al sharpton and sq"politics yn nation." good evening. and welcome to "politicsnation." live from atlanta, georgia. tonight's lead, better to have a few rats than to be one. that's not mine, folks, but a direct quote from the "baltimore sun's" editorial page today. criticizing president trump a day after he tweeted insult after racist insult against the baltimore district represented by senior democratic congressman elijah cummings. calling it, among many things, a, quote, disgusting rat and rodent-infested mess where no human being would want to learn. and just a few hours ago, he followed it up with maximum irony by calling cummings a

racist. the beef stems largely from cummings' criticism of this administration's border policy and treatment of detained migrants, but unsurprisingly, the president never bothered to familiarize himself with the specifics of cummings' middle-class district, only his assumption that because it's baltimore and just barely a majority black district, it must be, of course, broken. add a black opponent in cummings and you have a president with nothing to fear from his base. most of which endorses the racial rhetoric or from his party which looks the other way. it's why trump has kept up his attacks for a dna aay and half. even as the city of baltimore, even as the city of baltimore 2020 candidates, and even barack obama, have chimed in with the former president tweeting a link

to an op-ped criticizing trump's, quote, poisoning our democracy, written by more than 100 black staffers who worked in the obama administration. by this morning, it was up to white house chief of staff mick mulvaney, to justify the president's latest attacks, specifically against an elected official of color. he didn't. >> i think it's right for the president to raise the issue of, look, i was in congress for six years. if i had poverty in my district like they have in baltimore, if i had crime in my district like they have in chicago, if i had homelessness in my district like they have in san francisco and i spent all of my time in washington, d.c., chasing down this mueller investigation, this bizarre impeachment crusade, i'd get fired and i think the president is right to raise that. it has absolutely zero to do with race. >> joining me now, two strategists, michael steele on

the republican side, and joe payne on the democratic side. michael, let me go to you first. how does the president and his chief of staff justify such a blatant, dehumanizing, racist, rant against a district which is basically middle class? barely a majority black. because the representative of that district chairs the oversight committee and has to deal with a plethora of issues, including the things that are a concern to many people of color around the country, but also would deal with oversight situations such as whether russians are interfering with our elections and such as other items that makes the president uncomfortable, if not outright unethical. >> sure. i think we could all crack one open and have a discussion of the merits of charm city.

two things are going on here. one, the president doesn't like oversight. he doesn't believe that congress has a constitutional role to hold him accountable when he and his administration break the rules. there's also the fact that his path to re-election lies in exacerbating the divide between urban and rural america. he needs an overperformance among older, whiter, more rural voters in order to win those states in the upper midwest that constitute his very narrow path to election in the first place, and so exacerbating that divide including with -- with this racial language is going to be part of the playbook. >> so, in other words, joel, play the race card. since you don't like the oversights, since you don't like to be investigated when there's clear evidence that we saw in the mueller report this week of russian interference with the election and continuing. since the mueller report also said they did not exonerate this president from obstruction of

justice. play the race card. >> well, rev, that's what he knows and that's what he's been doing his entire life. okay? i mean, we've talked about this. i worked for the hillary clinton campaign. we cut a number of ads. we put out a lot of warnings about this. telling people that this is who he is at his core. he's demonstrated this over and over again, whether it's being sued for housing discrimination. you know very well some of the other issues in new york with the central park five. and issue after issue where donald trump has shown us to be who he is. here's the difference that stands out to me at this moment. you know, normally, you know, these attitudes have always existed in politics, frankly, not just republican politics. they've existed all over the political spectrum. butst usually from an adviser who's nameless like lee atwater or jesse helms or george wallace. it's usually not the person occupying the white house. even when ronald reagan talked about welfare queens, he wasn't the president yet. he was a candidate in 197 f.

in the modern era, i don't know if we've had a president that uses race as a weapon like this president uses race as a weapon and i think it's all in an effort to supercharge his base. i just don't know if that's going to work because, yes, he is going to exercise and he's going to exacerbate a lot of republican voters, the folks that michael's talking about. he's also going to push away a lot of moderates. a lot of swing voters. a lot of people who don't like this, don't feel comfortable being associated with this, so while i think this is the president's gut visceral reaction, as a political strategy, i don't know if it's going to work. >> well, we also are looking at, michael, beyond the political, is what does the country stand for? and i think that a lot of people that are independent voters and voters on both sides are saying, wait a minute, are we talking about the president of the united states, the sitting president, saying the things

like "infested", saying no human being wants to live in a certain district? i mean, this is ugly. this is racist. and you may pick up some votes from people that don't share the values of trying to have one nation that has fairness, but at the same time, you are representing what this country's supposed to stand for as president and the republican leadership seems to have laryngitis in responding and denouncing this. >> the moral dimension is a certain extent above my pay grade. from a political point of view, this is a very dangerous strategy. the president has one election left. he an has to run again for re-election in 2020. that's why he is only focused on those handful of voters in a handful of states. i worry as someone who wants to see more republicans elected across the country for many elections to come that this will damage and poison the entire

brand and that's why you see so many republican elected officials recognizing the president's popularity but at the same time failing to echo a lot of the rhetoric that he's using because it makes sense politically for him in the short term but not for the long-term growth of the party. >> rev, can i add something? >> not echoing -- not echoing is one thing, but to be silent in the face of blatant racism is another. let me let you in this, joel, because as i said, i'm here in atlanta where dr. martin luther king and mrs. king are buried, where people like reverend joseph lowery who made tremendous sacrifices to move this country forward, still live, and i can't help but riding through the street of atlanta thinking about the price paid by those that a generation or two ahead of me and those of us that are working in national civil rights circles now, where we are seeing a president saying, i don't even care about my party, i'm going to use race and no one in the party's going to stand up to me. >> you know, rev, i'm so glad

you brought that up. you know, my family is based in the atlanta area originally, and many of them grew up in the jim crow south, obviously. my mother, just one generation from me, grew up in the jim crow south where her school was the first integrated school district in her area. these are very personal issues, and this president speaks with the casual racism of bull connor. okay? that's what this guy sounds like. he doesn't sound like somebody who wants to unite who wants to bring people together. you know, just from a political standpoint, usually around this time in a presidency, this is when a president is thinking about how do i reach out, if i'm barack obama, how do i want to cut deficit spending so i can reach out? if i'm george w. bush, i want to talk about hiv in africa, so on, so forth. this president has no interest in uniting and, tank frankly, m be the only modern president who has no agenda to reach out to the half of the country who

didn't vote for him. >> michael, in my life, in my work, i opposed a lot of republican policies but i never heard a sitting president use this kind of language even though as joel said i've known donald trump, have marched on him, for him, for decades, but as president you would assume that the nation would rebel, at least in rhetoric, when he comes with this kind of blatant kind of racism. what happened to those in the party? i remember as a kid growing up in new york, jacob javitz and others would fight for the civil rights act. even everett dirksen. here you have even george bush and others that we oppose never use this kind of language. here we have blatant, raw, racism and no crickets from the republican party. >> i think that the party of lincoln has a record to be proud on on many of these issues and i think that it is disappointing. it is shameful that there is so

little rebuke of the president and these unfortunate remarks, these remarks that echo a hateful past that has no place in our present or future. >> do you think, joel, that this will energize many people that were independent voters that voted for barack obama and then turned around and voted for donald trump, which gave him a margin of victory in some states that were close and the fact that you don't even have the third-party candidates. as a political strategy, i don't even see how that works unless he's assuming that americans will go along with this kind of ugliness. i mean, we're talking about one week it's the squad. a month before, it's calling african nations s-hole countries and haiti, calling the people in charlottesville, people that are marching to preserve a confederate statue of a man guilty of treason, all of these things counting up, do they

really feel that the majority of american people will go for that? i think it will be a sad referendum if they do. >> i've got more faith in my fellow countrymen than that, rev. i think you do. frankly, i think michael does as well. you know, rev, you talk about all of those issues and if you're someone who was going to the ballot box to vote in 18 months, i can't imagine that you're not carrying all of the things of the last 2 1/2 years. charlottesville, this ugly episode, the go back comments. how do you not bring all of things into the voting booth with you? i don't care if you voted for barack obama and you voted for donald trump. i don't care about economic anxiety. what we saw in north carolina two weeks ago, that wasn't economic anxiety. that was a crowd that was ready to march on four women who looked different, talked different, worshipped different, than they did. so i don't know how you do not carry all of these emotions and all of these ugly thoughts that the president has stirred up, i

don't know how you don't carry that with you into the voting booth. >> we're not talking about an isolated comment here, michael. we're talking about a president that started his political rise with birtherism saying that president obama was not one of us, that's basically what he was saying. and he wasn't american. all the way to now telling four women of color elected to the u.s. congress, go back to where you come from, even though three of them were born here. but when you look at him calling baltimore a place that no human being would want to live, maybe he meant go back to where you come from because he sees areas of color where the people of color are the majority of the districts, he sees them as infested. >> well, reverenreverend, as yo being a new yorker the president's rhetoric on these issues has been hateful and divisive long before he discovered birtherism as a national issue. he played this role on the stage in new york for decades. i think we all need to report

that the moral ark of the universe continues to bend toward justice. it zigs and zags. we're enduring one of the more unfortunate valleys in our recent history when it comes to these issues. >> well, we are going to have to keep that bending toward justice. we'll have more with michael and joel later in the show. coming up, just two days away from the second democratic presidential debate. we'll talk to a joe biden surrogate. atlanta mayor tesha lan lancebottoms. that's next. this is "politicsnation." snatio. that's one of thousands of prizes in the shell great gas giveaway! fuel rewards members are automatically entered when they fill up at shell. - i like to plan my activities before i take trip, so by the time i get there i can just enjoy the ride. with tripadvisor, it's easy to discover over 100,000 bookable things to do, from walking tours in rome to wine tastings in tuscany,

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1994 crime bill, we had a gigantic epidemic of america in violence particularly if african-american communities. now, jesse and i disagreed a little bit in this. my community, the notion was it was overwhelmingly supported. it was supported by the black caucus and the united states senate by in large. >> some members. >> some. majority supported it. a majority supported it. and black mayors supported it. >> former vice president joe biden at the naacp convention in detroit wednesday defending his role in writing the 1994 crime bill a day after rolling out his first campaign proposal on criminal justice reform. his plan would reverse many of the provisions in the law he helped author, but he continues to face criticism from democratic 2020 contender senator cory booker over his

past positions even as biden maintains a major lead in the polls with black voters. joining me now is an elected official who has already endorsed joe biden for president. atlanta mayor keisha lance-bottom. thank you for coming on, mayor bottoms. let me ask you, i remember at the first debates that you, that day, had come out that you endorsed joe biden and i sat right behind you and his wife as you sat there that night of the first debates. first of all, why have you endorsed joe biden? >> i know joe, and by that, i mean we know what joe biden stands for. we have a long history with joe biden in the african-american community. eight years as a part of the most progressive administration in the history of this country, and he's always been a champion for our communities. he's been a champion for unions. he's been a champion for african-americans, for gay and

lesbian rights. i think that it's important as we go into this election where so much is uncertain in this country that we go in with the strongest candidate possible with the best possibility of beating donald trump. and it's joe biden. >> now, he has gotten a lot of flak from people like me around the '94 crime bill in '94. he is correct when he says that many members of the congressional black caucus and mayors supported it, but some of us did not even march during it. and he has, in fairness, come to national action network's breast fa breakfastonal action netw in ja there were things that happened that were wrong as a result. doesn't he have to deal with this issue forthright that there have been many people incarcerated for inordinate amount of times because of that bill that he helped to write and bill clinton campioned? >> reverend al, you're a very

wise man. you recognize the flaws in 1994. i think the great part that we're dealing with joe biden right now is he's saying there were some failures that were part of the 1994 crime bill. the last time i was on your show, i shared with you my personal story, my father major lance's incarceration. my father was sentenced in 1978 under state law for 10 years for first-time conviction of selling cocaine. and so the issues that we have with mass incarceration in this country don't solely lie and rest upon the 1994 crime bill. in fact, mandatory minimums were instituted under the reagan administration in 1986. and over 90% of those in prison under mandatory minimums in this country right now are under state charges and so while there have been flaws in the 1994 crime bill, i go back to what maya angelou often said, you did ten what you knew to do and when

you know better, you do better. those flaws have been recognized. when i look at this policy that vice president biden has put out, i am confident that he is the one to get criminal justice reform right in this country. and what i like most about this policy, he listen. we sat down and had a conversation about what we're facing if atlanta, what our challenges are, what we need help with. when i saw the rollout of that policy, i saw a candidate who didn't just come to the table with what he thought should be done, but he had care and concern for what our communities needed and what we need in our cities to help especially people of color overcome this issue of mass incarceration. >> the most recent poll about black democratic primary voters shows a massive lead for former vice president biden with kamala harris a distant second. so it seems that at this point, he has that support or at least in the polls of black voters.

do you think the motivation of many voters, particularly blacks, but even non blacks, that they are looking for who can defeat donald trump, especially in this wave of such blatant racism that is spewing out of the president's mouth and his fingers when he's tweeting? >> i absolutely believe that. i think that people are afraid. i think that families are full of anxiety. i know that my family is. even in talking with my teenager and my young children, donald trump has this country in a state that we've never been in before. and that's why i think it is extremely important that when we go into 2020, into november 2020, we don't take a candidate in that general election limping in the way that we did with hillary clinton. and i think that when you look at joe biden, you look at where he is doing well, you look at wisconsin and michigan and pennsylvania and even ohio and

these states that we will need to carry, i belief ve he can cay georgia and north carolina. we have to have a strong candidate going into november of 2020 and that's part of the reason that i endorse early because i have a lot of respect in regard for many of the candidates but i know joe biden is our best opportunity to beat donald trump in november. >> now, as i stated, you and i were front-row seats at the last debate and joe biden just didn't do well. do you have any kind of indication of what he plans to do in the second round coming this week? if he's attacked, if he's confronted, will he fight back? he's already exchanged various comments between he and senator booker. are we going to see joe biden be more aggressive or is he going

to remain as he said earlier in the campaign, i'm not going to fight with my opponents? what can we expect? what can you share with us is joe biden's strategy for this coming week? >> i believe you will see a more aggressive joe biden on the stage. i think that joe biden is a statesman, and that's what you saw in the first debate, but i also think that it's important we talk about the circular firing squad, that when you look at the candidates who are vying to be the nominee, this is about us going in strong into november of 2020. and i think that the more we tear each other down with policies and with positions that just aren't grounded in fact and in truth, then i think we're doing danger to the entire party as a whole into this country as a whole. so joe biden is able to defend himself. joe biden is able to speak eloquently about his record. what i would caution people to remember, though, this is 30

seconds/60 seconds. it's great to win a debate, but we want the election won in november of 2020, and i care far more about the election than i do a debate performance. >> but you're not suggesting that he's the only candidate that can beat donald trump because the same polls, though they have biden, the last poll i've seen, beating trump by ten points, you have others that are tied or only one point behind trump according to the polls which is really a dead heat. you're not suggesting that he's the only one that could beat donald trump of the 25 candidates running? >> i am suggesting that he is our best bet to beat donald trump. when i look at all of the other candidates, i don't see any other candidate who can win ohio, who can win michigan, who can win wisconsin, who can win pennsylvania, who can even win georgia, who can win north carolina. i don't see that with any other candidate, and i have a great deal of respect and regard and a

personal relationship and admiration for many of the candidates who are running, but i don't think that they can carry the states that we need to carry in order to beat donald trump in november of 2020. >> all right. i'll have to leave it there. thank you, mayor keisha lance bottoms. >> thank you. >> for being with us. coming up, presidential candidate andrew yang on his preparations for the upcoming debate. be right back. this is the story of john smith. not this john smith or this john smith. or any of the other hundreds of john smiths that are humana medicare advantage members. no, it's this john smith, who met with humana to create a personalized care plan.

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a reminder that tonight award-winning journalist katy tur and jacob soboroff team up for an all-new msnbc docuseries, "american swamp." the four-part series dives deep into the murkiest areas of american politics, everything from president trump's business ties to the way money impacts our election. catch the premiere episode tonight at 9:00 p.m. eastern only on msnbc. and tonight at 7:00 p.m., the latest on dan coats stepping down as the director of national

intelligence. plus, dnc chairman tom perez joins kasie hunt live ahead of the second democratic debate. when we come back, presidential candidate andrew yang joins us. be right back. t a button. ♪ that a speaker is just a speaker. ♪ or - that the journey can't be the destination. most people haven't driven a lincoln. discover the lincoln approach to craftsmanship at the lincoln summer invitation. right now, get 0% apr on all 2019 lincoln vehicles plus no payments for up to 90 days. only at your lincoln dealer.

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in just two days, 20 of the democratic presidential candidates will face off again at the second primary debate of

the 2020 election season. this time, the candidates will take the stage in detroit where on tuesday evening senators bernie sanders and elizabeth warren will compete to represent the progressive base and on wednesday, eyes will be on senators kamala harris, cory booker and former vice president joe biden after their recent face-offs over racial issues. of course, that's five candidates out of 20. for most of the other 15 who made the cut, this week will be about getting the right kind of attention they need to stay relevant. joining me now, presidential candidate andrew yang. he is the founder and ceo for venture for america. mr. yang, what is your strategy for the debates, the second d debates, that will take place tuesday and wednesday in detroit? >> well, my strategy is to continue to introduce myself to

the american people. i spent seven years helping create hundreds of jobs in detroit. it's going to be great to be back there. my plan, the freedom diffidevid would put almost $500 million every sickngle month into the hands of detroit residesidences families and that's a move we need to make to rebuild communities across the country. >> how would it put $500 million in their hands? >> my plan, the freedom dividend, as you know, would put $ $1,000 a month to every american adult and would hundreds of millions of dollars into the hands of detroit residents. i've spent so much time in detroit and most of the citizens there are still struggling in the wake of the automation and the elimination of millions of manufacturing jobs in michigan, and so we need to put more of the gains from the 21st century economy directly into their hands and the hands of their families so they can actually try to rebuild. >> but after they get $1,000 each, and you certainly got some

attention saying that, then what? i mean, how far can someone go with just a thousand dollars coming at first? where do we go from there? what will be the way you would alter the economy that it would make it fair? when we see that we are in pretty good economic times but blacks are still doubly unemployed to whites. how would we deal with the race gap beyond just giving everybody $ $1,000? >> well, if you think about what $1,000 a month would mean in the hand of every adult, that might be $24,000 in a household with 2 adults. $36,000 if you had an adult child. so this money would not only go into the individuals' hands, but it would supercharge religious organizations, non-profits, community organizations. it would make it so our economy actually revolves around our needs and values. one of the things i like to talk about, if you see someone who's struggling and homeless on the street, right now what is the

incentive to help pick that person up? right now that incentive is essentially zero. if you know that person's now getting $1,000 a month, all of a sudden the incentive to help that person get on their feet, $12,000 a year, this would be a huge game changer for millions of american families, and this is just the beginning. this is the foundation we have to lay and then start building on top of it in terms of the organizations, the opportunities that can help give every american a path forward. >> but even we accept that, and that's another question, but even if we accept that, how does it close the inequality problem? if everyone is getting $24,000 a year, those that are up still remain up with their -- and they just get $24,000. and those that are down still remain down proportionately with $24,000. how do we bring about more of equality and opportunity? >> well, rev, $24,000 in the hands of someone who's starting with a lower base actually is a

huge leg up. if you were to give jeff bezos $is,0 $1,000 a month, he might not notice. in a community that's struggling, $1,000 a month would help get the boot off your throat, car repairs are an inconvenience instead of a major crisis. $12,000 a year goes much, much further in certain communities that have lower access to opportunities. and martin luther king championed this very idea. he called it the guaranteed minimum income in his 1967 book, "chaos or community." this is what he was fighting for when he was assassinated in 1968. to me, it's a strategy that it's 50 years later and for whatever reason, we've forgotten the central mission that he was fighting for on the day he was assassinated. >> you know, that was his book, "where do we go from here: chaos or community," he also talked about enforcing laws where people couldn't discriminate, where opportunities are made available. not just giving money but also

changing the economic imperatives that has generated this inequality. and i'm asking you, beyond the money, how do you propose that we change the institutional inequality that has set in in this country? what is your plan for that? >> so my plan, and i completely agree with you that the money is just the beginning. what we have to do is we have to rewrite the rules of our economy so that it actually works for our health and wellbeing and what you said just now, we're at record high gdp, record high stock market prices. you know what else we're at record highs of? anxiety, depression, substance abuse, drug overdoses, suicides. this economy is sick. and gdp and stock market prices have no meaning to the vast majority of americans at this point. so my plan as president is to make it so that the actual measurements of the economy are our health, our mental health and freedom from substance abuse, how clean our air and water are, how we're doing.

and if you make those the actual measurements of the economy, then anything that makes us stronger and healthier, anything that makes our kids more successful, that's actually economic progress and then we'd see just how badly so many americans are doing and we can make those changes. we have to get the measurements right. if we continue to follow gdp, we're going to follow gdp off a cliff. >> what about criminal justice? there are those that are doing well that are still subjected to an unequal and unfair criminal justice. how would you handle that? >> i couldn't agree more. i would get rid of private prisons. it makes no sense to have prisons that actually profit from shoddy treatment of inmates or high recidivism rates. i'd pardon anyone in jail for a nonviolent marijuanmarijuana-re offen offense. most of those people are going to be african-american. get rid of the punitive cash bail system, throwing people in jail to be crime and should not

be a crime to be poor in the united states. we need to go in and try to address the problems in our criminal justice system one by one. certainly putting money into people's hands, imagine if you came out of prison and were getting $is,000 a month. people would be excited to see you in a new way then your incentive to stay out of criminal activities would be much, much higher because you know it's like, hey, i'm getting $1,000 a month thanks to president yang, things have changed a lot since i went in. >> all right. thank you very much for being with us, andrew yang. we'll be watching you this week in the debates. >> i feel cheated, man. i thought we were going to see each other inner. you're in atlanta. >> i'll be in detroit for the debates. we'll see each other. >> see you this week then, rev. up next, our political strategy on the keys for success in the upcoming primary debates. be right back. all money managers might seem the same, but some give their clients cookie cutter portfolios. fisher investments tailors portfolios

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can break through the noise and deliver a clear and convincing message to voters. back with me to break it all down, two political strategists. republican michael steele and democrat joel payne. let's go to you first, joel. what do democrats that are trying to break through, whether they're on what is called the top tier or lower tier, what do they need to do on this coming week in the debates? >> well, i think all of these candidates are focused, depending on where you are, you're on a couple things. if you're joe biden, an elizabeth warren, a kamala harris, it's about maintaining your momentum or about padding your lead and that means trying to avoid getting dragged down into fights. these candidates are going to have to defend themselves but they're not going to want to provoke controversies most likely. if you're a mid-tier candidate like a cory booker, a pete buttigieg, someone like that, who's maybe a step below the top tier, you're looking for

opportunities to draw distinctions, but you're also looking to demonstrate that you can -- you can be a viable alternative to donald trump. you know, what we're seeing is that joe biden is rating very well as the number-one democrat who can combat the president. some of these other candidates want to show that they can do that as well. and, you know, just a broader theme here that i'm seeing, rev, is that i think there's a lot -- a subplot of this round of debates is going to be there are a lot of small brush fires that are going to be building up. whether it's kamala harris and joe biden, obviously, round two from there. it looks like tulsi gabbard's going to attack kamala harris. cory booker's talking about going after joe biden. we've even got beto o'rourke going after pete buttigieg. and on and on. it feels like there's a series of undercard fights belying the entire debate. which could make for some interesting theater, particularly on night two when you've got booker and harris who are probably going to try to draw contrasts with biden. it will be interesting to see how that plays out.

>> what will republicans, and more specifically, the trump campaign, be looking at, michael steele? and what will cause them to be nervous or comfortable? steel, and what will cause them to be nervous or comfortable? >> i think they're looking for the biggest food fight possible. they will be gleeful if these candidates start going after each other. they want to see a messy primary fight. they want to see a wounded democratic nominee emerge from that wound. and frankly they want to see the left most, most politically unacceptable opponent as possible to face the president in the fall. >> now let's take a look at the two recent polls. biden is still at the top of the list of democratic candidates. sanders in second place and kamala harris in fourth. the same poll shows biden ten points ahead in a head to head matchup against trump and sanders. also polls higher than the

president. what does this say about the american electorate according to these polls, michael, and does this make biden and even possibly sanders the ones they're going to be watching carefully on tuesday and wednesday night? and the fact there are others that are close to tieing him, whether they can in some way build more momentum to be the candidate that can say electability is something that i, according to the polls, can also achieve? >> i think that the name identification that the former vice president and senator sanders have is a huge advantage in these early polls. a lot of this is just who do voters know, and do they have a positive perception of them or as the alternative to secretary clinton who obviously went down in defeat to president trump and disappointed a lot of americans in doing so. what i think they're focussed on

is the top tier you identified earlier. harris, potentially mayor pete buttigieg, elizabeth warren, the candidates who have a legitimate chance of beating the democratic nominee and seen as unacceptable by the largest number of american people as possible, getting pushed as far to the left, gutting pushed to take positions that will be hard to uphold in the general election. >> joe, how do we see candidates distinguish themselves? because you talked about the kind of brush fire fights. how do they distinguish themselves without engaging in political cannibalism and this kind of ugly fight that michael said would only be to the pleasure and political assistance of the president? how do you do that? how do you thread that needle? >> well, i think the term is counter punching, right? it's being ready to respond when you are attacked. you know, this is actually

somewhat of an enviable position for joe biden. he knows he is going to get attacked. he's going to get attacked by corey booker on criminal justice reform. he will get attacked by kamala harris on similar issues, some of the progressives on being too moderate. so he knows where they're coming from and he actually -- i think he's got a chance now, now that he sees what they will come after him with, he has a stance to be ready. if you are someone like joe biden, what you need to do is show you can find and fight. we throw around that term electability a lot. that means you can really beat donald trump. in order to beat donald trump, you also have to be able to take on ongoing from your contenders. i remember there were two very consequential debhats, the october debate in 2007 when obama and john edwards teamed up on hillary clinton and really

created some negative back spin which benefitted then senator obama. four months later they kind of did the same thing in new hampshire and it backfired on them. the entire idea of drawing those contrasts can work to your advantage sometimes and work against you at other times. it depends on how the elector rat is socializing the election. >> thank you, michael and joe. up next, my final thoughts. with all day comfort for all day fun... depend® fit-flex underwear features maximum absorbency, ultra soft fabric and new beautiful designs for your best comfort and protection guaranteed. life's better when you're in it. be there with depend®. that's ensure max protein, with high protein and 1 gram sugar. it's a sit-up, banana! bend at the waist! i'm tryin'! keep it up. you'll get there. whoa-hoa-hoa! 30 grams of protein, and one gram of sugar. ensure max protein. woman: (on phone) discover. hi. do you have a travel card? yep. our miles card. earn unlimited 1.5 miles and we'll match it at the end of your first year.

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there is a misconception that many are trying to sell, that those of us in this time of racial acrimony incited in large part by the president himself are the ones that don't love or care about the nation. the fact of the matter is those that stand up for civil rights and voting rights and gender rights and lgbtq rights and immigration rights are the ones that do care about the country. i was sent a very significant quote by the godfather of the civil rights movement, the co-founder. and reverence lowry said this statement, that true patriotism doesn't mean "love it or leave it." true patriotism means you love your country so much you won't leave it alone until it lives up

to its values of justice for all. it's like anyone watching me that's a parent. the parent that loves their children or loves a child they brought into this world is the one that corrections them and that keeps nurturing them to do what is right and stand for what's right and to think and behave in a way that will give them long and fruitful life. excusing the weaknesses, the low values, the lack of ethics and appearing to be mean spirited is not how you build a strong country or sustain it. it is those that understand that how the world looks at us and how we look at ourselves is the only way that you will sustain a country and keep it strong and keep it viable. those are the patriots. they love america. they will be the ones that will make america become as great as it could be, those that want to

go for cheap racial divisions and for easy ways out of pitting people against each other are the ones that really don't love the country. that does it for me. thanks for watching. i'll see you back here next saturday 5:00 p.m. eastern. up next "meet the press" with chuck todd. this sunday after mueller, the impeachment debate. democrats try to get robert mueller to make the case against president trump. >> does that say there was no obstruction? >> no. >> what about total exoneration? did you actually totally exonerate the president? >> no. >> your investigation is not a witch hunt, is it? >> it is not. >> while republicans seek to discredit the investigation. >> when people associated with trump lie, you threw the book at them. when christopher steele lied, nothing. >> i find those facts in this entire process un-american. >> now democrats today opening impeachment