. they're the ones that are saying, let's get people who are experienced, let's get some diversity in here. >> yeah. >> which is, again, the great irony. but i know that. >> yeah. >> and i've seen that because, actually, i've known bannon all the way going back to like '99 when he worked with jeff quants at the firm, but the rest of america needs to -- >> see more. >> they need to see more. i think you're right, willie, he needs to explain breitbart. he needs to explain those headlines. >> for a lot of americans ts is the first time they're hearing about breitbart and this man. >> he's becoming a senior government official. it's a public office. this is not a private company where he can avoid accountability. he's not going to be senate confirmed. >> right. >> so the only accountability he has is to speak out.

>> i think the void -- the void works against him. i think the more he speaks out, the more he talks to reporters, the better things will be for him and by extension for donald trump. >> and, by the way, that void is being filled by groups like the ku klux klan that are coming in saying this is a great move for our country, that steve hand is at the right hand of the president. >> if hillary clinton had won and she had put as her senior strategist of the white house someone on the left who had said such controversial things and wasn't explaining them, people on the right would be going -- >> absolutely crazy. that's true. joining us from capitol hill, member of the select committee on intelligence, democratic senator mark warner from virginia. >> good to have you back. you can talk about whatever you want to talk about, but we're most interested around this table and have been for the last three hours about defense and the intell communities. can you give some names that

would give you comfort running the cia or dod. >> one of the names i wish the president-elect had stuck with was mike rogers. unfortunately we saw him unceremoniously booted out yesterday. i wish he would maybe keep ash carter as secretary at least for a year at dod for continuity. when i was first elected governor i had never served in public office before. moving from running a business to running a government, you know, you've got to get people with different types of skills. you need a diversity of views, particularly running united states government is much different than running any kind of private sector enterprise. and i think mr. trump's got to learn that. and, you know, we're seeing some of this play out. i've just been listening to your conversation. who would have thought a week ago we'd be talking about one of his top appointments being somebody with ties to white supremacists. i don't know this guy bannon, but clearly donald trump, i hope, will set a tone that's more what he said the day after the election, that you're going

to try to be a president for all of americans. now at the same time, i've got to just add one other point. i think all of us, this was a rejection not just of the democrats, it was a rejection of establishment republicans, it was rejection of the media, it was a rejection of corporate america and i think we've all got to listen that our current economic system is not working for enough people. my dad worked for the same company for 45 years. nobody works for the same company for 45 years anymore. we've got a business community that manages to quarter by quarter profits as opposed to long-term value creation. you know, something has fundamentally got to be rearranged. my hope is that there be a group of us from both parties that can actually set out to see if we could get capitalism working for more people. >> senator, it's willie geist. we had congressman tim ryan on not long ago. he's considering a bid to run against nancy pelosi at this point and his argument really is, look what happened last tuesday, which is that we ignored the problems and the

concerns and the fears of working class people in this country and he would be a better vessel for that than someone from san francisco coming from outside youngstown, ohio. do you think that would be a good idea for leadership in the house? >> i will not comment on leadership of the house. i spent a career as a governor and senator saying the 21st century has left a lot of rural communities behind and the democratic party can't just be a party of metropolitan areas on the east coast and west coast. we have to do a better job for those communities which have lost a factory to trade or globalization. we have 1/3 of the work force now that doesn't work in traditional full-time employment. they have no social insurance. we have to have a portable benefits system to allow people to start collecting some social insurance, disability insurance, unemployment, retirement from that first job. we really need to rethink the structure of the social contract. i think a fundamentally new way.

i'm not sure whether this breaks down democrat or republican. i do think democrats do a lot better when we kind of lean into the future and recognize that you've got to be a lot more party that includes a lot more folks, particularly working class folks all across the country. >> senator, hi, it's bianna. i think one of the big take aways was that modern capitalism isn't working for the majority of americans. from what you're hearing about the president-elect's economic plan and business plan going forward, aside from you see the stock market rallying from earnings expectations and what have you and dividends for shareholders that a lot of shareholders are expecting from tax cuts, what do you say to the west virginian coal miner who voted for donald trump who is going to get a $200 tax break and that's it? what do you say about the future plans coming together with democrats and republicans to help the majority of americans re-establish themselves into the modern economy? >> i'd say a couple of things. one, i do hope particularly some of my friends in the freedom

caucus in the house will stick to their comments about debt and deficit. you know, a quick sugar high with a tax cut that's unpaid for when we've already got 19 trillion in debt is really unsustainable. you know, right now if interest rates go up 1 percentage points that adds $140 billion a year of additional spenting for debt service. i think we need to think about alignment of how we get business to think longer term. i spent longer in business than i have in politics. something is wrong when 95% of corporate profits are paid out in share buy back and dividends and not reinvested in businesses. that coal miner in west virginia, whether it's coal or other energy production jobs, they want reinvestment in their community and that's not going to happen. the current focus, which is so he focused just on the short term, just on quarter by quarter profits. we have to recognize we have work force training programs that candidly government has run that don't work. yet there's no incentive in

place for businesses to invest particularly in low and moderate skilled people. that needs a whole new relook. again, i don't know if this is democrat or republican. i do hope that the democratic party will embrace these kind of ideas, but it's going to be a lot different than the kind of traditional liberal conservative. it will be a much more future past. we have to make this economic system work for everybody. >> senator mark warner, thank you so much. >> thanks, guys. republican senator rand paul of kentucky joins us next. ♪ ♪ style lets you stand out from the herd. what's inside sets you apart. the cadillac escalade. enjoy our best offers of the year.

♪ i want a hippopotamus for christmas ♪ ♪ only a hippopotamus will do at the united states postal service, we deliver more online purchases to homes than anyone else in the country. and more hippopotamuses, too. ♪ so whatever your holiday priority, our priority is you. i found a better deal on prescriptions. we found lower co-pays...

...a a free wellness visit. new plan...same doctor. i'm happy. it's medicare open enrollment. have you compared plans yet? it's easy at medicare.gov. or you can call 1-800-medicare. medicare open enrollment. you'll never know unless you go. i did it. you can too. ♪ yoyeah, i do.e? you guys are working on some pretty big stuff over there, right? like a new language for crazy-big, world-changing machines. well, not me specifically. i work on the industrial side. so i build the world-changing machines. i get it. you can't talk because it's super high-level. no, i actually do build the machines. blink if what you're doing involves encrypted data transfer. wait, what? wowwww... wow? what wow? there is no wow.

joining us from capitol hill, member of the foreign relations committee, republican senator rand paul of kentucky. senator, you have been very vocal in your criticism of some of the options out there that have been floated in the press. i think for the record we should say not by donald trump himself but john bolton or rudy giuliani as the next secretary of state. you say no. why? >> well, you know, one of the things i liked about donald trump and one of the reasons i supported him was that he was emphatic that the iraq war was a mistake and that regime change was a mistake. the biggest lesson that came out of the last 20, 30 years in the middle east is every time we've toppled regimes we've gotten something worse and we haven't increased our national security. we've often made our national security more tenuous. i don't think hillary clinton ever got that message. donald trump did. it's a big part of what he stood for. it was in thousands of speeches so i just don't think it would be a good idea for him to

appoint somebody to be secretary of state who completely disagrees with him on this. bolton is the an ttithesis. he is someone who is an unrepen tent supporter of the iraq war. i think giuliani is as well. he's been a friend to trump and i'm sure he's going to find a place in the administration but i think it would be less damaging if they found a place where he didn't completely disagree with president-elect trump. >> senator, give us one or two names of people you think would be good secretaries of state that you could recommend to donald trump? >> you know, i don't think i get to choose nor am i being called and solicited my advice, but on the list of ones that have been put out there i think bob corker is a more thoughtful, reasonable, someone who i think comes from the realist point of view in the foreign policy spectrum and would be head and shoulders above both giuliani and bolton. i hope they will consider him. i also know that he would go through the senate fairly easily.

this position has to be approved and only takes a few of us to really put a position like this in jeopardy. >> would you have -- would you have enough votes between the democrats and republicans to stop a john bolton secretary of state nomination? >> you know, john bolton's been stopped once before because he's an outlier. he doesn't fit within the mainstream of either parties and really you want your chief diplomat to be a diplomat, not a bomb thrower. someone who's advocating war would be if we had a secretary of war would more likely be a secretary of war. yeah, i think every democrat will vote against bolton. >> what about rudy giuliani? do you think you have enough republicans and democrats alike to stop a rudy giuliani nomination, especially when you consid all the money that he's received from foreign interests, including an iranian terror group? >> i think that there will be some pointed questions and i will be part of that because i think the thing is is that one of the big issues of the elections was taking foreign

money for hillary clinton and being beholden to foreign interests. so, yes, it will be a big question and i will ask those questions. i think also we ask the same questions that we're bringing up with bolton. are you still in favor of bombing iran? are you -- do you understand the iraq war was a mistake and that regime change has not made us safer? if he doesn't believe that, if he doesn't accept donald trump's vision on that, i think another place in the cabinet might be a better fit for him and that maybe we find somebody that has a more realist point of view. like i say, i think senator corker would fit that role and is somebody that i think we're already hearing from the trump team is being considered. >> senator, sticking with foreign policy. let me ask you about russia. the conservative think tank, the heritage group, came out yesterday and said that russia was trying to maximize its strategic position around the world at the expense of the united states. i'm all in favor of having better relations with russia, but i think they should be on our terms. what are your thoughts? and should the president, aside

from the beautiful letter that he received from vladimir putin and the phone call that they exchanged, should he have brought up things like cyber security? >> well, i don't think we know what was brought up. it was a private conversation. i would say this, as i think trump will negotiate from a position of strength with russia, but i think trump is a realist in the sense that he understands that russia's had a base for 5 years in syria. theye not going away. if there's a way we can work together on some issues, such as terrorism, we ought to. i think we've had some naive utopians who believe we're going to push russia out of the middle east, bop them in the nose and have a no fly zone. hillary clinton's advocacy for a no fly zone was ridiculous. so bella does thcose that it th world war 3. he will negotiate from a position of strength but he won't have unrealistic utopian ideas that we're going to shoot

their planes down. for goodness sakes, we went through 70 years. all the calm, cool hands from the state department in the past who don't like donald trump, you know what, i think he's much more realistic than they are because shooting down russian planes should never really be something that we have people in high office advocating for. >> do you trust vladimir putin? >> no, i don't think that's a way to put it. i think when you negotiate from a position of strength you understand that he's an adversary, but you also understand that that's what diplomacy is for. we don't necessarily need diplomacy with england. obviously we do. we see things so much alike that we're not trying to bridge our differences. with people who are your adversaries, like russia, we do need diplomacy to try to show both through strength and through negotiation that we can find a common ground. but we don't say we're going to shoot their planes down, have a no fly zone. i think that was such an unrealistic concept. it's part of the reason i think hillary clinton lost is that her advocacy for regime change

really sounded more like the george w. bush administration than anything else. >> senator rand paul, thank you very much for being on the show this morning. >> thank you. up next, nbc's kristen welker has new reporting on trump's transition moves. we're back in just a moment. ♪ looking for clear answers for your retirement plan? start here. or here. even here. and definitely here. at fidelity, we're available 24/7 to make retirement planning simpler. we let you know where you stand, so when it comes to your retirement plan, you'll always be absolutely...clear. ♪ time to think of your future it's your retirement. know where you stand.

♪ time to think of your future why pause a spontaneous moment? cialis for daily use treats ed and the urinary symptoms of bph. tell your doctor about your medicines, and ask if your heart is healthy enough for sex. do not take cialis if you take nitrates for chest pain, or adempas® for pulmonary hypertension, as this may cause an unsafe drop in blood pressure. do not drink alcohol in excess. to avoid long-term injury, get medical help right away for an erection lasting more than four hours. if you have a sudden decrease or loss of hearing or vision, or an allergic reaction, stop taking cialis and get medical help right away. ask your doctor about cialis.

last i checked, a pretty healthy majority of the american people agree with my world view on a whole bunch of things. and i know that that begs the question, well, how is it that somebody who appears to have a very different world view just got elected. as i said, sometimes people just feel as if we want to try something to see if we can shake things up, and that i suspect was a significant phenomenon. >> president obama responding to nbc's chris jansing's question in greece. let's bring in kristen welker. a lot of changes in the last 24 hours on the trump transition team. what can we expect today? >> reporter: i think you can

expect a more fleurry inside trump tower. he was huddled in there with vice president-elect mike pence. you've been talking about this notion. it comes amid some turbulence. he's advising the trump transition team. it's not seen here, but there is a sense that people with close ties to chris christie are being ousted. there's a sense that jared

kirchner is at the center of this. he doesn't like chris christie and his management style. 2005, tensions between these two families, chris christie is the one who prosecuted jared kirshner's father. that's why you're seeing chris christie ousted as well as the likes of mike rogers and others. looking forward though, donald trump saying there's nothing to see here. he tweeted last night when he was out. he said, very organized process taking place as i decide on cabinet and many other positions. i am the only one who knows who the finalists are. one more point, i would say there is some concern that the broader focus here is on trump loyalists, that he's looking at people who he can trust, people who are close to him during his campaign and that he really brought in his scope as he moves forward with this transition process. mika, joe? >> nbc's kristen welker. thank you. in terms of loyalists, i'm not sure. for one thing you realize when you become president, not that i

would know but i've seen it, loyalists will still be loyal after you're president whether they make a decision to pick you for something or not. you can still call on them and they will still show up with their tongues hanging out. >> yeah. the most important thing of that trump tweet, he already knows who the finalists are. rudy giuliani can float his name out for rocket ship master to mars, but it's donald trump who knows. nobody else. >> put him in a top position. rudy said i want one job and one job only. >> i've turned down attorney general. who says that out loud? >> maybe he thinks he can make more money, foreign speeches. worked for hillary clinton. what do you -- >> but basically he's undermined the president-elect. >> yes, he has. >> the president -- the sound bite we heard from president obama again reminds us all in the collective media that we're spending so much time covering the candidates and not covering the country that we reacted with such shock at donald trump's election. if you covered the country, you knew that this was more than a possibility. >> absolutely. >> what have you learned? >> donald trump is a guy who

respects loyalty, honors people who are loyal to him. i just hope he's getting advice about people outside the circle of loyal. >> they'll still be loyal. you're president now. they're going to be there. they're going to be begging. all right. that does it for us this morning. stephanie rule picks up the coverage right now. mika, hi there, i'm stephanie rule. this morning, transition troubles. reports of brutal infighting within team trump as loyalists jockey for powerful positions. one prime candidate who's purged is speaking out. >> there's a lot of folks that don't have any experience in what this might look like. there's a little bit of a vacuum in clear chains of command. >> surprise, surprise, donald trump firing back this morning amid new reporting he's requested his son-in-law get access to his presidential daily briefings. and under fire. democrats seizing on the appointment of steven bannon. >> to bring someone who is a white supremacist