bullying. the other thing which harkens back to the korea situation. to me the entire thing of north korea and south korea is we're using the same stuff that created this problem to solve the problem, and it won't do it. >> so fun to have you here. >> great to be here. >> my thanks to everyone that joined us. a new way is fantastic. go order it on amazon. that does it for this hour. "mtp daily" starts right now. hi, chuck. >> my, is nicole. i thought we were going to be like physically handing off studios. >> where are you? >> i don't know where you are. i know where i am. >> you know where i am. this is like who is on third, who is on second. i messed it up. >> exactly. >> have a good show. >> thank you. if it's wednesday, it's a thin red line between rhetoric and warfare. >> tonight, the fire in the fury. should we take the president literally or seriously? >> i think americans should sleep well at night. >> so where does the rhetoric end and the red line begin?

>> what the president is doing is sending a strong message to north korea in language that kim jong-un would understand. >> plus, senator ron johnson suggests john mccain's brain tumor caused his no vote on obamacare. meanwhile, mitch mcconnell dings the president. >> our new president has of course not been in this line of work before. >> and the president takes a swing at mcconnell right back. and finally, the growing opioid epidemic. >> the best way to preep vent dug addiction and overdose is to prevent people from abusing drugs in the first place. >> the mayor of nashville shares her deeply personal story after losing her son to addiction. this is "mtp daily" and it starts right now. good evening. i'm chuck todd here in new york. and welcome to "mtp daily" and

welcome to the scenario we've all been dreading when the president's credibility crisis clouds with an actual crisis involving nuclear weapons and threats of all out war. how many times have we had to ask this question, should you that i this president at his word or not? do you take him seriously or literally or maybe neither? remember that debate? and how do you answer that question when the commander in chief in charge of nearly 7,000 nuclear warheads says things like our enemy will be met with fire and fury like the world has never seen. and, quote, our nuclear arsenal is now far stronger and more powerful than ever before. some might argue you'd be a fool to take that stuff literally. owes say you'd being a fool not to. and the fact that we're getting zo many mixed signals only height ens the confusion. if you believe secretary of state rex tillerson today, then you'd be inclined not to take this president literally. >> what the president is doing is sending a strong message to north korea in language that kim jong-un would understand because he doesn't seem to understand diplomatic language. what the president was just

reaffirming is the united states has the capability to fully defend itself from any attack and defend our allies, and we will do so. and so the american people should sleep well at night. >> but if you believe the deputy assistant to the president, you'd be inclined to take him very literally. >> he's saying don't test america and don't test donald j. trump. we are not just a super power. we were a super power. we are now a hyper powerment nobody in the world, especially not north korea, comes close toe challenging our military capabilities. >> north korea's military threatened the u.s. today, saying they were, quote, seriously reviewing a plan to strike the u.s. territory of guam. it was actually a notable departure from the north's typically hyperbolic threats pledging to reduce the u.s. to ashes. striking guam with missiles is a realistic threat from north korea, and that came just hours after the president drew a red line, arguably brighter, than

even when president obama ever drew. >> north korea best not make any more threats to the united states. they will be met with fire and fury like the world has never seen. >> now, the administration today did not dispute reporting that there was no formal vetting of the president's exact statement there, and as quickly as.president drew that line, north korea did cross it, meaning they're not taking his words very literally yet. and then came the leaks from inside the administration advisors speaking to both the north korea times and politico are now playing down his rhetoric saying don't read too much into what he said. inevitable stories that we assume will get attributed to fake news on twitter at some point. and then pressed about the president's rhetoric a state department spokesman gay us a familiar if totally unhelpful response that the president's words speak for themselves h. making matters even more confusing, this president isic

maing threats which sound early similar to the rhetoric had that we hear out of north korea which boasts of its super mighty and a nuclear arsenal that they portray as far stronger and powerful than ever before. mr. trump threatened them, warning our nuclear arsenal is now stronger and more powerful before. there will never be a time that we are not the most powerful nation in the world. if it weren't hard enough to decode this president's motivations, what i told you he had real estate vefrmgts in south korea as well, six of them. >> joining me now via skype is maximum bok us who was of course the u.s. ambassador to china. senator bach us, thanks for doing this. >> you bet. good to talk to you, chuck. >> we've been talking about what the north koreans hear when the president speaks, but there has been this idea that he was trying to send a message to

china, and we can have a debate about whether he clungd that up a little bit, but what are the chinese hearing when the president uses the language that he uses? >> i think the chinese, as much as any other country, respect strength. they respect stability. they respect a very strong adversary they can work with. and i think all of this -- all these contradictions. all this tweeting does two things. it causes confusion on the poort of the chinese, but more deeply, i think it causes the chinese to think that maybe this guy is a little but unhinged of the maybe he doesn't have a good foreign policy. and i think that hurts us. >> all right. but let me play devil's at voe cat here. some would say the mad man theory here may be what finally gets china to do something about this. >> i don't think so. i think that it certainly does help for us to make it very

clear that we're going to protect our national security interests. that is really very important. and that's -- president trump is making that very clear. on the other hand, china will pursue china's interests. and what are china's interests? >> china's interests are to maintain stability on the peninsula. and if the united states were to go in preemptively that would cause instability and very much cause a lot of anxiety on the chinese part and be very unpredictable. the very problem here is we don't have good honest communications with china. china is an opaque country. and it's regretable that we're not having more candid conversation with them. so we can better plan what to do next. >> you just said that china's priority is stability in the korean peninsula. i guess define their version of stability. ic make an argument korean stablization, but i've had a theory posited on this show that says, no, china doesn't view

that as stable. china views that as unstable because suddenly that's a big u.s. ally that's sitting close to their shore. >> you've got it exactly right. china would be very opposed to a unified peninsula controlled by south korea and or the united states. and they will look for ways during all of this so-called instability, that is between north korea and south korea to try to find ways so that the end game is one where they are in more control of the peninsula. they have at least a very significant influence in the peninsula, and they care about themselves very, very strongly. i also have another thought here. the united states has to sort of get its act together. with all the various parties, vary countries and come up with a really good solid plan and start talking to kim jong-un. i mean, the goal should be not to get him to did he nuclear eyes. he's not going to do that. that's not going to happen.

but at least start talking about a potential freeze, a potential cap down the road on missile and nuclear development in north korea where we have to come up with a unified plan and make it clear to north korea and the chinese because this means the china is going to have to be on board, russia is going to have to be on board that if that doesn't work then we're going to have to up our deterrence effects or national security planning with more ships and all that entails. >> let me throw up one other counter idea that's been tossed out there today, which is are we too impatient as a country on north korea, meaning that, look, this strategy of sort of waiting them out and on sanctions, yeah, it doesn't pay a lot of dividends immediately, but long-term, eventually they will collapse upon themselves, and that we're just being too impatient? do you buy any of that? >> i don't think they're going

to collapse by themselves, but i do think that additional pressure is needed, because that's going to make it more likely that finally kim jong-un is going to come to the table and more likely that russia and china will also join in with us. i think kim jong-un is a rational person. i don't think he's a nut cake. i don't think he's crazy. and so additional pressure is something that he as a rational person will see and in my judgment he's going to say, okay, let's start to talk. enough is enough here. and we have no choice but at least try that approach. people talk about, you know, preat the present time i have, push the button, all that. that sounds good. it's easy to do. but clearly we have to go the extra mile, as hard as it is to try to find a diplomatic solution. and i think it's along as the lines of allied. >> i appreciate you coming on and sharing your views. and as i think we all know, easy

to do and a military strike never seems to work out that way when the history is written. any way, thanks very much. appreciate it. >> you bet. thanks, chuck. >> okay. all right now let's get a little bit of the north korean what perhaps the korean perspective here a little bit. i'm joined by chris hill who of course the u.s. ambassador to south korea. the last time he really had some serious talks with them and he is an nbc news dim's expert. you're in pay bit of a remote location in hungary there. let me start with what did kim jong-un hear and the koreans hear when president trump said fire and fury? >> i think one of the problems when the president says things like this is you really at this point don't know what to take to the bank. he plufs. he bluffs a lot. and so i think that's probably

what they heard. i don't think it changes the basic calculus. and i mean, what worries me is, of course, we have a president who doesn't seem to listen or even read what his advisors put in front of him. so i think the real issue we have is what are we going to do about this situation in north korea and does this president have the temperament and wisdom to deal with it. >> explain -- i was surprised -- the north koreans are known for -- are also known for their hyperbole and when they responded, they didn't respond with this, you know, we're going to make the united states ashes or something. their retort to the president was we're going after guam. that sounded much more realistic and serious. should we be hearing it that way? >> i don't think they are going after guam. i think that was one thing they have on the shelf. they like to talk in specifics. it was even jargon as they talked about as misses of missiles, which i think sent a

lot of the pun back to their wick i peedas to figure out what that meant. so i think the north koreans, you know, are not without a kind of die bol cal sense of humor, and i think we saw a little of that. what we haven't seen, though, is a clear policy, how the administration plans to deal with this and what is the game plan for dealing with china. and it's also pretty clear that despite naming a new chief of staff, we have a president who still, frankly, seems to kind of operate on his own. >> so you heard secretary tillerson, which i think two weeks ago he seemed to open the door for direct talks and said, hey, we don'tment regime change. it was arguably more than -- more in that direction of what you heard in talk from the united states, from any secretary of state being willing for direct talks to see no regime change, things like this.

why didn't the north koreans just say, okay, let's have that conversation? >> well, you know, even dictator ships have their politics and i think they want to look really tough to their people and willing to stand up to the u.s. i think the real problem here is not the exchange of what people are saying publicly. the real problem is north korea, especially under kim jong-un, has demonstrated no interest whatsoever in any kind of negotiation based on denuclearization. we have no choice. we have to get them to did he nuclear eyes. for them to kind of threaten the u.s. mainland is really an effect to did he couple us from south korea and if we blink with respect to our obligations to south korea, we've essentially blinked to our obligations all over the world. so i think we have to be pretty tough on this and pretty clear on this. and i think the problem, of course, is the administration isn't really sure where to go. there are a lot of people within

the republican foreign policy establishment who aren't very comfortable with this idea of working with the chinese and so often work being with the chinese has turned into kind of an outsourcing idea much how to deal with china. i think rex tillerson has his work cut out for him, not only dealing with the chinese and others, but also dealing with this president. >> what is kim jong-un's incentive to denuclear eyes? to me it's very rational. if you're him and you look around, mow march qaddafi gave up his nuclear -- he's thriving -- oh, wait, no. you don't survive if you give up your nuclear program. that could be what he sees. >> oh, i think there's definitely an element of that. he's looking at the situation, and he thinks nuclear weapons are his ticket not only to being a super power. you know, it's -- i mean, hope

dies eternal with the north koreans. they really do believe that they have an opportunity to kind of get everyone's attention in the world. so i think there's no question he sees nuclear women's as a key element of his survival. on the other hand i think the united states autos secretary mattis pointed out about our capabilities, we have the kamt. we have an ability essentially to make sure he does not have those nuclear weapons. and if comes to push and shove, we will indeed take care of ourselves, our allies and our -- even our territory such as guam. so i really think that we need to convince kim jong-un that his best hope of survival lies in a negotiating process aimed at doing what everyone has asked him to do, the russians, the chinese, et cetera, and that is give up those nuclear weapons. there yet and clearly he feels he has the upper hand and he's racing to develop those weapons

such that we then cannot take them away from him. >> isn't one of the reasons he may feel he has an upper hand is to be blunt, american leaders are more concerned about north korean civilians than maybe north korea's leadership is? >> well, certainly there's an element of that. but i think the problem is china simply doesn't know what to do about this. they're very split. you ask chinese at shanghai what do you think of north korea, they have no interest in north korea. but, you know, clearly the national security state within china is very split. at the same time we've got some difficult problems to deal with in south korea. if the u.s. looks like it's pushing on north korea without being mindful of the reason we're there in the first place, which is the defense of our ally south korea, we could cause a lot of problems. so this kind of three-dimensional chess is proving difficult, especially for the current administration. i must say in fairness to it, i don't think the rest of us who

worked on this problem in the past necessarily solved the problem, but at least we had a process in place. we got the reactor shut down. we had international inspectors there and i think we ought to try to work on this step by step effort and especially work with the chinese and don't expect to outsource it to the chinese. >> all right. i'm going to leave it there. i appreciate you making the effort to get with us on skype and hope you get home safely. thanks very much. our panel will weigh in on the north korean threat next and the politics behind it. plus new developments in the russia investigation. what we know about the fbi's raid of former trump campaign chairman paul manafort.

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it is a sign that the investigation is escalating. to get a search warrant mueller had to convince a judge that there was probable cause a crime mab committed. sources with knowledge of mueller's inquiry into manafort say the sirch of his residence is tied to the intense investigation of the former campaign chair's business dealings both in the us and abroad. news of the search was first reported by the "washington post" which reports the fbi seized documents after descending on the residence on that front. we'll be back with more "mtp daily" in 60 seconds. what's with him?

he's happy. your family's finally eating vegetables thanks to our birds eye voila skillet meals. and they only take 15 minutes to make. ahh! birds eye voila so veggie good the former general of the air force, measure ril mcpeak said you could not launch preemptive strike against north korea because the nuclear fall out could be devastating to the asian peninsula. if the military told you, mr. trump, we can't do this. >> you're giving me two names. i don't know. you want to do it in five years when they have warheads all over the place, every one of them pointing to north korea city, to washington, and every -- is that when you want to do it or do you want to do something now?

you'd better do it now and if they think you're serious -- i deal with lots of people. if they think you're serious and they'll negotiate and it will never come to that. >> welcome back. that was president trump on "meet the press" in october of 1999. he was promoting his book the america we deserve and he was laying out why he would be willing as president to launch a preemptive strike against north korea. by the way, at the time he was a sort of kind of running for president as a reformed party candidate. that cycle for what it's worth. bring in tonight's panel. welcome all. john, let me start with you and what you heard there from donald trump 1999. what do you make of it? in some ways very consistent with the donald trump that we hear foed? >> well, i'm sorry, you can't look at the existence of a miniature iced nuclear warhead

on a north korean icbm and say that in 1999 it was crazy to think that a preemptive strike against a nace ent north korean nuclear program would have been a bad idea at the time. i mean, you can't from the vantage point of a time when we are now maybe past the sell through date when we could have stopped this program before its infancy then say, well, he was wrong and it's all the same now. i mean, we've been now handled an absolutely horrendous hand in which every option is lousy. and i'm not saying that, you know, the president wasn't being silly in 1999 when he scoffed at general mcpeak, but nonetheless, you can't now look at this and say we didn't do it then and everybody kicked the can down the road and here we are. and they can threaten guam or japan or seoul with unbelievable

carnage. >> it seems, beth, that we're sort of -- that this story is -- there's two different facets of the story. facet one is the one we pointed out which is the president has his own -- is he speaking for the country, is he not? but then there is the other aspect of this which is, hey, it wouldn't have mattered who was president. this is an eni go ma wrapped in a -- or -- >> yeah. to john's point this has been something that's been building over the years and it's been sort of afrpg up at warp speed recently. trump happens to be the president now when it's reached the point that it has. one could argue he is uniquely unqualified person to be dealing with this issue. compounded by the fact that he does not have a lot of diplomats over at his state department. he doesn't listen to a lot of other people. he loves his generals. he's got generals on his staff, on his team. he loves his weapons. he loves his troops. we hear about all that from him all the time. we never hear anything about diplomacy. so the normal order of things where if this had landed in other presidents lap it would gone through a system. it would have gone through the

state department. it would have gone through direct talks. it would have gone through back channel negotiations. trump instead is sort of hitting it as a blunt object, as he does with most other things. but this is a situation that should not be handled that way. >> and when you get into the polling, right, you do see -- i've been looking a lot at the polling. 61% of americans are uneasy about his ability to do this. he's underwater on dealing with north korea, among independence, but when you look at his base, chuck, they're sticking with them. and guess what group of voters are most in favor of striking north korea? none college white voters, that group of trump's base right now. this ra ra and this sort of stuff and sort of fury, you know, it makes a lot of us uneasy, but the politics of this is it's probably not hurting him with his base. >> what's interesting, their job -- that doesn't -- it's weird to me that hiss base is for a military strike, because i'm not convinced the president is. >> no -- >> i don't know where the president is, frankly. >> no one knows where the president is. again, to be fair to him, to say

the state department, we should have a process. we had a wonderful process. well, it was a great fantastic process, wasn't it? because it's ended up with north korea nuclear iced in 2017. like it was a terrible process. it didn't work. you know, and for 30 years the west has been paying off north korea, trying to buy its way through grain deals and direct aid and this and that and kick the can down the road and kick the can down the road. and now the bluff of the west has been called by kim jong-un. >> but to be fair, i mean, those generals back then, i mean, i do take them at their word that this is prop attic. butterfly effect. we don't know. what would our relationship be with china right now if in fact we had went in and attacked north korea. >> sure. >> right. we might not -- we might be in a tremendous cold war with china right now if not at war with china right now. >> no. i'm saying -- it's a terrible situation. >> it is a terrible situation. >> but trump is not -- for once to blame trump -- >> he's inherited this, yes.

>> to blame trump for this and for chris hill to say i don't know if the president -- great. so every president before him has -- >> it's funny. you guys are actually getting at my frustration with this story. i do feel as if there is this -- the cloud of oh, my god, trump. and he is sort of disruptive to what is an already challenging problem. that's been -- that it adds -- it sort of -- this already had a high degree of difficulty of the he makes it harder. >> yeah, and i mean, to your point, of course the process programs has not worked very well. you know, that's self-evident. but on the other hand, is the option of, you know, fire and fury blurted out at them, apparently without planning, without his people even knowing he was going to say that, a way to handle this problem? >> well, i mean, to be fair, again, so if you sort of look at it with this, if he says, look, you do a single thing and we're going to destroy you s that's no different from the policy of any previous administration. >> that actually gets at the problem here.

and this goes back to a conversation we were having yesterday. i think there are some generals that regret that north korea doesn't believe the u.s. will ever use its military option, right. there has been -- the fact is they didn't do it in 99. they didn't do it -- no matter, three presidents chose not to do this. it's hard to get that -- it's hard to get your bluff taken seriously. >> it is. well, the ace here is that trump is such a loose cannon that they probably don't really know if in fact he'll do it or not. from his past statements he certainly says eldo it, but at the same time you do have the percentage of unamericans unease with north korea and fearful of going to war in north korea. he's not only scarring north koreans. he's scarring americans. >> considering what we heard from ambassador bach us, doesn't the answer getting south korea and china to become comfortable allies with each, so that a unified korea is not considered a threat to china? beth?

>> sure, but where that has that ever been? >> i don't know. it seems to be a missing piece to this. if that's what they fear, then isn't that what we have to work on? >> well, look, the simple fact of the matter is that the chinese are the only -- every policy that has been pursued both by the bush and by the obama administrations has focused on the fact that china is the only country with real significant influence over north korea, and they refuse to use it. so maybe now they're starting to hint at using it because of the vote in the u.n. security council, 15 nothing to sanction north korea. >> and they didn't even abstain. >> and they didn't abstain. they're responsible for this. we're not responsible. and that's the other thing i want to say, which is that there is -- because all of the world's politics focus on trump now, there is an idea that what really matters here is that trump said something, you know, sort of like emotionally pornographic like these missiles. north korea has missiles and they're threatening the world with the missiles. north korea is the villain here, not trump.

>> emotional pornography. that might be -- that is the phrase that pays today, apparently. any way, we will take a break. still ahead, is the trump administration doing enough to tackle the growing opioid crisis across the country? and later, majority leader mcconnell's mild critique of the president's expectations draws a little bit more than mild criticism from the president. this is not a cloud. this is a car protected from storms by an insurance company that knows the weather down to the square block. this is a diamond tracked on a blockchain - protected against fraud, theft and trafficking. this is a financial transaction secure from hacks and threats others can't see. this is a patient's medical history made secure - while still available to their doctor at their fingertips. this is an asteroid live-streamed to millions of viewers from 220 miles above earth. this is ai trained by experts in 20 industries. your industry. hello.

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how a republican senator ended up repeating what is turning into a crazy altd right talking pointed about john mccain. pointed about john mccain. we'll be right

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yesterday we heard president trump vow that the united states would, quote, win the fight against the opioid epidemic that is striking so many parts of the united states. and he argued for a stronger law enforcement response. the administration for now declined to did he clear the crisis officially a national emergency, a move that the president's hand picked commission on opioids recommended. that move would have allowed the executive branch to do things like direct more federal money to drug treatment. >> the best way to prevent drug addiction and overdose is toe prevent people from abusing drugs in the first place. if they don't start, they won't have a problem. >> the president, however, did not actually announce any new policies in his remarks yesterday. folks, this is a crisis that's hitting all corners of our country. 142 americans die every day

right now from a drug overdose, according to the pud president's commission. and just last month. battle against drugs became very personal for one of the country's elected officials. the mayor of nashville, tennessee lost her son. maximum barry was 22 when he passed away after taking a combination of trugz in a suburb outside of denver. he feels the mayor's only child. in dealing with the heartbreak, she has choesz ento be very transparent about her loss speaking publicly about her families pain and the larger epidemic sweeping our country. >> mayor barry, let me just simply begin by our con loans for your loss. >> thank you. >> and what did you hear when you heard from the president yesterday? >> well, what i was hoping i would hear is much more of a proactive approach to what we can be doing across our great country to combat this epidemic, and it is an epidemic. i was hoping that he would declare it a national emergency so that we could see some of

those federal funds flow into our communities for more treatment beds and for more preventive measures. that's what i had hoped to hear. >> nobody -- i can't imagine all the different things you've thought about what this could have done differently, this could have done differently. you want to share your experiences. what would you tell the president if he asked you, okay, mayor barry, tell me the tools you wish you now would have had as a parent, let alone as a mayor? what would you tell him? >> sure. well, first, as maximum's mom, it was really important for us to be able to have access to a treatment bed. and max did go to rehab last sum. so we were able to make that happen for our child, but there so so many children out there that need those treatment beds. and declaring this a federal emergency would make that happen. so those are the kinds of things that i think we can be doing as a community, and i'd love to see us move in that direction. >> what is the -- what's the national police department doing as they deal with this? i mean, every police department

in the country is dealing with this crisis every day on the streets. >> absolutely. i mean, this year we he quipped our first responders with nar can as a way to at least if there is a moment at that last point of life to rehabilitate somebody that we can. but this starts way before you're dealing with those last moments of death. i mean, my son got nar can. it didn't help. this is also about education, and it's about access to treatment. and i think that's the conversation we need to be having. we need to be treating this like a disease. >> all right. but what about access to the drugs themselves? what have you learned now going through all this that you feel as if -- because this is something a parent doesn't have enough power to deal with, a mayor doesn't have enough power to deal with, hoping that a president does. >> clearly in my son's case some of the drugs that he had with him were prescription drugs, so he got them somewhere. somebody prescribed them to somebody at some point.

i would love to see a much tighter control on prescription medicine flowing into our streets, because i think that can help. but we can't arrest ourselves out of this epidemic. so although i know the president spoke yesterday about being much more proactive in arrests, that's not the whole problem. >> are you somebody that holds the drug companies accountable. >> i think what i would like to see are much more tighter controls on how these drugs are flowing. so for me, again, my son did have prescription medicine on him, but he didn't have a prescription. but somebody had gotten a prescription at some point, so those drugs flowed into the community in some way. >> as a parent, what advice would you give to another parent who is concerned, who thinks i'm not sure, maybe, you know, what were some signs that you now know you saw? >> well, if you are a parent or friend or somebody who thinks that you have somebody in your life that's in trouble, please talk to them, please reach out to them and get them the help that they need.

i to tell you as parents sometimes we have blinders on, we don't see everything. my hope has been that by talking about what happened to my son, what happened to max, my conversation can inspire some other parent to talk to their kid and had they can avoid this horrible tragedy. >> i'm curious, what have you asked the city of nashville to do? what are you hoping to put in --? are you hoping to enact some new lies laws, procedures? >> well, in this year's bug before this even happened to my family, we had already put money in for an open 0i8d specialist to start dealing with the epidemic in nashville. we're about ten days into this and so at the moment, you know, i just want to thank everybody in nashville, the outpouring of community has been incredible. and in fact, my husband said it i think best at max's memorable. the counter balance of grief is community. and this is a community issue, and we all have to come together to figure out the path forward. >> no better way to end than with that comment there, mayor barry.

thanks for coming on, sharing your story. >> thanks, chuck. >> that's going to be helpful to i think a lot of americans. >> i hope so. thank you. >> all right. we'll be right back. for millions who suffer from schizophrenia a side effect of their medication... is something called "akathisia." it's time we took notice. ykeep you sidelined.ng that's why you drink ensure. with 9 grams of protein and 26 vitamins and minerals. for the strength and energy to get back to doing... ...what you love. ensure. always be you.

alzheimer's disease the fi is out there.survive and the alzheimer's association is going to make it happen by funding scientific breakthroughs, advancing public policy, and providing local support to those living with the disease and their caregivers. but we won't get there without you. visit alz.org to join the fight. welcome back. tonight i'm obsessed with something an otherwise smart, reasonable and responsible u.s. senator said today. senator ron johnson of wisconsin was on a chicago morning radio talk show yesterday when he offered an explanation as to why he believed hids colleague senator john mccain voted against the so-called skinny repeal of obamacare.

take a listen. >> again, i'm not gonna speak for john mccain. you know, he has a brain tumor right now. that vote occurred at 1:30 in the morning. so some of that might have factored? >> really? >> yeah, apparently really. in fact, one of the anchors on that radio show pushed senator johnson on whether he actually meant to say what he seemed to be saying. and then johnson said this. >> i don't want to speak for any senator. i really thought john was going to vote yes in that conference at 10:30 at night. by about one, one 30, he voted no, so you have to talk to zwron what was on his mind. >> today senator johnson took a step back, write being, i'm disappointed i didn't more eloquently express my sympathy for what senator mccain is going through. i have nothing but respect for him and the vote came at the end of a day for everyone. >> all right. no explicit apology in any of

that. fine. but johnson didn't come up with this idea in isolation. sadly, this is something we've seen in the dark parts of twitter w. what he is doing or accidentally doing is main streaming a fake news idea after a few months of echo chamber repetition will become received wisdom for some in the fake news right world. this is how fake news has impacted us. it's how it's infected us. trust me, it's unblooevl the conspiracy theories that have gotten tangled up over years. it's why so many americans, i think, are becoming so misinformed. and this is how a generally thoughtful senator can become wobbly when the alt-right is looking over his shoulder. we like and respect senator johnson, but really, senator, you have a responsibility to do more than tell what the alt-right may want to hear or what simply base voters may want to hear. but there will still be pain. it comes when your insurance company says they'll only pay

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our new president has of course not been in this line of work before, and i think had excessive expectations about ho things happen. >> welcome back. time for the lid. that was mitch mcconnell being very mcconnelly, frankly, with his way of criticizing president trump. he was hitting the president for what he said for having unrealistic expectations about how quickly things move in the senate. they rushed to the president's defense on this one and then the big guy himself shot back this afternoon. president trump tweeted, senator mitch mcconnell said i had excessive expectations. i don't think so. after seven years of hearing repeal and replace, why not done? okay. we were just talking about, i said geez, we got mccain versus

ron johnson. he said on monday we led with republican in fighting. and it got worse. >> on top of the north korea nuclear crisis. this is all incredible three dimensional chess. >> kudos to you. what did you say? elaine chao having the unhappiest person in the world today, elaine chao. she is mitch mcconnell's wife. >> and you also have mitch mcconnell to get any legislative plan through. on the other hand, trump is not wrong. that tweet is true. if they were -- if they've been talking about this for so long, why didn't they get it done? >> i always said best quote of the entire health care debate, when he accidentally said, we didn't think he was going to win so we didn't think we had to worry about it. that's why everybody likes pat to toomey. he's a straight shooter. >> i always said that

republicans are really good at politics, not so at actually governing. i'm going off strip for a moment here. i got to go back to the conversation there with my heart goes out to the mayor and she's right. we do need to be more pro active. we do need to take challenge this because it tearing apart rural suburban america. we do need to challenge. this not just lock people up on it. my god, chuck, i wish we heard the same compassion about when the crack epidemic was ravaging, you know, urban america. and that's not -- look, it is absolutely something that is destroying parts of our country and with you should look at it as an epidemic we need to treat. but i have to point out the double standard here that we've seen in this country around drugs. i'd be remisif i ds if i did no >> i do think onest things about the opioid ep dem chick is one reason it was so invisible is

because it was a depressant epidemic, it was not accompanied by enormous amounts of violent crime as gangs fought for turf. the book "dream land" explains how this combination of prescription drugs and black tar heroin from mexico ended up working together in this horrible golden braid. one thing about an opioid epidemic is that naem are engaged in both the trade and who are unfortunately, you know, sucked into doom by it, mostly lie around. i mean they're not going crazy. they're not picking up guns and shooting each other. that was the difference between the crack epidemic and this. >> by the way, it's funny you say that. i thought the mayor picked up -- she goes -- she seemed to be a little bit confuse thatd president was thinking about this as a law enforcement issue. when i don't think many people do think this is a law

enforcement issue. really, based -- some of it on the lessons from the crack, from the '80s and how the crack epidemic was dealt w. >> the other thing that struck sme what president trump said which is people shouldn't start using drugs nifrt place. sort of takes you back to nancy reagan in the '80s, just say no. if you just don't start, you won't have to figure out a way to get off which perhaps is true. but that doesn't address the problem. the huge public health crisis this country is in. >> the problem isn't people -- i mean, we -- this is -- it goes to chronic pain. i mean, we're sort of -- there is a medical reason why this is all out there. and we have this pain management. the medical community needs to help us out on this. >> they do. and quite frankly, us saying that the president saying this is making this a law enforcement issue is like back to the future, right? it's about locking up more people. we're not going to lock our way up to a solution for our drug problem in urban america or

suburban or rural america. >> look, it's a hor horrendous situation because opioids are an addiction. it is unbelievably difficult to break. and so the problem here is that it turns out in part that the crack epidemic burned itself out. people dpoenon't have this lifeg connection to say cocaine use that people do to heroin and it's very -- it's hard -- it's intractable. >> all right. i'm going to leave it there. >> sorry. >> on that upbeat note. but again, you can be elaine chao. >> i could be elaine chao. poor thing. seriously. >> cornell, john, thank you very much. a little something we missed when we're back.

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in case you missed it, this happened today in downtown d.c. because why not? that's right, it's an inflatable rooster that looks like the president is roosting outside the white house while the president is in new jersey. now we believe this is the work some of protesters and from this vanltage point, by the way, does it make it seem like it's very close to the white house. but this is a bit of an optical illusion. it's into the close to the white house. check it out from this angle. see? the rooster is way back. there turns out it's on the

ground about a quarter mile away. fwz as close as the public can get to the white house south lawn which is not that close. according to the intelligencer, the artist behind the design was commissioned to create something rooster like in honor of the rooster being this year's zodiac animal. he tez l. sasaid the resemblanc president is coincidental. i don't noechlt i thought that was possibly a bizarre kfc ad or something that this is the latest attempt at getting the colonel. >> we're going to get to the bottom of this rooster story. >> you got it. good to see you, chuck. paul man i for the said he was cooperating with the russia investigation. today we're learning the fbi had a very different view and that's why the fbi raided paul manifort's