for them. >> all right. thank you very much. >> thank you. >> we're going to be reading axios am in a bit. you can sign up for the newsletter at sign hundred.axios.com. >> that does it for us this morning. "morning joe" starts right now. ♪ ♪ green acres is the place to be ♪ >> the united states whole heartily condemns iran's attack on the kingdom of saudi arabia. >> this was the largest audience to ever witness an inauguration, period. ♪ >> okay. yes. >> wow. >> yes! >> wow. >> yes! oh my gosh. the spicer sound machine explodes on tv.

gloria es ta fan, just give up. you have been replaced. mika, everybody's talking about spicer, no doubt about it, right? >> yes. >> but, you have even bigger news coming from the world. >> yes. >> of dancing with the stars. >> if you can believe it, poor christie brinkley broke her wrist. but thank god her daughter saler is going to step in for her. >> sailer will step in. she's going to step in, of course we're all thinking about christie brinkley right now and spicer, the spicy sound machine. it is -- >> well, if you're going to do it go all in. go big or go home. >> go big or go home. >> i'm impressed. >> i haven't seen it yet because i figured we were going to talk about it. i wanted to see it with fresh eyes. the shirt, pants, the moves, the bongos, all of it. but when you stack it up next to

the rick perry, rick perry is still the king to me of dancing with the stars. a game effort last night by the former press secretary of the white house, sean spicer. >> if you're going to go, go all in. and that he did. >> that's what he did, i have to say. >> all right. good morning. >> sources tell me, mika, he finished second to last, so he may not be around for a long time on the show so just let's enjoy it here this morning. >> it's all heart. >> no justice. >> all right. welcome to "morning joe," if you can recover from that, it's tuesday, september seven teen17. we have mike barn nick will. >> i'm waiting for mike. >> we'll wear the same outfit. i'll look like a human lime green -- [ laughter ] >> his partner will be an emt for the show. >> just something i don't want to see at all.

former aide to the george w. bush state house elise jordan. and editor for the "washington post," eugene robin skblon yson >> it was beautiful. it's like that last scene in raiders of the last ark where the guy goes it's beautiful before his face melts off. willie, tell us, what was it like seeing mo rivera yesterday, the sand manman in the white ho >> it was interesting to see the sandman played in the white house. listen, he's one of the greatest players who ever lived pettigrew up in a little fishing village in panama, learned thousand play

baseball by taping fishing nets together. he was recruited a tiny guy, 155 pounds, but had he this pitch, the cutter, this one pitch that nobody could touch. as a yankee fan we knew that the game was eight innings long, maybe seven if you needed it because once you got ra,ivera i the bull pen, everybody knew the game was over the he is the greatest closer of all time. it's it was really cool yesterday. >> and mike barnicle, the only guy inducted in the hall of fame in a unanimous vote. >> deservedly so. mariano rivera is one the nicest human beings even those he's an kmalt exalted baseball player. what a truly good guy he is, in the spring of the 2005 at the

red sox opening game after they came well behind three games down in the championship series the prior october and the fellow by the name of bill miller. >> i remember that. >> he got a great pinch-hit scoring single from rivera. when he came out from the pen, the crowd started applauding him in jest and he took off his cap, smiled, and waved to the crowd. there's a good guy. >> a good guy. all right. we're going to get to news and politics. elizabeth warren saecemented he position against government corruption in a speech in new york city where they urged democrats to embrace her call for fundamental change. >> what has this corrupt business as usual gotten us? the extension of one species after another as the earth heats up. children slaughtered by assault weapons. the highest levels of inequality in a secentury.

>> wages that barely budge, shrinking opportunities for the next generation and the one after that and the one after that the 'the american people get it and they are sick of it. >> so warren spoke in washington square park near the side of the triangle shirt way factory fire of 1911 which due to corrupt working practices killed 146 garment workers, most of them women and immigrants. according to the "new york times," the new york city department of parks and recreation expected between 8,000 and 10,000 people to attend last night's speech. however, warren's campaign says the crowd exceeded 20,000. though that estimate could not be independently verified, warren spent about four hours after the speech taking selfies with the crowd. there is, you know, a growing narrative here about the size of

her crowds which are rivaling some of the trump rallies we've seen. >> donald trump always talks about his crowds, these were the type of crowds that he -- 4,000, 5,000 in new hampshire before the new hampshire primary, he was very proud of that. he's proud of -- you know, he's had big crowds, 20,000, 25,000. but donald trump is a showman. no doubt about it. regardless whether you love him, whether you hate him, he puts on a show for people, that's what draws them. we talked about it before. it's elvis in '77. he sings the greatest hits. it's a happening event. elizabeth warren is drawing these crowds talking about policy. >> right. >> talking about the legislation

she'll put in place. it is, in fact, even more fascinating, even more remarkable that a woman who is -- she's not a show person. she's there talking policy. >> she's a proffessor. >> she's a professor and she's drying thooeds these sorts of crowds. >> she's inspiring people and exciting people in a way that, as you say, donald trump did four years ago, still does at his rallies, in a way that joe biden doesn't out on the campaign trail. that's not a knock on joe biden it's a fact if you go to his rallies they're not like that. she's doing it in a way that bernie sanders did four years ago and still does to some extent today. she's firing people up and it's with policy and ideas. mike was actually down there last night. the crowd probably bigger than they even said. but what was it like to be in the crowd? >> first of all, the crowd was enormous boit thi

enormous. i would go with the towards 20,000 people. the interesting thing about the crowd is that opposed to the trump crowds, the trump crowds you go to a trump rally and people are having a good time because he's an entertainer, he's skillful at that, she's a showman. but in his speeches and what he tells the crowd, there's an edge of anger and resentment in the crowd in response to what he says. the warren rally last night and most warren rallies are bent on policy and they're bent on the future, on your future and what we want to do with this country. there is one interesting element to the warren crowds and the warren campaign and it was mentioned yesterday here on this set by senator gary peters of michigan when i asked him off camera, unfortunately, how would the warren campaign go in michigan? he said it would go pretty well except for one caveat. he said the united auto workers

have a gold standard for healthcare policies and anyone telling them that the government is going to take over your healthcare policy, medicare for all, they're going to be met with some recent zblent there's a line her speeches that directed at joe biden. she said again we can't choose a candidate we don't believe in just because we're scared do anything else. we can't win if we're scared. and looking backward. she started making that case that you hear a lot of people making, i don't know if i'm inspired by joe biden. he didn't look great in the debates but i think he's the one that can win so we'll go with him. she's make the case we have to be inspired and energized by our candidate. >> she's hitting ought right notes politically watching this story and her campaign develop. i can't think of one wrong move that she's made along the way. >> you know, that -- >> it's all from her gut. >> that line has the added benefit of being true. you don't win campaigns scared. you don't win on the defensive. you don't win playing it safe.

>> that's right. >> i've always said nobody stops you when you're going 90 miles per hour in a campaign. it's the truth. and right now her campaign is going past 90 toward a hundred. and joe biden it seems like a tentative campaign that's -- that's not comfortable with joe biden out on the campaign trail. that needs to change. >> all right. president trump took his 2020 campaign on the road with a visit to new mexico. trump held a rally in rio rancho. he used the stop to try to win on hispanic voters as he looks to tilt the state in his favor in next year's election, es spite losing new mexico by eight points in 2016. >> we will campaign for every vote and he will win the great state of new mexico in 2020. and by the way, you have thousands and thousands of people outside who came today.

so we love you. we love you. we appreciate it. we try to get the biggest arena we can get and they're never big enough, frankly. the radical left democrats want to demolish everything that we've gained. they want to raise your taxes, they want to bury you in regulation. they want to take away your health insurance, 180 million americans. they want to erase american history. crush religious liberty. [ booing ] >> indoctrinate our students with left wing ideology. [ booing ] >> and left wing democrats want to confiscate your guns and eliminate your god-given right to self-defense. [ booing ] >> you know that as your

president i will never allow hem to take away your licht, your dignity, your social security, [ cheering ]. >> and i will never ever allow them to take away your sacred right to keep and bear arms. >> it's all too easy, isn't it? i mean, we've been saying that the two talking points that he will take all the way into the fall of next year if people keep talking about them on the democratic side, one is the confiscation of guns, which i think mayor pete was exactly right when he said that is just a nonstarter. democrats need to talk about issues where americans are with them on that issue, nobody, including reverend al yesterday said people want their -- nobody wants their doors kicked down. the federal government comes for guns. and as reverend al said, he would be getting phone calls all

day about the black americans being targeted as well. and also taking away healthcare for 150, 160 million americans, it's just -- i'm sorry, it's a political loser. twitter, the wonderful world of twitter can be angry with me if they want to, it's just a political loser and it won't work. but, gene, bigger question just looking at the clips from new mexico is why is donald trump there? he's minus 34% in new mexico since his inauguration. i know a lot of people were saying the same about minnesota and he almost won minnesota. this ain't minnesota, it's not close right now, and i've got to say, i have no idea what he sees in going to new mexico because they don't like him. >> yeah, i don't see it in new mexico for him either. but he's there for -- because he needs to try to expand his map.

i mean, you know, the one last time with wisconsin and michigan and pennsylvania going the way that we didn't -- nobody expected. and he won those states by the slim 60, 70,000 votes. and he's way under way in those states that he unexpectedly won last time. and so he's got to try to put more states in play. and so they've decided for some reason that new mexico is a state that they can nut play. i don't see it, i don't know what they're seeing in those numbers which look atrocious for him. you know, it's a heavily latino state. he talked about how, you know, we love our hispanics at that rally last night and the way he talked about how we loved our

african american in the last campaign. you know, that didn't work out too well with him -- for him with african americans. i don't think he's going to do that well with latinos in new mexico. i just don't see it. >> and that's something, willie, yesterday that marc caputo said, if you look at numbers, hispanics in florida have noticed that he has called over the past four years hispanics rapists, called all hispanics breeders, has associated them with gang members. i don't know what -- what other world, what alternative reality donald trump lives in where he can call an entire race of people breeders and think they're going to vote for him. but that's an alternate reality that a lot of hispanics in new mexico and florida and texas do not live in. >> yeah. and making the act of coming to

this country more difficult, which many latinos in new mexico did themselves, came here legally or sought asylum in the state of new mexico. and they look at donald trump as being someone who wants to prevent future generations from doing that. to go back to the big themes joe was talk about. we started the segment with elizabeth warren praising her event last night but the trump campaign believes she's handed them a gift with the idea she's going to get rid of private insurance and her medicare for all healthcare plan. also that beto o'rourke gave them a gift the other night by saying explicitly the fantasy and conspiracy that democrats are coming for your kbuns. he guns. he said yeah, we're coming for some of your guns. how big of a problem for that for elizabeth warren? >> she seems to be trying to moderate her healthcare for all stance in recent days. she's shied away from medicaid for all a bit. but this is a problem. this is a big problem,

especially if they won't -- if the language continues to be towards open borders. and if the language continues to be not immigration enforcement down on the border of a reasonable standard that all americans can agree that the border needs to be protected. and so that helps donald trump. i think donald trump actually was more on message last night than he seems to be in a while. what he needs to do if he wants to try to skate towards re-election is keep trying to paint the democrats as socialists, and that was his message last night. >> and elise, you bring up a good point and you go back to that first debate that the democrats had, they're going to have to proactively move away from some positions that they put them self -- corners they put themselves in idealogically when they raise their hands. first of all, everybody on stage saying they're going to

decriminalize illegal immigration. everybody on stage saying that they were going to provide healthcare coverage to people who did cross the border illegally. and then they talked, of course we had the first debate on busing instead of democrats talking about the two or three things they have to talk about, which is we've got to stop donald trump from getting re-elected. we've got to save the supreme court from being shaped by mitch mcconnell and donald trump for the next 50 years. and we have to save obamacare and make it better. that's their message. and i think they have to proactively get back on the right track for an election that's going to be won in wisconsin, michigan, pennsylvania, north carolina, and florida and let the 160 million people on health insurance know that the federal government's not going to come in and rip away their healthcare coverage and tell them what

pediatricians their children can now go to. >> and also that the government isn't going to start going house to house confiscating guns. >> yes. >> i -- there's a message that could be awinn winner, they cank about background checks and banning high-volume magazines. there are plenty of gun supporters who that's a very palette able messa palatable message. when you start talking about confiscation, that's the worst fear of strong second amendment supporters and plays into the narrative that, yes, the government is coming after your guns. >> and you know what else, mika? as dick durbin said, they can also stop talking about impeaching everybody they don't like. you know what? maybe they stop running around, especially the lawyers, especially the lawyers that are running for president of the united states, might actually think twice before talking about

impeachment in every other breath. >> okay. still we'll get to that. still ahead on "morning joe," our first guest as a blunt assessment this morning of what's happening overseas, quote, saudi arabia is not an ally of the united states. former obama adviser ben rhodes is standing by. he joins the conversation just ahead on "morning joe." fact is, every insurance company hopes you drive safely. but allstate actually helps you drive safely... with drivewise. it lets you know when you go too fast... ...and brake too hard. with feedback to help you drive safer. giving you the power to actually lower your cost. unfortunately, it can't do anything about that.

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welcome back to "morning joe." 2020 presidential candidates push ahead for their calls for the impeachment of supreme court justice brett kavanaugh. senator kamala harris hit the nomination process and doubled down on investigating kavanaugh last night on msnbc.

>> it was a sham. we have to recognize that the process by which he was confirmed has created a crisis of confidence in that court. one of the worst things that happens is that when we are not willing to believe the victim and take them seriously. take them seriously, investigate t the case. >> beto o'rourke echoed a similar sentiment alleging kavanaugh lied under oath. >> the american people deserved better and given the fact that it appears as though brett kavanaugh lied under eeth e ooah is a crime think there he has dis disqualified himself from service on the supreme court. he should step down or be impeached. >> but while the calls from 2020 democratic hopefuls continue to come in, key democrats are

capitol hill are throwing cold water on the idea. here's judiciary chairman jerry nadler. >> the jurisdiction that we would have with respect to a sitting supreme court nominee is did he lie to the senate? frankly we are concentrating our resources on determining whether to impeach the president. we have our hands full with impeaching the president right now. >> on the senate side, minority whip dick durbin of illinois answered, quote, get real when asked by "politico" about the possibility of impeaching kavanaugh. durbin continued, we've got to get beyond this impeachment is the answer to be every problem. it's not realistic. if that's how we're identified in congress as the impeachment congress, we run the risk that people will feel we're ignoring the issues that mean a lot to them as families. one of the issues may be thus far the investigations conducted have not revealed any corroborating witnesses in any of the four instance who's confirm the allegations took place. joe, you have this conflict between people out on the

campaign trail calling for the impeachment of the sitting supreme court justice and the people who sit on capitol hill that would have to deal with that saying we're not going there. >> it's almost like they're being "politico," applying for the cheap seats on the campaign trail. mike, i heard kamala harris say we have to believe the victims, of course first of all, as a prosecutor she really should put an alleged in front of the word victims, especially in the case in the "new york times" essay, the baffling essay, the baffling editing process that they put forward. because if you believed the alleged victim in the alleged incident, the alleged victim in the alleged incident doesn't ever remember the alleged incident occurring. so if kamala harris is believing the, quote, victim, the alleged victim, the alleged victim says, i don't ever remember that

happening, according to friends. so i'm just -- again, for a lawyer, i'm confused. and beto said he lied under oath, okay. what specifically did he lie about? again there is coming after a "new york times" essay over this weekend that, again, even the most liberal of liberals are scratching their heads at how badly "the new york times" botched that. >> you know, joe, there are really only three things that are quite clear in this story. one as you've just pointed out, the alleged victim has no memory of the alleged charge against judge kavanaugh, then an 18-year-old and 19-year-old student. the second thing that's pretty clear is that, you know, this call for impeachment of everything is a drain on the democrats campaigns. and thirdly, elise, it's pretty clear, the third element is that dick durbin might be the only

democrat who goes home and listens to people during the weekend. >> wow. i mean, if democrats just want to take that sliver of independence that everyone's going to be fighting over in the next election, this is the culture war that they need to pursue, the impeachment of justice kavanaugh. you look at "the new york times" opinion essay that came out over the weekend and it's just staggering and confusing that if a woman is an alleged victim and yet she says she is not a victim, a man is still allowed to speak on her behalf as to her so-called victimhood? this is all just madness. it makes no sense. and we need to look at the facts and what actually was in the book that i found interesting was another witness who was supposed to be with kristine

blazesy ford during the incident. that was actually far more of a news peg in the book than this other poorly sourced -- anecdote. >> exactly. and the fbi clearly it did not do a thorough investigation. >> so more details on the fallout over the essay in the "new york times" published that ignited this entire situation. last night the authors of the piece told msnbc's lawrence o'donnell that the key element of the book's account that, quote, the female student declined to be interviewed and friends say she does not recall the episode which was added more than a day later to the original "new york times" article was included in their draft of the piece. >> in your draft of the article, did it include those words that have since been add to the article? >> it did. >> it did. so somewhere in the editing process those words were trumped? >> i think what happened

actually was that we had her name and, you know, the times doesn't usually include the name of the victim. and so i think in this case the editors felt like maybe it was better remove it. and in removing her name they removed other reference to the fact that she didn't remember it. >> okay. >> meanwhile, vanity fair reports that the authors of the essay initially pitched their scoop to the news side but top editors ultimately felt that there was not enough juice to warrant a story there, let alone a big page one treatment. instead they were told that they could pitch the paper sunday review section which is entirely independent of the news department. the times declined to comment to vanity fair, but did point out that it's not unusual for opinion or sunday review pieces to break news. look, there's a lot of questions here, some of them are really important questions. and that shouldn't be invalidated, but politically, joe, it may not be fair. this plays right in the trump's

re-election if 2020 democratic candidates want to take this on as an issue. just it won't work. i don't know how else to say it. it won't work. >> well, you know -- >> this is a bad topic for them. >> you actually said this in the lead up to 2018 for the senate candidates repeatedly. >> yeah. >> claire mccaskill came on after losing and said that you were exactly right, that senate democrats that were running for re-election got hurt because of that. >> please remember i said there are important moral questions here, there are important questions that are legal, there are important questions i'm not invalidating that. it's not going to work politically. it's a horrible choice. >> you kept talking about due process. that's what you kept talking about. again, dpeen, again, gene, we go back to a candidate who was a prosecutor for a long time talking about the victim instead of the

alleged victim and the alleged victim says this never happened. in the "new york times," that interview last night is even more daximning for somebody in e "new york times" for somebody who decided to take out the part that said oh, wait, a man said it happened but the woman who's the alleged victim said, no, i -- told her friends i don't remember that ever happening. >> well, you know, i mean, i won't pile on "the new york times" editing process except to say that they need to find out why that happened and how that happened and that issue shouldn't have been made and they tried to correct it but too late. i mean, just a couple of points. you know, the way that this story should have been phrased -- i think it is a story -- is the shoddiness and incompleteness of the fbi investigation of kavanaugh. and it is, you know, if you want to characterize it as basically a sham, i think it was.

i think they didn't -- they didn't do a thorough job. there are a lot of people, they didn't -- the fbi didn't talk to and should have talked to be. people were willing to talk to the fbi. now, and i'll make one other point, which is that in cases of sexual assault, if the woman who is the victim, hypothetically, but in a case where there is a victim, sometimes the victim does not fully recall or recall at all what happened. but, i do believe there usually is a recollection that something happened. and so it's unclear to me from the piece and from the reporting about the piece whether this is just, you know, gee, nothing like that ever happened or i'm just, you know, i'm just kind of not sure. but it's not unprecedented or

all that unusual that someone, if, indeed, the victim hypothetically were intoxicated would not necessarily recall the attack. >> all right. coming up, sources tell nbc news that the attack on saudi oil facilities did not in fact originate from iran. and the president is -- it did in fact, excuse me, it did in fact originate from iran. and the president is signaling that he's opening to responding to lethal force. we'll discuss that with one former president obama's top national security advisers ben rhodes. we'll be back in a moment. ♪ (dramatic orchestra) performance comes in lots of flavors. there's the amped-up, over-tuned, feeding-frenzy-of sheet-metal-kind.

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have you seen evidence, proof, that iran was behind the attack? >> it's loaning that waoking th. we'll have some strzok studies done but it's looking that way and we'll receipt you know. as soon as we find out definitively we'll let you know. >> they targeted something without a person in it, without a man or a woman, and certainly without anybody from the united states in it. so we want to be proportionate. i didn't like the idea of them knowingly shooting down an unmanned drone and then we kill 150 people. i didn't like that. that was an attack on saudi

arabia and that wasn't an attack on us. but we would certainly help them, they've been a great ally. they spend $400 billion in our country over the last number of years. saudi arabia pays cash. they've helped us out from the standpoint of jobs and all of the other things. so now they're under attack and we will work something out with them. >> [ inaudible ] you said it wouldn't be proportionate to the lethal strike. an attack on the oil [ inaudible ]. >> would this be proportionate, is that what you're asking? i would say yes. >> president trump says strikes against iran in the attack against saudi oil would be proportionate. three sources tell nbc news american intelligence indicates the attack on the saudi oil field originated from iran and there is, quote, extremely compelling evidence showing the origination point of the strikes. one official with direct

knowledge tells nbc news that the evidence is imagery. the houthi rebels who are backed by tehran have claimed responsibility for the attacks. joining us now, former department security adviser to president obama, ben rhodes. good morning. how should americans be thinking about this i think colored by the war in iraq and the bad intelligence there, everyone pumps the brakes even when the president presents something even when it's images saying ears hoo the evidence, now let's go do something about it. how should we look at this? >> this would be iran, the houthis have claimed it. they have ties to iran. but there's a cost to lying all the time. and we just have to recognize that. if you have a president of the united states who has told 10s of thousands lies in office, we need to see the evidence for us as citizens of this country understanding what our government does and why. >> can we trust intelligence?

i understand your point about president trump. if the u.s. intelligence comes forward and say these attacks originated from iran, how should we think about that? >> i trust the intelligence community and they have the capacity if they want to declassify imagery that to make a case for where it came from. intelligence community also determined a couple years ago that iran was complying with the nuclear agreement. trump said he didn't believe it and decided to pull out. the rest of the world saw that and so the world has lost confidence on president trump's leadership on iran generally speaking and that's why we find ourselves where we are today. >> so, ben, even if we do have complete confidence in the intel community's conclusion that the iranians were the ones that struck the saudi oil fields and we find out over the next few weeks that they, in fact, do have compelling evidence, does that still justify the united states going to war with iran,

taking military action against iran because of strikes they made against saudi arabia? >> no. i absolutely do not believe, joe, that that would be in the interest of the united states to go to war with iran on behalf of an attack on saudi oil infrastructure. strikes me as a very bad idea. and the reality, joe, is we are where we are because of what trump has done over the last couple of years. this was the predictable consequence of pull out of a nuclear deal that was working, of escalating the sanctions on iran over the objections of all of our closest allies who worked with us in that process, particularly the europeans, of heaping threat upon threat of the iranians. at the same time we backed an open-ended saudi war in yemen against the houthis that's killed tens of thousands of people, put millions more at risk for famine. inevitably that leads to this type of escalation in the middle east. president trump wanted the feeling and the politics of being so-called tougher on iran,

but the results he got are much, much worse than where we were when he took office. >> ben, the president said yesterday and you saw the clip that the saudis pay cash, the saudis pay billions of dollars. in fact, when he's running for president he said the saudis have paid him at least $150 million in cash. that the saudis loved his, quote, toys. now as president he's saying the saudis are giving us billions and billions of dollars and creating jobs and suggests that that's reason enough to fight their wars for them. what's your response? >> i think it's an outrageous statement, joe. american foreign policy should not be for sale. the american military should certainly not be for sale to the highest bidder. especially like mohammed bin salman, killing a journalist for "the washington post" in a consulate in turkey while launching this war in yemen that's had disastrous consequences. and saudi is not a treatied

allied of the united states. we have no obligation to come to the defense ever their oil fields and they're a country that should concern us in complete rejection of our democratic values. i think the american people would look at this and not think it was a wise idea go to woman on behalf of this saudi leader. >> in retrospect do you think that the obama administration should have had a tougher stance against the saudi intervention and war in yemen? do you think that the obama administration shouldn't have sold arms, maybe at the time you felt you had to because of the iran nuclear deal. but that perhaps our posture has been wrong on saudi arabia and how we've approached them? i would fault the bush administration. i was a part of the bush administration wind say one administration, and i would say

one of our biggest shortcomings was our position with saudi arabia. in retrospect, do you think we need a wholesale reexamination of our foreign policy with saudi arabia? >> absolutely. i think was a mistake looking back for the obama administration to provide any support for this war in yemen that began at the end of our administration. we sought to condition that support, we withheld certain mu anything when's we were concerned at times. but clearly under mohammed bin salman who emerged as the de facto leader in twist/16, they have taken a dark, dark turn. what i've seen since trump came to office is american foreign policy has become a saudi wish list. you had the blockade against qatar. you had open-ended blank check support for they've for the in yemen. you had the pull out of the iran nuclear deal. what we have to ask is why? and we know, as joe pointed out, trump tells us they pay cash not just for our airplanes, they pay cash at trump properties. we don't know what jared kushner has been talking about with mow

had ham med bin salman as it relates to the corruption american policy. think it's time for a wholesale rethink here. in this regime in saudi arabia continues down the course that they're going down, more and more brutal human rights violations, more and more aggressive foreign policy, do not believe we should be providing them with these kinds of weapons absence some change on their behalf. >> ben, the world is an ugly dangerous place and you end up handcuffing yourself to some unreliable allies, but with regard to saudi arabia, the president of the united states has shown amazing deference in the tweet that he sent out on sunday or monday indicating that our reaction, the united states reaction would depend on under what terms we would proceed, saudi arabia would tell us under what terms we would proceed. one of the questions that has been raised is we give enormous amounts of money and military aid to saudi arabia. how is it they had no air missile defenses?

>> well, the reality, mike, is that if you look at the kind of technologies, you have 20th century air defenses and you vin kreetionly 21st century technology, whether that's drones or missiles or other things. look, the reality is part of what we were trying to folk cuts saudis on at t focus the saudis on was help you build your infrastructure rather than yemen where they're not achieving the strategic objective with the huge this. and we tried for the most pressing concern for american interests which is iranian nuclear weapons capability. i think it also bears out that things have gotten worse since we left that nuclear agreement on across the board. not other they resuming some of their nuclear weapons or potentially nuclear weapons activities with their nuclear stockpile, but we've seen their behavior get worse across the

region, not any better. >> thanks always for your perspective. good to see you. coming up, the trump impeachment hearing gets underway in the house today with former trump campaign manager cory lewandowski set to testify the but it appears the white house has already told him what he can and cannot say. coming right back. (classical music playing throughout)

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54 past. strike by united aukers workers union members against general motors is now in its second day and it appears the two sides may be at a standoff for some time. uaw representatives tell msnbc that while both sides are talking they are also bracing for a long and costly fight. they add that the strike will go on as long as it takes to achieve the uaw's goals of obtaining higher pay, more job

security, and better benefits. general motors has called the walk-off disappointing saying that it put forward a fair offer. "the wall street journal" is reporting that gm stands to lose as much as $100 million a day if the strike continues. according to the journal, auto industry analysts estimate by the weekend the stalled production could slash more than a tenth of gm's expected third quarter operating protest of about $3.5 billion. the paper says those analysts add the company could make up some lost production once workers return. eugene robinson, thanks very much. we'll be reading your latest column in the "washington post" entitled the hardest job for the next president may be fixing trump's mess. coming up, we'll talk to the chairman of the house intelligence committee adam schiff, plus the president makes a pitch to voters in new mexico, a state that doesn't have a

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we have plenty of them in new york and washington, a different variety. i don't like snakes either. we got a lot of snakes in washington, d.c. we got a lot of snakes in new york. i don't like either kind of snake. i think i like the kind on the ground better than the ones we have in washington. >> welcome back to "morning joe." >> willie, the mosquito thing again. >> it's a thing, isn't if? >> he's got this thing with mosquitoes. if you've ever eaten with him, he has a stack of those -- those things he takes out and he wipes his hands, he's like -- >> really? >> he's like howard hughes in the aviator. >> i don't think that the ac was working there. >> minus the jars. but i told you before he was like elvis '77. he's got all that sweat on him, he should do what elvis did, he'd have those and wipe his face-off and throw it out into the crowd. >> oh. >> maybe that's what he needs to do.

we need the eye don't like mosquitoes. >> i don't like bedbugs. >> he kind of goes up an objective too. he hits that note. and then the snake met for was a little tortured. maybe not his best night last night. >> okay, it's tuesday, september 17th, still with joe, willie and me. we have msnbc contributor mike ba barnicle, and elise jordan. joining the concession, and political writer for "the new york times" and msnbc political analyst nick confessore. political editor for the daily beast sam stein, and national security expert, tom nichols. good to have you all on board this hour. president trump held a campaign rally in rio rancho, new mexico, last night trying to win over voters, specifically hispanic voters as he looks to broaden his base ahead of 2020 while

also slamming republicans who have been critical of him. >> i hate to say this, but we have some republicans they're not good. you call them a rhino, they're rhinos. they're rhinos are worse. and some of them are worse than the obama people, right? they're worse than the obama people. they're worse than the clinton people. but there aren't too many of them left. they're pretty much on res sp respirators. they're gasping. they're gasping for air. >> it's really unbelievable. this is what autocrats do. he's not an auto crat, of course, he's a with be auto crat if he lived in a country that was allowed to be one. there are these loyalty tests. and despite the fact that republicans have been sick of it and allowed this guy to breach constitutional norms, to breach political norms, to say the worst things about p.o.w. war heroes, to say the worst thing about other american heroes, to

attack everybody left and right, they've remained mute while he called the fed chair enemy of the united states, enemy of the people, calls the press an enemy of the people. his greenland debacle where he canceled a meeting with the nato allies -- >> wait, we don't have enough time. >> we don't have enough time and yet the republicans remain silent. but isn't this the way ought top kra autocrats behave? they're loyalty tests and then you never ever ever are sufficiently loyal enough and you find yourself wearing green ruffles on dancing with the stars a year later. >> you're absolutely -- >> no, i'm serious. i'm serious, go down the list of people who have done what donald trump has ordered them to do, they're all out and they're all lesser people because of the humiliation he put them through.

>> i think you're absolutely right, joe. there's a sense in which donald trump demands loyalty from those around him and he doesn't reciprocate in any specific sort of way. i'm like you, like you guys said last block, i'm confused why he was in new mexico in the first place. i don't know what the political strategy is there. but i'm also kind of struck just a couple of weeks ago we were talking about with david french and tim carney about the language of the alt-right entering into the republican mainstream and here we have donald trump using the language of rhino as a way of talking about those who aren't loyal, right? and that language has a particular resonance among the breitbart crowd. not only is it autocrat, but that the very moment he was mainstreaming a language that we were talking about just a couple of days ago and a couple of weeks ago that tim carney and others said we should banish because we need those sorts of folks out of the republican party altogether. >> isn't it fascinating, willie, or elise, let me talk to elise,

somebody who has worked for republicans before, you know what we used to call rhinos, elise, people that ran up the largest deficits ever, people that ran up the largest national debt ever, people who fought furiously against free trade, people who called chairman of the fed enemies of the people because they said terra fors were not good for the pekt they gave $16 billion social yift bailout to agricultural industrial interests, that's what back in my day people would call rhinos. them that actually embrace vladimir putin and took the russian's word over the word of the fbi. people that would actually constantly say terrible things about our intelligence community, constantly saying he didn't believe the intel community, that he believed an ex ex

ex-kgb spy more than his own intelligence community tie and military. that's what we called ryan knows. so for him to trot that word out last night is really rich, 1984 rich. >> if you don't salute dear leader, if you don't let him tell you that the hurricane is indeed going through alabama when science doesn't back it up, you are any kind of slur that this president wants to throw at you and you're going to have every elected republican in congress pretty much cowering in fear of being bullied by donald trump. and so we remain day after day where we are today. and we will be tomorrow and the next day probably too. >> all right. last night the president also boasted of the funding. he said he has secured for new mexico's -- >> that's right. >> military sites. >> this is great. >> we've achieved record funding for the u.s. military.

all of that money, trillions and trillions of dollars spent all produced right here in the good old usa. and i have to tell you, new mexico, i know you're gonna like this, a lot of those trillions, because, you know, when you do the 716 and the 730 and the 700 billion will all of a sudden you're in trillions and i can save a lot of lines when i just say trillions, a lot of that money's going to be spent in a state of the art military equipment that's being used at halderman air force base, white sands missile range [ cheers and applause ] >> kirkland air force base. [ cheers and applause ] >> and many other vital new mexico military installations that are going up as we speak.

>> now let me put this in my super computer and my fact checking super computer. donald trump going to spend trillions of dollars in new mexico. no. >> what he didn't tell the crowd in new mexico is that $125 million in military funding the state will lose by money being diverted by the department of defense for the construction of trump's border wall. >> so, nick confessore, look at that. president has stolen $85 million from hollowman air force base, $40 million from white sands missile range that was appropriated to those military installations. in said, he's stealing 85 mill from holloman, 40 mill from white sands, total of 125 million from the state of new mexico. >> well, joe, look at. that rally is he sit there and read from a book of fairytales

and talk about snakes and mosquitoes and they would still cheer him. it's a performance. it's a rally. it's untethered from the truth and the facts as rallies so often are. he think can he go there and expand the map. it's actually kind of a sign of d desperation. he's grasping at a state where he thinks he might have a chance. so he'll go there and do a road show and talk about the trillions that aren't there and hide the fact that the wall will zap money away from these day bases. >> you can go to any state where the president does a rally and he'll say he supported these bases and we can put up a graphic showing the 3.6 billion that be being diverted from military projects to work on the border wall. the president talking about new mexico, his campaign, broad parscale talking about expanding the map. what do they say in the state of new mexico the rest of us don't see? because the president was there in august was well.

tom. >> well, just to take nick's point, that sounds like desperation, the president going to new mexico and talking about trillions of dollars. first, i think it should be clear whenever you're fact checking a rally it's a pointless exercise. you know, there's just -- he says, as nick said, he can say anything he wants, people are going believe him and it doesn't really matter because i think the president himself doesn't understand military spending. he doesn't understand the budget he signs and so, you know, that's almost a pointless endeavor. but to try to expand to new mexico, i suspect what it says is he's already seeing that he's losing states that he lost -- that he won the last time and now they're going to scavenge around and see if they can kind of bluff the democrats into thinking that the president can actually expand the map. i don't think there's much hope of that. when you're under water 34% in a state, that's probably not the

natural hunting ground for more electoral votes. but, you know, we were wrong in 2016 so, on this. we'd be a little cautious, but i think it's -- and i think he likes rallies. i think that's just the other part of this is where hasn't had he a rally for a while? let's try someplace different. let's change the geography in the background. it's easier than governing for sure to have a rally so why not? >> so on the democrat side, four candidates made their pitch to hundreds of south carolina voters at a historical political stump. former vice president joe biden, senator amy klobuchar, and mayors bill deblass blasio and buttigieg all participated which for the first time hosted white house hopefuls. the democrats made their appeals to the early state voters including taking on president trump and his administration. >> when i'm the nominee, this

president can talk tough, throw himself military parades, hug the flag every now and then, but i face worst kinds of incoming than a tweetful of typos. and i don't mind reminding a guy that was getting ready for season seven of celebrity apprentice while i was out here trying to figure out how to rescues use a rifle, i don't have a problem bee debating with him on who's going to be candidate and chief. >> this has to be a movement ground the in the values and ideals that define this nation at its best. this has to be a moment that we stand up and let the world know who we are and what we believe. >> you know, sam stein, south carolina is such an important state because unlike iowa and

new hampshire, which of course get the overwhelming amount of press conference -- press coverage, majority of the press coverage for a year, year and a half, actually south carolina looks like the rest of the electorate for the democratic primary. >> totally. there are minority voters in south carolina, especially african-american voters which are the, you know, foundational base of democratic voters. so it makes sense that all the candidates are there. and i like that, you know, it was interesting that biden was talking about a movement to beat dump. you know, his pitch so far has been roughly i can work with republicans and bring us back to sort of a sane prior era of politics. it seemed to me rhetorically at least that he was kind of nodding at movement building there, which is what bernie sanders and elizabeth warren are talking about. but, listen, i can't let this stand. i've been biting my tongue. how dare you go after sean spicer's green leotard like

that. >> i loved it. >> that was fashion forward at its finest and i think it's worth complimenting him on those choices. >> it was incredible. >> what do you say, mika? if you're going to go there. >> go big or go home. >> go big or go home. >> i will respect this for what it is. >> exactly. if you're going to do it, baby, do it. and sean was all in. and my only point was that this is a guy who did whatever donald trump told him to do because he thought he was serving the president of the united states. and serving a greater good and at some point it just, you know, it just -- it got outrageous. and -- >> actually from his first day when he talked about crowd sizes. but willie, though, this is -- this is what happens, maybe not to general mattis, but all trump people. >> are you so sure, joe? >> it worked for him. >> sorry, i can't get my eyes

off that. it was like, i don't know. >> by the way, earlier mika had breaking news on dancing with the stars. >> i did. >> no, it was about christie brinkley and her daughter is going to step in. i have unfollowed the people on twitter who told me that. >> willie, you look at the list of people that work for donald trump, that pledged loyalty to donald trump, that were forced to lie for donald trump, forced to umihumiliate themselves for donald trump, it's in the dozens now. i mean, maybe we're approaching a hundred, i don't know the exact number. but you always see the list. and it is a long, long list. and they at least the ones that i've spoken to, and i've spoken to a lot of them, they all leave with regrets. and the understanding that donald trump is a disloyal man who will throw you under the bus the second it suits him.

>> and i understand at the beginning the temptation to be close to power, maybe it would mean good things for you and your career and your life. i think there's another category of people like general mattis who you mentioned who truly believed that they could impact and influence the president, perhaps prevent him from act on some of his worst instincts. i firmly believe we will not see general mattis on dancing with the stars in a green ruffled shirt. >> i want to see it. >> i don't think we see that y day. i feel confident saying that. >> i want to see it next season. i want to see tom nichols next year. tom, before we get there, who your dancing partner would be, let's talk about iran right now. you have the president of the united states yesterday saying that the saudis who actually played him better than any country i think so far his first trip abroad, they flashed his image up on -- >> it was too easy. >> hotels, gave him the orb treatment. it was too easy to manipulate donald trump. now donald trump is saying they pay cash, they pay us hundreds

of billions of dollars every year, they create jobs in america and he seems to draw from that that if the saudis need us to attack iran, to invade iran, to do the saudis bidding, that he's perfectly willing to do so because, quote, they pay cash. what do you say to that? >> some of that i think is top cover with his voters to say, look, no matter what i do, if i move forward, if i -- if i back up, it's always because somebody is paying an american worker. and i think that's really an important part of the message he's always sending when he's at these rallies or when he's making these statements. he's just keeping an eye, again, the president only interprets the world as it has an impact on him. he doesn't understand any of these issues. he can't be briefed on any of these issues. he wouldn't know the difference between a houthi and a yemeni, you know, if his life depended on it.

and so, you know, he's always looking for the way to rationalize the thing he's going to end up doing. so i think the thing about the saudi cash is, first of all, i think he admires mbs because he wishes he was 34 and in absolutely absolute control of a country and could do anything he wanted. but i also think he's decided that whatever he does he's going to rationalize it it's about jobs and big beautiful weapons systems and people paying cash because, look, unfortunately it works. i mean, there are people out there, americans don't understand foreign policy and they don't really care that are much about it and this line that's going -- generally speaking with the people he's aiming it at, it's going to work. >> we're going to pick up this conversation again. i want to circle back, eddy, if i can, to the democratic candidates in south carolina. we were getting ready to talk about that before sean spicer's green shirt led us on a bit of a detour. as joe and sam point out, 60% of the democratic electorate in the

state of south carolina is african american. african-american voters, the most recent reliable polling we have is from late july. they had joe biden at 51% among african-american voters. then down to 12% for kamala harris. what changes that die nam snick because that's decisive, of course, in the favor of joe biden. do you see that being shapen differently? >> i think that data reflects name recognition and it also reflects a pragmatic choice that many black voters, particularly older black voters want to support someone who can beat donald trump. and to be explicit, i think that that desire has everything to do with being scared or afraid that white america will not do the right ming thithing, that they' fact vote for trump again. this is a riff in some ways on the last block with what elizabeth warren said last night. if you don't believe in the candidate but you want to vote for that candidate because

you're scared, that's not enough. so if, for example, joe biden after the last democratic debate and the answer aroun roud the ar of slavery where he stumbled, he went to debunked social science research about language acquisition for black children that social workers need to go into black family's homes and help them parent, he if in effect blamed the poor people for their situation in some ways. that if that is the answer, if that -- if that is the way he responds to race, he will stumble. and then if he doesn't do well in iowa, and new hampshire. >> right. >> then that firewall that we think is up in south carolina will not be there, i think. and we saw this in interesting sorts of ways with the way obama surged in 2008. >> well, which is, eddy, why iowa is so important for joe biden, if joe biden were to hold

on and win iowa. this is still five months away. but, it's interesting the map plays out much like it did for barack obama who knew that if he won iowa he was on his way to the democratic nomination because he knew he would surge in south carolina. and all the states that were more demographically aligned with him. but, since we're hearing about joe biden, he's had three debates, he hasn't done particularly well in any of those debates. he's had sum stumbltumbles in a those debates and yet he's still doing well with black voters, especially older black voters. and i wonder how much that has to do with the fact that at least for the second debate he was the only one on stage defending the legacy of barack obama. he was the only one on stage defending obamacare. he was the only one on stage defending barack obama's record on immigration while the others were telling him he should be

ashamed for it. and castro even saying who, of course, was also in the obama administration, that he should have spoken up and spoken out. i wonder what it -- how it helps him in south carolina and among other places where there are a good number of black voters that he is the defender right now of the obama legacy. >> well, it may help, joe, i think. it just seems to me that it's only going to take him so far. in some ways we have to understand that barack obama chose joe biden as his vice-presidential candidate precisely because coallay ahe cy any fears that he was some man churian candidate. thattio biden wasn't chosen to be the vice president for barack obama because in some ways some ewill be rate progressive agenda around race that he embraced. so i think it's important for

joe biden to put forward a vision around the country that isn't just simply about iowa's next to obama. that he has to address those kitchen-table issues that black communities and brown communities are facing all around the country. and if he continues to slip on the question of race, barack obama will not provide him cover because there are some obama supporters out there who are beginning to murmur and turn away from him, particularly after that answer in the last debate. >> yeah. all right. well, you know, mika, we have to say good buy to tom nichols. >> yeah. >> but i'm thinking that we may get him on dancing with the stars next season. >> really? >> and he will dance. and it's beautiful because, willie, it will start slowly and then it will explode across the stage as jimmy page's guitar just cranks into stairway to heaven. but he starts out dancing -- >> stairway to heaven, oh my gosh. >> to slow bill. just a very slow build but worth

it. >> tom nichols, thank you. still ahead on "morning joe," president trump claims that his energy policy has shielded the country from feeling the full impact of the attack on saudi oil. >> he has an energy policy? >> we travel to texas to see the effects of those policies. he joins us with his reporting next. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be -- oh -- right back. ♪

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until's economy. >> that was president trump in new mexico last night touting america's energy independence under his administration. joining us now, nbc news correspondent cal perry. he recently returned from west texas where he's reporting on the energy boom. what did you find out in the context of these new developments? >> this another note that the president is using in these rallies and we see it on social. we have a tweet yesterday after the devlution. because what we found out is as is usually the case with this president ar he's only telling part of the story. >> this is what it looks like to be number one. >> the united states has tremendous wealth. the wealth is under its feet. we are now the number one energy producer in the world.

>> and this is what that smells like. >> i guess it's a little rotten egg smell . it's really putrid and horrible and you can't breathe. >> it's making me dizzy. >> it will affect your eyes and can it kill you. >> people report the rotten egg smell. if you smell it you should move away. >> some residents are already moving away citing health concerns including sue and jim frank zblin why do you move from davis? >> to get away from the wells. all the stink and the stench and the smell and all that. >> that smell is the toxic air being emit from the merge platforms through a process called flaring burning the natural gas off as well as sites that are just leak. they say this is slowly poisoning west texas. >> there was a situation down in the area where we were, a lot of

the gas and oil wells were leaking. and sue got very sick from fumes. >> so this is what they were living. >> right, surround. they were surrounded. and the tanks are venting a profuse amount. this flare is just blasting hydrocarbon gases into the air. >> sharon wilson is a certified on the gal gas imaging they'eer. she takes a camera around the country to monitor methane and other emissions. >> these emissions are invisible to the naked eye. if the public could see this, there would be no fracking boom. >> the air pollute ant exceeds nationally mandated standards and a recent study found that methane trapped heat at a rate 80 times that of co 2 accounting

for a quarter of current global warming. but this is texas, a state where the energy companies tell the r regulators how much they're polluting. >> when they flare that off and burn that uh, it releases a lot of sulfur dioxide. we've got this massive air quality problem in the permian basin and the state of texas and the epa are just not monitoring out there. and the reason they're not monitoring is because their formulas are dependent on population. >> the permian basin is 86,000 square miles. it extends from texas to new mexico. put another way, it's bigger than the state of kansas. there's only one functioning sulfur dioxide air monitor in the entire texas portion right here in big spring. one of the two state regulators in charge, the tceq, texas commission on environmental quality, declined to be interviewed on camera for this story. but the agency that oversees oil

and gasper mit permits here did down with us. >> if you're american and you say energy costs air big dealar deal to me, figure my gas tank up or energy bill, it's one of the things that hit my budget. if i don't let people flare, then the cost goes up dramatically. >> it's the most profitable oil field in the world changing economics for the entire country. but at the same time it's incredibly wasteful. more gas is flared off here into the air than it would take to power all the residential houses in texas. >> it's very important, i think, for consumers to understand that any energy source produced at scale is going to have an environmental impact. and so that's a factor that we need to have part of the conversation. >> i won't everybody to see this so oil and gas industry has been lying to the public for over a decade. they're saying that natural gas is a clean energy. you can see it's not.

and until they stop expanding and drastically reduce their emission emissions, we will keep on this rapid warming trend. >> so everyone involved in this can go into two categories, those who want to engage with the public on it and those dwho not. those who do not include the tceq who should be look out for people's theth nehealth in texa. and we've got this statement from shell, despite the administration's propose allege to no longer regulate methane, that was something that happened two weeks ago, trump just drufrpd those regulations, shell's assets will continue to contribute to that global target. while the law may change in this instance, our environmental commitments will stand. a truly bizarre place here where big oil is more environmentally conscious. >> you cent get maouldn't get m to come on camera. secretary of energy is the former governor of the state of

texas rick perry so he doesn't strike me as someone who is going to do anything about this. >> or that he knows what he's doing. that's kind of clear to me based on what he said to me in the past. i think when we talk about energy independent rerns it's so much more than the ability to not go to war if the you're willing to pay such a high coast either on people's health or the environments, it should go beyond not going to war. we should be able to say to saudi arabia improve your human rights record. stop what you're doing in yemen. >> the companies are saying it will cost too much if we stop these emissions. >> right. >> how accurate is that claim. is there a better balance that could be struck between cheap energy and the environment? >> part of this is infrastructure. they'll say the pipelines don't exist. if we had the ability to store it we wouldn't need to flare it. that's partly true. a lot of this is about der deregulations. the obama administration had regulations that were supposed to kick in right about now, trump removed them.

it's about excess, it's not about our energy needs. >> such a fascinating report. i'm glad you shined a light on it. abo coming up next, we'll talk to adam schiff about his battle with the acting director of the national intelligence over the documents related to whistleblower complaints. cumento whistleblower complaints val, vern... i'm off to college and i'm not gonna be around... i'm worried about my parents' retirement. oh, don't worry. voya helps them to and through retirement... ...dealing with today's expenses... ...like college... ...while helping plan, invest and protect for the future. so they'll be okay... without me? um... and when we knock out this wall imagine the closet space? yes! oh hey, son. yeah, i think they'll be fine. voya. helping you to and through retirement.

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♪ 39 past the hour. live look at the white house. the white house is claiming immunity over two former aides subpoenaed by the house judiciary committee now blocking them from testifying about what they told former special counsel robert mueller. the letter from white house counsel to chairman jerry nadler, directs former senior advisers rob porter and rick dearborn not to appear before congress saying the two are absolutely immune from testifying. both are key witnesses in several instances of potential

obstruction of justice laid out by mueller. a second letter places limitations on what former trump campaign manager cory lewandowski can and cannot say. sip loney said lewandowski is not allowed to any answer questions about his communications with the president beyond what was in the mueller report. nadler responded to the letter saying, quote, this is a shocking and dangerous assertion of executive privilege and absolute immunity. the president would have us believe that can he willful i engage in criminal activity and prevent witnesses from testifying before congress even if they did not actually work for him or his administration. makes a point there. meanwhile, house intelligence committee chair adam schiff on friday issued a subpoena to the acting director of national intelligence joseph mcguire to force the production of a

whistleblower complaint that has not been submitted to congressional intelligence panels as required. mcguire's office declined schiff's request stating that dni is withholding the complaint from the committee because, in part, it involves confidential and potentially privileged communications by persons outside the intelligence community. a lot to unpack here and congressman schiff joins us now. congressman sam stein has the first question for you. >> hey, congressman, a couple questions here on this whistleblower front. first off, have you heard from the whistleblower? are you -- do you want to hear from the whistleblower? what protection cos you provis provide to the whistleblower? and then you're citing a request for the higher authority, the insinuation left at least for me and others was that the president himself had intervened is. that the insinuation you sought to provide and, if so, what basis do you have for making that insinuation?

>> we have not spoken directly with the whistleblower. we would like to. but i'm sure the whistleblower has concerns that he has not been advise dollad as the law rs just as to how is he could communicate with congress. so the risk for the whistleblower is realtation. will the whistleblower be protected under the statute if the offices that are supposed to come to his assistance and provide the mechanism are unwilling do so. but we would love to talk directly with the whistleblower. in terms of our information about the source of the resistance to providing this information to congress, you know, i think you can easily read between the lines of what the office of national intelligence has had to say when they say that this involves someone outside of their jurisdiction in terms of the intelligence community, but it involves an intelligence activity. it relates to an intelligence activity. and that this is someone who is asserting a potential privilege.

well, that's a pretty narrow category of people involving basically the president and people around him. so i think it's pretty clear. what the problem is here. and as, i think the two stories you just related demonstrate, it's part of a pattern of the white house basically taking the view we ken gauge in corrupt conduct and we have a privilege to conceal that from congress and the american people. that's the root of the problem here. >> quick follow-up here because it's vague in developing. do we know what the nature of the issue is what the whistleblower's coming forward about? what can you tell us about the substance of the matter here are your in the back as well? >> we don't have the complaint so there's a limit as to what i can say about the substance of it. but we do know from the inspector general that the subject matter relates to an intelligence activity that is not just a concern, but an urgent concern that it deals with serious or flagrant abuse, and that's really all that is necessary to provide that

complaint to congress. and, indeed, the practice since the establishment of this office, the speinspector genera and the other offices, even had they think there it's not credible they still provide it to congress. that's been the unbroken practice since the beginning of that office until now. here we have confirmation that it's credible. and that suggests that during that 14-day investigation that the ig did, they uncovered other witnesses or evidence that helped to affirm what this whistleblower is saying. >> so, mr. chairman, you were the chair of the intel committee. we've perceived at nbc news three sources telling us that intelligence officials believes that these attacks on the saudi oil fields originated from iran. organize mate is murky languages. we don't know if that means they were launched from iran or directed from iran. what is your understanding of

the source of the attacks on saudi arabia? >> i'll get more in classified form later today. but i think it is certainly fair to attribute at least the technological know how to the iranians. whether it was launched from iranian soil or by the iranians as opposed to their prox viies, have yet to make any determination myself so i dant won't to process to seyni more than say anymore dhan. but certainly this would involve iran at some level. now we need to be working with our allies to figure out how to consa contain this iranian action in the region, whatever their role was in this attack. it follows on the attack in the shipping industry. this is an attack on infrastructure affecting the whole world in terms of shipping and oil production, but also

part of the aim here by the iranians is to separate from us our allies. and that means more than we should simply outsource our military to the saudis as the president seems apparently willing to do. means that we need to work in concert so these actions are counterproductive for iran, not helping iran's cause. >> the saudi's believe this is an act of war. if we find out it was directed from iran, what should be the american response? should the american military be involved? >> i think that first of all whatever we do should be in concert with our allies. here i'm talking much more broadly than the saudis. the same is true for the attack on shipping. it wasn't an attack on u.s. ships it was world ships. so we have to do this in consultation with our allies before we contemplate action ourselves, the president should come to congress and make the case, particularly if there's a risk that any retaliatory step leads us into warfare. and the risk here is i think not that the president wants a war

with iran, i don't think does he. and i don't think iran wants a war with us, they want out from under sanctions. the risk is that we bumble our way into war. and so i think any military step of any substance ought to be debated in congress. the president should come to congress if he wants to go down this path. but, again, fundamentally we cannot allow the iranians to pry us away from our allies. and already our allies have great skepticism about our actions. they didn't support us leaving the nuclear deal and they were concerned it would lead to us exactly where we are now of heightened confrontation and possible war. >> do we have a responsibility to defend saudi arabia as an ally if they go to war with iran? >> look, the saudis are doing what's in their national interests. we need to do what's in ours, which means more than getting reimbursed for our military costs, which is what the president seems to be

preoccupied. they are an ally but frankly after the murder of jamal ka showingy, after the unending war, we need to reassess the nature ofsh. and i think be far more skeptical of saudi intentions and not place such reliance on the saudis or middle east peace, to put an end of the war of their own in yemen, in terms of standing up to iran, it needs to be more in the saudis interest. >> there's some internal debate about the democratic party about justice kavanaugh. you had presidential candidates including senator harris and former congressmen beto o'rourke saying he ought to be impeached or removed by any means necessary. you had people like dick durbin inside the saying we can't be the party of impeachment and that's all we do. chairman nadler saying we're trying to impeach the president or we're working on the impeachment of the president we don't have time for this. do you believe justice kavanaugh

should be removed from the bench? >> i never felt he should be confirmed. >> but he has been so what about now? >> now i guess i feel the way dick durbin does. we have to be more about just impeachment. i think about impeachment. look, there should be a full investigation of why the fbi's hands were tied. why they did no credible investigation. you could see that at the time. they were given an artificial deadline acres few days to investigate incidents that took place decades earlier. they didn't do that credibly and they didn't even try. if that was the white house, we should find out. if that was mitch mcconnell, we should find out. this situation may happen again. and so it will shed light on the character or lack of character of justice kavanaugh. that's important. but it will also, i think, help in terms of any future confirmation in making sure that we do fully vet nominees to the court. >> but you don't believe he

should be impeached? >> i don't see the point of beginning an impeachment proceeding that we know would e be. impeachable offense, obstruction of congress, the president is in a different category, i think, than kavanaugh. >> chairman adam schiff, thank you as always. >> thank you. mika? up next, the president under investigation on several fronts once again deflects, suggesting an investigation into barack and michelle obama. we'll be right back. elle obama we'll be right back. johnson & johnson is a baby company.

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years after he has been leaving the white house. trump took to twitter writing in part, quote, look at the obama book deal or the ridiculous netflix deal. then look at all the deals made by the dems in congress. the congressional slush fund. and lastly. take a look at them. those investigations would be over fast. continuing allegations he has profited off his presidency to the obamas signing a deal with netflix after leaving office. final thoughts, nick? you can talk about that or what you're looking at today. >> things the president wants investigated, michelle obama's book deal. things he doesn't want investigated, his own financial deals for real estate and money he may have taken from russia

investor investors. >> still ahead, elizabeth warren vows to take on government corruption in one of her biggest campaign rallies yet. a state that's only gotten lower since his loss there in 2016. the latest in the race for president ahead on ""morning joe"." to our cancer patients- like viola. when she was diagnosed with breast cancer, her team at ctca created a personalized care plan that treated her cancer and strengthened her spirit. so viola could focus on her future. their future. this is how we inspire hope. this is how we heal. cancer treatment centers of america. appointments available now. ♪

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♪ ♪ green acres is the place to be ♪ >> the united states wholeheartedly condemns iran's attack on the kingdom of saudi arabia. >> this was the largest audience to ever witness an inauguration period. ♪ >> okay. yes! >> wow! >> yes. >> wow! >> yes! oh, my gosh. the spicer sound machine explodes on tv. gloria estefan, just give up. you have been replaced. this is like when the beatles took the place of elvis. it's unbelievable. mika, though, everybody, of

course, is talking about spicer. >> yes. >> no doubt about it, right? but you have even bigger news coming from the world of dancing with the stars. >> if you can believe it, poor christy brinkley broke her wrist but her daughter, sailor, will step in for her. this is the peril of twitter. >> the peril of twitter. sailor will step in, of course. we're all thinking about christy brinkley right now. spicer, the spicy sound machine. >> if you're going to do it, go all in. go big or go home. >> go big or go home. >> i hadn't seen it yet i wanted to see it with fresh eyes. it is spectacular, the shirt, the pants, the moves, the bongoes, all of it. when you stack it up to rick perry, he is still the king, to me, of "dancing with the stars." game effort by the former press secretary of the white house, sean spicer. wow. >> if you're going to go, go all

in. >> wow! >> that's what he did. i have to say. good morning. >> sources it meal, by the way, mika, he finished second to last. he may not be around for a long time on the show. so let's just enjoy it here this morning. >> all heart. >> no justice. >> welcome to "morning joe." it's tuesday, september 17th, along with joe, willie and me we have msnbc contributor mike barnacle. >> i'm voting for mike. >> i'll wear the same outfit, look like a human lime green popsicle. >> his part will be an emt for the show. >> something we don't want to see at all. former aide to george w. bush white house state department elise jordan. >> oh, man. >> pulitzer prize winning columnist and associate editor

for the washington post and msnbc political analyst, eugene robinson. you cannot unsee any of that. >> it was beautiful. it was beautiful. it's like that last scene in "raiders of the last ark" where the guy goes it's beautiful before his face melts off. what was it like seeing mo r rivera in the white house. >> the song that marriano rivera used to run into the bullpen into the stadium to. one of the greatest players that ever lived, learned how to play baseball by putting together old fishing net, taping them together. he was recruited, tiny guy, 155 pounds. he had this pitch, this cutter, no one could touch. as a yankee fan, we all knew the

game was eight innings long, sometimes seven innings long if you really needed it. because once rivera came into the game, it was over. the greatest closer of all time. really cool yesterday. >> mike barnacle, only guy inducted into the hall of fame in the unanimous vote, never happened in the history of the hall of fame. >> on several fronts, mariano rivera is one of the nicest human beings you will ever meet in his life even though he's an exalted and professional baseball player. proving what a truly good guy he is and good humored guy at the red sox opening game after the red sox came from well behind, three games down in the american league championship series the prior october and a fellow by the name of -- >> i don't remember that.

>> single scoring run to win the game off mariano rivera, when he came out opening day from the bullpen the fenway crowd started yelling and chanting mariano rivera in jest. he took off his cap and waved to the crowd. that's a good guy. senator elizabeth warren cemented her position against government corruption during a speech in new york city where she urged democrats to embrace her call for fundamental change. >> what has this corrupt business, as usual, gotten us? the extinction of one species after another as the earth heats up. children slaughtered by assault weapons, the highest levels of inequality in a century. wages that bare lly budge, crippling student loan debt.

the american people get it and they are sick of it. >> so warren spoke in washington square park near the site of the factory fire in 1911 which, due to working corrupt practices, killed 136 garment workers, most of them women and immigrants. according to "the new york times," new york city department of parks and recreation expected between 8,000 and 10,000 people to attend last night's speech. however, warren's campaign said the crowd exceeded 20,000. though that estimate could not be independently verified and our campaign embed reports that warren spent four hours after the speech taking selfies with the crowd. there is a growing narrative about the size of her crowds, which are rivalling some of the trump rallies we've seen. tens of thousands of people. >> what's interesting about it, willie, donald trump will

obviously -- he always talks about his crowds. these were the types of crowds that -- 4,000, 5,000 in new hampshire before the new hampshire primary. he was very proud of that, saying he has had big crowds, 20, 25,000. but donald trump is a showman. no doubt about it. regardless of whether you love him, hate him. he puts on a show for people. that's what draws them. we talked about it before. it's elvis in '77. he sings the greatest hits. the crowds scream and yell. elizabeth warren is drawing these crowds, talking about policy. >> right. >> talking about potential legislation she'll put in place. it is, in fact, even more fascinating, even more remarkable than a woman who is -- she's not a showperson.

she's there, talking policy. >> she's a professor. >> she's a professor and she's drawing these sort of crowds. it's quite an achievement. >> she's inspiring people. she's exciting people, in a way that, as you say, donald trump did four years ago, still does at his rallies, in a way that joe biden doesn't on the campaign trail. it's not a knock on joe biden. it's just a fact. if you go to his rallies, they're not like that. she's doing it the way bernie sanders did it four years ago and in some ways is doing it today. the crowd probably bigger than they even said. what was it like to be in the crowd? >> first of all, the crowd was enormous. i would think it was larger than 8,000 to 10,000. i would go with the towards 20,000 people. the interesting thing about the crowd is that opposed to the trump crowds, as joe just mentioned, you go to a trump rally and people are having a

good time because he is an entertainer. he is skillful at that. he's a showman. but in his speeches and what he tells the crowd, there's an edge of anger and resentment in the crowd in response to what he says. the warren rally last night, and most warren rallies i've seen, as joe indicated, they are bent on policy and they are bent on the future, on your future, whoon we want to do with this country. there is one interesting element to the warren crowds and the warren campaign that was mentioned yesterday here on this set by senator gary peters of michigan when i asked him off camera, unfortunately, how would the warren campaign go in michigan? he said pretty well except for one caveat. the united auto workers have a gold standard for health care policies and anyone telling them that the government is going to take over your health care policy, medicare for all, they're going to be met with some resentment.

>> there's a line in elizabeth warren's speech that's starting to rise to become a theme, obviously directed at joe biden. she said again last night at washington square park, we can't choose a candidate we don't believe in just because we don't know anything else. joe biden didn't look great in those debates but i think he's the one who can win so we'll go with him. she is making the case we have to be inspired. >> she's hitting all the right notes politically, watching her campaign develop. i can't think of one wrong move that she's made along the way. that's all from her gut. >> that line has the added benefit of being true. you don't win campaigns scared. you don't win on the defensive. you don't win playing it safe. nobody stops you when you're going 90 miles per hour in a campaign. it's the truth. and right now, her campaign is going past 90, toward 100.

and joe biden, it seems like a tentative campaign that is not comfortable with joe biden out on the campaign trail. that needs to change. still ahead on "morning joe," president trump rallies supporters in new mexico, telling them only what they want to hear. can he win re-election by simply hanging on to those who already backed his presidency? eugene robinson jumps in on that next on "morning joe." next on "morning joe." i'm your cat. ever since you brought me home, that day. i've been plotting to destroy you. sizing you up... calculating your every move. you think this is love? this is a billion years of tiger dna just ready to pounce. and if you have the wrong home insurance coverage, you could be coughing up the cash for this. so get allstate and be better protected from mayhem, like me-ow.

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his favor and next year's election, despite losing to mexico by eight points in 2016. >> we will campaign for every vote and we will win the great state of new mexico. and, by the way, you have thousands and thousands of people outside who can't get in. we love you. we love you. we appreciate it. we try to get the biggest arena we can get and they're never big enough, frankly. the radical left democrats want to demolished everything we've gained. they want to raise your taxes, they want to bury you in regulation. they want to take away your health insurance, 180 million americans. they want to erase american history, crush religious liberty, indoctrinate our students with left-wing

ideology. and left-wing democrats want to confiscate your guns and eliminate your god-given right to self-defense. you know that. as your president, i will never allow them to take away your liberty, your dignity, your social security. [ cheers and applause ] >> and i will never, ever allow them to take away your sacred right to keep and bear arms. >> it's all too easy, isn't it? we've been saying, the two talking points that he will take all the way into the fall of next year if people keep talking about them on the democratic side. one is con ffiscation of guns. mayor pete said that is a

nonstarter. americans talk about where they're with them on that issue. people want their -- nobody wants their doors kicked down. the federal government comes for guns. as reverend al said, he would be getting phone calls all day about black americans being targeted as well. and also taking away health care for 150, 160 million americans. it's just -- i'm sorry. it's a political loser, twitter. the wonderful world of twitter can be angry with me if they want to. it's just a political loser and it won't work. gene, a bigger question, looking at the clips from new mexico, why is donald trump there? he is minus 34% in new mexico since his inauguration. i know a lot of people were saying the same about minnesota and he almost won minnesota.

this ain't minnesota. it's not close right now. and i've got to say, i have no idea what he sees in going to new mexico because they don't like him. >> yeah, i don't see it in new mexico for him either but he's there because he needs to try to expand his map. i mean, he won last time with wisconsin and michigan and pennsylvania going the way that nobody expected. and he won those states by 60,000, 70,000 votes and is way under water in those states that he unexpectedly won last time. and so he has got to put more space in play. they decided for some reason that new mexico is a state they can put in play. i don't see it. i don't know what they're seeing

in those numbers, which look atrocious for him. you know, it's a heavily latino state. he talked about how we love our hispanics at that rally last night, and the way he talked about how we loved our african-american in the last campaign. that didn't work out too well for him with african-americans. i don't think he will do that well with latinos in mexico. i just don't see it. coming up on "morning joe." >> friction is a good way to look at the music, because of this rub between white and black. >> ken burns is acclaimed for making films with stunning images and deep storytelling. his latest documentary on the history of country music is no exception. ken joins us, straight ahead on "morning joe." straight ahead on "morning joe." ♪

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joining us now, staff writer

at the atlantic, george packer. he has an in-depth new piece in the magazine's october issue online now entitled "when the culture war comes for the kids." in it, george takes us through his family navigating the new york city school system and what it says about education in this country. good to have you on the show. >> an extraordinary article, especially for anyone who has navigated the new york city school system either public or private. talk about the piece and when you decided to write this. >> i've been thinking about it for years as i followed our children's education and politics, how the two have quernled and how the space of school has become also the space of politics, maybe a little

earlier than it should be. look, there's two values that i believe in, and that i think education should reflect. one is equality. equality of opportunity access, inclusiveness. i'm a passionate believer in that. i'm a liberal. this say piece of criticism about the left by a liberal. the other is merit, achievement and individual effort and those two are in contention with each other. we were one family among many trying to find a way to get both of those for our children. and the school that we found or that found us really -- because we didn't choose that school. that school chose us. it's hard to get into a good public elementary school in new york. there were many wonderful things about it, not just the diversity of kids there, but the attention

to the individual child and the quality of the teaching but over the years it also became a kind of group think that led to, i think, sort of politicization of the atmosphere of education on a couple of counts. one was the opt-out movement, which is parents and educators refusing to let the children take standardized tests, which have many problems with them and the other was just a sense that identity as group thinking was becoming maybe overshadowing the reality of the individual child, which is what progressive education is sort of about in its origins. those two things began to make me feel as if, yeah, we were -- our kids were in a place where rather than being sort of sheltered from the worst currents of our politics, they

were being exposed to it. where the parents and educators, some of them, were giving into a kind of group think that was rather intolerant. >> i was going to actually say, and you've said it, it's a group think but it's an il liberal group think. il liberalism is prevailing on the right but in a lot of cases prevail ong the left. we can talk about the culture wars as it impacted your children even going to the bathroom at school but before we do that, let's talk about the opt-out, the idea that instead of it being voluntary, you felt pressure over and over again, time and again, to have your children take standardized tests just to see how they were doing in relation to other schools in the state and other schools in

the country. and you mentioned this. there was this really telling moment when you asked a fellow parent whether they were going to have their child take the test and they were so worried about il liberalism and group think that they said i can't talk to you about it in school. >> there's no problem with the opt-out movement, keeping your kid from taking it. ta makes a kind of sense. but once you create an atmosphere where parents are afraid not to opt out because the school has adopted an ideology of opting out and you sense that somehow you might be on the receiving end of some punishment which, of course, didn't happen then it's an atmosphere that you say is il

liberal and doesn't allow for freedom of thought and diversity of thought, true diversity of thought. this is a very small thing in the great scale of everything that's wrong with our country. it reflected for me a tendency not to be able to stand descenting views or even argument but things to be set in a way that -- and i see this in media. i see it in academia, in schools, all areas of our culture where if you are against a prevailing wind, you keep it to yourself. and, believe me, twitter is the medium that is pushing this hardest. >> for sure. >> which is why i'm not on it. >> right. >> good for. >> you i hear you on that. it's a 10,000-word piece. if we can boil it down to one excerpt, maybe this would be it. quote, adults who draft young

children in their cause might think they're empowering them and shaping them into virtue use people. in reality, the adults are making themselves feel more righteous, indulging another form of narcissistic pride, expiating their guilt and shifting the load of their own anxious battles on to children, who can't carry the burden because they lack the intellectual apparatus and political power. our goal shouldn't be to tell children what to think. the point is to teach them how to think, so they can grow up to find their own answers. that pragmatic genius for which americans used to be known and admired, which included a talent for educating our young, how did it desert us? now we're stewing in anxiety and anger, feverish with bad ideas and too absorbed in our own failures to spare our children. but one day the fever will break, and by then they'll be

grown and they will have to discover for themselves how to live together in a country that gives every child an equal chance. wow! >> willie? >> george, i have kids in new york city schools, too. i relate to some of what you write here. i do wonder how much of this is about new york city. >> yeah. >> and an uber progressive school you're talking about. is this something you see across the country or is it a new york story? >> i think it's a legitimate point that it's a particular story of new york, big metropolitan school systems. i've heard from parents in san francisco, los angeles, washington, even portland, oregon, saying they've gone through something similar where

it's partly because we underinvested over a generation or two in our public schools. it's partly because we created an americratic system where the competition for the top has become so intense -- there's a book called the meritocracy trap that just came out. it's destroying the winners and the losers and our politics has grown so polarized and so intense that we adults no longer how to spare our children and instead have turned our children into players, participants for our own battles, rather than trying to create a little zone in how to grow up and learn how to think not what to think so they can become their own people. >> in a certain way, george, our children embibe the values we want them to have. >> yes. >> what we call socialization,

right? if we want a world in the new york school system that we have to actively work to change it. we have to be very clear about what we're doing. there's a line in our piece that not the piece that mika read but the legacy of racism together with the false meritocracy that keeps children trapped where they are is inequality of city schools but calling out racism and getting rid of objective standards won't create racial equality. might have the perverse effect by driving out families of all races. so in some ways, right, you seem to be, as a liberal, right, conceding to the structural inequality that's at the heart

of our school system, right? because you say if we call it out, try to educate our children in such a way that they respond to it, even your baby girl who comes home and said dad, i don't want to be white, because i don't want to bear the burden of slavery and you can say honey, whiteness say moral choice. that's not who you are. let's understand the ideology of whiteness. they're changing who she is instead of you using it as a moment to critique. help me understand what you're doing as a liberal. >> she was 4 years old so i don't use the phrase ideology of whiteness. i'm saying, we can't lose either one. you are absolutely right about structural inequality. and i think it's a thing that journalists and scholars have pushed to the front of the debate today and it's now right there in the democratic debates on national tv, where it should be. this is a reckoning that is long, long overdue. but it's becoming simplified, i

think, into what turned into a $23 million program in the new york schools of training every employee at the school system in implicit buy as as if that would keep our children from equal opportunity and from high performance when, in fact, there's so many other factors that we know about, that we've learned about, that are being ignored because the focus on bias has become so complete. i'm not saying ignore racism. other things thatv to be talked about if we truly want equality. >> there's an enormous amount to digest in this piece. my wife and i have been through all the educational wars that you can think of, but never a

2-year-old being interviewed for kindergarten. one thing you i took from the piece, you didn't address it specifically. i know you've thought about it. is this. every parent i've ever met, rich, poor, the color, the ethnicity doesn't matter, want the best for their child and hope for the best for their child. some can fight for that better than others, have more cloud, have more resources. but we have been on the road for a long time. and you mention this in the piece in several specific ways of education becoming a divider between class and culture. that the very best kids move on to the very best schools. >> yes. >> and eventually they graduate and the young man from georgetown meets the young woman from brown at a cocktail party and they have children. >> and get married in "the new york times" wedding section. >> and the culture, the society around this narrows and narrows and narrows to this this top

tier. it's frightening. >> that is the meritocracy trap. the idea that we think hard work, effort, achievement, good tests, good grades will be rewarded in a fair system. but what we don't acknowledge is that it's already fixed from birth. once you're 3 or 4 years old, if you are born in a certain socioeconomic level, certain place, certain family, you are either two years ahead or two years behind your peers because of the advantages you've been given just by being around the parents you have, by getting into the preschool you've gotten into, by being read the books you've been read. and it's kind of betrays the american ideal that equal opportunity is a real thing and leads to fair distribution of

rewards. i don't think we can say that anymore. we no longer have the social mobility we used to have. we're now behind europe. and we all know about the vast economic inequality that's opened up the past four years and the wealth gap between white and black families where a white high school graduate makes more money than a black college graduate. so there's all kinds of evidence that we are failing real equality in this country. and that's part of the theme of the essay. >> it's an extraordinary essay and one that should be read by every educator, every newspaper editor, every network producer and, yes, every presidential candidate. new piece is in "atlantic" magazine and online now. as willie said, this does talk about the reality of schooling in new york city, but it sounds oddly similar to the complaints we've heard about higher

education, especially elite universities, for a long time. george packer, thank you very much. >> very thought provoking. >> appreciate it. hope you'll come back. >> thank you. civil war baseball, the vietnam war, jazz, ken burns' documentaries have taken on iconic american institutions, eras and personalities. the award-winning filmmaker joins us next with his latest project that is just as sweeping and impressive. keep it right here on "morning joe." joe. ♪

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hit. she didn't consider herself part of any movement nor did her legions of female country music fans but they believed at last someone was speaking for them. >> they just bought the record and see their husband coming home, turned it up. that's what they did. ♪ don't come home a drinkin' with lovin' on your mind ♪ >> a look at the new eight-part, 16-hour documentary entitled "country music" airing now on pbs, which follows the evolution of country music over the course of the 20th century as it eventually emerges to become america's music. definitely want to see all of this. joining us now, director and producer behind the project, the great ken burns. ken, another great one. >> another great one, ken. thank you so much for being with us. you said at the heart of every great country song is a story. and it reminds me of why some

have called really the heart of a story that encapsulates the entire series so much. and it's the lenl endry charlie barker standing over a jukebox playing one country song after another as buddies, like what are you doing, man? why are you listening to that music and charlie barker said it's the stories, man. it's the stories. >> you know harlan howard, the songwriter said country music was three-quarters in the truth, meaning it's pretty simple but it's also about the truth and it's about universal human themes of love and lost. we're embarrass bid that so we disguise that with pickup trucks, good old boys and six packs of beer. that's what dollarly barker was playing, hank williams. the silence of falling star lights up a purple sky and as i

wonder where you are, i'm so lonesome i could cry. there's nobody on the planet that doesn't know what hank williams is talking about. >> the movie explores a little bit how juke joints influenced country music. for those in the audience who don't know what juke joints are, they are the amazing places all over the south where local blues going until the wee hours, usually on sunday nights. can you talk a little bit about the influence of blues on country music? >> it's huge. country music comes down to us as one thing, something white and rural and southern and it is not. it is intermixed as all things in america are with an african-american tradition. great pioneers like ap carter, hank williams, father of blue grass, like johnny cash had african-american mentors and sup superstar jimmy rogers worked as

a water boy on the all-black crews laying track in mississippi. they are all infused. it's evolving all the time. at one point, post war, it becomes the era of honky tonk and juke joints and it's dancing. it's men. it's women. it's fights. it's brawls. it's love. it's all of those things. it's a huge and proud tradition and hank williams, he could make you cry with those sad songs and he could get you up and dancing with his rolicking good beats. he also wrote hey good lookin' i got a hot rod and a 2 dollar bill. >> late '80s, early '90s, i grew up listening to hip hop and thought country music was red neck music. didn't have time for it. then i went to school in nashville and i got it, that they were telling storys, different story thans the guys i

liked in hip hop but they were telling stories and i got it. >> it may actually be the same story. country music is not an island nation. you don't need a passport, visa or relaxed immigration rules to get or lax immigration ruled to get there. so it comes with the jazz, rhythm, and blues. the parent of rock and roll, to pop, to rap, and classical music. and this alloy is stronger by the constituents parts. and if they say i can pull out something essentially american, you have weakened it and made it worse. country music is the story of class people. they worked hard, built it, and

expected from the very beginning it wasn't a level playing field and the songs reflect their understanding of life at a dimension that some of the other forms of music don't quite approach. johnny cash has a wonderful thing called "i still miss someone. i go out on a party to look for a little fun. i wonder if she is starry for laeing what we begun, there is someone for me somewhere because i still miss someone. >> you look at trail blazers like hank williams, patsy cline, these are all when you think about it, some of my favorite performers. >> i love how you talk about them and how music is porus.

we have always seen this in the deep south. and how one form of music blaeds into another. and it explains why a guy who is just absolutely incredible, ray charles, decides in the 1960s i'm going to do a country album. it goes number one and it is prove it's. >> that is exactly. high pressure well he comes out with modern films, and the summer of 1962 was "i

can't stop loving you." and he said you take country music, black music, and you have the same gd thing all of the time. we're all saying we're all in thissing to. they have all been about the u.s. but all of my films have been about us. all of the imagine industry and bread breadth and contradiction. and i learned there is only us, there is no them. and anyone that tells you there is a them has gotten you in trouble. we have a nice line between church and state. they can't come in and tell us what to do, but our corporate underwriter has a bank of america has a wonderful tag line, nothing connects the country like country.

it is time to abandon the presence of silos. and categorizing into other things. this is a broad river with many tribute tears. and that is the idea. >> yeah, i went to interview luke brine a few summers ago, and he was selling out, 50,000 people, and chris stapleton sold out, when did that happen? >> right away when radio and phonographs connected. so if you got a station with a big 50,000 watt beam, you're reaching hank snow. you're go across the sierra

nevada. when we talk about world war two, our sound track and or mind has been good. a majority of the people were listening to classic. >> breaking news from the onion. >> i hate when they give away what i'm working on. panicked ken burns worried he in too deep with 17 trillion how the universe democracy. >> they caught me in a moment, it is daunting. >> sorry, that was a worthy joke from ken burns. the new documentary is country music on pbs, thank you, you have done it against. that does it for us this morning, stephanie ruhle picks up the coverage after a quick break.

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