two tickets to nascar! yes! find rewards like these and so many more in the xfinity app. >> that's it for this weekend. i am julián castro. alicia will be back next weekend for more american voices. but right now, i hand it over to mehdi hasan. hey, mehdi. >> good evening julián. my show tonight as on democracy versus fascism, and i'm guessing that you, like me, would be delighted to see joe biden call out trumpian fascism on thursday. and weren't bothered by the two marine standing by. >> oh, not at all. i thought it was overdue like a lot of people have been saying. and i thought he was right. he was blunt. he also was careful and nuanced. also, as you know, mehdi, very predictable response that we're gonna get from republicans.

nothing new there, especially from trump. >> he should have listened to both of us when we were saying earlier this year. have a great rest of your night. nice to see you. >> good to see you. >> tonight on the mehdi hasan show -- prosecuting a former leader. why are some people acting as if it would be completely crazy to prosecute donald j trump? plus, a right-wing harassment campaign against children's hospital staff, based on pure hate and disinformation. what is this country becoming? and, devastating climate-related floods in pakistan. my conversation with the grandson of the country's former prime minister on how to help, and who's to blame. ♪ ♪ ♪ >> good evening. i am mehdi hasan. it is called the most exclusive clubs in the world. and as a marvel fan, i was always tickled by how saturday night live used to portray the ex presidents as actual cartoon

superheroes. because speaking as a relatively new citizen to this country, one thing that is uniquely american about it is that no former president of the united states has ever been charged with a criminal offense. while that may seem normal to you, it is not normal everywhere else in the world. former leaders and countries across the globe are being prosecuted and imprisoned all the time. really. in israel, the expert minister benjamin netanyahu is getting ready to launch a run for his old job, even as his corruption trial is underway. we for bibi says he's the victim of a witch hunt. where have i heard that before? and speaking of things that sound familiar, former president nicholas sarkozy of france had his home raided, after he left office in a campaign finance investigation that led to two convictions. he is currently appealing them in an effort to avoid prison. peru, as axios reports, has even prosecuted every president since 1985. imagine if every president

since ronald reagan has faced trial in the u.s.. so, you can understand why i chuckled when one reporter asked this question at a recent white house press briefing. >> is the white house at all concerned, given the domestic threats, and also to the extent of the rest of the world at the department of justice, carrying out this operation on a former president that could even be -- create the appearance of a politically motivated prosecution. >> the rest of the world is probably wondering why he hasn't been prosecuted yet, why we are a weird global outlier when it comes to giving former leaders some kind of a blanket immunity from prosecution. now, many media pundits and trump loyalists keep saying that the search of trump's home slash waiting venue was unprecedented. his teenage son lives there. his wife loves their. prosecuting trump would be unprecedented, they say. they leave out the fact that what trump did to trump that

search, and the possible prosecution, was also unprecedented. i don't take my word for it. listen to one former trump enabler. >> people say this was unprecedented. well, it's also unprecedented for a president to take all this classified information, and put them in a country club, okay? >> when trump's former attorney general bill barr is the one saying it's unprecedented for president to take home classified documents, like there are a few office supplies. the guy, in effect, rewarded trump for obstructing justice in robert mueller's russia probe. that can be good for donald trump, all the gop defensive narrative. over the weekend, the former guy still seem to be treating the classified documents investigation as more of a pr problem than a legal one. lashing out at the fbi before a crowd of supporters in northeastern pennsylvania, claiming the rate was, quote, one of the most shocking abuses of power by any administration in american history. and 665 days after the election was called for presidential

biden, nearly two entire years later, donald trump was again falsely declaring the big lie, that he had actually won, in the keystone state. that wasn't all. take a listen to just some of the deranged stuff that came out of his mouth. >> well, you did listen to me because i won pennsylvania by a lot. i did. >> if you want to see a debt bird cemetery, go under a wind mill sometimes, it's not a pretty sight. it's also, the single most expensive form of energy you can get. >> we're gonna have the country set up properly, like it was before the covid came in, before the china dust came in. >> i am calling for the death penalty for drug dealers, which will -- reduce drug distribution and our country, on day one, by 75%. >> the republican party has a leader that wants to overturn

election results, and do duterte style execute drug dealers. but don't you dare call them fascists? who better to talk about this with then-journalist and author adam serwer. he is a staff writer at the atlantic, where this weeks he writes of trump, if it were anyone else, they'd be prosecuted. also new york university law professor melissa murray, who served as a law clerk to sonia sotomayor, and is an msnbc legal analyst. and dean obeidallah was a calm columnist for msnbc, who wrote -- to try and slow down cases against him. he's the host of the dean obeidallah show on sirius x m radio progress channel. thank you all for being here this sunday evening. adam, you write in your recent piece in the atlantic that for trump defenders, the law is meant to be enforced only against certain categories of people among whom trump is not included. and you are right, of course. it's a great line. but it's not just trump defenders, is it? america as a whole hasn't done what other republican or

liberal democracies have done, and prosecute a president ever? >> no i mean america has not done that and it's one reason why -- i mean, america's ex presidents have tended not to commit brazen crimes out of office. i mean it's sort of surreal to hear bill barr talking this way about a man who, you know, he advised, and who he enabled throughout the entire administration. when he was in there. but he was right. i mean, the reason this has never happened before is that no president has committed or appeared to commit an offense that was so clearly a political and related to something as a political as national security. and i don't mean a national security in general is a political, but the handling of classified information is one of those things. it's not a highly ideological or political issue, in the same way that a number of other things might be. and so, what trump did was not only put him self in a

situation where the fbi would think that they had to do something like that. the justice department think that they had to do something like that, urgently, in order to protect classified information. but it's also ironic because it is exactly the thing that he was demanding hillary clinton be locked up for when he ran in 2016. so, folks, both trump and his appointee, making it clear that lock her up was not about protecting classified information. it was about -- it was about the thing that they're accusing joe biden of doing, which is about prosecuting your political rivals using a pretext, which is exactly wire and they're making that accusation now. because they assume that people are acting for the same reasons that they were acting in 2016. >> well the republican body, adam, it's always projection. and we did get some lock her up chants and pennsylvania last night. melissa, there are multiple legal cases against trump, both criminal and civil, from the doj january 6th investigation, to the manhattan da, to the fulton county da in georgia, to this declassified document

scandal. you are a low professor. how big a legal undertaking is it to indict and then successfully prosecute a former president of the united states? >> well, mehdi, it's a significant undertaking simply because as adam says, it's unprecedented for the united states to actually prosecute a former president. we've never done so. and it's not just that this is a former president. it is also someone who may be in the future, a presidential candidate. so, there is a degree of present concerns that come in here, but i think is unlike any other person. but again, the fact that this is a former president, someone who may again be a candidate for the presidency makes this even more urgent. the idea that someone is above the law, simply because they have sat at the helm of this country, or may stick at the helm of this country in the future is absolutely untenable to the idea that no man is above the law. and we've seen in other advanced democracies, like italy and france, that former presidents, and former prime ministers have been subjected

to criminal prosecution, and then held accountable. and most of those cases, it's situations that involve corruption, not necessarily political concerns like an insurrection, or the overthrowing of a lawful government. so, the fact that the doj is investigating what has happened at mar-a-lago, and the recovery of the stolen documents, as a crime, suggests that this may well be the kind of thing that will have more lens, in terms of holding trump accountable, ultimately. >> and dean, when you listen to trump speaking yesterday at a rally in pennsylvania, it's a reminder of how abnormal a politician he is, how deranged the stuff he says is, and how we've just become numb to it. it's almost normalized. but we can't allow it to be normalized, can we? >> no, i agree. and, mehdi, you picked a perfect time to become a u.s. citizen, just as our democracy is ending. i'm glad that you hear so we can all join in together. look, i would love to ignore

donald trump, and certainly you can't. but at that rally, he demonized law enforcement, he dina lies prosecutors, he demonized judiciaries. and he did that with a batch of unprecedented spikes and threats of violence against the fbi, against the magistrate who side signed the first warrant. and as i said, donald trump doesn't care. donald trump knows his base better than any of us. he knows he's a subset that will use violence to help him. he doesn't care. and maybe, mehdi, to the bigger point, if donald trump cannot be prosecuted, it's not like why are we prosecuting them -- where could we walk free and try to wage echo? having classified documents screwed around his golf club in between the tennis course and the pool, are you kidding me? and any other nation, he is prosecuted. and the rule of law -- >> you know, prosecuted for much less and other nations. adam, there is reporting -- there is reporting jumper

indicted for taking classified documents home. it wouldn't be until after the midterms. but why? if. that's true, why wait that long, given he's not the candidate for office? why give the gop that advantage? i mean, the doj continues to confound me. >> well, i think in this case, if you disagree with it i think it's a defensible decision because their point is that we don't want doj to be interfering with the election. it's not necessarily the decision i would make. but they want these decisions to be seen as being made on the law, and not in an effort to aid the democrats political fortunes. and even though trump isn't on the ballot, you could arguably accuse doj of acting politically, if they did indict him prior to the midterms. now, i wish -- you know, it's too bad they weren't thinking like that in 2016, when they decided to go on a basically public relations campaign against clinton, hillary

clinton while she was under investigation, instead of keeping her under wraps the way that the doj said. ironically, that was the trump administration's justification for pretextual justification for firing james comey, when they ultimately removed him. but, you know, i could see the argument for not wanting to wait, but i also think, given where doj is, they want us to see it's a political as possible, the decision makes a certain amount of sense. po>> melissa, have a listen to trump speaking last night. >> they talk about documents, not being properly stored, yet, they go in and take documents, dump them on the floor, stage a photo shoot, and pretend that i had done it like i had put them all over the floor. >> melissa, if you are prosecuting trump, would you admit that as a evidence, admitting that he had the documents? >> certainly, every statement

he makes at this point in time has to be looked at by a prosecutor, something that is relevant to this ongoing investigation, and the likely future prosecution. but with regard to the question you asked adam about whether or not there's some defensible position for the doj to want to postpone, bringing the prosecution against trump, i think adam is exactly right. we are roughly 65 days out of the midterm elections. this is someone who is endorsed a number of candidates, in a number of key races, that holds the control of both houses of congress in the midst. i think it's defensible for doj at this point in time to say, we've really tried to keep ourselves out of the partisan fray. merrick garland has made that a big part of his tenure as ag, and i think it makes sense, even if it is postponing it, it's only 65 days, and in the midterms are coming soon enough. and this will all wait. and there's still work there doing during the interim period. >> so, melissa, adam, dean, stick around. we have much more to discuss, including joe biden's primetime

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happening in our country today is not normal. donald trump and at the maga republicans represent and extremism that threatens the very foundations of our republic. this history tells us that blind loyalty to a single leader and the willingness to engage in political violence is fatal in democracy. >> those remarks from president biden on thursday evening, those objective observations about a growing fascist threat posed by extremist elements within the republican body, somehow sent a gaggle of mainstream liberal media types into a tizzy this week, as they obsessed over the importance of civility and decorum, and whether or not biden should have had two marines standing behind him when he spoke,

because of course, that's the real outrage. meanwhile, this is how the grand uber of the quote unquote, intellectual right responded with warnings of political violence. >> by the way what fans the flames of political violence more, then literally naming have the country from the podium of the president of the united states, enemies of the republican, republic. people who wish to tear down their public, traitors. it's hard to think of everything that can raise the temperature more than that. and that's exactly what he's doing. he says, i oppose political violence. also, all of my opponents are basically akin to domestic terrorists. i mean, number one, you are driving a press, oppression on behalf of the actual state. and number two, you're driving people who may be prone to violence, who can take up arms and commit acts of violence. >> did i miss here, or did ben shapiro they are not literally make biden's point clear? don't call them violent, or they'll attack you. adam, dean, and mueller's are back with me. dean, what karine jean-pierre,

white house press secretary was on my colleague jonathan capehart's show this morning. have a listen to what she said. >> look, the president was very clear. all you have to do, again folks need to watch the speech go read the speech. if you have it, it is in powerful it is impactful. and you will hear directly from the commander in chief what he was speaking to. and he actually called out he called out mainstream republicans, democrats, independents, to come join him to help protect, to fight to protect our democracy. so, it was about a specific, particular, extreme, extreme part of the party that has taken over. the >> so, dean, who are these mainstream republicans who joe biden says, and still reaching out for them? i get why the president and his white house press secretary have to say it? but you and i don't, are there any minstrel publicans left to work with. 90% of the party seems to be

maga, it's not a minority other publican party. >> i tweet every day, i daily reminder today's gop is no longer a political party. it's a white nationalist fascist movement. i've been doing that for a year, i'm glad president biden write my tweets. look, we are dealing with academically, literally a fascist movement. forget all the definitions. understand this, it's about using violence for political goals, required to obtain power. it is the enemy of democracy. it is the enemy of freedom. and republicans are just along for the ride, then speak out if you are not. they used that us all the time, why don't you speak out about the extremist in your mix? well now, republicans go on tv, and they announced the maga wing, reminding people, cps pulled two months ago, asked republicans, are you with or against general six? nearly 6% -- not terrorism, defending freedom. so understand that at least around 60%, they look at that, and say, i like that. it makes that hair on my neck stand up. >> yeah, adam, correct me if

i'm wrong. joe biden used the speech in philadelphia to all of the growing extremism within the gop. he talked about the growing willingness of some on the right, many on the right, to engage, brace, defend political violence. then, you have the benefit heroes of this world, and others, responding by saying, that speech will cause right-wing political violence, literally doing joe biden's work for him. >> you know to hear these guys go on the radio every day and be like, you know, liberals are communist child molesters want to destroy the country, and also, you know if your mean to us will kill you. i mean, i just think it's not a very persuasive argument. what they're trying to do preemptively is say, well, if anything happens, the libs made us do it. it's your fault. look, i mean, there's no question that i think, you know, there's this very serious problem at the top of the republican party that is connected to donald trump, where you have trump promising

to give pardons to people who engaged in political violence on his behalf. you have lindsey graham saying, if you prosecute donald trump, it's gonna be political violence, just basically a threat. this growing acceptance of political violence among the right-wing elite is a real problem. >> look, you're never gonna get people, there's always had people in this country who have conservative news on economics, an immigration, on religious stuff. like, you cannot wish those people away. those people will need to be represented in a political party. the problem is not the leadership of the republican party is growing increasingly accepting of political violence, as a means to gain power. and that really is the problem. >> huge problem. melissa, republicans and fox hosts who spent the past week hyperventilating about biden's semi fascist remark, acting like at some unspeakable insight. fascism is a term with a legal definition, a political definition, academic definition. congressman jamie raskin, who

like you, is a law professor, he raised on one of the sunday show this morning, have a listen. >> two of the hallmarks of a fascist political party are, one, they don't accept the results of elections that don't go their way. number two, they embrace political violence. and i think that's why president biden was right to sound the alarm this week about these continuing attacks on our constitutional order, from the outside by donald trump and his movement. >> melissa, he's right, isn't he? the shoe fits? >> that's exactly right. that is a definition of fascism. again, it is joe biden, merely calling out the issue of fascism and these authoritarian leadership at their publican party. and republicans are saying, this is fascist, we, it's like the trove of individuals of color, calling out racism, and being told at that, in fact, is the racist act, to call out racism is in fact racist.

so, we are seeing just this kind of circular, ontological enterprise where to call out something as authoritarian, as fashion cystic, is being the fascist act itself, and that's just not the case. this is a very direct golfer reconciliation, for more moderate tone, and a move toward the center and away from these political extremes on both sides. >> i, myself, was outraged by joe biden's remarks. i think it was outrageous for him to use the word semi. >> adam melissa, dean will have to leave it there. thank you all. we have to leave it there. >> coming up -- john says he had dinner at the white house last week. must have been a surprise to president biden. first, jessica lincoln is here with the headlines. hello, jess. >> thank you, mehdi. we're following some breaking news on this, our a man hunt underway in canada for the two suspects who went on a random stabbing spree in saskatchewan. authorities say at least ten people were killed and 15 hurt. over more than a dozen crime scenes there, police say some of the victims were targeted.

others, randomly attacked but, the suspects here are considered armed and dangerous,. we beyond the cfo has now been identified as the man who died, following an apparent jump from the manhattan skyscraper. police say the 52-year-old executive body was found outside his residence. the iconic jenga tower on friday afternoon. the retailer released a statement saying it is profoundly saddened by the shocking loss. and john sullivan has left his post as a u.s. ambassador to russia. and he is retiring from public service. the u.s. embassy in russia made the announcement on sunday. sullivan, you may remember, was tapped by former president donald trump for the post in 2019, but then, biden asked him to stay on, after he entered office. more of the the mehdi hasan show, after this break. r this break camels. - llamas. - llamas. so save money shopping back to school on amazon.

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the labor forces, because we have to. we have so many companies coming in. people like kim, expanding all over, and doing things that i really wanted to do right from the beginning. i used to say, tim, you gotta start doing it over here, and i mean, it's really gonna put a big investment in our country. we appreciate it very much, tim apple. >> and that was then president donald trump in march of 2019, getting the last name of tim cook, the ceo of apple, hilariously wrong. yet, donald not everyone named their companies after themselves. and trump, of course, infamous for embarrassingly and bizarre ugly hitting names wrong, places wrong, people wrong. he just didn't know the most basic of things. and yet, the moment he left office and was replaced by joe biden, the right went to town, suggesting president biden is mentally unfit for office, uniquely played by gas out of his mind, suffering from dementia or other hidden

illnesses, so it was kind of funny last month, to see trump back at a rally in pennsylvania, just say, absolutely mad weird things, including this. >> last week, we are though is that we are though, mark zuckerberg came to the white house, kissed my ass. sir, i love to have dinner. i'd love to bring my lovely wife. all right, mark, come on in. >> wow! donald trump thinks he was in the white house last week, hosting guests, hosting zuckerberg. that is, for lack of better words, deranged. and yet, the crowd applauded him and laughed at his zuckerberg anecdote. now, to be fair, maybe it was just a slip of the tongue. maybe trump just misspoke. but can you imagine if biden said something so demented. he'd be on the loop, on fox, 24/7, as clear evidence to the gop base that biden is mentally

unfit to be commander-in-chief. so, remember, i've said it before, and i will say it again, if you want to define the messaging coming out of the modern conservative movement in america, you only need one word, projection. but coming up next, a string of constant violent threats against a children's hospital, children's hospital and their staff. more on that, after a short break. ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ so how many vaccines have you given to people? me? about 1000. walgreens...millions. ♪♪ i cannot miss her big debut. with your booster, i think you'll be there. for every twirl. i got a shot so my sister won't get sick. way to go, big bro! so while we're here... flu shot, as well? let's do it.

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because the life enhancing innovations you've never even dreamed of? buick is dreaming of them every day. >> from donald trump to run the santas, their public impact has made it demonizing trans people in your priority in their never-ending culture of wars. and now, it's spilling over to children's hospital it seems. boston children's hospital prides itself on having the first pediatric and adolescent transgender health program in the united states. so, naturally, it became a target for far-right activists, like the hate account libs of tik tok and the daily wires matt walsh, while accusing them

of quote, putting children at butchery before they can even walk. while libs of tik tok founder chaya raichik claimed they were offering a gender affirming hysterectomies for young girls. again not true. it was a hateful campaign that resulted in employees getting death threats. this week, a bomb threat was called into the hospital, called into a children's hospital. authorities thankfully didn't find any sign of a bomb. the staff remained on high alert. and now, it seems, some on the far-right have landed on another target, children's national hospital in washington, d.c.. brandy zadrozny as an nbc reporter has been covering the story. she joins me now. thanks for coming back on the show. you are reporting, the activists are targeting doctors who appeared in videos from the hospital's youtube account. is this the next frontier, regular people in the medical profession, in danger, just for doing their jobs? >> yes. i think i called it the latter.

you don't think it can get worse, right? like you said, this is an ongoing way of anti-lgbtq sentiment, the far-right and from the loudest conservatives on on twitter. and that was had hit libraries. we've seen librarians targeted. schools, we've seen kindergarten teachers, elementary school teachers targeted. and now, we're heading to children's hospitals. literally, these folks have doctors, librarians, school teachers in their target. >> brandi, obviously, the question becomes, then misinformation, disinformation is being spread, when hate and is being spread, where are the social media companies? what is your job doing? what is twitter doing? and then, of course, you have the reaction to that, oh, this is big tech silencing people. it always becomes the debate about free speech, doesn't it? >> yeah, it does. you know, last week, twitter suspended libs of tik tok, specifically for the policy against the promotion of threats, violence and harassment. so, great job, right?

but it's been seven days, and lips of tiktok is back now, and they're tweeting, about teachers, taking a random teachers video from tiktok and promoting it, some sort of scare tactic. you know, against teachers, sort of indoctrinating people to be children, to be gay, somehow? you know, here's the problem, it's that none of these tech companies have a north star when it comes to moderation, right? this is violence. this is harassment. it's clear what these accounts are doing. but with their policies they literally have to wait until somebody gets hurt or killed to say, oh, this is promotion of violence. just like we saw with january 6th, nothing got donald trump kicked off the platform until something dangerous, until violence actually happened. and by then, it's too late. at this point, the way that we've built social media, it's already been weaponized. and so, even kicking libs of tiktok off now would hardly really do anything.

they could still target on another social media platform, or another person who just would come up and take libs of tiktok's place. it happens all the time. i don't actually see a way out of it. >> yeah. and the social media companies, as you say, they are masters of shutting the door after the horses both, especially when it comes to violence. you've been following this for a while, and you follow it more closely than the rest of us do. i get a sense that this has happened in a very compressed short space of time. like, last year, it was like, dr. seuss and mr. potato head was the kind of stuff, ludicrous, but not particularly home harmful stoppage or being pushed around as like evidence of lives shutting down free speech. i don't know, from the new year on, it became very quickly about lgbtq, trans kids, grooming teachers, don't say gay. am i imagining that this has all happened very, very quickly in the recent months? it wasn't like this even a year ago. >> no, i totally agree.

i'm old enough. i remember foxes war on crisis. this is just miles ahead in terms of, just the scariest of it to be quite honest. they're using this language that is demonizing, you know, when you talk about the tweet you just put up about mutilating children. this is like some real save the children stuff. and the problem is that when we have mr. potato head and all of that righteous indignation about silly culture where things, that's sort of a true traditional media pipeline. but what happens now is that, in this world that we live in, what happens is that a couple of really powerful accounts, they will promote these really niche, sort of strange, or like, they're just not like indicative of the larger lgbtq community. and just like they did with crt, right? they will show like some sort of weird workplace training and say, oh, everything has gone off the rail. and demonize the entire thing. and that's what they're doing now. the problem with that is, it

goes so fast. and the pipeline is just straight from lives of tiktok now, to tucker carlson, and then to bomb threats. and we see it happen over and over again. it's concerning. >> 30 seconds left brandy. i have to ask, how are the staff at the boston's children hospital handling this? >> really not well, to be honest. it's not just boston children hospital. it's in d.c., it's in omaha you know, it's all throughout the country. and the problem is, they -- the goal of this whole thing is to make people so scared that they scrub all mention of lgbtq people or care for trans kids or young adults off of the internet. so, no one can access that. doctors are scared right now. employees are scared. regular hospital employees are literally 12 terrified. there is no playbook for how to handle these things, and it's literally terrifying. >> it is terrifying. nbc's brandy zadrozny, thank

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minister described the devastating drought that has put under one third of his country underwater. about one people -- and damage from the disaster is expected to cost over ten billion dollars. pakistan is suffering terribly from the climate crisis. this is among the ten countries most affected by it. but when you break down the numbers, but pakistan is barely even responsible for this very global problem. since 1959, has pakistan been responsible for 0.4% of the world's historic co2 emissions. the u.s.'s contribution, 21.5%. china and the eu were responsible for 16.5, and 15% of global emissions, respectively. so, climate change is a global justice issue, too. which countries like our own pump out massive levels of carbon emissions, while poor countries like pakistan have to pay for it with their crops, their homes, their lives.

i spoke earlier about the current crisis in pakistan with artist and activist, zulfikar ali bhutto jr., the grandson of the country's former prime minister, and his namesake, he is fundraising on the ground in sindh, one of pakistan's hardest hit provinces. zulfikar ali bhutto, thank you so much for joining me on the show tonight. it's hard for a lot of us, thousands of miles away, to get a sense of just how bad it is in pakistan right now. we've heard the stats on death, displaced people, just being the worst flooding in the country's history. but try and explain to our viewers, please, just how bad the situation and there is on the ground? >> you know, mehdi, first of all, thank you for having me on this show. it's really, really very overwhelming. i came here to -- it's about a 600 kilometer drive. and the whole way with just water. and this is a desert, or

supposed to be a desert. so, if you can imagine, i mean, this is just a place that has been completely inundated. and i was also here when the rains are happening. and i had never seen anything like that in my life, raining heavily for days and days on end, you didn't know where the water was coming from. there was water to your knees. and millions, i mean -- you know, conservative estimates, 32 million people have lost their homes. where as a more likely estimate, it's 50 million people have lost their homes. everywhere you go, you know, there is no, you know, we're not prepared for anything like this. so, whole villages have been wiped out. we have cities that are underwater. i am in conversation with the journalist that had to go to one city in about. >> you have something like 3000 miles of roads, i believe, just obliterated by these floods.

you have far rural areas underwater. is it possible to physically even get eight to those places, to the people stranded dying in these remote areas of your country? >> only if you have a boat. and even then, it's extremely dangerous. you don't know, again, you don't know where the water is coming from. we've had flash floods coming from one side from the mountains into the plains. and we've had, we've had water coming down the river. so there is water coming from all sides, and you've got grain coming from up ahead. a lot of people are still stranded. you know, these figures and facts that we're getting, these are only estimates from the places we're able to reach by road, and where maybe, we're likely to safe them safely. and a lot of people are stranded. people are getting sick. people are dying. it's a really frightening situation. >> the u.s. has committed $30

million in aid, even though the government of pakistan suspects cost of these loans could be ten billion dollars or more. given pakistan is historically and currently responsible for less than 1% of global carbon emissions, but it's one of the top ten most vulnerable countries to climate change, is it fair that the u.s. and the west aren't doing more drop backs down, given we, in the west, historically responsible for more carbon emissions than anyone else, but your country is suffering at this crazy level? >> you know, cancel debt. cancel debt. cancel pakistan's debt. pakistan has an incredibly huge debt to the rest of the world, and the imf, the world bank has funded dams, has funded barrages, have funded all these major, major, major mega projects within pakistan, also, that have exacerbated the flood. and i know it sounds strange, because a dams are meant to store water.

but what they've actually done is an equally, also, distribute the floodwater. and more than 50 dams were also broken in pakistan, in these floods. so, you know, we have so much debt towards the people that are responsible for this. so, we as a nation, we need to pay back, otherwise, people will start. there is a famine coming, something like 90% of the crops within this area, sindh, river sindh, have been wiped out. some khyber pakhtunkhwa has about 50% wiped out. people are going to starve and -- >> it's horrific. last question then, what about the responsibility of paxton's own political elite? not just at the national level, your cousin is the current foreign minister. i know your grandfather was once prime minister. but also, at the local level, pakistani infrastructure is substandard, even if it exists

in many places. and that is because of corruption and political dysfunction, is it not? >> yes. yes definitely, definitely. there is an incredible amount of crops that exist in this country today. the people's party has been responsible for an incredible amount of corruption, and for at least in the past two decades. of course, i don't want to criticize my family on a personal level, but on a political level, you are completely right. and corruption here begins at the very first level, as i was talking to someone in the education ministry. and people have to ride their way into college. that's where it starts. that's where corruption in this country start. you have to bribe your way into school. you have to bribe your way into higher education. and in sindh, in particular, people have been changed towards an incredibly archaic system that is very aggressive, oppressive, such as feudalism. but also, modern structures,

capitalism, that work in tandem with feudalism, that have been oppressing the people in this country, as well as what you've mentioned, not allowing for local infrastructure to be properly built, to actually sustain itself, or manage a catastrophe like this. >> yeah, it's a human tragedy of epic proportions. zulfikar ali bhutto, thank you for joining us tonight. please do stay safe. >> thank you. thank you for having me. >> coming up at the top of the hour with a, congressman ro khanna will be discussing gop extremism, threatening the very foundation of our democracy and how democrats plan to combat it. that's next at nine eastern, right here on msnbc. before that, i will be talking to amen about game of thrones lord of the rings, and representational scream. plus, don't forget, you can listen to the mehdi hasan show

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the msnbc hub on peacock, stream it anytime. new episodes of the mehdi hasan show monday through thursday. now, it's time to hand it over to my friend. have you seen what the right is up in arms about? the latest thing they have been

attacking? it's the casting of a black actor to play a lord in the new hp o game of thrones prequel house of the dragon. and the casting of -- to play a queen and amazon's new lord of the ring show, rings of power. one conservative writer said, amazon was taking liberties with characters, races and more in order for a show to be more modern, how dare they? this is history. except it isn't, it's fantasy. it's middle earth, not the middle ages and i find it astonishing that these people can be totally fine with washing and believing in wizards and lord of the rings or a flying dragon on game of thrones, but not black people on screen. no, no, no. that's a step too far. that's unrealistic. >> it's beyond ignorant. what i found so fascinating about all of this is we're watching in realtime the evolution of the word woke. a few years ago, conservatives used woke and wokeness to mock the excesses of