about what that says about the priorities of the republican party right now. thank you getting up way too early with us on this monday morning. don't go anywhere. "morning joe" starts right now. every conversation with people you haven't seen since quarantine started. >> it's such a weird time, but things seem to be opening up again. fingers crossed. who the hell is this woman? is he my wife's friend or do our kids go to school together? >> is she my cousin. i feel like she might be my cousin. >> he's my cousin, right? how many times can people say, "it's such a crazy time right now." >> it's such a crazy time right now. >> did you travel at all? >> no. you? >> no. >> cool. >> is this really a conversation. >> i think this is going pretty well. >> i think i'm just going to be extra cautious for the rest of my life, you know.

>> which vaccine did you get? >> i got pfizer. >> i got moderna. >> nice. >> a question that leads nowhere, it's like asking, are you more tylenol or advil. >> let me get, the second dose knocked her out for about 24 hours. >> the second dose knocked me out for about 24 hours. >> how, that sounds like a unique experience you should tell everyone about. i said that out loud, you should laugh so she thinks you're kidding. >> quarantine was good? >> no. but recently, i've been going to dinner again. >> do i have brain damage? i think i might have permanent brain damage. >> it's too close. good morning and welcome to "morning joe." it's monday, may 10th. with us, we have white house reporter for the associated press, jonathan lamir. mara gay, former treasury

official and economic analyst, steve rattner, and u.s. national editor at the "financial times," ed luce is with us this morning. all right. let's dive right in. a ransomware attack that shut down the country's largest gasoline pipeline was most likely the work of russians. two sources tell nbc news, a new russian criminal group known as darkside is the leading suspect in the attack against colonial pipeline. the company was forced to pause operations that transport nearly half of the fuel supply of the entire east coast. nbc news sources say early indications suggest the attack did not look like the work of the kremlin and was rather a criminal plan. darkside is known for its extortion plots. colonial pipeline has not said what the hackers demanded. gasoline futures are up nearly

1.5% this morning, heating up nearly 1.3%. >> ed luce, this is where the future of warfare may be going. you have these asymmetrical attacks that any country can launch, if they've invested enough in getting an army of hackers. they don't have to have 50, 60 years of military buildup like the united states. just do something like this and shut the east coast down of this country or of britain or, well, you just fill in the blank. >> yeah, it's a little bit like the pandemic. the vulnerability to cyber attacks. particularly of critical infrastructure to our critical infrastructure has been flagged for years and years and years. like pandemics have been. so we know what we're vulnerable to. and in this case, you know, it's an extraordinary vulnerability. this 45% of american refined

assets goes through this one pipeline, the colonial pipeline. i think the fact that there's an infrastructure bill coming up for consideration before congress, which is returning from recess means that this attack might be, in a curious way, quite well timed, to focus minds on just how vulnerable our critical infrastructure is to ran ransomware attacks from private sector criminal groups, but also more geopolitical motivated attacks from countries like russia. so it's a timely reminder, let's say, of what we need to get done. >> yeah. and ed, while i have you here, i was reading over the weekend a column by e.j. dionne, talking about how boris johnson and conservatives did so well throughout most of britain. what can you tell us? >> well, there were local elections last week. ordinarily, not such huge events.

and there was also a buy election in a formerly very, very working class labor stronghold of falmouth. and the labor party did very, very badly, indeed. it should have done well. we're in the middle of a conservative government led by boris johnson. and that's normally when, you know, the protest vote benefits the opposition. but boris swept most of what we used to call the red wall. constituencies that relate, but could rely on. and that's caused a leadership crisis in the labor party. also in scotland, the scottish nationalists almost swept the board. it was something close to a landslide, so the possibility now of another scottish referendum on independence is going to be extremely hard for boris johnson to put off. so, he swept england, but lost

scotland, which is kind of in keeping with the host post-sort of-brexit story. that it was really an english first, an english nationalist phenomenon. and that england is becoming a conservative party stronghold. the rest of britain, quite the opposite. >> yeah. you know, steve rattner, i know you've worked for "the times" over in britain for quite some time. it is just absolutely fascinating to look at the map in great britain, compare it to what's happened in the united states, and you've got the northern part of the country that's always been so pro-labor and always been so liberal. that was where, really, as you know, from your reporting. that's where the teeth of anti-thatcher movement was in the north. now, just as we see in wisconsin

and in pennsylvania and in our old industrial midwest, industrial midwest, you have boris johnson and conservatives winning in britain in places they never would have won in the '80s or the '90s or even ten years ago. this is a global phenomenon that we see in every election now, it seems. >> yes, it's a global phenomenon. and it's one, i think, in britain, just as in the united states, that's driven in part by economics as well as other issues. but you do have large groups of people for whom the economy simply wasn't working under labor and who felt that the traditional liberal solutions to these kinds of problems weren't making their lives better. and have tried -- have decided to try an alternative. and apart from the economic side of it, you do again have the same kinds of social tensions, changing demographies, and

concerns among white working class voters there, as to how the country's evolving and who's going to be in charge and who their neighbors are and things like that. and so, yeah, you do see a lot of the same phenomenon going on there, as you said. >> and it should be noted, at least, democrats should take note that boris johnson conservatives in a race they should have lost are still doing so well in these areas, as we move from the pandemic. >> well, back in the u.s., we're following two mass shootings. one in colorado springs, and the other in the heart of new york city. in colorado springs, a man, police say, walked in and shot and killed seven people before taking his own life. he walked into a birthday party. there were children at the party. none were injured. police say a gunman was a boyfriend of one of the victims

and there's no word yet on a motive there yet, though they're putting the pieces together and we're following that. then go to new york city, where police have identified a person of interest who shot three innocent bystanders in times square on saturday, including a 4-year-old girl. two senior nypd officials tell wnbc that farrakhan mohammad was trying to shoot his brother when the unintended bystanders were shot. hours after the times square shooting, brooklyn borough president and his rival, stressed support for the new york city police department, rejecting calls of defunding the police and stated that their beliefs that new york city's economy could not recover

without public safety. >> so, mara, i've been following the new york city mayor's race by following a lot of your reporting from the early part of the campaign and it's been fascinaing how -- really, how this debate has broken down. where the defund the police sentiments and that campaigning works better than in other areas. and it's not always obvious. just like we were talking about british voters and where they broke. talk about the defund the police argument right now, as it's breaking down in the new york city mayor's race and why these two moderate candidates may have broken out. and andrew yang may have even said something like, we need you, nypd. your city needs you, nypd. >> well, the key to understanding the way this is breaking down here in new york is to understand that in new

york city politics, in democratic politics in new york, central brooklyn and black voters are key stakeholders. and because of that, you have folks like eric adams, especially, who's been able to do extremely well in central brooklyn. this is his base. and this is a group of people, of communities, who city workers, union workers, they are traditional democrats, liberal in many areas, but when crime spikes happen, these are the kinds of communities that get hit first. and so that's important to understand. they are communities that are concerned about safety, particularly the voters, who tend to be older women. especially, who vote. and union members. so the message that eric adams is trying to straddle and that the other candidates are as well, right, is the need for reform, but also a reflection of the reality on the ground right now, which is that these

communities are suffering. and i think it is important, though, that it's really not a binary dynamic here in new york. there's no candidate, including eric adams, that is running for office on a law and order message that also doesn't support reform to the nypd. and i think we really need to pull back and really try to look at the larger picture, which in my opinion is that if you have a more accountable police department, and you have common sense reform, and that doesn't mean defunding the entire police department, that's ridiculous, right? but if you do have a department that's more accountable to the public that it serves, you will also have a more effective department. the nypd has issues, you know, throughout the organization and it does some things really well, but there are other issues -- i mean, its clearance rate, for example, extremely low. so that's another area where it needs to rebuild trust with communities. and i think the protests that you saw last summer, that energy

that you saw throughout the city, the anger over george floyd's death, which in new york really manifested years after eric garner's killing, right? so that is not going to go away. the key for these candidates is capitalizing on the moment of, let's really be responsible and be aware that communities are suffering right now. but also, there are going to be reforms that will come, too. >> all right. meanwhile, lawmakers may be close to a deal on policing reform. and house majority whip james clyburn said yesterday that he may be willing to support the legislation, even if it does not end qualified immunity. >> are you willing to pass the bill that has most of what you want, but just not the end of qualified immunity? >> well, you know, i will never sacrifice good on the altar of perfect. i just won't do that.

i know what the perfect bill will be. we have proposed that. i want to see good legislation and i know that times, you have to compromise. if you don't get qualified immunity now, then we'll come back and try to get it later. but i don't want to see us throw out a good bill because we can't get a perfect bill. >> jonathan lemire, it looks like this is one of the first areas where we're having really healthy back and forth between republicans and democrats. and quite a few south carolina people involved, from, of course, jim clyburn to tim scott to lindsey graham. they're all working together, trying to find a middle ground for police reform. >> joe, there is some actual momentum here, and there's been so little of it on capitol hill in recent years, and certainly since the beginning of the biden

administration, where it looked like something could come together between two parties. republicans have made clear on most issues, they want to be the party of "no." mitch mcconnell said out loud last week that his purpose as republican senate leader was to object and to block 100% of the biden administration's proposals. but this is one where there seems to be at least some common the ground. qualified immunity, of course, is sort of enshrined protection from individual officers so they can't be sued in the wake of potential misconduct. and it is something that civil rights activists for a long time, police reform activists have wanted removed. and it was striking to see clyburn sort of step out of that yesterday. and to say that, look, even if we can't come to an agreement on that, we need to make something happen. and you nailed it. south carolina seems to be the nexus of this with tim scott, the republican senator, taking the lead for his party on this issue. and there has been progress made on a number of issues on policing in the wake of the guilty verdict in the george

floyd murder trial, which really was the impetus for so much of this across the country. you're now almost a year ago, with protests sweeping from coast to coast, and refocusing sort of the national attention on this issue. and sadly, we've had a number of very questionable police-involved shootings since then. so there is some hope here. even though there isn't much common ground on the issue of guns, very sticky negotiations await on things like immigration. and frankly, right now, we're facing a real -- the white house and democrats and republicans don't seem to have -- they seem to be very far apart on this infrastructure and jobs package the president has put forth and they're going to be meeting in person this week. but on policing, there seems to be some hope. >> and ed luce, last week, the dirty little secret about this huge debate over the -- you

know, whether democrats could get to 50 votes or not, if they get rid of the filibuster was the fact that they cannot only get to have 60 votes on a lot of these issues, but they're having trouble getting to 50 votes, because of joe manchin and kerstin sinema. it seems to me that while many of us were distracted last week by what was happening in the republican caucus with liz cheney and kevin mccarthy, that really, if you step back, the big story is that joe biden gave one of the most sweeping progressive speeches of our time. a few weeks back, but here we are, two weeks later, and you sit there wondering, well, is he going to be able to get to 50 votes, let alone 60 votes on 90% of those measures. which means, they're going to have to figure out a way to compromise with republicans. they're going to have to figure out a way to get some republicans on their side. or that legislation is not going to move. whether you like the

legislation, hate the legislation, or ambivalent about the legislation, that's just the political reality. and that's the one thing i think a lot of people are overlooking in washington right now. they've got to figure out how to get ten republicans onboard or, if you believe joe manchin, none of this stuff is going to pass. >> yeah. and i think that the fact that the white house is beginning to move in that direction, you know, it's signaled a lot more willingness to compromise with republicans in the last few weeks. explains why bernie sanders is getting so frustrated, because whilst joe manchin has one vote, which is enough to kill any democratic bill that goes through reconciliation on the 50-vote basis, so does bernie sanders. he has one vote that can kill it. and i think that that tussle now is going to get a lot more intense, because i think the founder's theory of the case, which i happen to share, is that

there is no compromise republicans are willing to make that would preserve their sort of main features of what biden wants to get done. and so i think that sanders intervention is going to get stronger and it's going to be heard in the white house. i should mention, joe, that when you ask me about the british election results last week, i accidentally referred to the constituency of falmouth, not hartley pool. hartley pool is the traditional labor stronghold, in which they were wiped out. and it's a fascinating subject, but i don't want to get the name wrong, particularly since i'm from britain. >> yes, so jonathan lemire and i were rubbing our chin about that, quite confused. no, actually, we weren't. thank you for clarifying it anyway for our listeners in britain. mara, let me ask you very quickly about this question. bernie sanders upset about the possibility of these negotiations and biden dealing with republicans too much.

how did democrats get to 60 or better than that? how do they get to 50? how do they get any of this passed if they don't figure out how to pull some republicans on their side? >> yeah, there's going to be some machinations behind the scenes on capitol hill, surely. you know, i think that bernie sanders is, you know, flexing political muscle here. but i do believe that there's probably a fair amount of deal making going on behind the scenes. i think democrats can probably get there. it might involve -- it might be expensive. you might have to -- the democrats may find themselves and joe biden may find himself having to lean, bend over not only for joe manchin, but also for the left wing of the party. and i don't actually believe it's only bernie sanders. i think he may be speaking for a larger constituency. you have folks like ocasio-cortez, too, on that side. and they can make a lot of noise. so it's a balancing act.

but i don't actually think it's a deal that's that far away. >> so president biden is using last week's lackluster jobs report as evidence to help pass his $2.3 trillion infrastructure plan. the u.s. economy gained 266,000 jobs in april, far short of the more than 1 million economic analysts predicted. here was the president's response. >> today's report is rebuttal for the loose talk that americans just don't want to work. i know some employers are having trouble filling jobs, but what this report shows is that there's a much bigger problem. it's that our economy still has 8 million fewer is jobs than when this economy started. the data shows that more workers, more workers are looking for jobs and many can't find them. >> after the jobs report, the

chamber of commerce called for an end to the extra $300 in federal unemployment benefits, saying it's keeping people from returning to work. treasury secretary janet yellen refuted that idea. it's interesting, joe, because there seems to be a real opportunity for a lot of people to work and yet they're not coming out. those numbers were stunning. >> and you and i have heard from people, steve rattner, i don't know about you, but we've heard from -- i mean, i've heard from a couple of very, very liberal democrats who own restaurants who have told me, i just can't get workers. i voted for biden, and yes, i'm glad the relief package passed, but, you know, the $1,400, the $300 supplemental unemployment insurance, i can't get workers to come in. and this is something we even heard last summer with a more modest relief package from last summer, where we had people in

the travel and leisure and hospitality areas of the economy could not get workers in, because they had received federal benefits. and again, i know this isn't the case with everybody that receives those benefits. and i'm glad people are receiving those benefits. but steve, we haven't talked about this. and this is impacting democratic employers as much as it's impacting republican employers. >> that's right, joe. so let me take you through a few charts so sort of lay out what the friday jobs report tells us and what we've learned in general. it's a complicated issue, and the president is right, there are issues on the demand side for labor, there are issues about supply chain shortages, but there are also issues about the supply of labor. what this chart shows, compares is employers looking for people to work versus people actually applying to work.

the light blue line are job openings, which as you can see, have recovered nicely from the downturn and in fact have shot up there. the number of job openings in this country is now higher than it was before the pandemic struck. in other words, the number of jobs that are available is higher than it was before. but the number of people applying for jobs has actually stayed very depressed throughout this -- >> let me stop you right there, steve. so tell me, i mean, that is a massive gap. i don't know that i've ever seen a gap like that, where the job openings are that much higher than the applications for jobs. why -- first of all, have you ever seen a massive gap that big? and why is it that big? and why do we have more job openings now than we had even before the outbreak of covid? >> we have more job openings now than we had before covid because

we have 8 million fewer jobs and employers are trying to fill a lot of those jobs, so there are a lot of openings as they look for people to fill them. and you've had companies like uber and domino's and pilgrim's poultry, a big chicken processor all saying, we can't find enough workers, as you just say in your opening. the national federation of independent business said that 44% of its members is having trouble filling jobs, which is the highest number they've ever seen. but to talk about the reasons, let's first talk about people dropping out of the labor force. so what's happened, if we can go to the next chart, what's happened during the pandemic, which is normal, is that when joblessness hits, a lot of people drop out of the labor force. you can see the dotted black line is the overall labor force. and you can also see, it was also worse among blacks and hispanics and also women, because they occupy many of the jobs that were eliminated during the pandemic, restaurant workers, hotel workers, and things like that. and you can see that the labor

participation rate has really not come back very far, very fast. there are now 2 million more women who have dropped out of the labor force and 1.5 million men who have dropped out of the labor force. the labor force as a whole is 3.5 million people, smaller than it was before the pandemic. these are not people who dropped out to collect unemployment insurance, they're not collecting unemployment insurance. we'll get to that in one second. these are people who dropped out maybe because they're baby boomers like me and they decided they'd work long enough, it's time to call it a day. there may be people who have kids at home and they have child care problems and they can't work, so they're not out there looking to work. and the consequences have been very high. we have black unemployment up to 9.7%, compared to 3.6% before the pandemic. but part of it is, as i said, there's a supply of labor problem in terms of people out of the labor force, not because of unemployment, but simply because for one reason or

another, they don't want to work. we can turn now to the next chart and get right to your point, joe, about the effects of unemployment insurance on work. now, we don't know. there's no way to study who's actually not working because of the unemployment insurance and so forth, but what we can look at is the comparison between what a worker gets on unemployment versus what a worker gets by working. this happens to be for the state of pennsylvania, because these benefits are all calculated state by state. and so what you can see on the left is for a minimum wage worker and pennsylvania doesn't have a special -- its own minimum wage, so it uses the $7.25 federal, a worker who was earning the minimum wage would collect $11.23 per hour on unemployment. and then you can see a number of professions across here, where the amount of unemployment is either larger than the median wage or very close to it. everything from dish washers, hotel clerks, preschool teaches,

and so forth. and on the right, you can see the median wage in pennsylvania of $20.08 an hour is not that far above the $17.78 an hour that you get on unemployment. i would also mention in this context that we have sent out a lot of stimulus checks, and that has also put money in people's pockets and may lead them to feel, i don't really need to go back to work right at this moment. i don't want to overstate this or claim this is the entire answer to the issue of how many jobs are out there, but it is a much-debated subject among economists and it's very hard to see how it doesn't play some role in the overall picture that we're looking at. >> right. it certainly plays some role. you don't know -- we won't know probably for another year or so when we get all the research in. certainly, there are several people in the workforce, a lot of people in the workforce who probably don't want to go back

until either they're vaccinated or their children are vaccinated or they feel safer going back into the workforce. but all of that being said, jonathan lemire, this is an issue that's been talked about among not just republicans but democrats and democratic economists. i want to put this chart back up. and while people in the media may not be talking about this much, because it's very easy to draw the wrong conclusions out of having a truthful conversation about this, like people are too, you know, people might listen to an argument about this and think, oh, you think people are too lazy to stay at home. no, what a lot of people are talking about and economists are talking about are economic incentives. while people in the media don't want to talk about this. look at the first one, two, three, four categories there. and i guarantee you republicans will have chart like this, they'll circle it and they'll say joe biden made it easier to

stay home and collect unemployment than to go out and work. and that's what democrats need to prepare themselves for in 2022. so what is the white house response to that? i know they're on top of this. i've talked to you and i know they're concerned about it. what are they saying? >> well, certainly friday when the jobs report came out, the white house and most economic analysts were blindsided by it. there was a expectation of adding like a million jobs. and of course, got nowhere near that. and we heard from the president on friday. he will continue to make the case that this shows the need more more federal intervention. that people aren't safe. and they're taking -- people aren't feeling comfortable to go back to work. and they need some help. an example, they point to something like child care, where for so many americans, working parents, particularly mothers, unable to join the labor force for the last year or so, because

they couldn't send their child to child care, because they were fearful of the virus, or it was closed, or they couldn't afford. it now they're saying with the jobs infrastructure, that there'll be money for that. that there'll be child care funding that will allow americans to send their children to a facility that will then allow them to go back to work. this is something they recognize makes their sell a little bit harder. republicans spent the weekend sharpening their weekend about this, saying that the aid is too great. there's no need for another big package like this. it's too much in the way of spending. this will be a vital week. and it's all connected. we've talked about, we shorthanded the infrastructure plan from the president, but it's much, much bigger than that. a reshaping of how the government interacts with the citizens. it's infrastructure, it's jobs, it is that human child and family care. and this is the week where the white house will have a couple of very key meetings on it. biden's first meeting with the

big four, which includes the republican leadership. his first face-to-face with mitch mcconnell and kevin mccarthy since taking office, that's wednesday. and on thursday with that group of republican senators, but they feel like if there is any hope for a compromise to get at least part of this done, the hard angle, aspect of the deal, bridges, road, highways, fwld with those republicans and a democratic-only vote down the road. but they know, they have to do a lot of selling here and they're not married to the size of it. they've been sending signals the last couple of days, they're willing to back off a little bit on the corporate tax rate hike and willing to back off a little bit on the overseas size. shrink this to make it more palatable and get some bipartisan support. >> so steve rattner, to sum this up, i don't know if we can put that graph up one more time of unemployment paying better than the real jobs that people had out there or the real jobs that are available. waiting to hear from what the president has to say today, but you look at these numbers in

pennsylvania, $7.25 an hour. that american is not living far above the poverty line or perhaps below. so is there an argument within all of this, and i know the administration has to really, really navigate carefully over the coming weeks, but is there an argument in here for raising the minimum wage? >> sure, there's absolutely an argument for raising the minimum wage, for any number of reasons, because as you say, it's not a living wage. pennsylvania, for whatever set of reasons, has chosen not to have a higher minimum wage of its own. many states like new york and so forth do. one encouraging thing in the jobs report. and it has to do ironically with the fact that many people have dropped off the labor force or are otherwise not looking that hard for work, is that wages are starting to go up. employers are finding themselves in a position of having to raise wages, because they can't get enough people to work. so in a perverse way, this unemployment insurance benefit

has forcing employers to raise their wage rates. i think it's a very complicated situation. there are any number of reasons for why the economy is behaving the way it is. i think there's a chance this one-month number is a bit aberrational. and there are problems on all different parts of it. but the problem we don't have at the moment is too little money in the economy. there's an enormous amount of money in the economy from the previous rescue packages, from all the money people have saved over the past year, from the stimulus checks. and so while i'm very supportive of the president's jobs plans and so forth. getting that money into the economy is not the problem at the moment. the problems are elsewhere when it comes at least to these kind of unemployment numbers. >> and as steve said, the good news is from all of this, in a

roundabout way, this has forced larger employers to raise their minimum wage up to 13, 14, 15. i think cosco may be at $16 an hour. but again, one more warning, as morris said, we keep talking about getting those republicans onboard. you move too far toward the republicans, and then suddenly, the house that everybody has been taking for granted has been following behind joe biden, suddenly you start having problems with defections from the house. because of course the democrats only have a four-vote cushion there, as well. so, yeah, there's going to be some sort of rough legislative sledding ahead. >> steve rattner, thank you very much. and ed luce, thank you, as well. and still ahead on "morning joe," with the future of the republican party in question, house minority leader kevin mccarthy officially supports ousting liz cheney as gop conference chair.

plus, demand for coronavirus vaccines appears to be plummeting in states across the country. what it means for the race to get more americans vaccinated. and what dr. anthony fauci is saying about the indoor mask debate. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. i have an idea for a trade. oh yeah, you going to place it? not until i'm sure. why don't you call td ameritrade for a strategy gut check? what's that? you run it by an expert, you talk about the risk and potential profit and loss. could've used that before i hired my interior decorator. voila! maybe a couple throw pillows would help. get a strategy gut check from our trade desk.

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it is 40 past the hour. welcome back the "morning joe." looks like a rainy morning in times square. some states are asking the federal government to withhold portions of their covid-19 vaccine allocation as demand for the shots drop. the demand shortage in states

from washington to south carolina is causing the u.s. stockpile to grow by the hundreds of thousands of doses. giving a glimpse at the vaccine hesitancy hurtle that the country is facing. the biden administration announced that if states don't except their full allocation, it will reallocate surplus to meet demand in other states and the u.s. will start sharing its supply with other countries. not all states are reducing delivery. new york, colorado, and maryland are all accepting their full allocations, although demand is dropping slightly. 57% of americans have had at least one dose, but health experts have stated that about 70% of population will need to be vaccinated to reach herd immunity. and we are still not there. meanwhile, as more and more americans get vaccinated, dr. anthony fauci now says he's open to relaxing indoor masking. >> as more people get

vaccinated, the cdc will be, you know, almost in realtime, george, updating their recommendations and their guidelines. but, yes, we do need to start being more liberal, as we get more people vaccinated. >> and mika, that's what you heard last week from scott gottlieb saying, it's time. he was talking to shep smith on cnbc, and he said, it is time to start talking about lifting mask requirements indoors. that is so important to get this country moving back again. you know, you can do that. you can only -- if you feel the need to only let a certain number of people into the store. or if you're a shop owner and only want to have people in who have been vaccinated, that is certainly up to you, as a private business owner, or it certainly should be, if this is still a free country, as some of my former republican brothers and sisters might say. but it's time. it is time to move past most of these mask mandates, as again, over 57% of americans have at

least been vaccinated one. >> you know, dr. fauci said that masks during cold and flu season might become the norm going forward. i could see people using masks on planes. i'm not against it. but, you know, if someone's not comfortable with that, that's fine, too. but you really saw not just the coronavirus being curbed by social distancing and mask guidelines by a number of people who got the flu and, you know, you can't pass as much around from person to person. it's something to think about. >> it certainly is. you think about going over this past year, year and a half, and again, because of wearing a mask -- >> i always get the flu. didn't get it. >> you didn't get the flu. so many of my friends didn't get the flu. i didn't get the flu this past season. because, again, you're wearing a mask, being more careful. that certainly makes sense in the future, if that's what you want to do. now, if you like the flu, if you like covid, okay, if you like smoking like five or six cartons of cigarettes a day, you know,

up to you. it's a free country. people should be able to make at choice on their own. but it does. it really was revealing this past year, wasn't it, mika, that if you wear masks when you're on planes, if you wash your hands a little bit more, you can actually even avoid the flu and colds. >> i'm pretty sure this conversation will continue, as we navigate through this. because we're definitely at 57%, not where we need to be for the country to reach herd immunity, but getting there. let's move to afghanistan. the death toll from a car bombing outside an afghan high school is now at least 68, as concerns grow about the u.s. removal of troops from the country. the blast happened as the classes of all girls were leaving school in kabul and was followed by two other explosions. according to "the new york times," a witness reported speaking to a man shaking with nerves in this car shortly

before the attack. the man reportedly told him to mind his own business. no group has been taken responsibility for the bombing. this is horrific. joining us now, washington anchor for bbc world news america, katty kay. and former nato supreme allied commander, james stavridis. joe, i know we don't know exactly where this came from, who this came from. no one has claimed responsibility. but the immediate concern most people had about the pullout from afghanistan was the impact on women. >> yep. impact on women. impact on young girls who we have been talking to for 20 years and been assuring them that they could go to school, that they would be safe, that the united states would take care of them, that this was a new time, a new era. admiral stavridis, it doesn't take much imagination to figure

out exactly why this was done and done to show the united states of america that afghanistan's not our country and we're going to be leaving. and whether it's isis or whether it's the taliban, that they're going to hunt down and kill these young women who are trying to get an education. >> yeah, joe and mika, you know me, and i'm a pretty optimistic person, but this one really shakes me, as someone who spent so much time in afghanistan as supreme allied commander of nato, leading that nato mission and often visited the schools, this is something we would point to with great pride. these were girls 11 to 15 years old. and i really commend our colleague richard engel's reporting, which has been running over the last few days. this is heartbreaking. and sadly, i think this is only a taste of what is to come if

the taliban completely take over the country of afghanistan. now, before we leap to that almost apocalyptic outcome, let's recognize that this scene plays terribly in afghanistan, as well as it does in the united states. and that this will repulse people, many will further denigrate the taliban. i don't think this does them any favors. it certainly has a hallmark of their ongoing campaign against girls and women, which in many ways, is the worst element of the taliban. >> well, and i know you remember this, admiral stavridis, but you lived it and were there in the war zones, but i remember a jordanian wedding that was bombed in 2006, i believe it was, that so repulsed people of iraq, and scenes like this,

zarqawi, so repulsed the people of iraq, especially western iraq, that it made your job, it made the state's job in trying to turn some of the people in the al anbar province away from al qaeda and these terrorists, to actually start working against them. so explain how that happens. explain how this imagery actually turns more afghans against not only the taliban, but also, and especially, isis. >> yeah, your example is apt, joe. which is what we called the anbar awakening. many of my senior colleagues who are leading that fight in iraq were able to weave that into our messaging. and it had a palpable influence on the people of iraq. and i think that this kind of event may have the same catalyzing effect. we'll see. it's worth remembering, when we

say "the taliban,," it's a very, if you will, diverse organization that runs from super hard liners who would sign up for an act like this to taliban who are willing to think about coming into the government as partners with ashraf aghani, the current president. it is a spectrum and one can hope cautiously, i suppose, that this would have a salutory effect on those in afghanistan, but i think the people have to be as repulsed as we are by these photographs. >> and katty kay, i know you have a question for the admiral, but we also have isis that is now not only trying to kill americans and trying to kill young women, but also trying to kill members of the taliban, because of the fighting that

they have, the reasons that they have to battle them. so you actually have several elements with competing with each other to see who can become the more radical and the more deadly for the afghan people. >> yeah, there's a few things that are really interesting and telling about what happened here. this was actually a mixed school. it did teach girls and boys, but it taught the boys in the morning and the girls in the afternoon. and the attack took place at 4:00 in the afternoon. so definitely targeting the girl part of the school population. it's also in an area of afghanistan that is largely sheikha, and they felt under attack from islamic state for a long time, that they've been targeted by them. it is possible this is an islamic state attack and not the taliban attack. the taliban have actually condemned the attack as well. but i think what it points to is even if it was islamic state and not the taliban, it doesn't suggest that the taliban have very much control over islamic state in certain areas of the

country, in certain afghan government forces. and i guess the question for you, admiral, is what's the american role going forward really going to be in afghanistan? we're going to be limited, it seems, to some eyes over the country, with drones flying from the persian gulf to the extent that you can really keep eyes on that very mountainous country. presumably, we'll have some clandestine forces in the country. but clearly, the goal is not going to be to protect afghan girls and afghan women. so what is the goal going to be after u.s. forces have pulled out? realistically, what can america do in afghanistan after those 2,500 troops are pulled out? >> i'm old enough to remember the 1970s when we left vietnam. and in vietnam, the key thing which maintained the government in south vietnam for almost

three years was funding for the afghan security forces. and i believe that if we continue to fund the afghan security forces and we can share that burden with our allies who have indicated they will sign up to it, it's in the a couple of billion, $4 billion a year. it's not nothing, it's very reasonable. so funding the afghan security forces, second, your point, intelligence. the cia is not pulling out of afghanistan. and you will see, i think, eyes on the ground alongside satellites, overhead imagery, drones as you say, intelligence and information shared with the afghans and third and finally, we'll maintain the ability to come in over the horizon. and that will not directly impact girls and women, but if we are coming over the horizon, it will be to go after targets

like the islamic state or other highly radicalized elements that will perhaps have some positive effect. but your point is right. the u.s. is stepping away from this. it becomes, if you will, an international effort at this point. let's hope our allies, partners, and friends will continue to support afghanistan. >> so let's talk about the pipeline, the sabotaging of the pipeline, admiral. is this a scene of things to come, a dress rehearsal of sorts for countries like russia or north carolina that spend an inordinate amount of time, attention, and money on figuring out ways to engage in asymmetrical warfare against us? >> unfortunately, it is. and i spend way too much time as a nato commander focused on cybersecurity. this time, the attack, which

appears to be done by an organization called dark side, which, by the way, doesn't attack targets inside russia or former soviet union countries, is a ransomware attack. they cut off or purported to be able to cut off the supply of gasoline to the east coast. the company has worked through that. unclear whether they paid a ransom, almost certainly, they did. but joe, your point, what if it was russia cutting off not gasoline, but electricity? and does that sound like science fiction? well, maybe. except in 2015 and 2016, russia cut electricity to the western half of ukraine. so these cyber weapons are approaching very high levels of effect in societies. we've got to be very concerned about russia's capability and china and right behind them, north korea and iran. i'll conclude by saying the administration is moving in the

right direction here. they've created the first cybersecurity director. a brilliant man named chris englis, a one-star retired. we've got the right people coming at this problem. >> all right, admiral. >> admiral james stavridis, thank you very much for being on this morning. still ahead, new questions about a possible cheating scandal after the horse that won the kentucky derby failed a post-race drug test. what does it mean for the preakness stakes this weekend? "morning joe" is coming right back. this weekend? "morning joe" is coming right back ♪♪

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right now, it's basically the "titanic." we're in the middle of this slow sink. we have a band playing on the deck, telling everybody it's fine, and meanwhile, as i've said, you know, donald trump's

running around trying to find women's clothing and get on the first lifeboat. >> oh, my gosh! >> you know, i've got to say -- >> that is a picture. >> -- i like shows that aren't afraid to push the boundaries and i love that "face the nation" now, playing theme music behind -- oh, that wasn't them? >> no, that's just "morning joe". >> it really works. he was scared. he was like holding on. to the "titanic." republican congressman -- >> he never saw the "titanic," but he's like, i know how it ended. he was like at the bottom of that. he'll be the last one. >> well, he's been actually pretty outspoken. republican congressman adam kinzinger says the gop is a sinking ship in it efforts to ostracize liz cheney. welcome back to "morning joe." it's monday, may 10th. the bbc's katty kay is still with us. and joining the conversation, we have white house bureau chief for "the washington post" and

also an msnbc political analyst, ashley parker. her latest reporting is entitled trump's out of power agenda. retribution against those commanding the spotlight or at least trying to with his website, and total domination of the gop. we'll get to that in a moment. also with us, reporter for "the washington post," eugene scott. and professor of history at tulane university, walter isaacson and host of msnbc's "the last word." he's up early and looking so fresh. >> he's on the east coast. >> lawrence, let me start with you. we talked last hour about the problem that joe biden is facing right now. he gives this great speech and for a week, we're all focused on the liz cheney, kevin mccarthy knockdown. >> it's dramatic. >> over the weekend, i just started thinking, wait a minute, he gave the most progressive speech since lbj, at least.

and here we are, a week and a half later. and saying, wait, does he have 60 votes? no, he doesn't have 60 votes. no, he doesn't really have 50 votes. so now he's about to go into really turbulent water, because if he reaches too far out to the republicans, and he starts moving towards -- let's say he starts moving towards 60, then suddenly nancy pelosi's house, which has been taken for granted, oh, they're going to go along with anything. suddenly, you have progressives in the house going, oh, wait, we're not -- we're not going to be voting for this just because you pulled lindsay and a couple of other republican senators onboard. so how is that going to look over the next couple of months. and how -- you've been there. what would your recommendation be to the biden team? how do they run those rapids? >> listen, anyone who's going to try to make recommendations

ron klain and joe biden to run those rapids, those two have more experience than all of us combined. and joe biden has lived with exactly the dynamic you're talking about in his 36 years in the senate. remember, that used to be the story. i mean, i have to say, it's a fascinating time for the story about disorganization, disarray within the party, to be the republican party in congress. that story was all the democratic party. that story was always about exactly what you just described. how are they going to get the house to go along with what the senate will be able to achieve and joe biden, you know, has been in the middle of that. and so, you know, listen. i will have an opportunity on wednesday, joe, to ask joe biden directly about that, because he has agreed to participate in an msnbc special about vaccinating america. he is going to be one of our guests on wednesday night along with dr. anthony fauci. but vaccinating america is not a

narrow cast subject. it affects everything, including that jobs report you were just talking about in the last hour, joe, in complex interactions with vaccinations and the job market that we really don't understand at this stage of it. but so this question of how do we get from what we can now call, i think, joe, the manchin phase of the legislative process, which is senator joe manchin basically as the ambassador to the republicans in the senate to try to go out and find some. he might find none. that could be the outcome. he finds zero. then we have a really interesting conversation about how does the conversation go with joe manchin in order to get to 50, do it through reconciliation. but joe biden is the master of that, if there is one. so he's got a better plan than i could come up. >> so, lawrence, so you swatted that one away, for good reasons. >> no, i didn't.

no, i didn't, joe! it's a complex senate question and he knows more about it than i do. >> this is modesty -- >> it's what we do at 10:00 agent night on msnbc every night. it's the modesty report. >> is that it? >> i'm bringing some modesty to the morning. >> we need some of that. >> and lawrence, you've always been known for your light touch. it's so great to have that light touch here. >> thanks for the great advice. >> let me ask another question that i've been trying to sort through and been talking about, you know, tactics versus strong. the republicans have the tactics down. and i think if you just look at the calendar, most people believe, the house at least is probably, historically, when you look at redistricting, going to have a great 2022, all things being equal from now until then. that being said, they don't have an overarching strategy.

adam kinzinger is right, others right. they seem to be going down a road to nowhere. how do you tell the democratic base that there may be some rough times ahead, but the stay the course, because while they may do well in 2022, we're looking out past the horizon. >> you have to convince the democratic base something they've never been convinced of before, or this party has never been able to get this dynamic going, which is that a presidential election is not a one-night event. a presidential election is a multi-year event. you have to show up for the lech where the president's name is on the ballot. and then you really have to show up two years later to keep the president in power, in effect. you know, in a parliamentary system, this is so much more

clear to voters. they get it. they understand it. they know what they're going to vote for each time. and we have now, in effect, a parliamentary system, where the president really can only govern if his party is in control of both chambers of congress. and so, you have to get that parliamentary energy of what's at stake, two years after you've delivered all of that energy to voting for president. >> so let's listen to senator bernie sanders saying, let's go big. >> i think if i am a working class person in this country, i've seen my job go to china. i'm working for $9 an hour and i used to make $20 an hour, you

can't afford health care or prescription drugs, you're resentful. are we talking to those people? i think we're beginning to see that the last few months under biden. but democrats traditionally have been very tepid, very fearful about going big. and i will say -- >> i think it's a glossiness to it, as well, sort of san francisco, new york gloss to. it >> i'm so smart. i am really smart and we've got $100 dinners and who really cares about those working class people. >> walter isaacson touches a nerve when he describes the situation that americans are facing in this country but there are risks to going big that joe biden has to navigate. >> and i'll pick up on what lauren said. i think that president biden and ron klain and others are going to understand how to consequence this. in other words, they're going to be some things, i suspect, that can be done on a bipartisan way

become able to peel off some republicans and the most obvious is infrastructure. there's a lot you can compromise and not have to go big on an initial infrastructure bill. likewise, surprisingly, congressman clyburn and others have opened the way on police reform to have something that will have some republican support. i think biden needs to do that first, to show that he can actually do some things on a bipartisan basis. and that gives him the chance to go big when it comes to some of the family help things he wants to do for the middle class and working class families. and once he's passed an infrastructure bill, even if it's scaled back on a bipartisan way, i think that gives him some more runway room. >> ashley parker, i want to look at your piece, especially as it pertains to everything that's going on today. you would think that perhaps

donald trump or the republicans could find a place responding to all of this. you're looking at president, former president trump's off power agenda. retribution against foes commanding the spotlight in total domination of the gop. while his presence is lasting for sure, i will say his need to command the spotlight with his website from the desk of donald trump, which is some sort of weird scroll/screed of grievances against people based on nothing and it kind of looks pathetic with him standing, doing a lounge act at mar-a-lago next to a band wherever he feels like interrupting someone's wedding, but at the same time, there are republicans who cannot let him go so his presence is still very much there. >> that's exactly right. and he went, you'll remember, to mar-a-lago right after he lost,

after the january 6th insurrection, when twitter and facebook had banned him, when republicans really wanted nothing to do with him. and it seemed very briefly like despite everything that he wanted, he was really going to go away. but the reason we took this look at him in this story is because as you said, as early 2000s buffering as that website may be. as awkward and small bore, him appearing on the mar-a-lago patio may be, he has tremendous influence in this moment over the republican party. in part because his fellow republicans are giving it to him. one of the reasons we're having this vote to oust liz cheney is because donald trump got involved and it became a debate not about policies, as they like to claim, but about fealty to this president. he's endorsed in certain primaries and helped candidates really shoot to the top. texas six is good example. and there's that steady stream

that started with kevin mccarthy shortly after the election. one of the most recent examples is senator ted cruz who are journeying down to mar-a-lago to kiss his ring, supplicate themselves before him. and put out pictures on social media. and in that manner, he has become sort of the president of the republican states of america. and it is really pushing that party to the right and creating an existential debate about what it means to be a republican in the era of the post-trump presidency. >> so what exactly happened, ashley, that you can -- that you can tell? you can't -- >> i can't make that sound when you see a picture. >> but what are they celebrating? the insurrection? >> i'm trying to ask a question. >> i'm looking at ted cruz and donald trump having dinner at mar-a-lago. >> why would he not have dinner with a guy who has said such nice things about his family.

i don't know. maybe they both like cancun. they just want a cup of coffee. they just want to sit there and talk about how friendly they've been in the past. anyway! >> well, oof! >> i'll try to go to ashley again. because there is an incredible article. here we go. can you figure out in your timeline, when lindsay, who said, i've had enough, i'm getting off this plane right now, or something like that, and kevin mccarthy who got on the house floor and said, donald trump is responsible for -- can you tell me, can you pick an exact time when they went from deciding to be in the liz cheney camp to -- i'm sorry, there's no polite way to say it, crawling back to donald trump politically? >> well, one instance you would have to look at, and i don't know the exact date, but was when leader mccarthy made that first trip that you have up on the serene right now down to

mar-a-lago. and that showed he wasn't taking the leader mcconnell approach of saying, i never want to talk to this man again. may may be not going to go out and publicly criticize him, but i'll try to move the party on. kevin mccarthy made the calculation that all roads to the majority in 2022 run through mar-a-lago. and one detail we put in our story that was fascinating and i will caveat hit is that some of trump's top advisers are telling him, if mccarthy and republicans take back the house in 2022, that donald trump should not support him for speaker, should withhold his support. should freeze that race. now, if they actually win, donald trump likes to back a winner, winning solves a lot of problems, it is hard to ma'am a scenario in which donald trump does not support kevin mccarthy for speaker. but you have someone like kevin mccarthy for which his own personal interests is running scared and is the everyday of donald trump weighing in with a critical statement on that fairly bare bones website that you referenced yarl.

>> andion, katty kay, kevin mccarthy also has not been shig about telling people that work with him, that work around him, telling reporters, as well, off the record that he has no use for donald trump. he just understands that donald trump is his only ticket back to the speakership. washington is a really small town, and well, things get back to donald trump. >> yeah, you have this remarkable situation where we all know that mccarthy doesn't have much time for donald trump. mcconnell doesn't have much time for donald trump. and yet those two most senior republicans on capitol hill are bending over backwards to try to keep donald trump happy and it seems, trying to keep him the leader of the party. and when i listen to adam kinzinger say, the ship is going down and this is the last gasp of the grand old party, i'm just not sure when it goes down. i mean, actually, i would be really interested to know from your reporting to try to look

forwards a bit. because is kinzinger kidding himself? what's the thing, what's the moment, what would be the catalyst that would lead to the republican party as the trump party going down? there just aren't enough moderates, it seems to me, to pull the republican party back in another direction. and i just wonder whether kinzinger is right. >> well, it's a great question, and look a at the texas six special election, where donald trump, someone who is behind in the early voting and won that primary and kinzinger's preferred candidate finished ninth out of 22 candidates. and so i think what kinzinger is pointing to is it is hard to see that party with donald trump going down in 2022 or even maybe 2024. but i think he is referring to and what he and people like liz cheney are worried about is a more existential concern, what does it mean to be a republican if you are railing against

transgender women in sports. or you are moving the party so far to the right on issues of the border and refugees and embracing the conspiracy theories, including, obviously, the dangerous, baseless, false claims that the election was stolen. what does that mean to the republican party? we were talking earlier in the show about trying to negotiate with president biden. if you did not vote to certify his election results, fur claiming as president trump is that he is an illegitimate president and an illegitimate leader. that is kind of the way in which the republican party can eat itself from the outside in. but it's not that it is going to go down necessarily in one of these particular races, where donald trump's support can really be a boon for a republican candidate. especially in these house races. i've been talking about how the republican party since 2016 was going to go down. well, they certainly didn't in 2016. had great night, election night, 2016. lost a lot of elections since then.

and donald trump certainly lost in 2020, but you look at the house races and they did extraordinarily well. by any measures, republicans did four years later, after 2016, in 2020, when many of them were actually campaigning on an alternate reality that most of their followers gather from facebook and you look at vaccine hesitancy. so much of that is fueled by lies on facebook. and so it is, again, in the short-term, you've got a party that may succeed in 2022, but in the long-term, it is hard to build a party, completely on lies that supporters -- >> well, they're doing it. that alternate reality. >> in the house. and i think we have to separate the house from the senate right now, as far as you look at what mitch mcconnell said on january the 6th. and yes, he's talking about playing tough with biden and right to stop a biden, but at

least more republican senators, other than ron johnson and a couple of others are at least reality based. >> yeah, but the house matters and the president is up against a party much of which is kind of in this weird cult that doesn't operate on the basis of truth. biden is going to be meeting with six gop senators on thursday, so eugene scott, you're reporting on sort of that dynamic. this is about the infrastructure push. is there a way to work together given the state of the republican party and the cult part of it. >> well, biden certainly hopes so. and one of the reasons that we know that he is going to meet with these lawmakers from these conservative states is that he wants to make his pitch directly to them, highlighting the common ground that he believes they both -- all of them have.

new roadways and expanding broadband access in rural areas and making clean water more available by replacing lead pipes. so he's thinking that if he can bring people over bit by bit, you know, working individual relationships perhaps he can get the votes. but beyond that, we know that where biden's most effective is actually connecting with republican voters. we saw that last week when he visited louisiana. a state that obviously, he did not win in november 2020, but trying to make more republicans on the ground see that the plan that he wants to put forward is going to benefit them, regardless of what the lawmakers who represent them say. and so far, about 60% of republican voters support this infrastructure plan. and we know that the white house will try to work harder to bring those numbers up. >> ashley parker, back to your piece. because this is such an interesting dynamic, but you have former president trump and some of his allies, some still in leadership positions, obsessing about the election

results. and yet, you have reported folks close to donald trump holding poll numbers, showing what people really think of him. >> and that was my colleague's piece over the weekend. and that was one of the final straws for liz cheney, which was this idea and again, you were asking about, how does the party sink itself? an example is by not operating in reality-based community. how are republican members or republican candidates, this is liz cheney's arguments, to make the best decisions about targeting voters, about their local races, if they're not being provided the full spectrum of information, when it includes something negative about former president trump. that makes it very hard for them to do their jobs, for them to figure out which policies make sense, what the politics are, and it is sort of another data point of how donald trump's, you know, set of alternate facts,

alternate-based reality is not just being spouted from him, but is being parroted by members of the party, many of whom should know better. >> all right. ashley parker, thank you very much. we'll be reading her latest reporting on trump's out-of-power agenda in "the washington post." he's still very much participating in the process here, joe. not because of him, but because of republicans who cannot find a way away from him. >> well, again, lawrence, the house, it seems, and maybe because it's more gerrymandered, it seems that house members are far more attached openly to donald trump than, say, certain members of the senate, if you're looking at mitch mcconnell or you're looking at ben sasse, you're looking at some of the republicans who have spoken out fairly aggressively about january the 6th.

talk about those dynamics and how democrats handle that, how joe biden handles that. >> well, it's always been the case. and it's the difference between representing a relatively narrowly defined district with, you know, a million people in it or less versus a state. and it's -- you know, when you are elected statewide, in most states, you are going to be interested in talking to democratic voters and republican voters. you're going to have to learn how to do that. and so senators just are always in larger contact with voters from their opposite party. and so they just are more in that space all the time. and you know, the house members, republican house members, i don't really know what they believe. earlier in this discussion was

the question of how many moderates are there? well, if you ask me in 2015, how many insane members of the house of representatives are there? i would have said, oh, i don't know, it doesn't seem like there's many. but i don't -- they don't believe anything. these people who were, the trump supporters, what does kevin mccarthy believe? can someone tell me that. canlegislatively? he doesn't believe anything. he is in fair of whatever donald trump said yesterday. and so this is a very, very strange condition for the house to be in. this cult-like condition in the republican party, where they don't actually believe anything, so trying to do business with them is something no other party has ever faced the challenge of. how do you do business with a party that doesn't actually believe anything, except in the

sanctity of donald trump. >> well, again, walter, that seems to be the case in the house, certainly seems to be the case with kevin mccarthy, who even people close to him say, you know, kevin mccarthy wants to be speaker, so kevin is going to do whatever it takes to be speaker. and he'll follow donald trump to the ends of the earth, regardless. and again, we saw him back down after january the 6th. but it's interesting, this isn't just like, you know, if a republican's watching and listening to lawrence and going, well, that guy used to work for moynihan on the hill. that guy's a -- well, no, what lawrence said is what ross stuthat said, what other serious-minded conservatives are saying, here we find ourselves in 2021 fighting against legislatively the most sweeping

progressive legislation ever and we have no ideological base, because we stopped being the party of small government 20 years ago. we stopped being the party of free trade five years ago. we stopped being the party of sane, rational immigration five years ago. and we have no -- just, we believe what donald trump tells us to believe. that makes it awfully difficult for this republican party to build anything in the future, especially when it's so dependent on donald trump. but also, you know, how do you negotiate with that if you're joe biden and the democrats? >> what lawrence said is a key thing, which is, tell me what speaker mccarthy believes. speaker mccarthy has become somebody who believes in absolutely nothing, except for kowtowing to donald trump. i've known mccarthy. i know people from california

who are close friends of his and do fund-raisers for him. and of course, everyone's either baffled or just know he's craven and doing whatever it takes to rush ahead of the factions in his party, but there were people like paul ryan who moved off. for the republican party to actually get a grip on this, i think you're going to have to have a whole lot of the paul ryans, a whole lot of people, and it's not just moderates, but they're very conservative people like liz cheney who say, we don't want to be a cult of personality for donald trump. some of them, kinzinger, cheney, have spoken out. some have sort of mumbled a bit like paul ryan. but one day, you'll have to have a whole movement, just as what happened to joe mccarthy 50, 60 years ago when a whole lot of people said, okay, enough is enough. >> i'm sorry, mika, i don't see that happening. i don't think paul ryan could

get elected in this republican party right now. >> it's a strange time. >> one of the problems you have is that gerrymandering that you talked about, in my district in new orleans, i was just looking at it. steve scalise who was a smart, had been pretty normal guy. but then you look at his district, besides having all the white suburbs, it sort of crawls up st. charles avenue and gets a few streets of conservative, wealthy streets right off st. charles and it truly is gerrymander. so all people like he have to worry about is getting primaried. so they're all going to kowtow to the most base instincts of that party. >> meanwhile, eugene scott, joe biden doesn't seem to care. he's going right into red states, as you are reporting, to pitch his job plan to voters. and you know, he does have a very, very good ability to

communicate with folks, whether it's a red state or a blue state. he understands the way people feels. >> he does. and that's how he ultimately ended up winning the white house. you remember last week when he was in louisiana, he said, there's no democratic way to build a bridge, there's no republican way to build a bridge. that's resonating with people in these communities that have been devastated. we know he believes that this plan would bring about a million jobs to america, including in some of these red states that are experiencing higher unemployment, more than a year after the pandemic began. and they would like to. and so if he can get the message to these people that i'm trying to bring you and your community something that your own lawmakers are not working with me to bring you, he's hoping that can keep those voters on the side of democrats when it comes to this plan, and maybe pressure those lawmakers into actually representing the voters who elected them instead of

donald trump's interests in washington. >> and, you know, mika, he didn't just try, he did manage to move around the republican legislators when he went straight to the american people, presented a covid relief bill that we've talked about our concerns. i've talked about my concerns with it. but 75% of americans supported that. you look at the infrastructure bill. the overwhelming majority of americans support that bill, despite any limitations that small government conservatives like myself might have wit. you look at the other relief bills. and again, they're very, very popular with the american people. so, actually, going around members of congress, maybe joe biden's best approach right now. >> and republicans will be, you know, talking about their criticisms for all of this and all of this spending to audiences that will be benefiting from these things. >> by the way, lawrence, before we let you go, my favorite as

far as just sheer hypocrisy, i love the republicans, like watching the republicans attack a bill, attack a bill, attack a bill, attack a bill. and then put out the press release great news from north carolina 10 or whatever it is. we have a grant from the federal government. this proves that i'm working hard for you, when it's a bill that they've fought tooth and nail against. >> of course, you know, back before cable news existed and the world wide web existed, that was a traditional way of doing things. people would do that all the time. and no one -- you know, voters didn't have enough knowledge about how this all worked to realize that, well, this guy opposed the whole thing. it is an amazing thing to watch this time. they do it as if they think their voters have absolutely no access to the truth about how they vote. and it also shows you, joe, it shows you once again, they

believe nothing. they believe absolutely nothing. they don't even believe in their "no" vote on legislation in the house. >> you know, i'm just also talking with folks very close to dr. jill biden, just to follow up with joe biden going into the heart of red states. jill has been to alabama, utah, and she's headed to west virginia on thursday. so they're just getting in there and talking right to the people. "the washington post's" eugene scott, thank you so much for your reporting. and lawrence, we will be watching a very modest version of tv news. he's so modest. >> he's not only modest, again, the subtlety, the light touch. >> such a light touch. >> it's beautiful. >> it's something to behold. lawrence, i'm going to try to follow your example. >> we both are going to. also, this special msnbc town hall event with president biden airs this wednesday night with lawrence o'donnell. >> that is going to be great.

thanks, lawrence. it's great to see you! come back when you can. >> i love this, joe. it's great to see you both. >> it's great to see you. i love having you on. still ahead on "morning joe," last summer "the new york times" broke stories about russia offering bounties to kill u.s. troops. now newly declassified information is taking a look at the origin of that intelligence and why it was given a low-to-moderate confidence rate bying by the intel community. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. munity you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. the remarkable gx and lx. lease the 2021 gx 460 for $529 a month for 36 months. experience amazing, at your lexus dealer. ♪ ♪ we made usaa insurance for veterans like martin. when a hailstorm hit, he needed his insurance to get it done right, right away. usaa. what you're made of, we're made for. usaa

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problem, gentlemen? >> hey, dork brain. if you weren't a girl, i'd beat your face off. >> yeah, if you weren't a girl, i'd beat your face. >> you calling me a girl? >> you called me one? >> oh, you asked for it. ow! >> now get out of here!

forget those guys. they're just jealous because you're smart and funny and girls like that. >> what girls? >> lots of girls. i mean, i like you. >> well, i don't like you. now everybody thinks i need a girl to fight for me. you are a dork brain. >> ow! >> a scene from the 2000 film "miss congeniality," it's a lighter take at a serious question of how formative years impact young girls and shape women today. joining us now, author and associate professor at the university of iowa, melissa

febos. her second book entitled "girlhood" is a national best seller and it touches on some real issues confronting young women today. >> well, melissa, that was a much lighter take -- >> much lighter! >> on some of the challenges you faced growing up. i want to read a part of the book that really mika and i both were really moved by. at 12, you right. i already had a body like those women in magazines, but it was no surprise, and they offered me no congratulations, it was a race i had won without trying and to win it was the greatest loss of all. explain how developing at 11 and looking like a women at 12 -- >> unlike your peers -- >> unlike your peers, talk about how moving through that at such a young age was the greatest loss of all for you.

>> sure. well, you know, like many young girls, i was really confident and athletic and good in school before adolescence and i had really wonderful supportive, loving parents and then i developed early. and there's just no way that my parents could have prepared me for the change of my body's meaning in the world. and what this meant in practical terms was that men started reacting to me everywhere i went. and it was like i became an adult overnight. and there was just no amount of sort of support or love in my household that could combat that radical, shocking, and incredibly disorienting change in the world. and it was really reflected and enacted in many ways by my peers at school, as well. and my research for this book really taught me that although it felt very sort of personal and i felt really isolated in the experience, which most girls who experience it do, it's

actually incredibly common. and really sort of any quality that makes a girl an outlier at that age will result in this kind of treatment and to some extent, ostracization. >> you write, i had no control over what happened next, the names they called me in school, the crude gestures, the prank phone calls. not even when my mother answered the phone. she wanted to help me, but i had no words for what happened. my chambers were breached. they filled with that weight. i was sunk. how could she have prepared me for this. you cannot win against an ocean. there is no good strategy in a rigged game. there are only new ways to lose. >> and melissa, you might have faced, you know, the cat calls and the reaction from men as you developed so early and you looked like a woman, but you were a girl, but i'm also really moved by the way you described how your female peers pulled

away from you and how painful that was. >> mm-hmm. yeah. this is one of those experiences that i think on some level, we're very familiar with. there's a cultural narrative around it. but it hasn't changed. it's still happening, this kind of policing of female bodies and this projection of a certain kind of sexual shame and promiscuity or advanced sexual development that simply isn't true, you know? my body changing over the course of a single summer didn't make me not a child anymore, but i was suddenly dealing with some very adult treatment. and i think one of the most devastating consequences of this is the shame that comes from it, which leads to secrecy, you know, and in that passage, part of what i'm talking about is my inability to talk about it. i had parents that really wanted to support me and were totally dismayed at what they could see, which was just a little bit of the consequences on the surface, my withdrawal and anger, but i

was so embarrassed, you know? it's the nature of sort of body shaming that i felt like it was my fault. so i never talked to them about it. and i was getting these, you know, harassing phone calls and never telling anyone about it. and honestly, until i wrote this book, there were so many experiences, sort of micro and a little bit larger that i never talked to anyone about, because of that shame that was generated when i was 11 and 12 years old. >> this is so fascinating. i want to bring in katty kay. she's the author of "the confidence code" and "the confidence code for girls." and katty and i are always looking for new ways to help young women develop confidence and their ability to communicate effectively. katty, this is really kind of like a side, sub-issue that could overtake the entire conversation about confidence. >> yeah, because you know, one of the things melissa that you've pointed out is that

girls, really, socializing is so important for girls as they hit puberty. it's the be all and the end all, is your friend group. so to lose that support network, i can see how that would have a kind of double whammy effect on your confidence, and girls are already losing their confidence in those years and getting so anxious about failure. what was it that got you through the other end of this? was it other girls catching up with you? did you find a support network somewhere? did you find people you could talk to, or did it just have to be time and patience and waiting for your body to look more like the bodies of those girls around you? >> well, it was really sort of a combination of all of those things. i had a really supportive family, and while in the throes of it, i know they felt very helpless, but the love and confidence and boosting that i did receive for my whole childhood, i feel like it gave me a bedrock of confidence and resiliency and belief in myself

that was there for me when i was ready to come back to it. and you know, i did have friends. one on one best friends. and i will say, also, that for me, literature and books and finding descriptions of my own experience in young adult literature, adult literature, i really found a haven in stories. >> so, melissa, we've talked a lot, specifically about what had such an impact on you and that was developing into a woman at 11 or 12, looking like a woman at 11 or 12 to the outside world. but you actually, you bring that up to take the readers into a much larger issue, and that is women not having control of their own bodies. women not having control of their own destiny. women too often not having the confidence to take charge for themselves. can you get into that a little

bit here? >> sure. well, you know, in this book, i really wanted to start a bigger conversation, not about what i've come to think of as sort of capital "t" trauma, the violent assaults and forms of overt abuse that much of us are familiar with. and there is a larger public conversation around. i'm interested in the more microharms and the ways that girls are conditioned to value the desires and interests and bodily sovereignty of other people over themselves. and one of the ways that i really looked into this, starting with my own experience and then through a lot of interviews with other women is the idea that i coined empty consent. you know, we have this discourse around consent. first, it was no means no, now it's moving into a yes means yes, but i'm interested in that "means." what does it mean for us to really mean "yes"? and i'm not just talking about sexual interactions here, but all kinds of forms of touch and

how i observed in myself my tendency to say "yes" to things i didn't really want, because it seemed more important to not disappoint the other person. and this dynamic reverberated in every level of my life. and once i started talking to other women, i realized that it did for them, too. and many of these conversations were the first time that we were naming this, right? and i think that that conversation is really the beginning of the undoing of that kind of conditioning and a route to a greater freedom in our bodies and in our lives. >> the new book is "girlhood," melissa febos, thank you so much. thank you for sharing. we appreciate it. coming up, one of our next guest says much if not most of our greatest art was created by people you probably wouldn't want near your kids. so what does that mean for the art itself? should it be banned from museums? what about authors? should disgraced writers have their books pulled off the

shelves? we'll talk about it, coming up on "morning joe." we'll talk about it, coming up on "morning joe. what's the #1 retinol brand used most by dermatologists? it's neutrogena® rapid wrinkle repair® smooths the look of fine lines in 1-week, deep wrinkles in 4. so you can kiss wrinkles goodbye! neutrogena®

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also, medina spirits is in jeopardy. bob baffert revealed his horse failed a post-race drug test that showed excessive amounts of a steroid used to treat pain and inflammation. officials announced an immediate suspension for baffert barring him from entering any horses in races at the iconic churchill downs. why didn't they take the test before? i don't know. there's got to be a reason. denying any wrongdoing, baffert

said medina spirit was never treated with the drug as derby officials await results from another sample before deciding whether the horse will be disqualified. why are we doing this? trump weighed in on it calling the horse a junky and used it to further his false claim of fraud in the presidential election. >> it's too much. this is a "south park" episode. how do they do it every week? >> medina spirit is expected to compete this saturday in the preakness in baltimore. >> let's bring there roger bennett. we can tell everybody this right now. roger bennett failed during the trump administration one drug test after another drug test.

the "morning joe" drug test. he was found with large amount of horse steroids inside of him. we couldn't let him on the show. here he is again clean, sober and high on life. roger, thank you for being with us. what a weekend we had. i don't know where you want to start. what about chelsea, getting -- putting themselves in this position. they have had quite a run since that guy from france came on board. >> you bring on the nation's leading horse junky expert and we will talk about soccer. no stadium storming. just football. starting with a battle between man chester city and chelsea.

man city needed a win to clinch a title. they took the lead. rolled the ball across the box. sterling, can i kick it? yes, you can. city had a chance to put the game away. worse than elon musk on "saturday night live." what a goal. what a hockey assist by hershey, pennsylvania's christian. major alert. sublime finish. city's title back on ice. 2-1 chelsea. you either die a hero or live long enough to see yourself become a meme. mazel tov.

>> exactly. sergio apologizing to city nation after that duff. take us around the rest of the league. what especially happened? >> manchester united, they had to win to keep the fight alive. look at this. horse junkies. unit ready like a gentleman boxer who let their opponent get the first punch before initiating their result. 3-1 united. finally, this game, surprise package. had to win to keep their dreams of top four alive. they couldn't.

he is beautiful. for all the mother's of the -- mothers on mother's day. >> listen, if you want to hear more about british pornographers, warrior poets and horse junkies, tune in to roger. it's the tv show that's sweeping the nation, "men in blazers." all the kids are watching it. we want to tell about you roger's upcoming book, "reborn in the usa, an english man's love letters to his chosen home." i'm dead serious, when i hear roger talking about his love for this country and talking about every time he touches down in the united states he feels reborn and feels a rush of energy it is inspiring. roger, i can't wait to have you come on and talk about the book. >> thank you, joe. i always say, i'm an american

born in an englishman's body. courage. still ahead, we are following developments in the ransomware attack. new york police have identified a person of interest in the shooting of three innocent bystanders in times square on saturday, including a 4-year-old girl. "morning joe" is coming right back. back shingles doesn't care. i logged 10,000 steps today. shingles doesn't care. i get as much fresh air as possible. good for you, but shingles doesn't care. because 1 in 3 people will get shingles, you need protection. but no matter how healthy you feel your immune system declines as you age, increasing your risk for getting shingles. so what can protect you? shingrix protects. for the first time ever, you can protect yourself from shingles

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ever conversation with people you haven't seen since quarantine started. >> it's such a weird time. things seem to be opening up again. fingers crossed. who the hell is this woman? is she my wife's friend or do our kids go to school together? >> is she my cousin? someone that might be my cousin. >> he remembers he is my cousin,

right? how many times can a person say, it's such a crazy time right now. >> it's such a crazy time right now. >> did you travel at all? >> no. you? >> no. >> cool. >> is this really a conversation? >> i think this is going pretty well. >> i think i'm going to be extra cautious for the rest of my life. you know? >> which vaccine did you get? >> i got pfizer. >> i got moderna. >> nice. a question that leads nowhere. it's like asking, are you more tylenol or advil. the second dose knocked me out for about 24 hours. >> that sounds like a unique experience should tell everyone about. i said that out loud. quick laugh, so she thinks you are kidding. >> quarantine was good? >> no. >> great. >> but recently, i have been going to dinner again. did i just say i've been going

to dinner again? should i die? >> i went to one dinner outdoors and one indoors. do i have brain damage? i think i might have permanent brain damage. >> too close. good morning. welcome to "morning joe." it's monday, may 10th. with us we have white house reporter jonathan lemire, member of the "new york times" editorial board, mara gay, former treasury official and "morning joe" economic analyst joe ratner and ed luce is with us this morning. let's dive right in. a ransomware attack that shut down a gasoline pipeline was most likely the work of russians. two sources tell nbc news a new russian criminal group known as dark side is the leading suspect in the attack against colonial pipeline. the company was forced to pause

operations that transport nearly half of the fuel supply of the entire east coast. nbc news sources say early indications suggest the attack did not look like the work of the kremlin and was rather a criminal plan. dark side is known for its extortion plots. colonial pipeline has not said what the hackers demanded. gasoline futures are up nearly 1.5%, heating up nearly 1.3%. >> ed luce, this is where the future of warfare may be going. you have these attacks that any country can launch if they have invested enough in getting an army of hackers. they don't have to have 50, 60 years of military buildup like the united states. just do something like this and shut the east coast down of this country. or of britain, of -- you just fill in the blank.

>> yeah. it's a little bit like the pandemic. our vulnerability to cyberattacks, particularly of critical infrastructure -- to our critical infrastructure, has been flagged for years and years, like pandemics have been. we know what we are vulnerable to. in this case, it's an extraordinary vulnerability. 45% of american gas goes through this pipeline. the fact that there's an infrastructure bill coming up for consideration before congress, which is returning from recess, means that this attack might be in a curious way quite well timed to focus minds on just how vulnerable our critical infrastructure is to ransomware attacks from private sector criminal groups, but also more geogeopolitically motivate

attacks from countries like russia. it's a timely reminder, let's say, of what we need to get done. >> following two mass shootings, one in colorado springs and the other in the heart of new york city. in colorado springs, a man police say walked in and killed seven people before taking his own life. i walked into a birthday party. there were children at the party. none were injured. police say a gunman was a boyfriend of one of the victims. there's no word on a motive there yet. they are putting the pieces together. we are following that. then go to new york city where police have identified a person of interest who shot three innocent bystanders in times square on saturday, including a 4-year-old girl. two senior nypd officials tell wnbc that the man was trying to shoot his brother when the

unintended targets were shot. gun violence has nearly doubled in new york city since the same time last year. hours after the times square shooting, brooklyn bureau president and andrew yang, stressed support for the new york city police department, rejecting calls of de-funding the police. stated their beliefs that new york city's economy could not recover without public safety. >> i have been following the new york city mayor's race, following your reporting from the early part of the campaign. it's been fascinating how this debate has broken down where the de-fund the police sentiments and that campaigning worked better than in other areas.

it's not always obvious. we were talking about the british voters and where they broke. talk about the de-fund the police argument right now as it is breaking down in the new york city mayor's race and why these two more moderate candidates may have broken out. i think andrew yang said something like, we need you, nypd, your city needs you, nypd. >> the key to understanding the way this is breaking down in new york is to understand that in new york city politics, if democratic politics in new york, central brooklyn and black voters are key stakeholders. because of that, you have folks like eric adams, especially, who has been able to do extremely well in central brooklyn. this is his base. this is a group of people, of communities who -- city workers, union workers, they are traditional democrats, liberal

in many areas. but when crime spikes happen, these are the kinds of communities that get hit first. that's important to understand. they are communities concerned about safety, particularly the voters who tend to be older women especially who vote. and union members. the message that eric adams is trying to straddle and the other candidates are as well is the need for reform but also a reflection of the reality on the ground right now, which is that these communities are suffering. i think it is important though that it's really not a binary dynamic here in new york. there's no candidate, including eric adams, that's running for office on a law and order message that doesn't support reform to the nypd. i think we really need to pull back and really try to look at the larger picture, which in my opinion is that if you have a more accountable police department and you have common

sense reform -- that doesn't mean de-funding the entire police department. that's ridiculous. right? if you do have a department that's more accountable to the public that it serves, you will also have a more effective department. the nypd has issues throughout the organization and does some things really well, but there are other issues -- it's clearance right is extremely low. that's another area where it needs to rebuild trust with communities. i think the protests you saw last summer, that energy that you saw throughout the city, the anger over george floyd's death, which in new york manifested years after eric garner's killing. so that is not going to go away. the key for these candidates is capitalizing on the moment of let's really be responsible and be aware that communities are suffering right now. also, there are going to be reforms that will come.

congress is deadlocked over infrastructure. there may be compromise when it comes to police reform. the latest on that issue straight ahead. you are watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. [sfx: psst psst] allergies don't have to be scary. spraying flonase daily stops your body from overreacting to allergens all season long. psst! psst! all good stay restless with the icon that does the same. the rx, crafted by lexus. get 0.9% apr financing on the 2021 rx 350. experience amazing, at your lexus dealer.

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will be. we proposed that. i want to see good legislation. i know sometimes you have to compromise. if we don't get qualified immunity now, then we will come back and try to get it later. but i don't want to see us throw out a good bill because we can't get a perfect bill. >> jonathan lemire, peace may break out here. this is one of the first areas where we are having healthy back and forth between republicans and democrats. quite a few south carolina people involved from, of course, jim clyburn to tim scott to lindsey graham. they're all working together trying to find a middle ground for police reform. >> joe, there is some actual momentum here. there's been so little of it on capitol hill in recent years. certainly, since the beginning of the biden administration. it looks like something could come together between the two

parties. republicans want to be the party of no. mitch mcconnell said last week that his purpose as republican senate leader was to object and to block 100% of the biden administration's proposals. this is one where there seems to be some common ground. qualified immunity is enshrined protection from individual officers that can't be sued in the wake of potential misconduct. it's something that civil rights activists for a long time, police reform activists have wanted removed. it was striking to see clyburn step out of that yesterday and to say, even if we can't come to an agreement on that, we need to make something happen. you nailed it. south carolina is the nexus of this with tim scott taking the lead for his party on this issue. there has been progress made on a number of issues on policing in the wake of the guilty verdict in the george floyd murder trial, which as mara said

was the impetus for so much of this across the country, now almost a year ago, with protests sweeping from coast to coast and refocusing the national attention on this issue. sadly, we have had a number of very questionable police-involved shootings since then. there is some hope here, even though there isn't much common ground on the issue of guns, very sticky negotiations on immigration and frankly right now, we are facing a real -- the white house and democrats and republicans don't seem to have -- they seem to be very far apart on this infrastructure and jobs package the president has put forth. they will meet in person this week. on policing, there seems to be some hope. >> ed luce, last week i saw jim gerrity write that the dirty little secret about this huge debate over whether democrats

could get to 50 votes or not if they get rid of the filibuster was the fact that they cannot only get to 60 votes on a lot of these issues, but they are having getting to 50 because of joe manchin and kirsten sinama. if you step back, the big story is that joe biden gave one of the most sweeping progressive states -- speeches of our time a few weeks back. here we are two weeks later. you sit there wondering, is he going to get to 50 votes, let alone 60 votes on 90% of those measures? which means they're going to have to figure out a way to xoe compromise with republicans. they have to get republicans on their side.

that's just the political reality. that's one thing i think a lot of people are overlooking in washington right now. they have to figure out how to get ten republicans on board, or if you believe joe manchin, none of this stuff will pass. >> yeah. i think the fact that the white house is beginning to move in that direction, it signalled more willingness to compromise with republicans in the last few weeks, explains why bernie sanders is getting so frustrated. because while joe manchin has one vote, which is enough to kill any democratic bill that goes through reconciliation on the 50-vote basis, so does bernie sanders. he has one vote that can kill it. i think that tussle now is going to get a lot more intense. because i think the founders' theory of the case, which i share, is that there's no

compromise republicans are willing to make that will preserve that sort of main feature of what biden wants to get done. i think that will get stronger and it's going to be heard in the white house. . coming up -- >> what is dogecoin. >> it started as a joke based on an internet meme. it has taken off in a real way. >> what is dogecoin? >> it was created in 2013 and has a circulating supply of 117 billion coins of which 113 have been mined. >> what is dogecoin? >> elon musk on "weekend update" explaining cryptocurrency, sort of.

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the shots drop. the demand shortage in states from washington to south carolina is causing the u.s. stockpile to grow by the hundreds of thousands of doses, giving a glimpse at the vaccine hesitancy hurdle the country is facing. the biden administration announced if states don't accept their full allocation it will share supply with other countries. not all states are reducing delivery. new york, colorado and maryland are all accepting their full allocations. demand is dropping slightly. 57% of americans have had at least one dose. health experts have stated that about 70% of the population will need to be vaccinated to reach herd immunity. we are still not there. as more and more americans get vaccinated, dr. fauci now says he is open to relaxing indoor masking.

>> if more people get vaccinated, the cdc will be almost in real time, george, updating their recommendations and their guidelines. yes, we do need to start being more liberal as we get more people vaccinated. >> that's what you heard last week from scott gottlieb. he said it's time to talk about lifting mask requirements indoors. that's so important to get this country moving back. you can do that. if you feel the need to only let a certain number of people into the store or if you are a shop owner and you only want people in that's vaccinated, that's up to you as a private businessowner, or it should be if this is still a free country. some of my former republican brothers and sisters might say. it's time. it is time to move past most of mask mandates.

over 57% of americans have at least been vaccinated once. >> dr. fauci said that masks during cold and flu season might become the norm going forward. i can see people using masks on planes. i'm not against it. if someone is not comfortable with that, that's fine, too. you really saw not just the comfort being curbed by social distancing and mask guidelines but the number of people who got the flu, you can't pass as much from person to person. it's something to think about. >> it is. think about going over this past year, year and a half, because of wearing the mask -- >> i always get the flu. didn't get it. >> you didn't get the flu. so many of my friends -- i didn't get the flu this past season. because, again, you are wearing a mask, you are being more careful. it makes sense in the few fur if -- in the future. if you like the flu or covid, if

you like smoking five or six cartons of cigarettes a day, up to you. it's a free country. people should make that choice on their own. it was revealing this past year. you can avoid the flu and colds. >> i'm sure this comfort will continue as we navigate through this. we are at 57%, not where we need to be for the country to reach herd immunity. getting there. is it possible to separate the art from the artist? we dive into a hot button issue after a writer's book is pulled from publication amid allegations of assault. that conversation is next on "morning joe."

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sometimes they say, "it might work, it might not work." and so i ask myself the question, like, "why even get the vaccine, if it can also harm you?" for me, it's like taking a 50/50 chance. hi andrea. some say that the vaccine is harmful or that it might not work, but that's not true. millions of people have been vaccinated with no ill effects. and i can tell you that getting the vaccine

is far safer than not getting it. ♪♪ last month, author blake bailey published a book about philip roth. roth was also a controversial figure at times, dogged by accusation of mysogony. he would be accused of rape and grooming by his former students when he was a middle school teacher, allegations that bailey

has denied, calling them false. because of the accusations, shipping and promotion of the book wound up being halted by the publisher w.w. norton pending further information. the literary world is debating the impact of the decision to cancel the book. others are weighing in on the difficult decision, can you ever separate the artist from their work? let's bring in judith shulavitz, a literary critic and author of "the sabbath world," also with us matt bye and ron charles, a book critic for "the washington post". >> thank you for being with us. this is a fascinating subject. i want to start with you, judith. i was reading the articles going back and forth. you said, let me just say off

the top here that i was saying, don't get the book before i knew about any of the allegations, because you were looking at how he treated some of the issues that have come under closer scrutiny since the allegations. i'm curious if you think a book should be taken off the shelf if an author is "canceled." >> in i -- in the piece, i said the book is bad. in terms of whether it should be taken off the market, i don't think so. once a book is published, it's a big statement to pull it. publishers have the right not to publish things. once they put it on the market, they are setting a precedent for pulling books on the basis of an

author's moral tupitude. if the allegations are true, it's reprehensible and indefensible. norton knew about it or had some inkling and they went ahead. once they put it in the market, it's reputational damage. it sets a very bad precedent. bailey is a bad guy if the charges are true. the next person to come along might not be so bad and the reputational hit could be bad and they would pull it. >> i remember watching fran in her discussions with martin scorsese. just because i don't want to invite somebody over to dinner doesn't mean i don't want to listen to their music, doesn't mean i don't want to read their

books. we have to be, in her words, mature enough to separate the two. what are your thoughts there? >> yeah, those are my thoughts. honestly, joe, who would you want over for dinner based on art you have seen in a museum or books that we have read? i hate to break it to people, but so much of the art and literature we appreciate was created by people who share very few of the modern values or sensibilities that we do, but also might just have been lousy people. where does that end? frank lloyd wright created these beauty houses. steve jobs created a hostile work environment from what i read. are we bashing our cellphones in the backyard? i think it's a dangerous precedent. i agree about that. i downloaded it.

i look forward to reading it. i don't think you take art, literature, non-fiction, biography, whatever it is, i don't think you take it away, you vanish it, unpublish it because you want to prove that the moral fiber of the author or artist doesn't meet your standard or doesn't meet the standard of the market you are trying to impress. >> you know, ron, this book actually got wonderful reviews from most people, other than judith. it also came under scrutiny early because he was granted unlimited access to philip roth and talk -- let me try to figure out a better way to say this. roth played him. roth played him all along. he said, here, you are the only person that is going to get my letters.

you are the only person that is going -- even though this book got wonderful reviews from most sources, it was controversial among literary writers and historians and critics, was it not? >> yeah. roth chose him to be his biographer. he fired the first one because they weren't getting along. he gave him access to his own personality and his letters. this is a remarkable bit of access. sorry to lose that. we're not going to lose that book. the book is out there. the book is still for sale. the used copies are selling for less than the retail price. the book is not, in fact, vanishing. the publisher, although it doesn't want to publish it, said blake bailey can find some other publisher or publish it himself. the idea the book will vanish is not true. >> what is your thought about -- because there is so much

information in this book, so much access -- he was given so much access to one of the most important writers of at least the second half of the 20th century, if not the entire 20th century, wouldn't it be strange if this book disappear? are we not adult enough to say, okay, roth was considered misogynist because of what his second wife wrote and what others have said and there's allegations against bailey, if you are going to read a 900 page biography about a literary figure, you are probably -- you can sort through it when he starts talking about certain areas and be able to figure out whether he is shading the truth for roth or not. >> yeah. it's fascinating to read the book now. you come across anecdotes about roth's sexual behavior and you read them in a different way according to the accusations you

read. the book is more interesting. i thought it was always entertaining even before the accusations. the book should not vanish. this is unique access we have to this major author. >> this is an attempt to cancel the book, an attempt to cancel the author. i guess the question is, should it be? do you separate the art from the artist? >> it's such an age old question. i'm interested in whether there are issues of what was actually done and history, when it was done, on that question of whether you do separate the art from the artist. if you think about paying for sex with young boys, edward digger, a pedophile in today's terms, should we not see those paintings and read the books? matt, to your question, does it

make a difference if the artist did something that was illegal as opposed to just being a bad guy, does it make a difference if the artist is still living or lived in the 1800s or 1700s? >> you know, it may. everything is case by case. i can't believe that i'm hearing a literature critic essentially say, well, the book is not vanished because you can get it at a used bin if you are lucky enough to happen across it or some other publisher might pick it up, so that's not censorship. i hear a lot about this from the left. this is a common refrain is, it's not censorship because the government is not kicking down your door to take your books. that's not what censorship looks like, almost in any country or any instance in the world. you curb free expression of a society when there's a culture of fear and when individual

companies, publishers, museums, music labels decide there's too much risk to be incurred, too much damage done in airing certain art and the marketplace shrinks. that's how things get sensored. for people who know so much about this and who have defended free speech, who would define themselves -- i would define myself as liberal in the traditional sense, for that -- i see this on social media and all over, for that segment of our political conversation to now be sort of saying, well, there's no pressure on the marketplace of ideas here, because somebody else might do it or there's already copies of the book around, that's too cute by half. that's not facing the climate of fear and the potential for that -- the potential damage for that to society you are creating. this is one of the central conversations we are having as a country right now. >> ron, how do you respond to matt's accusation that you are

too cute by half? >> i'm flattered. thank you. >> awkward. >> the book isn't available at some obscure second half bookstore. it's at amazon and barns & noble. the book is not vanishing. if publishers don't want to publish a book, that's their right. let's remember, publishers turn down most of the books they get. a publisher deciding not to publish a book is not unusual. what is unusual is published it and deciding to to longer print it and promote it. if people decide they don't want to be associated with a certain author who are we, who is the government, who are other forces to tell that pubpublisher, you t continue to publish this book. time is part of the equation. an author who died 400 years

ago, we don't think about them the same way about an author who is alive. >> judith, artists and authors were brought up with a terrible past. we could bring up many rock stars that -- from the '60s and their actions with teenage girls. my god, half the catalog i listen to probably would be taken off of spotify. it's the separation of the art from the artist and exactly how we do that. my concern is now what happens with political books. for instance, people who i have been very harshly critical of over the last four years, mike pence -- should mike pence not be able to publish a book, should kellyanne conway not be able to public a book?

throughout history, i remember growing up and i think albert speers, "third reich" was a book selection. one seldom recognizes the hand of the devil whether it's on your own shoulder. there are insights to be gained. >> i haven't checked barns & noble but i did check amazon. it's no longer available. my local bookstore, they don't have it. they sold out. they are not getting another shipment. it's not as readily available as ron is saying. in ron's own piece, he said that the younger generation and the tastes of the younger generation of employees at the publisher must be taken into account, which is a curious standard if a book is internally unpopular because of its politics, sexual politics, its policy politics,

its republican politics or democratic politics, we should bow to the employees of the publisher and override the judgment of the editor because there's people at the company who don't want it? that seems very strange to me. again, disappearing a book after it is published makes a very strong statement. the public is not seeing what goes on behind the scenes. yes, a publisher has a right to do whatever they want with a book prepublication. they have a right to pull it. i'm just saying, norton, a reputable publisher, with a reputation for integrity, is setting a terrible precedent that will affect books like mike pence's. it's impossible to imagine albert speer publishing now. ron said he is looking forward to reading the book. lots of people don't get to if they don't already have it. i learned a lot from the book. i thought it was a bad book. the ways in which it was bad told me something about the

relationship between bailey and roth, which told me something about roth and gave me lots of information about roth i didn't have. one of the saddest things about this is bailey had access to information that other biographers don't have access to. you get that through the book. you may not like the judgements bailey comes to and you may not like bailey, but the world should have some of the factual information he reports in the book. now it's going to be very hard to get ahold of it. i disagree it's out there on the marketplace. >> looking at it -- >> ron, you are going to give us your latest amazon update. go ahead and respond to judith. >> i'm looking at it on amazon. it's available for $24. >> i didn't see it. the point is, i don't think a biography -- i don't think a biography is a work of art, to be honest. i think some non-fiction is a work of art.

biography is part of the critical cloud in which an artist swims. i think in the work of art, you really have to be able to separate the art from the artist, even though i think most people can't. virginia wolf had a term, the common reader, as opposed to the professional reader. the common reader can't unknow things they know. it's going to affect the way they read the book. that doesn't mean they shouldn't have access to come to their own conclusion. i don't think it's possible to separate them. i think that readers have the right to -- should have the right to try. >> interesting. you wonder if this conversation applies to other things. we need to continue this conversation in a big way. judith, matt and ron, thank you all very much. >> thank you. >> just scratched the surface. >> ron, come back.

you seem to provoke great conversation. we appreciate it. up next, from the reddit revolt, to the cryptocurrency, what happens when you eliminate barriers to investing. keep it right here on "morning joe." as gum issues. does it worry me? absolutely. sensodyne sensitivity and gum gives us a dual action effect that really takes care of both our teeth sensitivity as well as our gum issues. there's no question it's something that i would recommend.

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are cryptocurrencies? >> they're a type of digital money, but instead of being controlled by a central government, they're decentralized using blockchain technology. and lately prices have been soaring for bitcoins like crypto, ethereum and especially dogecoin. >> what is dogecoin? >> it basically strted on the internet as a meme and taken over in a big way. >> i'm trying to diversify my portfolio. my question is, what is dogecoin? >> i'm glad you asked. [ laughter ] >> what/. >> it's a virtual currency, unston april vehicle that's going to take over the world. >> i get that. but what is it man? >> i keep telling you, it's cryptocurrency you can trade for conventional money. >> so it's a hustle? >> yeah, it's a hustle. >> why didn't you say that, man! >> a meme-inspired, bitcoin,

dogecoin filled up the "snl" feed over the weekend. it went up as elon musk mentioned it while hosting "saturday night live." this while musk's spacex launched it would launch the dodge coin mission to the moon next year with the meme-inspired cryptocurrency as full payment for the lunar pay lode. while the market for dogecoin and other cryptocurrencies continue to the rale investors, it's attention grabbing headlines, have many of us asking pretty basic questions. what exactly is cryptocurrency? and how does it really work? joining us now is someone to answer our questions, former hedge fund analyst, now staff writer at "new yorker," sheila consult karsh. her latest piece is entitled "the big gamble: is robin hood democrat tiesing finance or encouraging risk?" we'll get to that in a moment, but first --

>> let's ask it again. >> what is it? what is dogecoin? >> it is one of several cryptocurrencies that trade using blockchain technology. blockchain is basically a giant digital excel spreadsheet that earn in the world can see and access where transactions happen and are recorded on ott spreadsheet and we can all see they happen and agree on them and we don't need an intermediary like a blank or a government to sort of be involved in this transaction. so it's a way to decentralize all financial transactions. so various people have created different cryptocurrencies that trade using this blockchain and dogecoin is one of them. and as mr. musk explained on "snl," it was started as a joke but now it is acting crazy, shooting relatively speaking to the moon and then collapsing again. and it's sort of a window into

this internet money hysteria that seems to have gripped a certain part of our economy. >> sheela, reading from your new piece, quote, "robinhood, which offers zero trade in commission in trading of stocks and cryptocurrencies pitches itself as a enlightened vision of wall street. its stated mission is to democratize finance for all." in spite of controversy, millions of new users opened account and in the first quarter of 2021 robin hood's payment for order flow revenue was $331 million, more than triple what it had been in the same period of last year. you go on to say, i was struck by the similarities between the lead-up to the financial crisis and the present moment, with millions of relatively inexperienced people jumping into the stock market, determined to take advantage of the wealth creation machine.

>> you know, i couldn't agree more. i remember in 2007 i had one friend after another -- despite the fact i had no money -- saying, you know, joe, we really should get into real estate developing. i was in northwest florida at the time. and because everybody that was in retail was suddenly in real estate. everybody that had been an accountant was in real estate. everybody had gotten not in on this land rush but also, you know, getting people to extend on their houses or whatever, and sure enough, when you have people talking to those that are as dumb as me on financial matters about getting into real estate, you know the end is nigh. >> well, yes, any time something seems on the surface to be absurd and maybe too good to be

true in my experience, it usually is absurd and too good to be true. and it's important to kind of look at this current robin hood craze and dogecoin trade in economics. economics explains a lot of this. we have wealth and income inequality in record brie portions. we have a pandemic that hit young people especially hard. the millennial generation already suffering serious economic headwinds. it's the first generation not likely to achieve the financial and economic success of its parents. home ownership among that cohort is extremely low. there's record student loan debt sitting on the shoulder of young adults. then suddenly many of these people were stuck at home, they received stimulus checks and here was robin hood coming along saying, look, rich people trade in the stock market. you can as well.

here you go. we're going to make it really easy and what we saw was sort of a fascinating roller coaster of populous stock trading, and we still don't know how it's going to end. >> katty kay is with us and has a question. >> and sheela just to close out the show to make it simple for me, am i better off thinking of cryptocurrency like gold as an investment or cash like hard dollars i can buy things with? >> i think it eventually will become similar to cash, but i would say don't invest more money than you can afford to lose. that's my only piece of advice about cryptocurrency or anything. >> all right. we'll leave it there but we need to have you back for sure. the piece is in the new issue of "the new yorker." sheela, very good to have you on the show. >> and it's great advice.

my kids have heard it a million times and she's so right, if something seems like it's too good to be true, it's too good to be true. >> it absolutely is. that does it for us this morning. stephanie ruhle picks up the coverage right now. ♪♪ hi, there, i'm stephanie ruhle. it's monday, may 10th and we have a ton to get to, starting with breaking news this morning. nbc news has learned that a russian criminal organization may be behind a massive cyberattack, crippling a 5,500 mile gas pipeline, knocking it off since friday. in washington, republicans are taking another step towards sealing liz cheney's fate after kevin mccarthy formally endorses elise stefanik to replace her in the leadership position of the party. and now