lawyer, he was functioning as someone who was making illegal deals for donald trump. >> what an hour. my thanks to knick conves sory and rick strengthel for getting me through it. "mtp daily" starts right now. two days in a row on time. >> i hope to get through my breaking news. >> if i can get through mine -- >> tonight as talks break down over trump/mueller interview, has is the president keeping his legal battles from clouding his decision on syria. >> we are looking very, very seriously, very closely at that whole situation, and we will see what happens, folks. we will see what happens. plus, the strike force, what options are on the table toen is send a mess aible to assad and putin? >> today our president did say he has not made a decision. >> reporter: and the gop leadership shuffle. >> i have never run against kevin and wouldn't run against

kevin. he and i are good friend. >> reporter: we will talk to congressman mark meadow of freedom caucus fame who could be one of the biggest influencers in the next battle for speaker. this is "mtp daily," and it starts right now. ♪ good evening. welcome to "mtp daily" i'm chuck todd here in washington. we begin tonight with the breaking news we have been telling you about an hour now. nbc news reporting president trump is now not likely to sit down for an interview with lawyers from special counsel robert mueller's team. talks basically collapsed after the fbi raid on home and office and hotel room of the president's longtime personal lawyer, michael cohen. now it's perhaps not a surprising development given president trump's comments about these things. unofficial presidential adviser alan dershowitz predicted this

yesterday on this show when he called the raid on cohen a quote nuclear option that was not likely to help the negotiations over these talks. now, this is yet another sign of how the cohen raid made an already high pressure situation even more volatile. and at this point the president seems to be weighing whether to fire the deputy attorney general rod rosenstein or the special counsel robert mueller or find a way to get rosenstein to be forced to recuse himself. all at the same time by the way he is weighing how to respond what the u.s. officials are now saying they are confident of it was an assad ordered attack on his own people inside the country of syria. that's the state of affairs right now of while we don't know which way either decision will go, we do know he is weighing them at the same time. the use of force is arguably the most difficult decision a president can make and requires clear mine. he is not just choosing what targets to strike, he is choosing what message america is trying to send to assad, putin

and the world overall. he is choosing a direction for the foreign policy for the rest of his time in office and potentially choosing whether to target assad or punish putin. potentially choosing whether to send more men and women into harm's way. making this decision amid all the pressure of what he calls a witch-hunt. can he ignore headlines like this. john kelly called trump dishonorable from firing me. that's the first drip from what could be a storm of headlines ahead of the release of james comey's tell-all book. can the president ignore that while kelly is trying to counsel him on syria today for instance. can he ignore the bar raj of what the fbi was looking for when it raided the office and home of his long time personal attorney mike ali cohen. can he ignore the calls of those taking to tv to call on him to fire rosenstein two.

week ago he was saying that the u.s. should be pulling out of syria very soon. now he is weighing a strategy that goes against his america first mantra from the campaign and may skit the united states to the region for a long time to come. and he is weighing it all while the mooulg mueller investigation hangs over him. joining me now, carol lee who was on the team that broke this story. carol, explain to me what this means, the breakdown of these talks. can mueller finish his obstruction of justice investigation without talking to the president? >> he can, according to the people we spoke with. and one person we spoke with said that essentially he has finished the obstruction portion of the investigation, and was really just waiting on the decision about whether or not the president was going to sit for an interview because one of the things that legal experts say he definitely would want to know is what the president's intent is. only the president -- he can

gather different documents and testimony from other people, but hearing from the president himself would be obviously an important part of that. but you know, if the president doesn't want to sit down and do -- have an interview, then robert mueller will just move forward. sources told us that in fact if this interview doesn't happen, if it really is not going to happen, that it could speed up the report that multer would write about the obstruction piece of this. so in some ways, this decision, the fallout from the raid on michael cohen is reaching this critical decision. >> right. >> actually it could then impact this big piece of this investigation that targets the president essentially. >> do we know that -- if mueller may write his obstruction of justice report first. but does it get released first? >> there is a lot of we just don't really know. our understanding is that it would go to rosenstein -- deputy attorney general rosenstein and

it would be confidential is but it's hard to imagine something like this would not be sent to congress or somehow released publicly eventually. >> right. now we know the president's legal team, past and present, has never been a big fan of trying to have the president sit down with mueller. is this a case where now the president has been convinced it's a bad idea now? >> yeah, you know, it's interesting talking to people. they say completely his mood has changed on this. he soured on the idea of sitting down with mueller. he is getting advice saying you shouldn't do this, why would you ever do this, the raid on michael cohen has become a catalyst for those folks to unleash and put pressure on the president not to sit down. and he feels that this is, as he said himself, an attack on him and he described it as an attack on the country. so he's changed his mind, at least for now. the thing about trump -- >> right.

>> -- that it changes his mind all the time. >> the most important phrase, at least for now. carol lee, thank very much. let me bring in kimberly atkins, ruth marcus, and danielle pletka. all right, we are trying to deal with both mueller and syria here. just as the president is trying to deal with both mueller and syria. that's not easy. >> let's compartmentalize. >> and we know this president struggles with come partmentalizing. let's start with this, to me it's not a surprise that after the cohen raid the president changes his mine. >> not a surprise that he gets bent out of shape. >> i'm out of here i am not going to talk with mutualer. >> the question is whether it was ever likely that he was going to take what seemed to me, and kim can speak to this the dangerous and unwise step of

sitting down for an interview with mueller where he was potentially going to be in grave legal jepe do. ask bill clinton what it's like to sit down and speaking and expose yourself to the possibility of the charges of making false statements. i always thought it was unlikely that he would speak. >> right. >> i think it's totally fair to say that the cohen raid made unlikely almost unthinkable. but we are leaving out one potential and interesting step here. this is not like you ask somebody to be on their show and they say maybe and then they say no. mueller has subpoena authority. >> i have tried to subpoena guests. it doesn't work. sometimes i can subpoena dan yl and get her to show bup. but that's it. >> you could subpoena the guest. he that's an aggressive move from the special counsel.

the president of the united states has a legal constitution move back. >> to fight night fight it and ultimately to take the fifth amendment. something we have never seen before. but never seen before is kind of the trademark of the trump ed presidency. >> a lot of people are telling the president to fire him. do you think he does. >> there is telegraphing out of white house saying the president isn't going to do this, that or the other. but none of them are in the position to know that. only donald trump knows what he is going to do. he made a tweet about sending missiles to syria. he made the decision about rejoining the tpp during

pompeo's hearings. what stops him from firing mueller? >> i don't understand why as he thinks it through it is anything other than a satisfying gesture. by the grown ups in the room he is being told this is your own nuclear option. and rosenstein will be replaced by somebody. >> you can't fire everybody. >> they are protected by the civil service. you can't fire the investigators. >> i have a partial answer to that good question. i think firing mueller himself would be a very bad idea. no up side other than immediate gratification. but firing rosenstein -- i'm not advocating this, i hope it doesn't happen. but firing rosenstein has some potential upside for the president which is you have someone else in place -- >> the solicitor general. >> the solicitor general, noele francisco who is not an expert in criminal law, more of an appellate lawyer who might be less -- more willing to put restraints on mueller.

so you wouldn't see an -- you would see a sort of slow motion curtailing of mueller's authority as opposed to a kind of nuclear get out of here bob moment. >> part of the problem is -- i understand what you are saying, but part of the problem is the mueller ship has sailed. the cohen raid was really -- if you wanted to stop him, the moment you wanted to stop him was before that. in addition, donald trump has something important to consider. if he feels that he hasn't done anything wrong among the 98 different avenues that our special prosecutor goes down then doing this makes him lack like he has something to hide. at a certain point he needs to go, you know what, you do what you are going to do, i am not going to talk to you anymore. >> doing this also would serve to build whatever obstruction case that exists with robert mueller. >> it is a lose/lose. >> all of this is hanging over his head while he is trying to deal with syria.

>> nice transition. >> bill clinton got accused of wagging the dog. we may never know, the clinton administration may have pulled back subconsciously on what they may have done because of political criticism. >> i remember those days, operation desert fox. >> we have no idea. but the fact is we know everybody is human. i'm sorry, you can't tell me it doesn't have an impact. >> i'm not sure that everybody is human. these days in washington, i don't think any of us can be sure. and that zuckerberg thing didn't give me confidence in that either. >> what's going to happen? >> i think the president is wrestling with two donald trumps. the one who appalled as a human being, is appalled by what he is seeing. and seeing it again is doubly appalling. he wants to do something. he knows that the united states is the only country that can do something. and yet he said -- just days ago he said, you know, we are almost done there. we are getting out. we have got this sort of dr. jeckyl and mr. hyde problem that

the president has and then tweets out, we thought this attack was happening last night. it didn't happen and then he says it may never happen at all. there is a challenge here. i think what the president has to do, just as a matter -- not talking about tactics but strategy. the president has got to decide okay i want to deliver more than just an empty message. for him this is a big red line moment. >> the question is, what should the objective be? right? you have got to define the objective? is it to prevent assad from ever doing this again? you have an idea how to do that, which is destroy every real estate that you can find this the country of syria. or is the objective to send a message to putin? and what does that look like? >> this is imagining -- even to ask that question is imagining a whole different president than the president we have. >> but his national security team is having these conversations, no? >> yes, but ultimately he is the decision maker and he is a decision maker who respond to the provocation of the moment and seems to me to be uniquely

and dangerously not good at, incapable of looking at the second order effects of his actions. bring us back to firing james comey. not smart. and yes, we -- he needs to be deciding what his goal is. but he is not that good at deciding what his goal is. >> and he doesn't believe in diplomacy. everyone you talk to says at the least you have to try to use some sort of incentive to get assad to the table to at least for some time stop this attack on his own people. >> i don't think that's fair. >> at this point does diplomacy work. kerry and lavrov trumpeted this we are going to get i rid of all the chemical weapons in syria. a bunch of hooha. >> he put purr onnin cho. they are both at the table. could he have put pressure on syria in order the get assad to

the table. >> i don't think that's the correct calculation with de mass cans. i think russia and iran think they are this close to putting the country mostly under their own control with hezbollah. >> turkey is helping, they are going to help the iranians because they think oh, great we can get rid of the kurds. >> that's why you can have a strategy of saying i'm out here on one day and then saying no i'm going to punish you on the next day. because that doesn't make punishment convincing. >> and i want to work with russia but russia is terrible. >> it is why syria has been the biggest application of the obama administration, and donald trump it is now yours. >> and 500,000 people are dead. that he is the end game of this whole -- >> that's the true tragedy of it all. anyway, kimberly, ruth, danielle, thank you. up ahead, the gop shuffle. now that paul ryan is on his way up. who will take up the republican

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welcome back. today in meet the mid terms both the republican and the democrat in one of the most competitive senate races in the country is calling on their own state's governor to resign. missouri's republican governor eric greitens is defiant in the wake of a report released yesterday detailing an extramarital affair but an affair with a woman who described sexual violence, blackmail and consensual and non-consensual sexual acts. he denies violence, stays the relationship was consensual and insist he is the subject of a witch-hu witch-hunt. josh howly, the most likely republican nominee againstst haskel, he called the conduct detailed in the report quote impeachable and said greitens

should resign. now look, if greitens continues to dig in it is detrimenta to the state and haskel. we will have more coming up. tell me about it. you know, it's made me think, i'm closer to my retirement days than i am my college days. hm. i'm thinking... will i have enough? should i change something? well, you're asking the right questions. i just want to know, am i gonna be okay? i know people who specialize in "am i going to be okay." i like that. you may need glasses though. yeah. schedule a complimentary goal planning session today with td ameritrade.

but their nutritional needs remain instinctual. that's why there's purina one true instinct. real meat #1. a different breed of natural nutrition. purina one true instinct. now, try new purina one true instinct treats. welcome back. house speaker pull ryan's decision to retire is not only setting off a debate over who should replace him, but when. ryan is adamant he will serve out the rest of his term, both as a member of congress and as speaker. that means jockeying for the next house republican leader would play out for another seven months with a quote lame duck officer in place. but some house republicans are already calling for ryan to let a successor take over and eliminate the uncertainty now. for instance, georgia republican congressman tom graves said quote we would have more success

if there is no am buy guity to what the leadership structure would look like. and another quote, a lame duck speaker is a challenge to the conference. it is a probable vacuum and doesn't see how it can be may be contained. other republicans are fine with waiting to deal with a divisive leadership conference until after the mid terms. why have a contentious vot now those folks ask. joining me, mark meadows the chairman of the house freedom caucus. congressman meadows, nice to see you. welcome back to the show. >> great to be back with you, chuck. thanks so much. >> i know where you stan on whether speaker ryan should stay or not. you believe he should stay the remainder of his term and the remainder of this congress. let me ask you this. is there a compromise here, you have some members wanting to know who the next leader is going to be. could you have the elections now

and they don't take over until after november? >> i don't know that's practical or what will happen, chuck. obviously it's one issue that might be discussed but i think realistically what's going to happen is the speaker tis not going to be forced out. it's going to be more policy driven hopefully getting some things done even in quote the lame duck speaker session. but what's going to happen is behind the scenes there is going to be a whole lot of negotiating and perhaps horse trading that happens to get an heir apparent. i think that's going to happen over the next two weeks not over the next seven months. >> so you think essentially what i just describe. you think there will be an unofficial -- >> well. >> -- maybe one of the two candidates we are talking about here, kevin mccarthy, steve scalise. steve scalise already said today i will never run against kevin for speaker. some people picked up the for

speaker part and thought maybe he would run against him for something else. you think it will be clear who the likely heir apparent is going to be in a couple of weeks? >> well, i think it could be. i don't necessarily believe it will be. but i do think it could be. here's the reason why i say. that even with you dissecting steve scalise's words today, you know, everybody is putting a big emphasis on may, shall, and little teeny word that normally don't have a meaning, but today they do. >> yeah. >> and i can tell you that whether it's the two individuals there or whether it's someone else that throws their hat into the ring, those discussions are already happening. if someone is willing to come on today and say they are not, they are not telling the truth. so they are happening. and at that point you know when you believe that you can get to 218 votes, i think that the decision becomes very different. now here's the interesting thing. everybody is talking about who

is going to be the speaker. you need to make sure that you are in the majority. maybe you are talking about a minority leader. i don't believe so, but, you know, for these discussions to debt too mature if you are not going to step aside and pass the baton is just a waste of time. >> and i was just going to -- let me ask you as a member of congress. do you think you can make a sound judgment between the candidate -- potential candidate to be house leader if you choose not to be one -- can you make a sound judgment before november? or do you want to see what it looks like post november before you decide whether person x has the skill set that's needed to be speaker versus person y who may have the better skill set of being a party leader for instance? >> that's a great question, chuck. i will say this. unless the new speaker is going to be a freshman member of congress coming in, the pool of people you are going to pick from are already here. so the answer is yes you can pick that today.

you can look. you can let everybody present their case on how they are going the lead the gop conference going forward. and to suggest it's going to be vastly different in november than it is in april or may is just not accurate. so. >> let me -- finish that thought. >> so as we look at this, i think there is going to be a whole lot more decisions that get made today, very quickly, as the weekend holds out. i'm sure phone calls are being made privately that will never come on and suggest to you that they are being made. >> sure. what's interesting here is you really are painting a picture of urgency here, that more is happening than maybe anybody wants to admit. let me ask you this about kevin mccarthy. the freedom caucus did not endorse him for speaker in 2015. it led to frankly his decision to step aside in favor of paul

ryan to unite the conference. has anything changed between kevin mccarthy and the freedom caucus? >> i think there has been changes between the freedom caucus and kevin mccarthy. but not just the freedom caucus. it is a broad spectrum within the conference. perhaps those that are more centrist, the leader and the majority whip are both engaging not just with our caucus but with others to try to say, you know, this is what we are all about, this is how i'm going to deliver. and i think in seeing that, you know, it bodes well for both men that have thrown their hat in the ring. but there is others that are talking about it. certainly i would be glad to come on if they throw their hat in the ring to talk about that. >> let me ask you, it sound like you will never be a candidate yet there is quite a few people that i feel like are almost taunting you to run. our friend at the "wall street journal" editorial page right now is also the time for the freedom caucus to step up.

mark meadow is never short of suggestions for the leadership. how about trying to lead. run for majority leader. show if you have the votes for a way forward that is more protective than being a critic on cable. trey gowdy didn't say you by name but it was implied. to those in congress who seem to have a better idea or a smarter strategy now is your chance the run for speaker. ball in your court, sir. >> trey and i talked all the time, about leadership positions and other positions as recent as an hour ago. i can tell you trey's comment wasn't directed at me. perhaps the "wall street journal" editorial board is. we call the "wall street journal" here on capitol hill the paul street journal. >> oh, ouch. paul referring to paul gentleman go or paul ryan? >> same difference.

i think at this particular point my message would be maybe have paul jago call me because he has never had an interview like this and maybe then he can speaking more directly about who i am and what i stand for. >> any chance you will run for a leadership post? >> really right now we are looking not at much about the penalties as about what they are going to stand for. and so as we look at that, it's about being about the people's business for the next seven or eight months, leading up to the mid terms. i'm not running for a leadership position. obviously, the freedom caucus, and if we vote as a bloch, which we probably will with a few exceptions, you know, it will be a factor in this leadership race. >> mark meadows, congressman from north carolina. head of the freedom caucus. appreciate having you on. always appreciate you coming on and sharing your views. >> thanks chuck. a programming note. house speaker paul ryan will be

my guest exclusively this sunday. we are going to discuss a lot of things, his decision to retire, the potential impact on the gop, the conservative movement, the mid terms. you name it. that's this sunday on "meet the press." coming up on "mtp daily," will president trump strike syria? if so, how? we will break down potential options and the strategy behind them next. alright, i brought in high protein to help get us moving. ...and help you feel more strength and energy in just two weeks!

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how bad the president says he is weighing a lot of options when it comes to syria. we are going the look at what those options are likely on the table now, next. if yor crohn's symptoms are holding you back,

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welcome back. the president held a meeting with his national security team this afternoon. moments ago the white house said no final decision has been made about situation in syria that comes after u.s. officials tell nbc news that blood and urine samples collected from the deadly attack in syria have tested positive for use of chemical weapons including the use of chlorine and sarin gas. officials say they have compiled evidence that the syrian government was indeed behind the attack. one year ago after another chemical attack the president fired 59 tamara hawk u.s. cruise missiles at an air field. what are the options for him now. colonel jacobs joins us now, good the see you, sir.

>> good afternoon. i want to break it down this way. it seems as if before we can figure out what the military strategy should be you have to decide what is the objective. so one would assume the objective is some form of deterrence from using chemical weapons. last year didn't work. this year, what could change? what is the deterrence? if you assume that the minimal objective for the president is to deter this action in the future, what do you do? >> i think you hit it right that the first order of question is what is the objective? you always start at the end and work backwards. otherwise you are throwing assets at something without really knowing where you are going. i think the objective last time was deterrence but it didn't work. i think the objective this time is merely punish mental. there are lots of things we could do, but all of them that would have a rolly positive effect on what happens in the future are going to have a very negative effect on the

relationship inside syria we are liable to wind you have killing russians and iranians and there will be collateral damage if we look on it -- really good targets, collateral damage among civilians in syria. start i think what we are doing to see ismerly punishment. a little bit more of the same as we saw in april. maybe more air fields. maybe two days worth of strikes instead of one. maybe more missiles. but i don't think deterrence is in the cards. we know that we can't deter them. assad has effectively won the war. the attack by chemicals just this week was on probably the last significant bastion of rebel holdings near damascus. i think we are not going the deter them at all i think it's just going to be punishment. >> you speak as if it's check mate. assad and putin and iran have won. >> i think if you talk to anybody who has taken a close look at it for a long long time they will say exactly that.

not the least significant component of that is the fact that we don't have the political will to go in there and fight not only syria but also russian and iran. we are not going to do it. danielle pletka who was on the round table today of the show of aei has written an op ed. she says you can could do this if basically you bombed all of the air fields in syria and that you could actually have a significant deterrence impact. do you buy that? >> you would have a deterrent impact on that maybe even for a while but tone forget that the collateral damage going to include people we don't want to bomb, and that is iran and russia. we certainly would like to but we are not going to be able to get away with it. no, i think we are likely to focus our attention on insignificant air fields. they will beual. it is just a demonstration that we can punish them. we are not going to be able to change things. >> well, then what is our policy

on syria? it's lost? if this is the new reality, what you are describing, which is sort of assad appeasement of some sorm, or acceptance. appeasement is a bad word there. or acceptance that assad is going to be there for a while. >> i think president trump telegraphed it just recently when he said i want to get out. and i want to get out right now. no, i think that's the objective here. we've done all we can do with isis. >> and the saudis and israelis don't want you us to live. >> the israelis have struck, the saudis are not willing to step up to the plate. the suedies are fighting a proxy war with iran. the suedies have good air force but they are not willing to do anything he will. no, nobody wants us to leave but we do want to leave. and i don't think we think we can be more effective than we have already been. >> what would it take for america to be back in thely role of this versus basically turkey,

russia and iran dictating this outcome? >> i can't think of anything reasonable in the world that's going to motivate us to commit the kind of forces the number of forces and for the duration that's necessary in order to prosecute the war in syria. we just -- we literally do not have the political will to to it. >> what's the fallout from that in your opinion? >> well, i think going to be much more difficult there for the forces of right. don't forget that both iran and russia are there for different but complimentary reasons. both of them want to have influence. russia would love to have much more influence there. but what they would really like to have is the warm water ports that are available to them in syria. and having assad on their side and supporting assad makes them -- makes it possible for them to the that. don't forget their warm water fleet is in the black sea.

they can't get to the mediterranean without the concurrence of turkey. though turkey and the united states are currently on the outs there is no guarantee turkey is going to not keep them bottled up in the black sea. iran, he have this a different motive. they are expanding their influence just to expand their influence. they want to be the controlling factors in the region. and they are doing a very good job of getting that way. >> colonel jack jacobs, thanks for shaerg your intelligence with us. up ahead our short-term memory about one of the world's greatest horrors. you wouldn't accept an incomplete job

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welcome back. on the i'm obsessed with memory. today marks holocaust remembrance day. and we were struck by a new survey indicating that memories of the holocaust are fading here in the united states. 70% of adults polled showed fewer people seemed to care about hello cost than they used to. 22% of millennials either haven't heard or aren't sure they have heard of the holocaust. that last number poses a troubling trend. knowledge of the holocaust among younger americans is particularly weak. only 66% of millennials were unable to identify auschwitz, the nassy death camp in poland. the good news in survey is that this memory loss is reversible. 93% of those surveyed said all

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time now for "the lid." a lot obviously going on. i want to dive into missouri. the governor, greitens is now facing a lot of trouble at home. a new report release by the republican-led investigation in

missouri's state house includes a woman that greitens has admit to the having an affair with. but the woman described some sexual acts that were not consensual. all allegations that of events that took place before he was governor. he is facing a trial on a charge of bribery with this woman in addition to the possibility of impeachment from the learn. greitens's called the investigation quote a witch-hunt hundred and he maintains the relationship was consensual the entire time and denied any allegations of violence and blackmail. but basically, every republican in the state of missouri is calling on the republican governor to kit. the panel is back. kimberly, ruth, and danielle. kimberly, in some ways political scandal stories like this, you know, compared to what we are dealing with these days, it seems so just sort of like, rude meantary, i guess, sort of your

traditional sex scandal, looks like someone might be lying about it. here we are. but there is the ballots for the united states senate that's in the way he here in missouri with cholera mccaskell. and it has have some fallout. >> there is. and back in the day the scandals would pop up and the person with would bow out shamefully to their spouse. now it is called a witch-hunt had, he is throwing shade at the investigators. he is taking the trump approach. he will go down but not without taking this really strong stance against the investigators. >> before i get into the -- him digging in his heels, isn't that -- isn't that actually not a stupid strategy? we move on so fast now with stories. anthony wiener, if he never resigned i believe he would still be in congress. >> i really actually don't want to think about that prospect.

i, because i am diligent and prepare for the show read the brighton record. it's like 50 shades of greitens. i'm sorry. >> did you write that down? that's clever. >> on the spot. >> wow, 50 shades of gridens, that's going to be in a missouri tabloid. >> i lived through the starr report. i've read about, i'm sorry, a lot of disgusting sexual practices in my work life. i wouldn't read this stuff in my personal life. the notion that kimberly kind of suggested, the notion that somebody can survive these kinds of disclosures is just astonishing. >> but it's the same thing, danny. there's something about now, we somehow, we don't feel -- we feel less shame. we think we do. >> those of us of a certain age remember gary hart who didn't do any 50 shades of anything. it was just a mild sort of -- >> just your vanilla affair. >> it was just your vanilla affair. and a little monkey business.

and then suddenly bill clinton thought he didn't need to resign the presidency, and it's really been downhill ever since. but i think the bigger question is less about the sordid sex details of our various political players and much more about what's happened to our political class. why is it that these men and they're mostly men, think to themselves, i have the trust of these people, i've earned it through the election, and i can just toss it away, because my libido says go for it, baby. >> male libidos, mostly male libidos -- >> sorry, chuck. >> apparently i'm going to be render the mute here. [ laughter ] >> -- have been pretty active for centuries. >> and people weighed these things and political life was something that they valued. it was something that we were able to respect. and i don't understand when this break happened, that this suddenly became some sort of game. if you could get away with it,

that was cool. >> well, but there's also the other side of it. there is people that are hoping to take people down, right? at the same time. quickly, political fall-out. claire mccaskill, is she catching a break here? this is a tough state, last time she got the gift of todd akin. this time josh holly has also called on greitens to retire. >> it's the least he could do, call for him to step down. i think if he backs the impeachment efforts, that might be enough for cover in this case, but we'll have to see. still a long time from november. >> i want to move to paul ryan. danny, paul ryan's exit, what does it say about where the conservative movement is in america? >> i think it says that a lot of serious people who believe in the power of ideas just aren't up to the viciousness and the

speed of this game anymore. it's no longer worth the price you have to pay. not just in terms of your family, but your reputation, to be the person who's fighting for the kind of values that you thought you were running for office. >> i find the coverage of ryan's exit fascinating, because i'm seeing anger from liberals and conservatives that he didn't do enough, but also praise from liberals and conservatives about his decency. i felt as if a lot of people looked to paul ryan and had a high bar for him and he never met it for anybody. is that fair? but a lot of people feel let down by paul ryan for a lot of different reasons. >> he had the worse job in america at the worst possible time. he had to deal with this completely fractious, ungovernable, ask john boehner, conference, and then he had to deal with you know who in the white house. >> pretty bad hand. >> a bad hand he was dealt with.

and i have to say, and i say this as somebody who knew paul ryan before he was paul ryan, i can't say he played it in the most admirable way. his failure to stand up to some of the president's worst excesses was really disappointing. he stood up to some but not enough. >> and keep in mind, he's stepping down because democrats are probably going to win the house. he's not doing some big admirable thing. i don't doubt he wants to spend more time with his family, but the political reality -- >> i think both things can be true. [ all speak at once ] >> if you're getting no joy in your work life, you pang for your private life. >> and if you're about to lose that job. >> congress at the end of the day is not the place to be anymore. because congress doesn't get stuff done. >> he's really frustrated. >> he got his tax bill. >> well, that wasn't his tax bill. >> i know people who have more influence showing up on tv than being a united states senator. i fear that they might be right. i don't think that's a good

place to be. thank you both very much. don't forget, you can now get even more of the lid, "meet the press" has a new audio briefing for you, it's called the lid. we break down the top campaign story of the day. the lid is available every weekday afternoon on your amazon, alexa-enabled devices or as a free podcast. so go get it. we'll be right back.

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in case you missed it, mark zuckerberg's two days of testimony on capitol hill has sparked a lot of questions. how do you protect user privacy in the evergrowing digital sphere? what is the role of a social media company in securing your information? but here's the question that had all of us talking. can you still poke somebody on facebook? i'd like a fire poker sometimes. what is that, you say? have you forgotten about the facebook poke? it was a big thing back when the site launched back in the mid oughts. since then, it's gone the way of my space, the microsoft zoom and the weird tama gachy things, i guess they were pets. casted in the heap of discarded technology. but the "mtp daily" team did the heavy lifting and found out through investigative journalism, poke is still there. hiding on the facebook profile page behind those three dots in the upper right corner. poke. not pokey. that facebook feature has yet to be rolled out.

will you get on it, zuckerberg? so you can still poke people on facebook, but the question remains, as it did from the very beginning, should you? that's all for tonight. we'll be back for tomorrow with more "mtp daily." "the beat" starts right now. ♪ good evening, i'm ali velshi in tonight for ari. we have breaking news. in a moment, i'll take to a reporter who has read james comey's entire tell-all book, not due to be published until tuesday. the details are scathing and they are sure to anger donald trump. according to the associated press, the former fbi director says trump was unethical and untethered to the truth. it also appears that trump's effort to secure comey's loyalty began before the inauguration when he and other top intelligence officials visited trump tower. comey reportedly writes that to him the demand was like sammy the bull's