i'm not hungry! you're having one more bite! no! one more bite! ♪ kraft. for the win win. welcome to "meet the press daily." i'm chuck todd on a busy solemn friday. we are on the eve of the 20th

anniversary of 9/11 attacks. politically and many ways culturally at least for a time united most of our country. our government leaders used or in some cases took advantage of that unity. that's another story. and certainly up for plenty of debate. still, we were a united states amid the depths of that crisis and right now we're anything but united when it comes to the current crisis of covid-19. as death toll far surpasses anything we saw on 9/11. 660,000 americans. in fact, according to our numbers today in first read of deaths just in the last report in the last 24 hours, this is not part of the seven-day average, but we had 3,200 over the last 24 hours. you know any time you see a 3 on a daily death toll in the thousands you think of 9/11, as well. put things in perspective. we're now seeing a 9/11 size death toll basically at least every two days and it's actually more than that now. and the conservative blowblack to president biden's sweeping new covid mandates that will

vaccine shots or testing requirements is pretty intense. republican governors across the country are vowing to fight these new rules. the rnc plans to sue the administration over them and just the start of what will likely be many, many legal challenges. we've seen calls for, quote, massive civil disobedience in some corners of the gop at least those in heated republican primaries and overheated and some cases completely, completely irresponsible rhetoric. this morning the president responded to that blowback while taking questions at an event focused on keeping schools safe. >> i'm so disappointed that particularly some of republican governors had been so cavalier with the health of these kids. so cavalier with the health of

their communities. this is, this is we're playing for real here. this isn't a game. >> there are, of course, many questions facing the white house on the implementation and enforcement of these new rules. many of which have yet to actually be formally written. there are, of course, many political questions facing the president and his party because we've said it so many times but it bears repeating. how covid goes so go the biden presidency. it is that simple. acting cdc director dr. richard besser and professor lindsay riley a professor at american university. monica, let me start with you and simply the implementation aspect of this. it's, it is, look, i think yesterday's speech was designed to both be a strong reaction and i think they expected a strong reaction and in many ways the strong reaction may help reinforce their larger message. but let's talk about

implementation. how does this work and does the federal government have the resources to enforce some of the penalties that osha might put on private businesses that don't fulfill the requirements of either the vaccine or increased testing. >> and this is going to happen in a lot of different phases, chuck. the critical thing here first, chuck, the clock does start ticking for federal workers, contractors who now have the 75 days. but for all these other millions of americans who work at companies that have more than 100 employees, it's a little less clear what the timeline is going to look like. we do know from a covid briefing earl ier today that health experts anticipate it could take four to six weeks if not longer to just write that emergency rule and see how it is going to work. in the time frame of that and plus the legal fights that the white house is fighting and embracing for we're talking weeks, if not months, until we know how that is going to work.

as you were just terms of wheree at with hospitalizations and death rates continuing to climb, think about the precious, precious lives that could be lost in the next six to eight weeks because that will be taking so long in order for it to be implemented. so, the white house is completely aware that for the 80 million or so americans that this will apply to once they believe the rule is put into effect, it will not be until far later this fall. now, when it comes to some of the other components like the 17 million health care workers that are in facilities that rely on medicare and medicaid funding, that will kick in sooner. in terms of just exactly how this is going to be enforced, there are still questions about the fines. the only thing we know for sure is that it is the federal workers and contractors if they don't comply within the 75 days, little more than two months from now they could face progressive

disciplinary action and with the companies that have a testing opt out it's not entirely certain how that is going to work because they're going to have to manage that, decides who pays for it and also seeing if it is checked. somebody could come in saying i tested negative versus showing proof of that. all is that is still to be worked out detail wise. chuck. >> i do expect the administration to. this is, i lost track of the number of times that president biden has promised more testing, more funding for testing, easier testing, at home, you name it. where is it? >> well, yesterday the president said is finally a more tangible step towards all of that because big companies like walmart, kroger and amazon are going to pitch in to at least have these be reduced and discount of about 35%. so they'll be sold at cost. starting this week, that is what they claim at least because, yes, just anecdotally those of us looking for the rapid at-home tests because you're getting back from a trip or check and

make sure before you go see older parents or anyone else like that, they are hard to come by right now. if you go online to amazon and try to order them, they're weeks and weeks away and you can go to a cvs and sometimes they have them. the administration acknowledges that and all of our health experts like the esteemed ones you have on this panel have been saying for weeks there needs to be more of that. there needs to be more surveillance. the other place where the biden administration is finally saying we have a real problem and get back and hold is testing in schools and that's another component of the six-prong strategy yesterday because about $10 billion has been allocated through hhs for that. that simply isn't being used properly according to these experts that really say schools should be doing more particularly for the kids under the age of 12 who are not eligible for the vaccines yet. >> monica alba getting us started at the white house, monica, thank you. so, dr. besser, we have both a health public health angle here with dr. besser and we also have the legal angle here we want to

deal with professor wiley. dr. beser, let me start with you. how many people are we looking at realistically that this new various forms of actual mandate from the federal government or encouraging a mandate in the private sector with a little bit of a stick approach here. what's the realistic expectation of our increase in vaccinations in this country? >> yeah, you know, chuck, that's a really good question. the white house estimate is that there are 80 million people who are eligible to receive vaccines who haven't done so yet. i haven't seen good estimates in terms of how that breaks down among people who work in businesses that have more than 100 employees, those who are working for the federal government, how many are in the 12 to 18 year range who wouldn't be covered by this. but i do think that this will spur some people who have been on the fence to roll up their

sleeve and get vaccinated, even before the osha regulations are in place and even before the medicare/medicaid regulations are in place. what i've seen as a pediatrician is that, you know, a small percentage of the parents i take care of are reluctant to get their kids immunized. but because it is required for school, they do it. it's not something that they are that passionate about. there is a group here when it comes to covid vaccination and when you look at the numbers, it's a largely evangelical christian and, you know, republican conservative group where you're not going to see much movement. you'll see them holding out on this. there is a movable group and i expect to see an uptick in vaccination. >> let me ask you about a couple things we desperately need near term. what is your guess, dr. besser, maybe you have more information on this as to why getting an

emergency use for the vaccine for kids under 12 has been so long delayed? >> well, you know, chuck, i think it comes down to the importance of having really good information. the younger you are, thankfully, the less likely you are to have severe disease, to be hospitalized and to die. and if you want the fda to approve the authorization of these vaccines for kids, if you want the advisory committee and the cdc to recommend them, you're really going to have to show that they're incredibly safe and that they're effective. it's much harder doing studies in really young kids. you can have a child who is in the study and they come in to get vaccinated and they are like absolutely not. they're not going to get that shot. it's much harder. so, you know, as a pediatrician and public health person, i want to make sure that the data are really good. we just saw recently that the uk did not issue a recommendation for vaccination of 12 to 17 year

olds. so, i want to make sure that if there is a recommendation, it's based on really good data and i can recommend it for my patients and make a decision as to whether i think it's the right way to go. and it puts more pressure on the importance of vaccinating adults who are around children, encouraging them because that is the buffer that will protect them. it puts more pressure on getting testing into schools which has not moved forward in a very effective way at all. >> i want, dr. besser, this testing issue. i'm just reading here from joebiden.com back in 2020, when he was just a candidate and one thing he promised. we were going to expand cdc surveillance programs and other surveillance programs so we can offer tests to those who ask and those who may not know to ask. this pledge to expand testing. i mean, it's, you know, it's been we're going to expand testing, we're going to expand testing. clearly, we haven't done enough of it. what is the hold up here?

is it a resource issue? is it literally a manufacturing hold up that we can't get these more tests available in the places we need it? >> you know, i think that what i saw happening was back in june, back in early july when the numbers were going down, down, down. when we were seeing 10,000 cases a day. incredibly low numbers. the push to get programs of perspective testing in schools went away. the cdc guidance around schools called on having testing programs when you were seeing significant or high levels of transmission. but we were on a trajectory where that wasn't happening and then delta arrived and it changed things in a major way and it's been catch up ever since. and with that, there hasn't been the incentives for manufacturers to make tests that they thought no one would be using. back in june and july, no one was looking to have tests at

home to screen themselves before they went to work because the levels of disease in so many places was so low. now we're playing catch up. i think that there was also an underestimation back in the late spring, early summer, as to where we were in the pandemic. we are no where near the end of this pandemic. we have no idea what the next variance will look like and there's a recognition of that now, but i think that there was a period where there was an early declaration of independence from the virus that just wasn't, you know, has not been the case. >> i hear you. but the testing thing has been one of those. there has always been a reason why that has been delayed. let me move over to the legal side of this argument, professor wiley. it does seem as if and i'm curious of your analysis on this. is the fact that the osha rule is likely to say a vaccine mandate or a rigorous testing program that that's what is going to make it legally pretty

difficult to dislodge this program? >> i think the vaccinate or test soft mandates that we've seen quite a lot of. employers and sectors are an effort to withstand legal challenge. but i think more importantly probably an effort to make these measures more politically powerful. by making them more flexible for those who object. in the case of the osha standard, i think these are steps that align nicely with federal agencies authority. the reach of the federal executive is more limited than the reach of a state legislator or governor when it comes to public health measures. but these steps with osha and the center for medicare and medicaid studies are within the wheel house of the federal government. that does not mean they're going to be challenged. it is very clear that we'll see court challenges and injunctions

to stop these rules from being implemented. but i think those challenges are more likely to be focused on questions about whether the proper procedures are followed and implementing these requirements as well as questions about whether the standards which we haven't actually seen yet but whether they're tailored sufficiently to signify the substantive requirements of the statutes. >> so, the financial sort of conductivity that the federal government can use sometimes. right. that's what they're doing with healthcare workers. can that reach into the education sector? right. there's federal funding to special education programs and a lot of local school districts. and it's a very limited amount of federal funds. is that enough to wield a federal mandate into various academic settings whether k through 12 or universities? >> i think that comes down to a question of power and its role

versus the role of the president and the agencies and the administration. the statutory basis for an executive action to attack that kind of condition on the federal government is stronger in the existing statutes that relate to healthcare, federal. particularly in the health care sector is really about making healthcare settings safer for people who are particularly vulnerable or immuno compromised that can't be safely vaccinated or effectively vaccinated themselves. we have a long-standing tradition of flexible and, you know, nimble tweaks to those kind of requirements coming from the administration. rather than require congressional act. and the education space their landscape is different. we don't have that same tradition of implementing health and safety requirements by the

administration. want to intervene here and attach conditions really to the vaccination if it was new funding with covid, that would work. but the administration has the authority at this point. >> this is really where the two places where they feel like they have some stronger standing is where they're headed. i get it on the education front because that ends up slipping more into the state and local categories. dr. besser and professor lindsay wiley, really appreciate having you both on today to help unpack this. coming up, combinations governors are reacting to president biden's new mandates. many are not happy on the republican side of the aisle. i'll speak with the chair of the national association governor hutchinson of arkansas. that's next. throughout the hour and all day today and tomorrow, commemorating the 20th anniversary of 9/11 here on msnbc. we'll take a look where our divided nation stands two decades after the collapse. the taliban now in control

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welcome back. even as delta rages in many of the states and districts many republican lawmakers were quick to condemn president biden's new program last night calling vaccine mandates for 100 million americans an attack on personal freedoms. as reported earlier the rnc did not waste any time. plans to officially sue the administration over mandates. kate ivy who has advocates for her constituents to get vaccinated and one of the people to note this is a pandemic lately of the unvaccinated still called the president's mandate outrageous and overreaching while doug described it in a mandate saying marks another government overreach. dr. fauci defended the mandates last night telling pbs the country exhausted all other options. >> i mean, we've tried

everything we can to get people vaccinated. we have the solution within our grasp, within our power. we just need to implement it and that is what the president has said tonight in his speech. that we are going to implement that. if that means more mandates, so be it. >> well, i'm joined now by the governor of arkansas. he's the new chair of the governor association and he's a republican, of course. it's governor asa hutchinson. you came out and also not in favor of mandates and made it clear you're also not in favor of what some other states have done which is ban the ability of a private business to have a vaccine mandate. so, you're sort of sitting there, i get it. you're trying to sit there in the uncomfortable middle. but let me ask you this, if this mandate idea this is an overreach by president biden, what other tools are left? we have hit a wall here, have we not? >> well, no, i don't think we have hit a wall. vaccinations continue to increase in arkansas.

yesterday we did over 13,000 vaccinations, which is a high level for our state. so, we've had one strategy which is building confidence, marketing this, spending hundreds of millions of dollars in a marketing campaign, building confidence. i've been to 16 cities, as you know, chuck, doing vaccine town hall meetings and trying to educate and trying to encourage, answer questions. and to build confidence. i start them off by saying we're not going to increase vaccination rates by more mandates from the government. we're going to have to build confidence in our communities. that is the concern. whenever you're trying to build confidence with a government mandate that i'm not aware that we've done anything like this in history where you're mandating businesses. to require vaccination or employees if you have over 100

employees giving it to osha to enforce with penalties. this is not the way to build confidence and that's what we're trying to do. there's some good points in the president's action plan, but this was going the wrong direction. >> let me ask you this, though. it does feel as if we, our entire sort of the political rhetoric has been about accommodating the unvaccinated. what about the folks that have done the right thing and they're still at risk. their freedoms are being denied here. the freedom to travel without feeling as if your health is at risk. i do think this personal liberty argument for the small minority is covered up. the liberty that i assume you would like to have to be able to travel fairly virus free around the state. i would. you know, what about that? what about the freedom of those that did get vaccinated? >> well, it is a matter of individual choice and individual freedom. but you always have to talk

about responsibility to the community. and that's the foundation of america that we join together and we act not just individually, but for the good, the common good. so, that is a relevant factor. let's think through this, though, that even with smallpox vaccinations, we require those in school. nobody requires them in businesses. whenever you look at the smallpox vaccination and others it's done on a statewide basis, state by state. not the federal government coming in and passing comprehensive mandates on business through the power that they claim they have. and so i think it's wrong on principle but it's also wrong on strategy and how we get to where we all want to get to increase vaccination rates. i think this can have just the opposite impact, as well as detrimental in terms of our businesses and how they operate.

as you said, i support businesses. if they want to require a vaccine, that ought to be their prerogative. but if you have a construction company over 100 people and they're all scattered out working on a highway out in the open, it doesn't make any sense to require vaccinations where it might lose some workers and it's unnecessary. that's where i think a targeted approach is much better than a federal government coming in. >> so, then it sounds like the health care idea makes a lot more sense to you. mandating health care workers. if that was the extent of the vaccine mandate where you extended it to healthcare workers, do you think that is appropriate? >> i think, i mean, i'm opposed to those mandates because we're working on them individually. we have many of our businesses that have required vaccination of their employees, including our healthcare and our hospitals. they're making those decisions.

so, i don't support a federal mandate there, but at the same time there's a better, more rationale basis for that action versus targeting every business in america over 100 employees. that's where the government overreach comes from and that is going to be undermining our efforts. >> when you brought up the smallpox example, one of the reasons i think why businesses don't have to worry about it is because it's mandated in schools. right. and basically it is pretty, you know, we've done a pretty good job making sure people get it. do you think the covid vaccine once it is approved, is that the best place to do the mandate? on the schools first? >> historically. we have utilized that tool in the schools for the broad public safety. we may be to that point in our country at some point. but right now we're not even approved by the fda for under 12. we've only had one of the

vaccines that have been fully approved by the fda and so we're a long ways from putting that mandate in the schools even though that we could reach that point and it should be done on a state by state decision basis. so, the schools is a good avenue and that's what we've historically used. >> given what we've seen in france and germany, you think this may have the opposite effect. their vaccination rates went up when they went with a tougher mandate on the private sector. ultimately, if the vaccination rates go up 10% to 15 percentage points, will this have bill a success? >> well, if that is the only goal you're increasing vaccination rates and businesses are afraid of osha. so, if osha comes in with rules and they're upheld by the courts, sure, it is going to increase vaccination rates there but at what cost? and we don't know whether that

is going to work. i think we could be there on a voluntary basis just as quickly. we're moving that way nationally and at the state level. i was with a bunch of firefighters today at a community event and this is not well received and the consensus is, you know, that this could build a little bit more resistance versus actually building greater acceptance. >> governor asa hutchinson republican from arkansas, always appreciate you coming on and sharing your perspective with our viewers. very important. thank you. >> great to be with you. thank you. right now you're looking live at ground zero in downtown manhattan as we approach the 20-year anniversary of 9/11. how americans have been commemorating the day already.

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proving once again that nobody builds networks like verizon. that's why we're building 5g right, that's why there's only one best network. we are back tonight. president biden plans to travel to new york city ahead of his visit to ground zero tomorrow to mark the 20th anniversary of 9/11. in addition he plans to attend memorials in shanksville, pennsylvania. today the secretary of state tony blinken and the attorney general garland held ceremonies in honor of those lost that day. >> 9/11 was to understate one of the darkest days in our history but out of it came profound humanity, compassion, strength and courage.

above all, it showed our remarkable resilience. >> what we must do, what we have done is to learn from the past to better anticipate and prepare for the next threat and to seek to disrupt it. it is an awesome responsibility but it is one we undertake together. >> and this morning the new york stock exchange observed a one-minute memory of silence in memory of the victims of 9/11. while much of today has been focused on those lost 20 years ago, senators chuck schumer and kirsten gillibrand made a plea to help first responders still struggling. schumer vowed to get more money for federal program that provides health care for those impacted by the attack and said it would be part of the senate's $3.5 trillion reconciliation

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welcome back. for a second consecutive day a passenger flight carrying americans out of taliban-controlled afghanistan. ten u.s. citizens are on board today's flight from kabul to qatar and the afghanistan these americans are fleeing looks like the afghanistan that existed before 9/11. the taliban in charge of the country and no u.s. troops on the ground. the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff general milley and mayorkas knows of no credible threat and our exit will not allow isis or al qaeda to reinstitute in the country.

u.s. ambassador to afghanistan and multiple administrations. you and i had some conversations about the overall strategy of afghanistan. but let's start with 9/11 and this sort of larger question. the one thing 9/11 did for me is pierce this idea that we weren't vulnerable. we're still vulnerable. are we both more vulnerable than we were at 9/11 and better prepared to figure out who is going to come at us? how would you assess our safety 20 years later? >> on the defensive side, there's no question that we are far, far more capable of defending our homeland than we were on 9/11. we spent billions and billions of dollars on it and from what i could tell it has been a very good investment. we are a hard target. that said as an open society we're always going to be vulnerable but far better prepared to deal with these threats than we were back then. that's the good news.

the bad news is you can't really win a game just by having the best defense anywhere in the world. you have to have an offense. that's what we have just given up sadly in afghanistan. it is the same taliban. and they are not kinder and gentler as we look at that list of interim ministers. these are the bad old boys. and similarly we've seen al qaeda already start to come back and one incredible public scene former security chief for bin laden arrived and the cameras were there to capture it. so, you know, we get an a, at least an a on defense but boy, oh, boy, our offensive capabilities self-inflicted. we have just handed afghanistan back to the group that sheltered al qaeda in the advance of the 9/11 attacks and, of course, al qaeda is coming back. >> do you suspect that u.s. boots will have to be back on

the ground in afghanistan in a substantial way because of this threat or do you think we can deal with this with special forces? >> well, we're going to find out, aren't we? we made this much harder all the way around. harder reliable intelligences. cia director bill burns said in open hearing it's just a simple fact. if you're not on the ground, your intelligence picture is going to be degraded. also with special forces. these are some of the finest troops the world has ever seen. but afghanistan is the landlocked country. we no longer have bases in that country. we don't have close bases in the immediate vicinity. so it's going to be much harder for them, as well. >> what is the, let me ask you something a little bigger picture which is there is the, what should we learn about the military postures we have taken? militarily we had plenty of success in iraq and afghanistan.

if you just looked at it via the actual battles. but this military dominance that we had on the battlefield did not translate into us essentially winning, i guess, you could say winning the larger argument. and, frankly, you could argue the cold war, you know, the hot parts of the cold war didn't go well for either side. so, what is the lesson to take away from this? >> well, there are many lessons, obviously, but the overwhelming lesson that i take away from it is we have got to muster more patience than we've brought to the field so far. it became the joke years ago in afghanistan and a statement attributed to the taliban. you americans have the watches but we the taliban, we have the time. we can outlast you. of course, that's just what they did.

afghanistan was not a military defeat for the u.s. it was kind of a self-inflicted wound. we had, when i was there as ambassador 2011, 2012, we had over 100,000 troops on the ground in the obama surge. that number went down and down and down just over 10,000 when obama left office and you know what the taliban didn't control. so, we were doing more with less. actually, the afghans were doing more with our less and that was sustainable. i think just about indefinitely. we just decided we didn't want to do it any more and now we are looking at what that really means. we're going to be doing aium i'. >> what do you make of the fact that the taliban appears to be somewhat cooperating with the ability of just us to get americans out after we have withdrawn all of our troops? >> well, i think that's very important, obviously.

and they have a logical interest i would think in appearing to be cooperating. we'll see how far that goes. i'm deeply concerned about a lot of things related to this u.s. withdrawal. high on my list are the afghans who risk their lives helping us as interpreters and other capacities and we left them behind. to get out now they will have to go through the taliban. even to get to the airport and certainly to get out of the airport. we're going, they're going to have to be allowed to travel by the taliban. so, let's see what happens then. >> ambassador ryan crocker who was an ambassador in afghanistan during a couple of tours there. ambassador, thank you for coming on and sharing your perspective with us. up next, as we said september 11th united this

country for a moment 20 years ago. i'm going to talk to a democrat who led the effort to pull both political parties together 20 years ago and why that is such a far fetched idea today. you're watching "meet the press daily." need a single line or lines for family members, you'll get great value on america's most reliable 5g network. like 2 lines of unlimited for just $27.50 a line. only at t-mobile. in 2016, i was working at the amazon warehouse when my brother passed away. and a couple of years later, my mother passed away. after taking care of them, i knew that i really wanted to become a nurse. amazon helped me with training and tuition. today, i'm a medical assistant

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i'm not hungry! you're having one more bite! no! one more bite! ♪ kraft. for the win win. welcome back. one of the many things that has changed in the 20 years since the terrorist attacks on 9/11 is our overall national psyche.

more divided two decades after 9/11. look at the historical numbers from our nbc poll. before the 9/11 attacks which are just over a presidential election that ended in a supreme court decision, americans were actually fairly optimistic about the direction of the country. more americans felt that the country was on the right track than on the wrong track. after the attacks, the country was even more unified against common enemy. 72% that the country was on the right track. pandemic that divided just 29% think the country is headed in the right direction. majority of americans think we're on the wrong track as well as everything else over the last 20 years has torn this nation apart. joining me now former house majority and minority dick gephardt the minority leader on september 11th, 2001. before we get to this interview

here's what he said on september 12th, 2001. >> i believe this is a time for us to pull together as a congress and as a country. i told the president today in the meeting that we were with him and behind him and that we would trust him and we wanted him to trust us in acting to solve this problem and to reassure our people. >> well, congressman gephardt, i have to tell you they don't imagine that i would hear kevin mccarthy saying something like that in the wake of something today, and how far off of the rails are our politics? >> pretty far, chuck. we shouldn't be, but we are for a bunch of reasons. a lot of it is the information culture of today and that is pretty bitterly divided the american people, and you have to remember that congress is the reflection of the american people.

if the american people are divided, congress is going to be pretty divided. but it also a test of leadership. i have always believed that public service, and that is really what you do when you run for these jobs, you are a public servant, and you should always put country over party, and country over self. that is what we did after 9/11. >> here's the part that i think that i have to remind folk that maybe are not aware of what our politics was like between 1997 and 2001, and september 11th, 2001, we had an impeachment that divided the country, and the 2000 presidential election that went to the supreme court that to this day has divided the country, and in more ways a legitimate set of anger over the election result that drm has created over the phony insurrection, and you have had members of your own caucus that hated bush, and just had the

anger to this, and republicans who are still angry over or the clinton impeachment and still angry over this, and how did it not surface itself in the first year or two after 9/11? >> it did, chuck, after 9/11, and we had democrats saying that we should blame this on bush, and he is president, and the buck stops there, and he missed all of the opportunities to know what was going to happen. i said, no, we are not going do that. this is everybody's fault. in fact, i gave a floor speech in which i said that people are blaming the cia and they are blaming the president, and blaming the fbi and whatever. i said, no, it is all of our fault. we are all responsible. we had plenty of ideas and had plenty of indicators that this could happen. we had an attack on the world trade center in 1993. it failed. we had three embassies blown up

in africa that killed american personnel and we were all asleep at the switch, and we fail at the responsibility, and our most important responsibility, and that is what people have to know and have to say. just respect your adversaries, and respect the people on the other side of the aisle, respect the president, and try to do the job for the american people. you are a public servant. >> you know, it seems so logical and obvious, and yet, that is not where we are. you are blaming the information ecosystem, and how much of this is on trump, because i am thinking of 2000 and that election and had al gore said that this is unfair and never conceded, do you think that the country could have unified after 9/11? >> yeah, i think that there is something to that. i really do. you know, president trump really took us into a different

direction than we have been in the modern era. he was very assertive and aggressive and really played into the grievances that always plays into the systems, and democracy is a substitute for violence, and that is what it is. it is a tough process that we go through, but as churchill said, it is the worst form of government except for all of the others, and he was right. we have to preserve this precious democracy that we were handed by our ancestors and by our fathers and mothers. and if we just hate one another, and half of the people hate one another, we won't have a democracy. you can't, it won't work. >> let me get to one of the

other parts of the early days of unity, and was it too unified. meaning it was difficult to criticize the strategies whether it was iraq or afghanistan without being called unpatriotic or un-american. it seemed as if, i mean, i don't think that barbara lee was alone in voting the way she voted, but she was the only one who felt comfortable going public with it. how much did we trample public debate a little bit? >> well, it is a good point, and i have thought a lot about it. in fact, my support of the iraq war was the biggest mistake i made in my public life, and i regret it to this day, and every time i see a soldier, i used to go out to walter reed and meet the young soldiers coming back with the legs blown off and the eyes blown out, and believe me if you think that you are responsible for for that, you

carry it for the rest of your life. after 9/11, we would have meetings with george bush in the oval office every tuesday at 7:00 a.m., and after a few months he would talk about doing something about getting rid of saddam hussein, and i would say, i am not for it, but if you believe and the intelligence people believe he has the beginnings of nuclear weapons or weapons of mass destruction i will consider it. so i went to the cia myself and three or four times and talked to everybody out there and asked them all of the hard questions, and i said, look, i have to justify this to people in st. louis if i vote for this, and they said that he absolutely has these weapons or he is getting the weapons, and i voted for it. we were mistaken, and george bush was mistaken, and it was another mistake. it was made honestly with the right intent. i am sorry we did it. and i would have never done it

if i knew then what i know now. >> dick gephardt, long time congressman from missouri and it is great to see that you are looking healthy and everything is good. thank you. >> thank you, chuck. and join us tomorrow for special coverage to mark the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. and that is going to do it for us this hour, and we will see you sunday, and it will be "meet the press" on your local news station, and we have a lot going on sunday for sure. and our msnbc coverage continues right here with geoff bennett. . [ding] power e*trade gives you an award-winning app with 24/7 support when you need it the most. don't get mad. get e*trade and start trading today. pool floaties are like whooping cough. amusement parks are like whooping cough. even ice cream is like whooping cough,

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it is good to be with you. i'm geoff bennett and as we come on the air, the president of the united states has apparently declared war. check out the headline from fox, biden has