i mean, are you kidding me? we're the bad guys? we're the ones twisting the truth? just to be fair, i'll play you the original tape of what he said and let you be the judge, folks. >> we have become or are becoming enslaved by government. this is crazy. what gives the commerce department the right to ask me how often i flush my toilet? or about going to work? i'm not filling out this form. i dare them to try to come throw me in jail. i dare them to. pull out my wife's shotgun and see how that acs twirp likes being scared of the door. they're not coming on my property. >> not going on his property. he's going to be pulling out that shotgun on a neighbor and he thinks we're crazy. he is a cnn contributor. he has a long history of this stuff, too.

when justice david souter retired from the supreme court erickson blogged, "the nation loses the only goat -- i can't say that on tv -- child molester to ever serve on the supreme court." in another blog post, "is obama shagging hookers behind the media's back?" he wrote "i assume obama's marxist happy wife would go lorena bobbit on him if he ever thought about it." he said "they were to send obama to a death panel." erickson compared white house communications director linda douglass saying that she is the joseph gurbles of the white house health care shop? now, folks, this kind of hate is constant with this guy, erickson. he's one of many. reacting to a proposed

washington state regulation aimed at water pollution he blogged this. "at what point do the people tell the politicians to go to hell? what point do they get off the couch, march down to their state legislator's house, drag them outside and beat them to a bloody pulp for being an idiot?" this cnn contributor needs to go. this kind of hate doesn't belong on what we call the best political team in television. john king, why don't you put him on sunday morning? that will do a lot more you. this is where the media's going. nobody is reeling in anything. conservative leadership also needs to step up and condemn this kind of rhetoric. you see, john boehner, you know, he agrees, i guess, with erick erickson's dark vision for america. sarah palin and michele bachmann, are you going to call this guy out tomorrow? i doubt it. that's what your rally is about tomorrow. i'm still holding my breath. this kind of rhetoric is

accepted on the conservative right. they can say anything they want and get away with it and never get coulded on it. i never dreamed this country would be locked in such an ugly debate. the finger pointing is unbelievable. the conservatives have given us a daily dose of hate. day after day, hour after hour, the political discourse in this country all revolves around who is president of the united states and how he has brought change to washington, where the revolutionary idea of getting every american some basic health care. and we've hit rock bottom with our discourse. guys like erick erickson, not only saying it, but this guy is getting paid for it and he's on the best political team on television? cnn, you know what you need to do? you need to change your promo. tell me what you think about this one. our telephone survey tonight. the number to dial is

1-877-ed-msnbc. my question tonight is, do you believe the conservative media gets a free pass for hate speech? press 1 for yes, press 2 for no. i'll bring you the results later on in the show. i guess you could say that cnn has found lou dobbs' number two. joining me now, eric burns, the president of media matters for america. mr. burns, good to have you with us. >> good to be here. >> i mean, how does a guy like this get a job after all the documented hate that this guy has put out there, what does it tell us about where cnn is going? >> it tells us it's really about ratings and not about delivering hard news which is unfortunate because as you know, ed, as well as i do, cnn prides itself on being the most trusted name in news. and just to give you an idea of how far cnn executives went to help erick erickson clean up his image, they put him on reliable sources with howard kurtz over a

week ago to address horrific things he has written on his blog and said in the past. hen to it he, you know, on the program apologized, said he needed to grow up, said they were stupid things he shouldn't have written about. even talked in the segment about understanding as an adult the real impact it has on his family, when his wife leaves the house and she's then, you know, talked to by somebody on the street that his words actually resonate with people and have an impact. then four days later a whole four days go by and on his brand new radio show that's where he threatened to pull out his wife's shotgun on the acs worker. >> of course, we had a death threat on the united states senator in the state of washington, and i remember going to of all places a football clinic once where tom landry, the former head coach who's passed away some years ago, head coach for the dallas cowboys said that the first amendment of the constitution is not a freedom of speech to go around and say whatever you want.

it's a responsibility. >> absolutely. >> i was a young guy at the time, and i said, this is tom landry kind of going into areas that football coaches normally don't go. and i've always remembered that, and, you know, you have to draw the line about when you're joking, when you're doing a parody or when you're actually believing what you say and it's not a joke. when someone goes on the air and says i'm going to meet a census worker and i'm not going to fill this out and they're going to be met with a shotgun, what does that tell other americans around this country that it's okay to act out your emotions with a firearm? >> that's exactly -- that is exactly what it says to them. it's why this rhetoric is so dangerous, why the rhetoric we've seen from the right, the fear mongering and the angst and anger it's designed to instill in americans in a difficult time in our nation's history, that's exactly what it does.

i wonder who's going to have to get shot. how much violence we're actually going to have to withstand in this country before we wake up and see that and expose this right-wing violent incendiary rhetoric, hate speech for what it is. it's shocking and disappointi i cnn once again after such a struggle to get cnn to see the light with lou dobbs and move on from there to have them jump again into the fray with erick erickson. though they tried to clean him up they couldn't. he lied to every one of his viewers, lied to howard kurtz when he got up there on "reliable sources" last week and said i'm not going to do this again, i have grown up, i'm all better now, i'm going to be responsible. i want to know, what is cnn going to do about it? so for they haven't said anything. >> eric burns, good to have you with us tonight. thanks so much. for more on this let's bring in congressman jim moran of virginia who introduced resolution to protect federal

employees. congressman, obviously there are reports of some pretty wild stuff going on around this country as the congressional members are on recess right now. we have a threat on a united states senator. reel this in for a moment. how serious it this in your opinion? >> i think it is serious, ed. the problem is not that there are crazies out there. we know that, but it's being fanned and legitimized, really, by people in the media. it kind of started with ronald reagan back 30 years ago when his theme was that government is not the solution to your problems, government is the problem. and then, of course, his media person roger ailes takes over fox news and they've done very well by appealing to people's base emotions. this like, erickson, would never mention the reason we have a census is so that he and the people in his community can get

a fair share of road funds, can be equally represented in the congress, can, you know, we need to know how many people are aware so that they can all have fair distribution of whatever resources are distributed and infrastructure and things like that. it's for his benefit, not for the benefit of the census work er. they get paid virtually nothing and they're trying to provide a public service. in fact, we have the finest civil service in the world. bar none. and we have pretty darn good representation when you compare it to other forms of legislative representation. you'd never know it. listen to these people. you'd think the government is the enemy. of course, the government can't fight back, so you have this bullying instinct, knowing that no federal employee is going to fight back because they're there as public servants. and so it continues to get more

and more heated. they know by appealing to their people's instincts that they're going to get more viewers. >> it's almost as if the righty talkers and these people that are acting this stuff out by imitating and saying it and trying to make it aim for themselves, they're trying to outdo one another. this is a tea partyer threatening senator patty murray back in february. here it is. >> how many of you watched the movie "lonesome dove?" what happened to jake when he ran with the wrong crowd? what happened to jake when he ran with the wrong crowd? well, that's what i want to do with patty murray. >> yeah, and then, of course, it's followed up by a death threat. what should be done at this point, if anything? and to number one, reduce the rhetoric in the country. where's the leadership? or federally.

i mean, should there be anything done? >> well, that's the issue. where's the leadership? they're not going to listen to president obama. they're not going to listen to the democrats. they think that we're the enemy. it's going to have to be republican leadership, ed. it's going to have to be the people who have almost encouraged this by their consent. they're not objecting to it. and if you -- and they certainly have done anything but condemn it. they know that these people vote republican. and so -- they're trying to stir up the base knowing this is an off-year election, i think a lot of it has to do with politic, but it's going to get out of control. if john boehner or mitch mcconnell or other republican leaders would stand up, john mccain, you know, mitt romney would say, look, there's too much of this, it has to stop, the government is not your enemy. >> they have a responsibility, congressman, you think republican leadership has a responsibility at this point? >> of course they do.

this is our country. we're supposed to be in it together. it's their country, too. some republican leader needs to stand up and defend their country and the democratic process that elected barack obama. and they haven't done it. and until they do it i think they're the only ones that can quiet down hate radio and the media who every day it's going to get worse until somebody with leadership, with real character, stands up and says, enough is enough. this is our country. it's time to start defending it. >> good to have you with us tonight. bill press asked a question today. we'll talk about that later on. ask a question at a white house briefing today. we'll have that later in the show. thank you, congressman. coming up, the only thing scary than michele bachmann and sarah palin teaming up is if you throw sean hannity into the mix. the psycho talker, the psycho talking trifecta may wind up in your backyard tomorrow in minnesota. and we did homework on

michael steele and found out he is a huge hypocrite when it comes to playing the race card. hey, michael, we're going to take you down memory lane here at the bottom of the hour. all that plus -- you know, a band of gun-loving militia gear guys in the midwest are coming up. we're going to tell you what that's about. national car rental knows i'm picky. so, at national, i go right past the counter... and you get to choose any car in the aisle. choose any car? you cannot be serious! okay. seriously, you choose.

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welcome back to "the ed show." thanks for watching tonight. it has been a harrowing day for families of four miners still missing after a deadly explosion in raleigh county, west virginia. more than two dozen miners were killed in yesterday's blast. four miners remain unaccounted for. the search has been suspended because of dangerous levels of deadly gases underground which could cause another explosion. crews are now working to drill holes to ventilate the area, but officials don't expect to be able to resume the search before tomorrow morning. joining me now is leo gerard, president of the united steelworkers. we should point out the company that was employeeing the workers, it was a nonunion shop massey energy company. mr. gerard, there are a lot of

americans out there tonight wondering, could this have been prevented? is this in your opinion, from what you can see, a worker issue, a condition that surround workers that could have been prevented? >> absolutely. this could have been prevented, ed. this company at this mine over the last period of time since 2005 had over 1,300 safety violations and, remember, that was during the majority of that time was during the bush regime. so it even gets cited for a safety violation then and in those days was pretty spectacular. and of those violations they paid almost $2 million in fines, but they contested over 400 of those violations. clearly they would rather have paid the fines, contest the violations than make their mine safe. let me just say this, because i heard you say about who stands up for them. this is another series of fatalities at another nonunion mine. the united mine workers stand up for them, the united

steelworkers stand up for them. we're the two major minings in this country. last week, ed, five workers were killed in a refinery explosion. i brought this poster to show you. this is an explosion from 1989 where 23 people were killed and the question is, have we not learned anything? when is it that we're going to put worker safety, as the number one priority? during the bush years -- during the bush years they went to volunta voluntary compliance. if you have voluntary compliance on the highway, what would happen? >> i think a lot of folks are wondering, how does the enforcement arm get so lax when this company was recently cited for highly combustible gas, methane, this was one of the infractions? this, of course, is what caused the explosion. how can that be just let go? >> i think that we have a culture that's developed certainly during the eight years

of the bush regime that was against regulation, was against enforcement. i do want to say this. we've seen demarked improvement since the appointments of the obama administration into osha and into emsha. again, when i say we've seen a marked improvement, remember, again, these were some of the appointments that were being held up by the republicans in the senate. so that we see that enforcement and regulation makes a difference, and i'm just beside myself at -- >> so if these workers were to organize, the workers that are left, and if they were to organize, what would that company do? because in that part of the state of west virginia this is the only commerce. >> the ceo of massey promotes himself as a union buster. he promotes himself as having a record of fighting unions, wherever they show up in his workpla

workplace. if he spent as much time helping the workers get a union, helping us then clean up his workplaces, we wouldn't have these fatalities and he wouldn't have these fines. >> are you willing to say tonight if these workers had been members of a union this would not have happened? >> i can absolutely say if these members had been member of a union they would have had the right to refuse unsafe work in our collective agreements and refuse that work. they wouldn't have been subjected to the kind of atrocious conditions. i can't imagine, ed, 1,300 violations in less than 6 years. >> they're still in business. >> and they're still in business. and in some places in the world like australia and canada this kind of negligence would result in criminal negligence brought against the management and ceo. >> mr. gerard, president of the steelworkers international. thanks so much. >> good to be here. coming up, one year ago tonight i crowned him as the very first psycho talker. he hasn't learned his lesson,

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in "psycho talk" tonight, on our one-year anniversary, i guess we're bringing it full circle with newt gingrich. the newtster, that's right, he was this show's very first psycho talker. one year ago, north korea had just launched a dud of a long-range missile that ended up in the pacific ocean. newt, he came up with some good old-fashioned psycho fear

mongering saying obama should have taken out the missile. >> so you're saying that president gingrich would have taken out that -- >> there are three or four techniques that could have been used from unconventional forces to standoff capabilities to say we're not going to tolerate a north korean missile launch, period. the world has got to decide that north korea is utterly dangerous, again, i'd recommend looking at elect ro magnetic pulse -- we've known about since 1958. it changes every equation about how risky these weapons are. >> i'm checking my pulse. hey, i'm still working. well, now it's one year later, and the newtster is one year crazier. here he is this morning making stuff up about the health care bill. >> this is a really bad bill. the more we learn about it, the worse it is. if you say the average american, you really want to have 16,000 more irs agents as brand new

health police? they're going to say no. >> oh, come on, newt. the idea that the irs is going to be hiring another 16,000 agents, you know, it's another one of these right-wing lies. anti-health care reform republicans made it up. the irs commissioner has specifically said they won't be auditing people to make sure that they didn't buy health insurance. in fact, the new legislation primarily requires the irs to hand out tax credits, not collect penalties. and the bill actually rules out criminal penalties for people who don't buy coverage. a brand new health police is about as realistic as president obama walking into your grandma's hospital room, newt, and personally pulling the plug on her. newt, you were crazy a year ago. you're even whackier now. and that's why you are the annual psycho talker. coming up, caribou barbie is on her way to the great state of minnesota to campaign for brain

wizard michele bachmann. what a match made in heaven. bob shrum will try to indoctrinate them later. plus, the michigan militia is planning an armed open carry tea party on saturday. can't wait. they say it's just their way of, you know, taking the stigma out of the word "militia." hmm. all that. plus obama's new nuke plan for our biggest enemies may shock you. that's coming up. over the count, discover card customers are getting five percent cashback bonus at home improvement stores. it pays to get more, it pays to discover. ♪ [ male announcer ] we make them beautiful. ♪ we make them tougher. ♪ we make them legendary. we make them better... ♪ to make your life better. ♪

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welcome back to "the ed show." thanks for watching tonight here on msnbc. president obama is working toward a world without nukes. today the administration announced an ambitious new strategy. the united states pledges never to use nukes on any non-nuclear country as long as those countries are not actively trying to get the bomb. that means the united states could still target iran and north korea. for more let me bring in cliff

may, president of the foundations for defense of democracies. cliff, good to have you on tonight. >> good to see you, ed. >> you bet. is this a safe policy? it's an ambitious policy. we're going to reduce our nuclear some piles by 1/3. your thoughts on this. >> well, look, i think you made an important point early on when you said the goal is to have no nuclear weapons and the most concern i think we have right now are with iran which is trying to develop nuclear weapons. threatening to wipe israel off the map, threatening that a world without america is possible. and my problem is this does nothing to address the iranian threat by saying, hey, we're going to cut american nuclear weapons. we won't develop new nuclear weapons, and don't worry, we won't retaliate with nuclear weapons, in most cases even if you attack us with biological and chemical weapons. sounds to me unserious. >> the subject obviously was

brought up today at the white house press briefing about what countries would be a target. this is the response from robert gibbs. >> if a country -- if we see that a country greatly expands its biological or chemical weapons capability, the posture of view calls for the ability to re-evaluate any assurances that have been given. our country possesses a massive conventional arsenal that we believe has an important deterrent effect on anybody that might make the poor decision to attack our country. >> cliff, are we going to be safe with this policy? safer than we are tonight? >> no safer than we are tonight. at best you can say it's neutral. they're saying, don't worry we won't retaliate unless we think we should. we're saying, what else, we're

not doing anything about the proliferation that is actually taking place by telling the world and telling our enemies we're going to have fewer nuclear weapons and we are less likely to -- we may change our minds and do it any how if we decide we want to. i don't think either our enemies or allies will sleep better as a result of this tonight. >> i think it's a lofty goal to have a world with no nukes, but -- >> it is indeed. >> -- what might be lostier is us, the united states, trusting the russians. they have a lot of deals cooking with the iranians. now, you can't have a deal like this unless you're willing to trust everybody who's got the nukes. are you willing to say that the united states is making the right move with the russians? >> i don't think it's a good idea to trust vladimir putin. i don't think we can trust the russians. any deal we make with them needs to be verified. while we may want a world that is safer, i think we do, i think you do, i think obama does, we know that's not the russian

goal. the russian goal is to take advantage of us. if it can get a lead in a nuclear arms race they'll do that. if we're going to be a less of a nuclear nation to be reckoned with, iran will find a way to be more of a nuclear nation to be reckoned with. i'm absolutely with you on that, ed. >> trust but verify. >> trust but verify as ronald reagan used to say. >> that might have been the only thing reagan ever said i agreed with. >> we might find another couple of quotes you like. >> all right. thanks, cliff. good to have you on tonight. let's get rapid fire response from our panel on these stories tonight. a michigan militia group is holding an open carry tea party this weekend? they say the event is designed to take the stigma out of being a militia? michael steele is a total hypocrite when it comes to plays the race card. newt gingrich thinks republicans should quit criticizing him.

cnn contributor and nut job erick erikkson refuses to back down on this threat to pull a gun on census workers. with us, bill press and ron christie who i know would never pull a gun on me if i were a census worker, although he was a special assistant to dick cheney who does know something about firearms. >> ed, you had to go there, didn't you? >> we're just having fun, ron, you know that. >> of course. >> let's talk about this. i mean, ron, how irresponsible is it for someone to have a microphone and say, hey, i dare them to come to my door, they're not going to arrest me. i'm going to have a gun at the koor when they show up. >> i think it's stupid and irresponsible. you know, i read this clip and he said liberals are taking his comments out of context. i read the entire thing. it's in our constitution we have a census and these individuals, these temporary employees are coming. they're doing their constitutional responsibility and to even joke about bringing a weapon out when someone's

coming to do their job is irresponsible. this person needs to grow up a little bit. >> bill press, what planet is cnn on, or any network keeping somebody on that advocates this kind of behavior? >> i don't know, but i have to say, ed, i think ron christie is getting much too rational to be on this show. i find myself finding it hard to disagree with him. >> i'll bring you to the dark side, bill, don't worry. >> let me tell you something, this is disgrateful cnn hired this guy in the first place after what he said about linda douglass and justice souter. >> this guy has got a history of talking like that. >> no, no, exactly. also, ed, i have to tell you, i don't see any difference between what erick erickson said and what the militia did, the hutaree. this guy did the same thing. >> i don't know what you're doing this weekend, what do you say we go to that militia thing up there with an open carry? come on.

what is this all about? >> you know what, ed, i have to tell -- i think it's a bunch of guys with envy who feel they have to march around and show everybody how big their guns are. that's the only explanation i have. what they say is they want to make everybody feel good about the term "militia." i don't think you get there by marching around in a public park wearing camouflage outfits and waving ak-47s. >> what about this, ron christie? is this overboard? >> it's pretty silly. if you want to go out and have your constitutional right to bear arm, all power to you. saying you're doing it under the rubric of a political demonstration is stupid, frankly. if you want to carry your guns, carry your guns. if you want to have a political discussion, have a political skugs discussion. don't mix the two. >> what about newt gingrich telling the gop to back off michael steele? >> i think the only way this controversy is going to get passed us, ed, is if the chairman goes back and does what

he needs to do, raise money and recruit candidates for office. i have my personal criticisms with chairman steele that have been very vocal on "the ed show" on other outlets on msnbc. i think the chairman needs to frankly stay off the air and i disagree. i have immense personal respect and affection for the speaker. giving what we heard from steele yesterday about race and people criticizing chairman steele because he's african-american is ridiculous. stay off the airwave, do his job and keep his mouth shut. i think he's on a very short leash. i think the donors are fed up with hearing drip, drip, drip out of rnc. he needs to get his job done rather than come nating the headlines. >> michael steele's problems have nothing to do with the color of his skin, but the incompetence of his leadership of the rn krrc. the idea -- i love what newt said. let me tell you, i think republicans would much rather focus on democrats than the chairman. then the chairman ought to stop doing and saying such stupid

things. >> ron christie, bill press, always a pleasure to have you guys on. coming up, in the last 15 months the stock market, it's jumped 3,000 points. now, i'm saying if this had happened under a republican president he would have been haled our savior. it's high time president obama gets credit for his economic policies to save wall street. your retirement, your 401(k), your savings and so much more in the "playbook."

still not too late to let us know what you think. the number to dial is 1-877-ed-msnbc. the telephone survey question is, do you believe the conservative media gets a free pass for hate speech? press 1 for yes, press 2 for no. again, the number to dial is 1-877-ed-msnbc. [ male announcer ] when we built our first hybrid,

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in my "playbook," folks on main street may be feeling the effects of this recession, but wall street seems to have bounced back pretty good. stock prices have surged over the past few months. in fact, my next guest thinks the dow jones industrial average will hit 12,000 by the end of the year. i think president obama needs to really be getting a lot more credit for what is taking place on wall street. remember where we were a year ago. we were told near virtual collapse. we might not like the idea of bonuses and the regulation hasn't been put in place yet, but this is very important. whether or not you're in the dow 12,000, this has got to be a great shot to go up almost 3,000 points over the last year. we haven't seen anything like that since fdr was in office. if wall street had that big of a turnaround under republican president, he would have been haled a savior and the greatest economic policy in the history

of the world. you can hear the right-wing talkers now, right? obama needs, i think, to get out there and start talking about this bull market. this is people's 401(k)s, this is your retirement, this is your education, pension plans which obviously are in the market. helping senior citizens in this country. and notice how the corporate conversation in this country isn't about how bad obama is. now we have to take it a step further. we have to help out main street. we have to loosen up credit markets. joining me now, peter morici, economist and professor at the university of maryland who told us last week on this show he thought the recession was over. we have the right indicators coming in order. why isn't president obama getting more help -- more really accolades for this, peter? what do you think? >> the think the president is soft peddling a bit the stock market turnaround because doesn't want to appear sensitive

to main street. the folks who have still unemployed might take up brans to that. the fact of the matter is, this track record, 15 months year over year since march is one for the ages. i went through the data today back to fdr. go back to fdr to see a new president that has made the stock market perform like this. >> where were we april 6th, 2009, we were at 7,975.85. where are we today? holy smokes. we're up almost 3,000 points. at 10, 969.99. now, there isn't a business guy in america that wouldn't say, hey, i really like those numbers. but for some reason they don't say, you know what, president obama has an economic team that's taken a lot of heat. this is pretty good. this is where the recovery starts. now it has to move on with the investment on main street. what do you think? >> absolutely. one of the things obama has provided is a sense of stability

now. now that health care is done, not all of us like every aspect of it, but we know what the rules are going to be. moreover, we're getting a good sense of what's going to come out of dodd's committee and compromise with frank and what financial regulation is going to look like. too much is made of this consumer protection aswrgency we it sits. we know what it's going to do and the other elements of the plan are going to do. we're not going to get cap and trade, i'm sorry to disappoint you. we're going to get regulatory changes with automobiles and negotiations with principle admiters, power plants and so forth. with business likes to know, what are the rules of the road? strong leader. we have that. let's face it, george bush whether you're a conservative or not was not a strong leader that provided clarity. this man provides clarity. >> peter morici, always a pleasure. great to have you with us tonight. thanks so much. one more final page in my

"playbook," in "psycho talk" tonight i mentioned this is our one-year anniversary of "the ed show." we kicked things up a 365 days ago with the intention of giving a voice to the working folk of america, middle-class americans. one year later we're still doing it. and i want to thank all of the folks who have made us, this show, "the ed show," a part of your viewing habits and hope you keep doing it. it's been a great year. i appreciate our team as the way we have worked to bring you what we think is the important issues of the day. i'm going to keep right on fighting for the middle class. thank you for joining us and hope you'll be back tomorrow night for "the ed show" right here on msnbc. up next, now, this is a story we have to cover. these two minnesota twins are charging ten grand a pop for you to get a picture with them? boy, that's pretty pricey. even with hannity around, huh? bob shrum will be here to preview the north star state nightmare, next. her things

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welcome back to "the ed show." our final segment tonight, we want to have great "psycho talk" we're looking forward to for tomorrow evening. two queens of crazy, michele bachmann and sarah palin will be campaigning together in minnesota. they'll headline a rally at the minneapolis convention center. then they'll head -- then head to a much more exclusive fund-raiser, i'm sure for the

middle class. we're taking a picture with the two tea party superstars is only going to cost you 10 grand. for more let me bring in democratic strategist and professor at new york university, bob shrum. for the record, michele bachmann says she doesn't believe the congressman from missouri was spit on because there's no tape. >> right. >> both these talkers have talked about death panels. sarah palin started that. bachmann has brought us and scared us about indoctrination camps, and both have fearmongered the american people when it comes to the census that is going to be taking place and is taking place in this country right now. and they're charging 10 grand a picture. that besides the point, i'd have to say, and you can disagree with me if you want, bob, these are the two most visible people arguably in the republican party right now. what do you think? >> i think they'd be a great republican ticket in 2012. i hope the republicans nominate them. my first question would be, how

much is sarah palin going to charge if he autographs your hand? is that going to cost $20,000? i mean, this is a pretty high price to pay for their phony demagoguic populism. these folks aren't fighting for the middle class. they're fighting for the insurance companies, they're fighting for tax cuts for the wealthy, fighting to deny health coverage to tens of millions of americans. they go out there and use buzzwords and these scare tactics in order to convince people that somehow or other there's some great threat to the republic and they're going to save it. >> you throw in the great american journalist sean hannity. no promotion there at all. now, sarah palin put targets on congressional districts. and now we have, of course, have got a threat on a united states senator. are these two clowns, or should they be taken seriously? >> i think they should be taken seriously. look, this is -- this use of not just metaphors about violence

and guns, but the actual notion that somehow or other, erick erickson on talk radio who's now gone to cnn -- i guess he's going to stay on talk radio too. saying if a census worker comes to his house he's going to pick up his wife's rifle and go after them. this is somebody who the next day attacks people for critic e criticizing him and says, well, really, he wasn't suggesting there be violence. look, this stuff, once it starts, once this kind of venom gets into the national blood stream, often has an effect and pretty tragic effect. i think people on the right and this was true, by the way, in a different context 30 or 40 years ago on the left, have a responsibility to say, this is wrong and it shouldn't be tolerated. >> so what do you make of karl rove cutting a psa that encourages people to fill out the census? i mean, it's kind of out of his bailiwick, out of his wheelhouse. i think he's doing it to distance himself from these

crazies. >> partly and partly because he counts votes and he understands if this loony stuff deters people from answering their census forms in states like idaho and rural parts of texas and rural parts of the south, republicans are going to lose seats in the congress, going to lose influence. they're going to lose federal funds. these folks are all against federal funds, of course, unless they're coming to their states. >> no doubt about that. minnesota senator terrel clark announced today her campaign raised $1.1 million to challenge michele bachmann in that district. i mean, this is going to be close. it's going to be a close race, and i have met ms. clark. she is one feisty liberal. this is going to be a real interesting race. could it help her a lot, that palin is in that district along with hannity? >> all palin does is consolidate the base. she doesn't reach beyond that base. 70% of americans think she's unqualified to be president. a lot of people think that she's

way too extreme. i think independents don't like her. so, yeah, it helps. i -- everybody who's watching this program tonight who wants to send a message that they hate this kind of -- that they detest the hate speech we're hearing ought to contribute to michele bachma bachmann's opponent. >> no doubt about it. great to have you with us. >> glad to be here. many, many more anniversaries, ed. >> i hope so. i'll show up form if they'll let me do it. >> you do defend the middle class. the other people are phonies. tonight in our telephone survey, i asked you, do you believe the conservative media gets a free pass for hate speech? 82% of you say yes. 18% say no. that's "the ed show." i'm ed schultz. for more information on "the ed show," go to ed.msnbc.com. or check out my radio website at wegoted.com. hear my show on xm 167 monday through friday from noon to 3:00 and always give us a call at

1-877-we-got-ed. "hardball" with chris matthews starts now on the place for politics, msnbc. see you tomorrow night. hot tea. let's play hardball. good evening. i'm chris matthews in washington. leading off tonight, teapot doom. here they come. we've got a death threat in seattle, a noisy town meeting in ft. lauderdale, another in new hampshire and a nasty racial attack down in georgia. we've got mad haters out there in the tea parties and of course, the steam is not blowing over. wait until you hear the latest racial or racist voicemail some character left the civil rights hero u.s. congressman john lewis on his phone. wait until you hear how congresswoman debbie wasserman-schultz was greeted at her town hall meeting in ft. lauderdale.

and now comes the arrest of a fellow for threatening to kill senator patty murray in washington. plus wrong way karzai. did you catch the hamid karzai saying, if foreigners don't stop meddling in afghanistan he's going to join the taliban. foreigners meddling? isn't he being defended day and night by american soldiers? earlier today on msnbc the former deputy u.n. envoy to afghanistan questioned karzai's mental stability. what makes me think we're going back to the regime in vietnam. that's not a nice place to go. also, that mining tragedy in west virginia is a tragic notice of the failure of some mining companies to keep their workers safe. last year, the operator of the mine was assessed $900,000 in penalties for hundreds of safety violations. was this mine disaster, the one right now avoidable? plus, an impressive gesture