country, how every young person could go free of charge to a first-rate local school right in their neighborhood. what a wonder. it's what made us great. what a country and we can have it again. that's "hardball" for now. thanks for being with us. "countdown with keith olbermann" starts right now. which of these stories will you be talking about tomorrow? pledge this. >> they proposed $4 trillion worth of tax cuts and $16 billion in spending cuts and then they said we're going to somehow magically balance the budget. that's not a serious approach. >> as the president pounds the republicans on the lemon of a pledge, even the gop begins to back down. those weren't plans. they were just measurements. >> once americans understand how big the problem is, then we can begin to talk about potential solutions. >> and it's really a pledge to nowhere. the economic policy institute

with an astounding crunch of the numbers. how many jobs would the gop pledge kill off? the new health care metric. the number of americans who think we need more doubles the number who think we need none and why is that poll a secret? let's go to the videotape. >> evolution is a myth and even darwin himself -- >> evolution is a smith. >> you know what? >> have you looked at a monkey? >> then why aren't monkeys still evolving into humans? >> okay, viewer, you just do the joke here. 16 years to the day after the last episode of the epic ken burns documentary baseball comes baseball the tenth inning. >> baseball didn't truly get integrated until you had black players that sucked. >> it is the only sport that goes forwards and backwards.

that guy. my special guest, ken burns. and why would this former minister of justice in france just said is one of the wildest things in political history. [ speaking in french ] >> all the news and commentary now on "countdown." good evening from new york. just 36 days until the midterm elections what if the new governing agenda from the party that wants to assume power appeared to be irresponsible? in our fifth story president obama says the gop's pledge to america is not serious. house democrats still have the chance to lock down the difference between themselves and republicans on tax cuts for the rich and the middle class with minority leader john boehner daring them to do just that. president obama characterizing the pledge could have been speaking to the deficit hypocrites within the

opposition. >> what i'm seeing out of the republican leadership over the last several years has been a set of policies that are just irresponsible and we saw in their pledge to america a similar set of irresponsible policies. they say they want to balance the budget. they propose $4 trillion worth of tax cuts and $16 billion in spending cuts. and then they say we're going to somehow magically balance the budget. that's not a serious approach. >> as for criticism that pledge is not new and the confession of the third ranking house republican. >> what we have in this proposal is not necessarily new. the idea of fiscal responsibility policies, openness and transparency in government, are solid american ideas. what republicans are committing to in this pledge to america is taking important first steps in this congress to steer our national government back to those basic practices. >> the pledge explainers like

not necessarily new and first steps doing little despite support from the so-called insurgents, the gop so desperately needs. the main state coordinator calling the pledge, quote, a mealy-mouthed sop to the tea party movement that is rif with platitudes and little on substance. a nice pr piece but i don't think it is even showing up on our radar. conservatives on the sunday talk show circuit were equally critical. the house minority leader about the public sides with democrats, tax cuts for the rich. although boehner put it this way, if democratic leaders leave town without stopping all the tax hikes they are turning their backs on the american people, adjourning the congress without a vote to stop all the tax hikes will be a vote to raise taxes on the american people and destroy jobs. he failed to mention that republicans passed those tax cuts ten years ago with a built-in expiration date this year. mr. boehner demanded that democrats vote on taxes without using the suspension procedure. suspension would require a two-thirds vote. more on that in a moment.

meantime, regarding the senate's failure, senator dick durbin on what he sees as simple math. >> i can count, and i know you can, too. we have 59 democrats and not a single republican in the senate supports our position that we need to do something that's responsible to reduce our deficit but also to help middle income families bring us out of this recession. >> why will that be different after the election? >> well, i hope it will be different. occasionally one republican will break ranks and help us. what it gets down to, we can count, and we know we don't have 60 votes for our tax position. we want to basically say after the election when we still face a deadline by the end of the year we'll take up all these tax issues. >> however, immediately after the election, the terms of three appointed senators expire from the states of illinois, west virginia, and delaware. if republicans win any of those seats and are seated immediately as expected, the republican filibuster would be harder to ov

overcome. and there is another issue democrats might want to come to grips the popularity of their health care reform law. a recent poll looks like a strong plurality opposes the law, 23% of the opposers think the law did not go far enough. 20% opposed only a few changes. finally today president obama signed into law what may be the last item democrats passed before the mid-term elections, the small business package which includes tax cuts as well as provisions to make loans more availability. let's turn first to "washington post" staff writer, "newsweek" columnist and msnbc contributor ezric kleine. the topic tax cuts for the middle class, tax cuts for the rich, the audience is the house democratic leaders. what should they be hearing they don't seem to be? >> the reality is the house democratic leaders see much more willing to take a chance. they can count to -- they can do the math when they don't have the votes. you mentioned this in your preample here. i'm worried after they come back from the election and have three fewer seats than they currently

do and that's just in the lame duck session. right now we're still hearing the house is uncertain and maybe leaning towards not voting. the house isn't going to vote if the senate definitely isn't going to vote. they don't want to be hanging out there without any backup. so there is something and there always is with the house and the senate where they have to hold hands and jump together. the senate is refusing to hold hands. >> we've discussed the notion in the house that the speaker might have a strategic motivation to bring up these tax votes under the suspension process which requires a two-thirds. boehner spoke out against that today. is he admitting that he fears the possibility that it would be employed? >> yeah. i think they do fear it. it's an odd procedure and i do sort of wonder how the democrats would go along with it. so a suspension requires two-thirds vote and what you would be doing and it would be the first time i've ever seen any of them do this would be instead of getting the number of votes you need down in reconciliation, you'd be getting the number of votes up so more would cross over and vote for the tax cuts the for the rich

but they still wouldn't pass. somehow i have trouble seeing it happening. if it does, it would be quite a way to end the session. >> turning to this other subject, it would be hard to believe last week looking ahead the gop pledge to america would continue to gain traction for reasons that the gop could not possibly have wanted. it's been criticized from both ends of things. have democrats been handed something that they can pick apart from now until the 2nd of november? >> very much. we've talked before about how the difficulty in any election is for the governing party making things a choice between two parties on the referendum and on them in the economy. and the gop's pledge made specific. and the answer, they're going to massively increase the deficit. they're going to do tax cuts for wealthy folks. they're going to do a bunch of other things that doesn't make a ton of sense. amid all of that, not any serious fresh thinking about what the economy should look

like after one of the greatest economic disasters in our history. faced with that, the americans who didn't love the gop to begin with are a little bit confused. the democrats feel they have a target but it isn't enough. they do have to end the session governing well. watch them whiffle does not inspire confidence. >> rolling back health care reform apart from the fact that would require a veto-proof majority for the republicans, the highly popular provisions of the law now going into effect, some of them maybe even in that republican pledge that they would be retained although they don't offer any way to pay for the ones, even the ones they like, and the no polling which looked fairly dire actually shows that there are more people who think the thing didn't go far enough, not that went too far. are any democrats running on their own success in health care policy? >> a couple of them actually are. we've begun to see ads coming up on it. what they do and this is smart,

all the component parts have always been very popular. pre-existing conditions. and that's pretty much a republican strategy and their pledge. we will do these component parts but we're not going to do the thing you call the obama care bill and so it's smart for democrats to run on the pieces of it and much more to the point force republicans which ones they'll keep and how. so far they've had trouble doing it because the republicans get to be in the position we're not going to tell you how. democrats have to defend sort of every piece of theirs. as you say, the consensus in this country is for health care reform. republicans come in and have to answer what's going to happen if they have to replace it with nothing. it's going to be a lot more difficult for them. >> ezra klein of "the washington post," thank you. let's turn to msnbc political analyst howard fineman of "newsweek" soon to be senior political editor at "the huffington post." the vote on extending tax cuts for the middle class and also for the wealthy, is the house

going to punt? is it not dead yet? is it any clearer today than last week? >> well, as of a little while ago when i was talking to some of my sources on the hill, keith, i'd say it's comatose. nancy pelosi would like to do it. i think some of the political leaders in the house on the democratic side would like to try to do it. i know here in pennsylvania, i'm in philadelphia tonight, here in pennsylvania representative joe sestak who is running for the senate would very much like to do it. he thinks it would play here. but there's some conservative democrats who don't want to do it and as ezra klein says without the cooperation of the senate, the house doesn't want to go first in part because some of those blue dog democrats are still angry that they were made by the white house to vote for the cap and trade environment bill a year ago, at least that's their excuse. >> the admission by minority

leader boehner that he seems wo worried that pelosi might bring the vote through in the house using suspension, the two-thirds. is that resonating to any degree from what you're hearing and is there, in fact, a serious approach from the democrats to do it that way? >> it sounds possible. again, not entirely likely, i don't think. i think it would be a smart thing for the democrats to do if they were brave, but that would require them to be brave on this issue and have a positive attitude towards it from the beginning. you don't get anything in politics unless you risk something. this, i think, would require -- call the republicans' bluff. it would take 60 -- approximately 60 republican votes to bring it up under suspension. if john boehner says he wants to vote for it, why not call his bluff on it? but i don't hear a ferment to do

it. that's not the basic sense that i get. >> and swinging back to health care reform, the chairman, mr. van holland, is disputing the idea that the democrats are not talking about their health care reform success but really are they -- are they doing this to a greater degree than republicans continue to talk about it in terms of the parts they would keep? >> no, again, ezra is right. the republicans are hammering the whole thing as a giant exercise in big government but the democrats aren't plucking out and running on in any consistent and high-profile way the things that they could argue are good about it like the fact that kids under 26 can be on their parents' plan, like the fact that pre-exist iing conditions are no longer a bar to coverage, like the fact that there's no limitations on coverage now. these are things that democrats could challenge the republicans to oppose. why there aren't tv ads talking about this up and down and all across the country, i don't know. here in pennsylvania, sestak's talking about it but it's not

his number one issue on the campaign trail, jobs is the number one issue. it seems like the democrats don't really want to use a lot of political capital on this and, once again, if you don't use it you're not going to get anything out of it. >> and not only that there is something to the old cliche about at the end of the day some porcelain must be broken if you're going to get anybody's attention to anything. the politics is to some degree if it's only the clash of ideas it should at least be that and the democratic idea seems to be let's see if we can can tiptoe past this election without anybody noticing the bad things or the good things. certainly there's a way you can emphasize the good things, isn't there? >> that's what bill clinton was a master at, plucking out the particulars and selling them in an unemotional way. don't start with the philosophy. start with the kitchen table particulars. bill clinton was really about it. pat toomey, a club for growth, wants to get rid of the whole

law, cut taxes. he's the pure thing on the conservative side. sestak, i think, would be wise to do an ad saying, okay, representative toomey, which parts of the health care law that has gone into effect right now do you want to deny the voters of pittsburgh and philadelphia? >> well, these democrats are not plucking out. they're plucking off at the moment. msnbc political analyst howard fineman in this transition period. i'm loosening you up for "huffington post." >> thank you very much. i need it. >> you've been loosened. thank you, howard. when the gop made that pledge, it forgot to mention how many people would lose their jobs if those policies were enacted. astonishing calculations next. nationwide insurance, let me hear it.

i've never had an accident. is there anything you can do for me ? yeah, i'm here with liz. i need a brilliant idea right now. guys ! i just gagged. here it is. deductible. take $50 off. wait. take $100 off for every year she doesn't have an accident... ... and call it vanishing deductible. hook, line, sinker.

the rhetoric over the gop pledge is well and good. the numbers from the economic policies institute, though, are astounding. you may not believe just how many jobs his pledge would eliminate. she said there was no evolution because monkeys were not turning into people as she watched.

i thought the reverse. has she ever seen that? his last baseball documentary got pbs its highest ratings ever. his next premieres tomorrow night. on the other hand, i'm in it. and this is a tombstone in a private, tiny muslim cemetery on private land in upstate new york. what local town lead eers want do to the dead bodies here you will not believe. [ tires screech ] the quarter-mile, or a quarter-century? is performance about the joy of driving? or the importance... of surviving? to us, performance is not about doing one thing well. it is about doing everything well. because in the end... everything matters. the best or nothing. that is what drives us. see your authorized mercedes-benz dealer for exceptional offers on the c-class.

we told you the number krun chers at epi have come up with the first estimate of how many jobs this country would lose under republican economic policy n. our fourth story before we

reveal that number, we're going to show you our math first because it's fun. republican leader boehner says he has a two pronged approach, freeze tax rates and freeze spending except for national security where president bush left that. so what will this do to the economy? it ain't good. here is how it works. job creation is generally tied to gross domestic product, gdp, basically how much money the country makes. renewing the bush tax cuts would do some good for the gdp but the problem is tax cuts for the rich are the worst way to boost the gdp and create jobs giving less bang for the buck than any other method. the tax cuts epi says would boost next year's gdp by just $12.2 billion and the spending cuts boehner would reduce spending levels to 2008 levels, meaning a 23% cut on infrastructure, roads, bridges, on government workers, on teachers, on scientists and so on. obviously paying salaries to workers creates more jobs than

helping rich people stuff their savings accounts full of dough. using congressional budget formulas the epi calculates that boehner's spending cuts would cut the gross domestic product by $183.2 billion. now prepare for math. $12.2 billion gained minus $183.2 billion equals $171 billion. $171 billion lost from america's gross domestic product. that is a 1.1% drop from next year's estimated gdp. remember i told you gdp is tied to jobs? the rate is roughly 1 million jobs for every 1% gdp. so the 1.1% drop in gdp from the republican economic plan would cost america e mreshg 1.1 milli. when the bush cuts were passed in 2001 and 2003 job creation took off, didn't it? republicans say uncertainty about tax rates holds back

hiring. in december of 2000 it became certain george w. bush would become president and would get to pass some form of the tax cuts he had campaigned on. but the unemployment rate went from 3.9%, the month he was appointed by the supreme court to 4.2% after his appointment removed all that uncertainty. in fairness, the tax cuts did not actually become law until june 2001 when unemployment had risen to 4.5% so how many jobs did the tax cuts create when they were signed into law? unemployment rose to 4.6%. 4.9% the month after that and then 5%, 5.3%, 5.5%. what about the second round signed in may of '03 when it had risen to 6.1%? it rose to 6.3% the next month. in all the years of his presidency the unemployment rate dropped only below 4.5% when he signed his first tax cuts into law in just four months dropping

to 4.4% four times in 2006. in the middle of the housing boom. thanks for your time tonight. >> thank you, keith. >> that analysis, 1.1 million jobs lost if republicans got their way in this pledge, does that sound right to you, and if it does, can you explain why those jobs would be lost? >> absolutely. that was a really important contribution made today and i think it really goes to show the peril of what happens when politicians start legislating talking points instead of actual policies. since the reagan era you've had the republican mantra, the bumper sticker being cut taxes, cut spending, and that's what the boehner plan would do. cut taxes and cut spending. unfortunately, we're in the middle of a jobless recovery from the deep eest recession wee

had since the great depression. corporations are sitting and hoarding trillions of dollars in cash and they're not hiring. the banks, which are sitting on trillions of dollars from the federal reserve, are not lending. states are in the red. they're not, because it's a housing crisis, they're not able to increase demand. the federal government has to increase demand and we know economic data shows from the cbo and all outside commentators that if you have government spending of the type that the obama plan would do, infrastructure, research, education and energy, you get $1.75 in economic output for every dollar that you spend. unfortunately, tax cuts, which are at the core of the boehner plan, actually are more expensive than they are productive in the economy. >> republicans live on that mantra, tax cuts equals job creation. is it not only not true, but is ret verse actually true? can tax cuts hurt job creation?

>> in this instance they absolutely can. it particularly because we're talking about the bush tax cuts which, as we know, the vast majority went to the wealthiest 3% of americans. now if i'm a working and middle class person who is living paycheck to paycheck, i spend every dollar that i can hold on to. i spend it on groceries. i spend it on my kids' books. i spend it on gas for the car. i immediately through-put that out into the economy. if i'm a millionaire or billionaire i, as you said, keith, sock it away. and so the problem using tax cuts as a stimulus is that it's far too expensive and it ties the government's hands to do the more effective form of stimulus, such as infrastructure spending. >> if it is clear, though, that tax cuts that are at best post expensive and the least effective way to create jobs, were are democrats insisting on extending any tax cuts even if it's to people in the middle

class? >> that's a really good question, keith. to answer it we have to look back at the inequalities in the tax code right now. in 2005 "the new york times" did a study of what all the bush tax cuts meant for the richest and middle class and lower class americans and found that because of the bush tax cuts, the 400 richest households in america were paying the same share of income on federal income, social security, and medicare taxes as americans making $50,000 to $70,000. >> heather mcghee. >> the four richest households were paying the same taxes, the same share in taxes as those in the middle class. and so the middle class and tax cuts for the low income folks are really what we need to be investing in. >> heather, great. thanks for your time. heather mcghee. >> thank you. the pyramids, the great

library in alexandria, al capone emitty until the bill maher video vault. christine o'donnell video has emerged. hoo? omnaris. [ men ] omnaris -- to the nose! [ man ] did you know nasal symptoms like congestion can be caused by allergic inflammation? omnaris relieves your symptoms by fighting inflammation. side effects may include headache, nosebleed, and sore throat. [ inhales deeply ] i told my allergy symptoms to take a hike. omnaris. ask your doctor. battling nasal allergy symptoms? omnaris combats the cause. get omnaris for $11 at omnaris.com. [ male announcer ] at ge capital, we're out there every day with clients like jetblue -- financing their fleet, sharing our expertise, and working with people who are changing the face of business in america. after 25 years in the aviation business, i kind of feel like if you're not having fun at what you do, then you've got the wrong job. my landing was better than yours. no, it wasn't.

yes, it was. was not. yes, it was. what do you think? take one of the big ones out? nah. it adds yellow to the standard rgb color system, for colors never before seen on tv. notice the lifelike color on this yellow seahorse, oh sorry, yellow-ish seahorse on your tv with three color technology. observe this stunning blue sea, in your mind that is. well, you get the picture. actually, you don't. [ male announcer ] quattron from sharp. you have to see it, to see it. that was the moment of truth. medicare by itself doesn't cover everything. i don't want to spend my life worrying about what would happen if one of us got sick. [ male announcer ] now more than ever, you may be wondering: do i have the right medicare coverage? talk to the health plan experts at securehorizons to get the answers you need. [ woman ] life's too short to worry about health care.

i hate to worry. [ male announcer ] in these changing times, the name on your medicare health plan may be more important than ever. choose a company you can depend on. call now.

christine o'donnell and the monkeys. that's ahead. first we turn to the tweet of the day. chris team o'donnell's philosophy can can be summed up as don't read, don't know. hoping she can get expelled for

v violating it, doubting she'll violate it. we begin in chicago. correspondent dorothy tucker is finishing up her piece on bed bugs with what we in the tv business like to call the on air tag. the woman in the background is not familiar with how television works. here's a tip, when the light goes on, the camera's live. hello. yes, the latest example. you get caught in an embarrassing moment and see how the station picks its local. a boat made of chocolate. there's no earthly way of knowing which direction they are going for the rowers keep on rowing and they're certainly not showing any signs they're slowing. there aren't any rowers and the boat is not doing a good job of floating. they made it as far as they could before the boat sank. finally it's time for what

you've all been waiting for, moroccan soccer highlights. we introduced you to the soccer cooper who made that save on the penalty kick and then saw the biscuit go into the basket while celebrating his own wonderfulness. well, look who's back. he is the victim of what i'm told is a bad touch, the easy goal right there but instead of pounding his chest he decides to expose the chest. he runs off the field and into the locker room. and time marches on. how to defeat the tea party. keep them talking. keep playing those christine o'donnell videotapes. i had a bum knee that needed surgery. but it got complicated, because i had an old injury. so i wanted a doctor who had done this before. and unitedhealthcare's database helped me find a surgeon.

you know you can't have great legs, if you don't have good knees. we're 78,000 people looking out for 70 million americans. that's health in numbers. unitedhealthcare.

the latest from the christine o'donnell archive reveals she is more mainstream than originally thought. o'donnell says evolution is made up. but in a fresh new twist miss

o'donnell argues that if evolution was real we'd all be able to head on down to the nearest zoo and watch monkeys turn into people while you wait. tu true to his word bill maher releasing another clip of the nominee for senate explaining her world view from his old abc show "politically incorrect." we take you back now to 1998. >> evolution is a myth and even darwin himself -- >> evolution is a myth? have you ever looked at a monkey? >> well, then why aren't monkeys still evolving into humans? >> okay. perhaps o'donnell was just clarifying a comment she had made two years earlier with a biology professor on cnn. she was asked to lend her expertise. her main concern, too many people blindly accepting evolution as pact. she offered evolution might be taught in schools in addition to creationism. if you teach them together, quote, it is not the establishment of religion. after all evolution is also

based on a set of belief systems, i.e., a religion, and that's secular humanism. o'donnell also allege that had dna is linked to god and citing the journal the book of genesis, pointed out god created the earth in six days, six 24-hour periods and there's just as much evidence supporting that. she challenged the merits of carbon dating. they use it as an example to prove something is millions of years old. we have the eruption of m. saint helens. these were hundreds of millions of years younger. they have the same results on the fossils and canyons on the test that is were 100 millions of years old. it's the kind of inconsistent tests like this they're basing their facts on. o'donnell based her facts on tests run by the institute for creation research whose credo is biblical, accurate, certain. they post water flea study inadvertently fits genesis

mandate and even bacteria seem to follow golden rule. joining me now, never followed children or an animal act or performing bacteria, the senior correspondent for american prospect magazine, co-author of "free ride john mccain and the media." paul, good morning. when the i dabbled in witchcraft clip was released, o'donnell got to it right away. she has remained silent on this. is this an admission this is still her position and there's no evolution on evolution? >> well, this kind of thing is really -- whether you're talking about her belief that scientists have created mice with fully functioning human brains or her apparent belief that your average chimp is a member of the x-men that's the last thing in the world christine o'donnell wants to be talking about. everyone on both sides understands the number one priority for voters is jobs and the economy. christine o'donnell is riding

this tea party tiger though that's not where she comes from. her career has been built on the conservative culture war. the thing that she does not want to talk about are all those things she spent the last 20 years talking about, what she would be on much safer ground is the economy is really bad and we need change. if she gets pulled into this culture war stuff it's not very good for her. >> is it a plus for her in delaware? do we have any idea how they feel in delaware or is this some idea she would be making decisions on scientific issues of concern to voters there? >> well, that may be troubling to you and me but one of the things that's going to happen regardless of whether the democrats hold on into the house and regardless what happens in any individual race is we're going to see a pretty significant increase in the size of the congressional caucus. we may look at people like louie and michelle and find them amusing and horrifying but there are going to be a lot more

people like them in congress and the gop as the tea party is kind of taking over it, it's becoming simultaneously more radical and also dumber. and i think that's what we're going to see in the coming congress with the sort of new incarnation of the republican party. >> i appreciate that i'm probably asking for a kind of consistency that is not requisite on that side of the equation but sharron angle used air quotes. by embracing candidates who are rejecting science and medicine and, i don't know, the formula that goes into h20 can the tea party continue to claim that it's only about small government, that all the other issues are irrelevant or are they suddenly getting big, crazy tent on their supporters? >> they can try to claim that and they're antiestablishment but what you see whenever they get into the details of those issues is that they're really just extremely conservative

republicans. on health care the provision she was objecting to is something that will take effect in 2014 where there are going to be certain kinds of conditions that insurance companies will have to cover. right now, for instance, they treat having a uterus as a pre-existing condition and a lot of plans don't cover any kind of maternity care. well, when you start speaking out against the affordable care act which will change that, all of a sudden that kind of view is not so popular but that is sort of what the view is on the extreme right. and that's where the tea party really is despite all the rhetoric that they're just concerned about deficits and the size of government. >> they will get every vote from everybody exactly like them but the more they talk the fewer people exactly like them there are. paul waldman, thank you again, paul. >> my pleasure. how to make a ken burns' documentary about things that happened exclusively in the video age on the eve of "the tenth inning." we'll ask ken burns. this is the former minister of justice in france. she lost that job because they

thought she wasn't that serious and kind of was show busy and sexy. that was before she made this amazing blooper. running there? running there? dancing there? flying there? how about eating soup to get there? delicious campbell's soups fill you with good nutrition, energy, farm-grown ingredients, and can help you keep a healthy weight. helping you get to a happier place. have a nice trip. campbell's. it's amazing what soup can do. tdd# 1-800-345-2550 are still talking about retirement tdd# 1-800-345-2550 like it's some kind of dream. tdd# 1-800-345-2550 it's either this magic number i'm supposed to reach, or... tdd# 1-800-345-2550 it's beach homes or it's starting a vineyard. tdd# 1-800-345-2550 come on! tdd# 1-800-345-2550 just help me figure it out in a practical, tdd# 1-800-345-2550 let's-make-this-happen kind of way. tdd# 1-800-345-2550 a vineyard? give me a break. tdd# 1-800-345-2550 [ male announcer ] looking for real-life answers

tdd# 1-800-345-2550 to your retirement questions? tdd# 1-800-345-2550 get real. get started. talk to chuck. tdd# 1-800-345-2550

the supposed real news man at fox pack phrases a political outfit to which they gave a million bucks. he is actually launching a sequel to baseball on pbs even though the first sound bite in the first episode is from me. i don't know. seems like crazy talk to me. this reminder as of tonight the new schedule kicks in. we're on live at 8:00 p.m. eastern, 5:00 p.m. pacific like we have been the seven years and nearly six months. our reair will be at 11:00 eastern. be there, aloha, worsts next. that's an old picture of me.

ben and his family live on this block. ben's a re/max agent, and he's a big part of this community. re/max agents know their markets, and they care enough to get to know you, too. nobody sells more real estate than re/max. visit remax.com today.

my special guest is ken burns. get out your pitchforks for the world's worst. the former justice minister of france made a boo-b oo o in a television interview. all you need to know there are two words in french and english that are nearly identical plus those two words sound like each other as well. one is the word that means inflation and the other doesn't. [ speaking in french ]

the translation into english of the full quote was when i see some of them looking for returns of 20% or 25% when fellacio is close to zero, we are destroying businesses. vive le france. pat wallace on his sunday pretend news interview show, nick ayers. mr. wallace complimented him because he, quote, has built the rga into the biggest political committee in town which at the end of june had more than $40 million cash on hand. mr. wallace said this without the slightest smidgen of irony or self-awareness considering that $1 million of that $40 million the largest individual donation so far was made by fox pack which mr. wallace seems to think is some sort of television news organization. bob mccarthy, town supervisor of sydney, new york, in delaware

county, has set some sort of record about islam-aphobia. the town supervisor mccarthy is trying to get the town attorney to sue a little community and force it to dig up the bodies of a handful of muslims buried there. to quote him, they just came in and buried the bodies and didn't go through -- there's no funding there. it's not a standard kind of deal. it's going to be a liability to the town. mccarthy adds, i don't know what the exact law is. in fact, there is no law. no local or state laws cover cemeteries on private land plus the city approved that cemetery five years ago and state troopers have been there to confirm everything is aboveboard and the town government of sydney, new york, wants them desecrated and the bodies exhumed. maybe they are muslim zombies just waiting to jump out of the ground and do something terrible to that prime target of sydney freaking new york. it is only 38 miles from

binghamton. the town supervisor, the worst person in the world. i know who works differently than many other allergy medications. hoo? omnaris. [ men ] omnaris -- to the nose! [ man ] did you know nasal symptoms like congestion can be caused by allergic inflammation? omnaris relieves your symptoms by fighting inflammation. side effects may include headache, nosebleed, and sore throat. [ inhales deeply ] i told my allergy symptoms to take a hike. omnaris. ask your doctor. battling nasal allergy symptoms? omnaris combats the cause. get omnaris for $11 at omnaris.com. lord of the carry-on. sovereign of the security line. you never take an upgrade for granted. and you rent from national. because only national lets you choose any car in the aisle. and go. you can even take a full-size or above. and still pay the mid-size price. i deserve this. [ male announcer ] you do, business pro. you do.

go national. go like a pro. it adds yellow to the standard rgb color system, for colors never before seen on tv. notice the lifelike color on this yellow seahorse, oh sorry, yellow-ish seahorse on your tv with three color technology. observe this stunning blue sea, in your mind that is. well, you get the picture. actually, you don't. [ male announcer ] quattron from sharp. you have to see it, to see it.

in september 1994 the montreal expos, the remnants of which are the washington nationals, finished a strike shortened season with the best record in the game. barry bonds was away from happing aaron's record and to date the most famous major leaguer was out of japan. the number one story ken burns and lynn novak's baseball documentary resumes on pbs with the tenth inning with one dispassionate observer calling it the finest television program ever made. ken burns joins me in a moment. "the tenth inning" will span two

nights. tomorrow the bottom of the tenth on wednesday. the documentary explores everything from the '94 strike to the rise in prominence of international players in the majors. the highlights, interviews with warm pedro martinez and a microphone reluctant ichiro suzuki. >> between the lines burns chronicles the rise of the braves in the early '90s, the curse of the bambino broken by the red sox in 2004. he deals with the issue of performance enhancing drugs. mr. burns getting interviews on the subjects of peds from primary sources like bud selig and fans such as the comedian

chris rock. >> people get upset. who in the whole country wouldn't take a pill to make more money at their job? you would. hey, there's a pill and you're going to get paid like steven spielberg, you would take the pill. you just would. >> i'm joined by documentary filmmaker ken burns. it premieres tomorrow night on pbs and that cup was not for water. we're going to do some testing for both of us. >> cheers. >> thank you very much. your standards for doing these series have been consistent over the years. it's a part of america that allows us to see the whole of america and microcosm. what about baseball in the last 16 years tells us about the country in the last 16 years? >> what doesn't? i mean, you know, from money -- deregulation -- deregulation which was so rampant in the '90s, allowed the steroids to flood. it allowed the players to do whatever -- to take whatever they wanted with impunity and

without any worry of punishment. everything is there. we live in a pharmacological culture. we give our kids pills to do better in school and everything else. this is all part of who we are. the sociologist said if you want to nope the heart and soul of america, study baseball. and sometimes that heart and soul isn't so pleasant but i think the good news in "the tenth inning" is despite all this stuff, despite the strike, despite the steroids, this is still the greatest game ever invented and the resilience of the game is the real star of "the tenth inning" how despite everything just like in every other decade where people say baseball is washed up, absence of african-americans, pay under the table, there was a complaint in our first inning that, you know, oh, they don't play baseball the way they used to. that was 1858 through amphetamines, free agency was going to kill it, steroids is going to kill it. steroids is in our rear-view mirror. it hasn't killed it and nothing will. >> with this one you start in a

different place. explain that because it is with the american theme of all of your work, it it truly is a departure. >> you remember the first nine episodes, nine innings, after a little prologue we began everything with the star spangled banner which is how all games should begin. the last words are apparently play ball. and we chose to go to the dominican republic to see these kids who are playing barefoot in back alleys with 2x2s instead of a bat throwing rags around, no mitt, running around with the joy of the game we love so much that isn't running down a field or a gridiron or on a rink or a court but this wonderful, great game which they get and the siren song that's going to move them off that island, i think, is the star spangled banner and the promise both real and bittersweet that they will eventually get to the major leagues and lift themselves and by extension their whole country out of the abject poverty they live in. >> your style traditionally

heavy on making the most you can and the most imaginative use you could of still photographs. much of baseball, a lot of the war, second world war documentary, a lot of jazz. how did you stay true to your own vision of what a documentary film should be in an era that is entirely recorded on videotape from six different angles each shot? >> exactly and we had to edit that. there's a tyranny of choice there as of no choice in the civil war where there's not a single old photograph of actual battles so you had to sort of re-create and do it. what we did we kept what you just said, the dna is still that individual image of the ability to convey complex information and while we have the great c cooperation of mlb which helped us at every turn and gave thus footage and let us see all the different camera angles we return again and again to a photograph that would anchor you, i think, in meaning as well as illustration. you don't want to just merely illustrate. you also want to have meaning where one-and-one, word and image don't always add up to two

but sometimes to three because that's what we want. we want that strange and improbable calculus in our lives. >> who is the breakout commentator this time and who is your buck o'neal? howard bryant or pedro martinez -- >> pedro is so surprising. an unbelievable interview with him and ichiro and joe torre. marcus in particularly in the top of the tenth is so moving. he knows barry bonds. he's a fan of the giants. he knows what it is to be a hispanic-american growing up in america without the role models and with the resistance in baseball is at least what rewarded that group in the midst of an era we are talking against them. and i think that in some ways it's torre and pedro in terms of the people who played and howard bryant is great and so is tom and so many people and so are you. >> no, no, no, no.

>> you don't get the opening statement for nothing, buster. >> far be it for me to question your film making but the first voice you hear sort of sets the tone for the whole thing and you open with this lunk who is talking about drowning in the river. >> no, no, no, this is the only game that goes forwards and backwards at the same time, and that's the thing. you go to somebody who is trying to convince you at a bar that football is the about best game or basketball is the game and you say how many points does wilt chamberlain have? they have no idea. how many yards does walter payton have? the casual fan knows what hitting .406 means in 1941. having a 56-game hitting streak and also in 1941, now even 762 means. these are all important numbers. a .300 hitter means the same thing to my three daughters as it does to me but more importantly it means to abe are ham burns who fought in the civil war and tell