Skip to main content

tv   The Rachel Maddow Show  MSNBC  November 18, 2016 6:00pm-7:01pm PST

6:00 pm
into those congressional districts and convince people that a new democratic party, one that is progressive and cultural and economically populous that can get the job done. >> congressman tim ryan from ohio, he is challenging nancy pelosi. thank you. >> and that will do it for "all in." the rachel maddow show starts now, how are you doing? >> you know, i'll tell you in an hour. at this point, i'm wiped out. i got super psyched for the show, and then i don't know who i am and where i'm going to be. thank you, steve. and thank you at home for joining us this hour. happy friday. it has been a huge day of news, got a lot to get to tonight, with a lot of really good guests. i want to introduce you to joseph brotten, a united states
6:01 pm
senator for a grand total of three months, elected in 1948, sworn in on new year's eve. and then he dropped dead in march. a that was it. that was his whole time in the senator. and before people got used to the idea they had a senator named joseph brotten, the voters didn't get to replace him. the governor got to replace him. it was an open seat. the governor of north carolina decided to look to a very prominent north carolina citizen to take brotten's senate seat. he decided to give it to the president of the university of north carolina. and the president of the university of north carolina at that time, 1949, was a really interesting guy. he came from an academic background, he had been a history professor, but was a very politically skilled guy. when he became president of unc,
6:02 pm
he got lots of funding and made a lot of impacts. there was previously a quota of the number of jews that they would accept at the school. but when he came president, he drafted the jew quota. he was unexpectedly vaulted into the united states senate when he was asked to fill that open seat when the senator who just won the seat unexpectedly died. when frank porter graham was given that seat in 1949, in north carolina, there were certain segments of the population in that state who were not going to stand for a guy like him getting a job like that. and the reason that it's worth talking about today is because you should have seen the campaign that they ran against this guy. all right, he had been president of unc, just appointed to the senate seat. you should see how they ran against him. look at this, white people, wake
6:03 pm
up before it's too late. you may not have another chance. do you want negros working besides you, your wife, daughter and in factories? do you want negroes riding besides you, in the buses, cabs and trains, negroes disciplining you, going the white schools and white children going to negro schools, do you want them occupying the same hospital rooms with you and your wife and your daughters? do you want neg negroes as your foreman and using the same toilet seat? and this will lead to whites and negroes working together in the south as they do in the north. do you want that?
6:04 pm
and then we get to the money part of it. frank graham, the newly appointed senator, the guy who had been unc president, and the guy just put in that open senate seat. says at the bottom, frank graham favors mixing negroes and whites, if you do want this, vote for frank, if you don't vote for smith for senator, he will uphold the traditions of the south. that was the willis campaign for senate in 1950 in north carolina. you know this kind of stuff went on but it kind of taking your breath away to see it. the campaign for willis smith in that year they doctored the photo to make it look like frank graham's wife had been dancing with a black man. they photographed it that year. in 1948, all right, it was just
6:05 pm
the year before frank porter graham had been nominated to the senate seat two years before the senate race. president truman had ordered the desegregation of the military. famously that was you know, ultimately a huge success. but in 1948 and nine when that decision was fresh in that north carolina senate race against frank porter graham with the wake up white people flier and the fake photo of his wife with a black man in that senate race, the desegregation was just another lit match for dry grass. and one of the other things that the campaign for willis smith did in -- in that senate race, they put god forbid, a black man. that was almost the ultimate outrage, a black man to west
6:06 pm
point? and that almost unbelievable, all race, all the time campaign against frank porter graham for that senate seat in 1950. it worked. frank porter graham had been appointed to the senate seat after that guy died, but thanks to that racist campaign against him he was voted out. and so willis smith became a u.s. senator. i think he knew why he n, of all the people who worked on his campaign, he took the guy who worked on the flier and the guy who reportedliy lused the scisss to doctor that photo of his wife with the black man, he took that man on his senate staff. even though he only brought that guy there as a junior staffer,
6:07 pm
that junior staffer proved to be ambitious and sort of hard to tie down. that junior staffer didn't have all that much interest in working that part of the regime. turns out he wanted to keep working that type of campaign that knocked out that senator in 1950. by 1952, he was back working on a presidential campaign, this time working on the presidential campaign of a failed presidential candidate but long-time southern senator named richard russell. by 1960, he was back out in another campaign, working on a north carolina governor's race that time. reporting an insurgent candidate whose only issue in the run for governor was race. the congressional staffer deported a candidate called bev lake, who only ran for governor because of the insufficient fervor he saw for segregation among the existing white
6:08 pm
politicians in south carolina. quote, the two in the home is not inevitable and not to be tolerated. so for this one campaign operative, who specialized in this type of stuff, right, this nominated senate staffer, but really he was a campaign operative and this was his specialty. segregation, segregation, segregation. he sort of cornered the market at least in north carolina on running campaigns that turned everything into race, white fear, encroaching black people with your daughters. and he got good at it. but finally this campaign pro who had run all of these expert confederately raced campaigns, decided the next big open seat in north carolina would be himself. and so he denounced frank porter
6:09 pm
graham's beloved unc as the university of negroes and commissiounis communists. and said this was the most dangerous piece of legislation in congress. he ran himself in the united states senate seat in north carolina, that was opened in 1972. and know is how we got jesse helm, and jesse helm, senator helms, ultimately got to the senate too late to stop the hated voting rights act, but when it was up for reauthorization for the first time in 1982, jesse helm filibustered it in his words, until the cows came home, doing everything he could to get rid of the voting rights act. that was 1982. in '83 he led an epic filibuster with martin luther king jr. when he finally relented, the ap
6:10 pm
interviewed him about what he had done. this was kind of amazing. i stumbled across it today looking at old newspaper clippings. quote, he said in an interview he realized his opposition to king and his comments angered the black community. but he said he didn't expect to get much black support anyway. he said i faced reality, the blacks have a history of voting democratic down the line. jesse helm did overlap with one african-american senator during his entire tenure in the united states senate. carol moseley braun. famously he got into one of the elevators with her and the senator from utah. and he looked at her, and then he turned to orrin hatch, and said quote, watch me make her cry. i'm going to make her cry.
6:11 pm
i'm going to sing "dixie" until she cries, and they described it later to the l.a. times. said he did get right in her face and sing dixie in her face, oh, i wish i was in the land of cotton, old times there are not forgotten. watch it all. make her cry. jesse helm's epic filibuster against the martin luther king jr. holiday, interesting the ap asked him, are you worried how it would affect you politicly? you're in a state with a lot of black voters. not only was he worried about it. he was doing it on purpose. that is what he was building his capital on. filibusterering, that was something he came back to again and again and again in his political life, proudly. he was not ashamed of it. he used it a lot. it can spike a particular white vote if you do stuff like that
6:12 pm
even if it costs you all your black vote. even though jesse helms did everything he could to filibuster the holiday, it didn't end up being a single person filibuster record. the record longest filibuster in the united states by any state senator, that record actually is not a jesse helms record. that record was also set against civil rights election but it is a record that belongs to this guy. >> i wanna tell you, ladies and gentlemen, that there is not enough troops in the army to force the southern people to break down segregation and admit the negro race into our theaters, into our swimming pools. into our homes, and into our
6:13 pm
churches. >> that was strom thurmond. it was the two political parties in our country, he said, that were not racist enough, so he had to run in order to create a whole new party, specifically to meet the racial needs of his constituents. >> bill murray comes out of retirement to join in the protests against the civil rights program. more than 6,000 to protest the ticket. governor thurmond attacks the civil rights rank. >> it simply means that it's
6:14 pm
wrong to dominate their country by force and to put into effect these uncalled for and these damnable proposals, he has recommended under the guise of so-called civil rights. and i tell you the american people from one side to the other had better wake up. and oppose the program, and if it does, the next thing will be is a totalitarian state in these united states. >> strom thurmond, running for president in 1948 to stop the totalitarianism for president and desegregation. he did all right and lost. it was not too long, 1954 before south carolina would elect him to the united states senate. and they would not stop doing it for another 40-plus years.
6:15 pm
until strom thurmond became the oldest senator in the united states, still holds the record for the filibuster, as the one man filibuster against civil rights legislation. even at his hundredth birthday, everybody still talked about his run for segregation back in the good old days. >> when strom thurmond ran for president, we voted for him. we're proud of him. and to the rest of the country that followed our lead we wouldn't have all of these problems over all of these years either. >> that was in 2002. and it -- obviously went over great in the room, but didn't go over well in the country when senator trent lott said that. by 1982, some of the charm of these guys was starting to wear off a little bit. at the point he said that at strom thurmond's 100th birthday, strom thurmond had been the top senator in the united states.
6:16 pm
but two weeks after he said we would have been better off in the country if the whole country had voted for the segregationist position, in 1958, two weeks after that, trent lott was gone. he was most recently enthusiastic about trump, saying what he would be for him and his friends. he is probably better off not as a senator any more. it's important for us as a country to know basically trent lott couldn't stay on as the top republican senator in washington, once he was caught talking on tape the way he did about strom thurmond and his segregationist rant about the presidency. at some point, this is what normal politicians choked on. there did used to be a lot of these guys around, and for a
6:17 pm
while, it felt like they were all going to live to be 500 years old. but they all nearly died out. i'm 43 years old, i saw it ethically unwieldy for them to run on these campaigns. over the course of my life i have seen most of them die out. most of them, not all of them. that ends up being really, really important for what is about to happen next in our country, and that is next tonight here as well. about my african roots. the ancestry dna results were really specific. they told me all of these places in west africa. i feel really proud of my lineage, and i feel really proud of my ancestry. ancestry has many paths to discovering your story, get started for free at ancestry.com
6:18 pm
you're hetruck, suv. used car, that's smart. truecar can help. it's great for finding a new car, but you already knew that. it's also great for finding the perfect used car. you'll see what a fair price is, and you can connect with a truecar certified dealer. so, no matter what you're looking for... there it is. this is how buying a used car should be. this is truecar. ♪
6:19 pm
in 1968, when reverend martin luther king jr. was killed, his funeral was organized as basically a massive procession. and his casket was led by mules.
6:20 pm
and the guy who led the procession, the guy who you see there on the left side with the white shirt behind the flag there, he turns out to himself have had an incredibly and now news-worthy role in american civil rights history. it's important in terms of where he came from and what he did. it's also important for us right now. you will see that story next and it will blow your mind. there is no typical day. there's nothing typical about making movies. i'm victoria alonso and i'm an executive producer at marvel studios. we are very much hands on producers. if my office becomes a plane or an airport the surface pro is perfect, fast and portable but also light. you don't do 14 hours a day 7 days a week for decades if you don't feel it in your heart.
6:21 pm
listen i know my super power is to not ever sleep. that's it, that's the only super power i have. like their photo claims tool. it helps settle your claim quickly, which saves time, which saves money. and when they save, you save. that's auto and home insurance for the modern world. esurance, an allstate company. click or call. esurance does insurance a smarter way, which saves money. like bundling home and auto coverage, which reduces red tape, which saves money. and when they save, you save. that's home and auto insurance for the modern world. esurance, an allstate company. click or call.
6:22 pm
this morning with more on that nomination. >> good morning, ken. >> good morning, jane. >> the man who said those things and would be a federal judge is jeff sessions, part of the struggle over his nomination takes pla s place right here, w sessions was born in alabama, and the struggle for black voting rights was waged. >> mr. sessions is a throwback to a shameful era, which i know both black and white americans thought was in our past. it's inconceivable to me that a person of this attitude is qualified to be a u.s. attorney, let alone a united states federal judge. >> jeff sessions iii, brought
6:23 pm
face to face with things he personally had said. for example, that the naacp and civil liberties university are unamerican. >> these comments that you could say about a county organization or something. i may have said something like that in a general way. and that probably was wrong. >> also brought face to face with the justice department civil rights attorney who knows him well and who was asked, is sessions a racist? >> i don't know whether he is or isn't. i probably ought to know, but i don't. i really can't say. >> but the would-be judge's case came in alabama. defendants in a perry county case, were political and civil rights leaders for more than 20 years. albert was an aide to martin luther king jr. their scrapbook has all the marches. >> this is bloody sunday, albert
6:24 pm
can see, that is him right there. >> albert turner guided the mules at martin luther king jr.'s funeral. the federal government charged him with doctoring the votes, and mail fraud. >> i just don't think jeff sessions came in with an ounce of evidence. >> blacks charge harassment by u.s. attorney jeff sessions noting there was no investigation of white vote fraud. the justice department said it had no complaints about white vote fraud. >> others said they may have found voter fraud if they looked for it. >> i have seen letters that said we know you don't live here but want you to vote here. >> albert and evelyn were found not guilty. the justice department said sessions had a good case.
6:25 pm
jack drake disagrees. >> i didn't think the government had a case. the impetus of it, i think, was to keep blacks from voting, to intimidate people. and they went right at the leadership they want to defeat. >> albert turner doesn't want him on the bench. >> a man like jeff sessions will be there for a long time and i honestly think he will be in the way of progress for quite a while. >> is i believe a disgrace to the justice department and he should withdraw his nomination and withdraw his position. >> and the jeff sessions nomination is not over, from my sense what i said is that if president reagan really wants jeff sessions on the bench he is in for a fight. >> it does sound rough, thank you, ken. >> thank you, it was rough, he didn't make it. this was 1986, by 1986, ronald reagan had been president for five years, been through a lot of judges. he had never had a district
6:26 pm
cou court judge rejected, until 1986, they decided a guy like jeff sessions could not be choked down. this guy erased? no, that was 1986. the voters of the state of alabama decided they didn't care about him enough to keep him out of statewide or federal office. by 1996, he was vote d state attorney general, and by 1996 they sent him to the united states senate. he was sent back there since. in his time in the senate, he got on the same judiciary bench that rejected him in the earlier phase of his career. >> i'm still concerned about some of the issues that have been raised with regard to the -- the wise latina quote where you said that they should make decisions that are better than a
6:27 pm
white male. throughout her career, she has associated herself with well-known activist judges. she clerked for justice marshal, well-known activist. >> he spits out just marshal there. he is talking about just thurgood marshal. as if that should be a black mark against them because he was such an activist. just marshal, who argued against the brown v board of education. sessions is the last of what looked like it would be a die breed of old school, absolutely unreconstructed white southern senators. his race politics over the course of his entire career is part of why he has remained a relatively anonymous low-level senator on capitol hill. there is a reason he is not in charge of anything. but today president-elect trump
6:28 pm
announced his next pick for the attorney general of the united states is senator jeff sessions. joinings us now is the senior writer, ari berman, author . part of why jeff sessions was rejected for that federal judgeship when he was in his 30s, was because of the corroborated report of him making racist statements. but the other part of it was the prosecution he brought in selma. can you tell us more, what should we look at now? >> he prosecuted three people very influential civil rights activists in alabama, people who had marched on bloody selma in 1955, who had been beaten and helped to build political power in alabama, who had virtually.
6:29 pm
the fact that sessions prosecuted them on trumped-up charges, the fact that he prosecuted them, the prosecutions took place in selma of all places, the fact they were prosecuted under the voting rights act, which were supposed to help african-americans, not harm them, was all outrageous at the time. >> and that was a case that went to the jury, the jury that went to the decision, he brought his charges. the jury was almost half and half, there were like seven african-americans, five white people, came back in five hours and said immediately, no, not guilty on all counts. they absolutely rejected the prosecution here. >> absolutely, it was not a strong case by jeff sessions, that is what civil rights activists told him at the time, don't do this. it is politicly and racially motivated, so for sessions to
6:30 pm
lose this high profile case against black activists, and to be voted for by reagan was shocking. >> did he ever have any problems, how did he react when the supreme court basically gutted the voting rights act a couple of years ago? >> he never changed his life, he supported the supreme court decision gutting the voting rights act, saying there was no discrimination going on in alabama, or georgia, clearly he is not watching your show or reading my reporting. in his own state of alabama, they required 31 dmcs, many in north carolina and alabama, the courts found that voter suppression law targeted black voters, there has been so much segregation that sessions has refused to acknowledge.
6:31 pm
>> if he is chosen, he will have a lot of influence on these type of cases. jeff sessions is a controversial nominee, not the only controversial person president-elect trump picked for a very important job today. we have much more ahead. there is a very important time in the news. please stay with us. [beeping] take on any galaxy with a car that could stop for you. simulation complete. the new nissan rogue. rogue one: a star wars story. in theaters december 16th.
6:32 pm
...one of many pieces in my i havlife.hma... so when my asthma symptoms kept coming back on my long-term control medicine. i talked to my doctor and found a missing piece in my asthma treatment with breo. once-daily breo prevents asthma symptoms. breo is for adults with asthma not well controlled on a long-term asthma control medicine,
6:33 pm
like an inhaled corticosteroid. breo won't replace a rescue inhaler for sudden breathing problems. breo opens up airways to help improve breathing for a full 24 hours. breo contains a type of medicine that increases the risk of death from asthma problems and may increase the risk of hospitalization in children and adolescents. breo is not for people whose asthma is well controlled on a long-term asthma control medicine, like an inhaled corticosteroid. once your asthma is well controlled, your doctor will decide if you can stop breo and prescribe a different asthma control medicine, like an inhaled corticosteroid. do not take breo more than prescribed. see your doctor if your asthma does not improve or gets worse. ask your doctor if 24-hour breo could be a missing piece for you. see if you're eligible for 12 months free at mybreo.com. keeping the power lines clear,my job to protect public safety, 12 months free at mybreo.com. while also protecting the environment. the natural world is a beautiful thing, the work that we do helps us protect it. public education is definitely a big part of our job, to teach our customers about the best type of trees to plant around the power lines. we want to keep the power on for our customers.
6:34 pm
we want to keep our community safe. this is our community, this is where we live. we need to make sure that we have a beautiful place for our children to live. together, we're building a better california.
6:35 pm
. this is raj goyle, from kansas, technically born in cleveland. he made his life in wichita, kansas. and he was elected to the state legislature in 2006. in 2010 after his two terms in the legislature, raj decided to try to take a big leap and run not just for the state legislature again but instead for congress. from his district in kansas, and this is what it was like that year to be raj goyle running for congress in kansas in 2010. vote american, vote for the guy running against this guy. subtle, right? the guy running against raj did not put up the vote american billboard against raj, that billboard was put up by a supporter by raj's opponent, not by the opponent himself. but when raj goyle called his
6:36 pm
opponent out on this, about this billboard that his opponent supporter put up, his response was just that raj goyle was just distracting from the real issues in that campaign. so that really is what that looked like, true americans vote for pompeo, now raj's opponent is pompeo, who is known for dissenting from the republican's benghazi report, because even though the report concluded basically that hillary clinton didn't do it, mike pompeo remains convinced that she did. so he dissented, he is also basically known for being the congressman from koch industry, they have been his biggest funders in his congressional life, ever since his first run, they have been the number one funders of mike pompeo, when he
6:37 pm
first got to congress he hired the former top lawyer to be his chief of staff and got to work on his top priorities which happened to be what koch brothers wanted for christmas that year, which was a super happy christmas. it was a, killing a registry of gas polluters, and b, stopping an on-line registry of product safety complaints, because that is what the people of his district wanted. now, after pulling that heavyweight for the hard-working people of wichita and writing brave op-eds like this, stop harassing the koch brothers, now he is donald trump's nominee to be the director of the cia. he has no intelligence experience, outside of his time as koch industry guy on the
6:38 pm
intelligence committee. mike pompeo has to be confirmed before he takes over, by the senate. but they have the numbers to get it done. and democratic congressman adam schiff called him willing and listen to engage, both key qualities in a cia director. and whatever fight democrats are going to put up over some trump nominations somewhere, we're not seeing much of one here for the cia director, at least not yet. the congressman for koch industry at least for now, appears to be on the path to the top agency. you're here to buy a car.
6:39 pm
6:40 pm
what would help is simply being able to recognize a fair price. that's never really been possible. but along comes a radically new way to buy a car, called truecar. now it is. truecar has pricing data on every make and model, so all you have to do is search for the car you want, there it is. now you're an expert in less than a minute. this is how car buying was always meant to be. this is truecar. ♪
6:41 pm
every new day is like civics boot camp these days. you know what, it is a blessing to have clarity. a blessing to see things clearly, and have a clear
6:42 pm
understanding of what you're up against in the world, and why. that is a blessing. tonight after today's news cycle we're working our way down the list that the new trump hires are. we talked about the senator who was bipartisanly viewed as too racist for a judgeship, but now he is tapped to be one. and the koch industry. this is one that makes the other two look really mainstream, and his story is next.
6:43 pm
6:44 pm
the president-elect today announced that retired general michael flynn would be his new security adviser. and that is not a position that requires any other form of announcement. that is it. no senate confirmation for national security adviser. for general flynn, that might be a blessing. last year, he attended the anniversary party for russian
6:45 pm
state-sponsored television. there he is there. and just to the right of him. see that handsome guy? that is russian president vladimir putin sitting with general gatlflynn, who explaines actions, saying he was paid for that appearance. that is his defense, going to the dinner with vladimir putin and honoring state russian tv. his defense was i was paid to be there. now he will be national security adviser to the president of the united states. general flynn was fired from the defense intelligence agency from 2014 as what was described from one side as leadership clashes. he explained it as, the military fired me for calling our enemies radical jihadists. i think it is fair to say, i think his supporters would concede that he is a fringe
6:46 pm
enough choice that you would probably hear, probably impotent opposition, for somebody like him having a big important role in the white house. a former colleague said his thinking process is not sufficiently analytical to test streams. if you listen to him, in ten minutes you will hear him contradict himself two or three times. flynn is known for putting stuff like this on twitter. fear of muslims is rational. he is also on board 100% with the things that donald trump campaigned on, on national security, that more national figures may be expected to balk at. >> would you kill the family of a terror suspect, yes or no? >> i would have to see what the circumstances of that situation was. >> are you kidding me? what circumstances would justify killing the family and wife and
6:47 pm
child? >> it would have to be the circumstances that we were facing at that time. >> kill a wife and child? what can you tell me about the child? these are things that you should know. donald trump has said he would kill family members of terrorists, even if the families themselves were totally innocent. and president-elect trump has now chosen to have mike flynn as the person closest to him whispering in his ear and advising him as national security adviser. general flynn has accepted the job offer, and as far as we understand it that is the end of that process. this is it. he is done. joining us is adam schiff, congressman, thank you for joining us. nice to see you. >> good to see you, too. >> broadly, what is your reaction to mike flynn being named national security adviser? >> well you know, shocked and gravely concerned about it.
6:48 pm
both for the reasons of his policies, they're well out of the mainstream when it comes to russia. his comments about turkey show a complete lack of appreciation on who is happening there. and more broadly, his views on islam, his failure to distinguish the perversion of that state by groups like isis. and his ideas, that there is a clash of civilizations between the west and islam, that they're incompatible with a relationship with the west. these are deeply disturbing ideas that the president-elect has expressed, and to have the national security adviser on this is alarming, and the tenure is especially alarming. i think what was found and he exhibited on the campaign trail. this is somebody who is often erratic and shoots from the hip and a volatile personality.
6:49 pm
you want somebody to bring the national security experts, the secretary of defense and state, the national security council and reach consensus on very tough issues and often with the pressure of time. you don't want another volatile personality guiding the way of already an impetuous president-elect. >> we get vague characterizations of what happened during his tenure. he was there from 2012 to 2014. he was asked to leave. you have the seat on the intelligence committee and obviously have your finger on the pulse on what is happening in the intelligence agencies. what can you tell us about why exactly he was asked to leave and what went wrong, what his colleagues at that agency thought about his tenure there? >> well, it has nothing to do with wanting to call islamic radicalism by its name. rather it had to do with his management style, which was one
6:50 pm
of essentially a bull in a china shop, the inability to work with others, enormous problems that were largely his creation, essentially a mess, that real p national security adviser. he is the equivalent of steve bannon in the national security arena. so you have one person who flirts with the alt-right in steve bannon in charge of domestic policy advice and now flynn as national security policy. that's a dangerous combustible combination. >> pompeo was named to be the director of the cia, you sort of welcomed that. you're not opposed to everything that trump has proposed.
6:51 pm
you're keeping an open mind as to whether mike pompeo is a good choice for cia >> i know him, he's a hardworking guidy. he has the capability of being a good cia director. he's a bipartisan guy. he will need to set that aside to be an effective cia chief, he is going to be strictly a political non-partisan. i think he can do that. what marijuaamericans have to recognize, the elections have consequences. mike is a conservative, he's not a modmoderate. and that is the president's prerogative to pick. and i am counting on him to do it well. >> always a clear and sober voice on scary issues. thank you for your time, appreciate you being here. >> thank you, rachel. >> we'll be right back. when heartburn hits, fight back fast
6:52 pm
with tums smoothies. it starts dissolving the instant it touches your tongue. and neutralizes stomach acid at the source. ♪ tum -tum -tum -tum smoothies! only from tums
6:53 pm
at this point in the show, i had something else we were going to cover, by i scrapped it, because there's a thick i feng to say about the mike flynn security announcement. all the president has to do is ask somebody and them say yes. so this mike flynn thing is done. that means it will not be discussed as much compared to the other people who have to go through the senate confirmation process. but the choice of mike flynn is
6:54 pm
a different kettle of fish than anything we might have expected from the trump campaign. mike flynn calls islam a political ideology hiding behind a religion. he calls islam a malignant cancer. he really did sit next to president putin and take money to go to a gala. he's been a frequent guest on russian state television and says he sees no difference between russian state television and for example msnbc. he will now be the closest person to the president on a day-to-day basis on all foreign policy issues, on all military issues, on all national security issues, and he is way outside anything that anybody on the left, right or center might consider to be the mainstream, either in thought or temperament in terms of national security issues, and it's done. and trump gets him unless he has some change of heart or
6:55 pm
awakening of conscious about doing something like this for such a key position. i would also say that mike flynn has been on the payroll, his intelligence firm has been on the payroll of turkey including during the trump campaign, without him disclosing that while he was working for the trump campaign. so this is just -- i know he's not going to get as much coverage as the other people who have to get confirmed over the next few days, but stick a pin in that. it's a really, really important, really worrying announcement. back to our regularly-scheduled program back in a second.
6:56 pm
thope to see you again soon.. whoa, whoa, i got this. just gotta get the check. almost there. i can't reach it. if you have alligator arms, you avoid picking up the check. what? it's what you do. i got this. thanks, dennis! if you want to save fifteen percent or more on car insurance, you switch to geico. growwwlph. it's what you do. oh that is good crispy duck.
6:57 pm
6:58 pm
two words: it heals.e different? how? with heat. unlike creams and rubs that mask the pain, thermacare has patented heat cells that penetrate deep to increase circulation and accelerate healing. let's review: heat, plus relief, plus healing, equals thermacare. the proof that it heals is you. okay. here's one tantalizing little jib let to meditate upon. if jeff sessions gets confirmed as the attorney general of the united states, jeff sessions is a sitting u.s. senator from one of the reddest states in the country, alabama. because of that, there is zero drama as to which party his successor will come from.
6:59 pm
alabama has a republican governor. if he leaves the senate to be a.g., the governor will undoubtedly pick a republican to replace jeff sessions, and that will undoubtedly be the safest seat in the country. that is basically a guaranteed job for life. here's a potential hilarious thing. one of the people who could be appointed by the governor of alabama is the governor of alabama. he could appoint himself. the same governor of alabama who was last heard on this show saying this. >> you know what, i stand behind you and i, and i put my arms around you and i put my hand on your breast and pull you real close, i love that, too. >> alabama governor robert
7:00 pm
bentley right now is facing impeachment at home because of that tape. but one of the people he could appoint to replace jeff sessions is himself, which would let him escape the threat of impeachment for the sex tape and it would be a job for life, and washington, d.c. is very nice this time of year. so keep an eye open for the prospect of him appointing himself. everybody can borrow my tape when that happens. we've got the sex tape. you can use the subtitles and everything. now it's time for the last word. good evening ari. >> we'll let you know when weavweav we need the tape. >> candidate drunonald trump sa he never settles. but the m