the pressure groups will do what they do. the question is whether the people will do it together what they need done. we needed a border and a budget. the question is whether the politicians have the stuff to protect either. thanks for being with us. good evening, americans, and welcome to "the ed show." tonight, from new york, these stories are hitting my hot buttons at this hour. former president george w. bush admitted he committed a criminal act on national television. i say, let him brag about his crime in court. and let the justice system decide if it was legal. my commentary on that in just a moment. incoming oversight chair, darrell issa. now, this guy recently called president obama his administration corrupt. but he has absolutely no proof of any of this. congressman dennis kucinich is furious and demanding a retraction.

he'll twist some arms tonight's story in "the battleground" is coming up. and tea party and queen michele bachmann threw in the towel on her dream to dominate the republicans. now, rand paul wants to drive the crazy train. that's coming up. but this is the story that has me fired up tonight. i think congressman darrell issa is on a witch-hunt to take president obama down for absolutely nothing. with no proof. but he doesn't have the guts to go after a president, who just admitted a crime on national television. a comment from former president, george w. bush to nbc's matt lauer has set off a wildfire of controversy. >> and so i said to our team, are the techniques legal? and a legal team says, yes they are. and i said, use them. >> why is waterboarding legal in your opinion? >> because the lawyer said it was legal. it said it did not fall within the -- the antitorture act. i'm not a lawyer. and -- but you've got to trust

the judgment of the people around you and i do. i will tell you this, using those techniques saved lives. my job was to protect america and i did. >> well, bush doesn't think that he did anything wrong because one of his handpicked attorneys told him, waterboarding was okay, it's okay it's legal go ahead. new york congressman jerry nadler, believes the former president just admitted to a crime. >> the united states' always considered waterboarding torture except during the bush administration. we prosecuted japanese generals for waterboarding people. we prosecuted american soldiers for waterboarding people. and pressed that case. mr. holder said that waterboarding is torture. always regarded it as torture and under our statute and we are bound to prosecute. >> what do we have here, more in action? president obama's administration has turned the page on prosecuting the bush administration. that was kind of a long time ago, wasn't it? now, bush feels like he's

pretty much untouchable. republicans are attacking nadler for calling bush on the carpet. fox news favorite congressman peter king in new york jumped to bush's defense right away and he told politico, quote, jerry and i are friends, but he's entirely wrong on this. there would have been lives lost and bush deserves credit fwhar he did. king went on to say that, bush should get a medal for authorizing waterboarding? now, republicans don't care if waterboarding is legal or moral. when this story comes up, their first reaction is to praise the former president, make liberals look like they're nothing but a bunch of damn terrorist sympathizers, well psycho-talking michele bachmann played that card and played that garbage over and over on "the o'reilly show." >> bush is right, bush did the right thing, all right he protected us. he had to dunk these three guys and he did and he got information and we captured a whole bunch of really bad, bad people from it. if you hear the left this is the worst thing the united states' ever done. we're a terrible country for doing it.

why? why are they doing this? >> well, it almost seems as if they need to come up with some sort of a case to defend the people who are making this action. the radical terrorists. and here take a look at the terrorists who have beheaded people like daniel pearl. they don't think twice about that. >> worst thing the country's ever done? that's a dandy, o'reilly. i think that the invasion was probably worse, and of course if we haven't invaded we wouldn't be waterboarding anybody. now for those two hate merchants and exactly what they are, to imply the left, wants to protect terrorists is beyond psycho talk. republicans have no moral high ground when it comes to this issue of torture. they don't have it anymore, never did. just because one of bush's conservative attorneys gave the green light for waterboarding, this technique, doesn't make it legal. attorney general eric holder, i think, has a responsibility to investigate the former president. his attorney, and any other former administration official who played a role in all of this.

president bush's new admission to this smoking gun, well, it's a whole new story, isn't it? but congressman nadler doesn't think that the attorney general's going to take any action. >> this is real, genuine, new information in your opinion, and you're asking attorney general eric holder to do this. do you think he'll do it, and do you think this is the smoking gun? >> well, it is a smoking gun. i'm dubious that he will do it because this administration, unfortunately, has taken the opinion that -- has taken the attitude that they're not going to look at any criminal actions by -- within the prior administration. they say, let's look forward, not backward. by that standard, no one would ever prosecute any crime. >> look, it's time for the administration and the white house right now to face facts and play hardball. let's face it, americans. while darrell issa and the republicans clogged up congress and subpoenas and frivolous hearings bush and cheney will never see the insisted courtroom. are you happy about that? i think that there's a whole bunch of americans out there, including me, that think the

bush administration broke the law and got away scot-free. if issa wants to play ball, well, eric holder, well, i think that he ought to get in the game. that's right, let's make it political. what the hell, they do it all the time. tell me what you think in our telephone survey tonight, folks. number to dial is 1-877-ed-msnbc. my question tonight is, would you like to see george w. bush face prosecution for authorizing waterboarding? press the number one for yes, press the number two for no. joining us now is joan walsh, editor-at-large, salon.com. what can liberals, what can americans, joan, expect in the aftermath of these comments, nothing or something? >> nothing. the administration said a long time ago that they were going to look forward, not backward. you know, dick cheney has -- has basically confessed to being

part of this decision to authorize waterboarding. there's plenty of evidence that -- that they ordered it. you know, i have to say again, listening to the president, watching the president talk to matt lauer about this, and then that shrinking little admission, well, i'm not a lawyer, you know, sort of -- again, swiping away briefly the moral and political justification for this and responsibility for this, then taking it back, you know it's -- it's i was going to say it's unbelievable. it's very believable. >> joan, is this another case of where the democrats are illustrating to the american people that they just don't have the guts to followthrough? i mean, if you -- i guarantee you, our poll tonight is going to be heavy, yes they want to see the attorney general take action on this. but here's the difference. we have the republicans, who can't wait to get the gavel and to go after president obama and just to find something. they're like a blind squirrel in

the forest trying to find acorn. here are the democrat, no we're not going to do that. this in my opinion is what infuriates people on the left. this isn't fair. we're getting a cheaper cut. we're not getting justice. and i really commend congressman nadler for coming up today and yesterday, last night on the show, and saying that he thinks it's the smoking gun. what do -- what do we have to do to get them to shake free and go do something on this? >> i don't know. i commend congressman nadler myself. i agree with you, ed. i'm going to try to really back in a little bit, just a little bit, ed, because i don't want to be like them. i don't want us to be like them. i don't want to be hunting for things that really didn't happen. i don't want millions of dollars spent on a kenneth starr investigation. i don't want dan burton back alleging that the clinton his

something to do with the tragic death of vince foster. i don't want any of that. >> i hear what you're saying but we have an admission there. >> yeah i know. >> we know exactly that waterboarding is illegal. >> it's illegal. >> it's been stated by the current attorney general. and now we have the word of an attorney, a conservative attorney in the bush administration. you mean to tell me that the obama administration's just going to take their word for it and move on? this is wrong. >> it is wrong, it appears -- it appears to be that that's what they're doing. you know -- people have been prosecuted for waterboarding, our soldiers, as well they should. it is an international war crime. and we really are duty-bound to prosecute it but you and i have been having this conversation for a couple of years and it's not happening. and you know, we just keep -- we have to keep talking about it and we have to keep standing up for our values and not being cowed by the likes of the fox braying hounds as well as you know, bush now taking this victory lap. when we all know that khalid shaikh mohammed gave up the most

information before he was waterboarded. basic humankindness and care and smart interrogation got all of the information that helped us. and they're also lying about the effectiveness of torture. so it's corrupt on so many levels but i'm just not optimist take we're not going see any action, ed. >> i'm really disappointed that we weren't seeing more of a push from other congressional members. it's -- if this was a democratic president, holy smokes. you know what they'd be doing with it. >> oh my god. >> it would be just be -- >> yeah. >> it would be unbelievable and it would be nonstop. >> would it be. >> the thing that bothers me about issa on the other hand is he's making reckless statements with absolutely no proof and we're calling him on the carpet on that later in the show. >> and we should. >> so what it comes down to on a lighter note, i guess what we got out of the bush administration was a couple of wars a pretty good movie that's coming out and a lousy book. outside of that, and you know a bunch of debt and deficits.

>> huge debt and deficits. >> i want justice! >> don't forget the wrecked economy. don't forget a city that hasn't recovered from hurricane katrina. there's -- we could go down the list and we know that it's true and it's tragic but you know on this one i don't say give up on talking about it and i will talk about it, i just don't want you -- i just think i'm going to handicap this and say we're not going to get any action and boy do i hope i'm wrong, ed. >> good to have you with us, joan walsh. >> thank you, ed. >> appreciate your time tonight. coming up bachmann's big power grab just bombed. rand paul just stepped up to the tea partiers. i'll track the crazies in the "the playbook" coming up. what in the heck is going on with the bush tax cuts? and the white house is sending mixed messages. they're trying to clarify it late tonight and we'll talk about that but they better do some clarification. we'll get rapid-fire response on that. plus, a radical right-wing talk show host gets booted off of congressman's payroll.

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coming up, house speaker nancy pelosi. she's not mincing any words. she says that the debt cutting plan alan simpson and his geezer friends put out is simply unacceptable. the afl-cio says it's telling working americans to drop dead. i couldn't agree more.

welcome back to "the ed show" and thanks for watching tonight. this next story, in my opinion,

is all about guts, who can make the tough choices? president obama's deficit commission is getting hammered from the left. house speaker nancy plosei called the proposed cuts to social security simply unacceptable. afl-cio president richard trumka says that the commission's bottom line for working americans is, quote, drop dead. but in all of the bad news there is a bright spot, guess what else the panel recommended to save a whole bunch of money? the public option gosh who's been saying that since the day that he came on board on msnbc? republicans keep saying that they're willing to be bipartisan. well a chance to prove it. i challenge the incoming speaker mr. boehner to work with democrats on creating a public option to bring down the deficit if that's what they're really concerned about. for more bring in adam green, co-founder of the progressive change campaign committee. adam, good to have you with us tonight. i want to play -- give you a sense of how i think the

democrats have really shifted on some principles when it comes to what's fair game on cuts, what the priority list is, and how you stand up for it. this is senator kent conrad, back with tim russert on "meet the press" in 2002, june 9th was the date. 2002. he was the budget director it's budget director was mitch daniels of the white house. he was on "meet the press" with conrad. this is what conrad had to say about the tax cuts coming up with the bush administration. >> the administration told us that we could have a massive tax cut, and they would still be able to have maximum pay down of the debt and protect social security. now what we're seeing is, they got the massive tax cut, but now instead of maximum pay down of the debt, they're asking for the second biggest increase in the debt in our nation's history and in protecting social security instead of protecting it, under the president's budget plan over the next decade, they will be taking almost $2 trillion out of

social security to pay for other things. to pay for his tax cuts to pay for his other spending. >> it sound like back then social security and medicare and all the great institutions that the democrats have put in place ever on the decades that have worked for americans that is important but this is senator conrad today. >> well, i propose some weeks ago that we extend all the tax cuts for a period of time until we're able to fundamentally reform the tax system. the idea that you don't have to touch revenue, that's not going to do it. the idea that you don't have to touch social security or medicare, that's not going to do it. hey, social security and medicare, are both headed for insolvency. that's a fancy word for saying, they're going to go broke. so, look, people can say we just want to keep what is. what is, is not affordable. >> boy, what a difference eight years makes. all they have to do is let this legislation expire.

it'll roll in $3.7 trillion to the treasury over the next ten years and we could do one hell a job to bring us back to fiscal sanity. adam, am i right or wrong and do you see a shift. >> yeah you know, democrats and people who voted for president obama have been asking, where are the fighting democrats these days? and it turns out they're in the past. the dream team apparently is the barack obama of 2008 and the kent conrad of 2002. i want those guys back. democrats lost this past week because they didn't fight hard enough for popular progressive priorities and it's hard to think of a more popular than one social security. it's absurd that people would put that on the table especially in light of the the polling that we announced yesterday that showed among last week's republican-leading electorate when asked, how do you prefer to reduce the deficit? over 40% said, tax the wealthy. over 20% said, well, let's cut military spending especially the wasteful military spending, and only 12% said touch social security.

so no mandate for this, and what we need now is democrats to stand strong. >> the debt commission is going to require the president to admit and congress to consider reforms to lower spending, such as add a robust public option and/or all payer system in the exchange. i mean it's very clear right there. of what should be done. but, of course, the republicans, they are saying, now that they want to repeal the health care bill, and they want nothing to do with any kind of government involvement. so we're still in the middle of an ideological fight for the country, even when we start making tough decisions about what we're going to do as far as our taxes and our money is concerned. do you think that the obama administration is throwing in the towel on the bush tax cuts? have we lost that fight? >> i don't think we've lost it. but we're on the verge of losing it. if we don't push back massively and tell president obama, look, this is the time to fight. don't compromise with your enemies. don't compromise with those who are trying to hurt the american

people. fight them and win. and it's not an accident that just in the last few hours alone, about 60,000 people have gone to our website, boldprogressives.org to address this exact issue and tell president obama, fight, don't cave. we're telling him, we need you to fight to repeal the bush tax cuts and it's not an accident that there's two issues in the news right now. do we cut social security? and do we give the super wealthy a tax cut? those two completely connect with each other. and we need president obama to be fighting for social security, and against tax cuts for the rich. it's that simple. >> adam green, good to have you with us tonight and great work at pccc, you folks, you're on top of it. i'm with you. i mean i just don't see how in the world the democrats can't draw a line in the sand and say, look, you want fiscal sanity, let's go back to the old tax rates. back before bush, back when the clinton administration was creating jobs. let's go back. let's give that a try for a couple of years. and see if we can start getting our house in order.

and you could still work on the spending as well. but i see a definite shift in the priority list when it comes to the democrats. this is going to be a very important lame-duck session and i'll tell you a lot of basers out there are going to get out of the ship if they don't see toughness during this lame duck on this issue. coming up -- smoky joe barton, he's another dandy. the loser who felt like he was so sorry for what bp had to go through and now he's dropping dandies left and right. he's freaking out over lightbulbs and calling himself general patton. well, this marches him right into "the zone," next.

and in "psycho-talk" tonight, smoky joe barton out of

texas is another one of these republicans who think the recent election means that making a complete takeover of the country. he's in the running of the house chair committee but that seat may be too small to hold his massive ego. >> with the new republican majority in the house, we're going to set the conservative agenda for a better america. speaker boehner will be the eisenhower and chairman barton will be the patton. >> hm? patton, huh? a guy who apologized to bp as comparing himself to general patton? ah, he must have gotten confused with all of that nazi rhetoric flying around this election season. barton's war is against the energy efficient lightbulbs, if you could believe it. he wants to repeal a law that phases out old lightbulbs in favor of more environmentally friendly ones. >> we prohibited in a few years of the safely incandescent lightbulbs.

the traditional incandescent lightbulb, i believe that you could get four for $1.99. the little squiggly pigtail ones, were one for $9.99. now, if you're al gore, you can afford $10 a pop for squiggly pigtailed fluorescent lightbulbs. but if you're mainstream america, two, three kids, mom and dad working outside the home, that's not a very good deal. >> what have we've done? i think he would know a great walmart greeter, don't you? a guy who wants to lead the energy committee should learn how energy actually works, don't you think? now, on average, energy-efficient cfl lightbulbs cost about three times more than a regular bulb, get this right

now, but they last around eight times longer. so you buy a lot fewer of them, and they use about four times less electricity. that's a good thing. so your electric bill goes down. that's another good thing. now these squiggly pigtailed bulbs they actually end up saving you money. maybe joe should stop gloating about the election and focus on issues, because comparing himself to patton and waging war against green technology, that is dim-witted "psycho-talk" for sure. coming up, darrell issa. ohh. i really believe he's on a witch-hunt with all of these hearings that he's planning. it's about you, darryl and your other broth darrell. congressman dennis kucinich is going nose to nose with issa on this issue. he'll fire back on "the battleground" story in a moment. caribou barbie should stick

to reality tv. republicans they don't even like her. plus michele bachmann waves the white flag and the tan man lies low and shooters in the playbook tonight. a lot coming up in the next half hour. you go next if you had a

hoveround power chair?

welcome back to "the ed show." the "battleground" story tonight, darrell issa's witch-hunt against president obama. what is this all about? issa went on national television and accused the administration of using stimulus funds as, quote, walking around money. folks, he is flat out accusing the administration of improperly funneling federal funds, federal dollars, to political allies without any proof. congressman dennis kucinich is furious. he wrote a letter to issa asking him to put up or shut up. that term, "walking around money," he wrote, as you may know, refers to the use of certain political campaigns of

money for off-the-books wholly unaccountable and potentially illegal purposes. therefore, i'm writing to demand that you produce your evidence or retract your comment. we reached out to congressman issa's office today. and here is their response through a spokesman. "we'll have plenty of time to settle these questions in the new congress." let's bring in congressman dennis kucinich now, who wrote the letter to mr. issa, asking him to show proof because he was on earlier this week on one of the other network saying that this money was being floated as political payback. congressman, in your opinion, how serious is this? this is an accusation. >> well, it's serious when you consider that mr. issa's the presumptive chair of an investigative committee that has the power to compel the production of records and to subpoena people to appear before the committee. he has to be very judicious in his approach to the use of that

power. and what i heard was something that went beyond intemperant. when you're in a position of being a judge and the person who owns that gavel has great responsibility to the american people to handle and conduct himself in a way that reflects honor and credit to the house of representatives. and to the american people. and so i wrote mr. issa that letter. saying that if you have such evidence, bring it forward. but if you don't, he's going to have to retract what he said. because you cannot make those kinds of charges when you're chairman of a committee, when you're the one who supposed to be able to judge the evidence that's presented. and if you make a charge without the evidence, that is a real problem for our congress. >> here is the comment that was made by mr. issa, which i think is a bold accusation, without proof. here it is. >> his administration received

$700 billion worth of walking around money in the stimulus and used to just that way. a great deal was used for political payback. his administration has a lot of explaining, where the $700 billion went. where investigations that should have gone on, particularly into a.c.o.r.n., an organization that he had past influence with, and should be willing to do a lot to end. i think those have to be dealt with. >> political payback, that is his quote, right there. and i appreciate you challenging him on this because they just throw it out there. and see if it'll stick. this is a congressman who said earlier that he thought that president obama was one of the most corrupt presidents in modern times. he later backtracked on that, when he was called on it, but here he is again. now saying that he used it for political payback. your thoughts again, congressman? >> well, it's one thing to talk about politics, but when you start to imply that possibly illegal conduct is involved, one has to be very cautious and one

must be very reserved with the kind of power of that gavel of an investigative committee. and i hope to talk -- i will talk to mr. issa when we return to congress next week to, not just caution him, but to tell him that it's absolutely mandatory that he either produces this evidence or retract it. he cannot, as the presumptive chair of an investigative committee, proceed in a way that causes people's reputations to be besmirched. what the american people and what congress has -- have a right to expect with respect to the conduct of the chairman of that very important investigative committee. >> congressman, another story i want to bring up with you tonight is the deficit commission proposals. in short form there's some pretty tough stuff there, if we're going to reach this $4

trillion mark of trying to set our country free, economically. they want to slash social security. raise their retirement age, they also want to set new limits on medicare. and they want to end several middle-class tax cuts. on its surface, it's not completely detailed what's on your first impression of what former senator erskine bowles have come forward with. >> well we know that the committee already is -- was stacked with individuals who represent various interest groups who have long wanted to privatize social security and who believe that medicare ought to be reduced. the fact of the matter is that if you reduce medicare or social security benefits, you're actually contributing to the acceleration of the wealth of the nation upwards. you cannot take any more from the middle class, they're already suffering. you can't tell people to work a lifetime and put their money into social security, that the benefit levels are not going to be there and we cannot reduce medicare services to people who depend on them. now we can cut the pentagon budget. we can put it substantially

without about in any way jeopardizing our defense. we can get out of iraq and afghanistan. which will save the american people hundreds of billions of dollars of -- in tax money. we have to take a new approach. so there is a way to deal with the deficit and we also have to start thinking of how do we get america back to work, ed? we can keep talking about deficit. there's 15 million americans who don't have a job, there's 12 million underemployed, people who are still worried about losing their homes. we've got get on america out of this financial ditch and this obsession of taking care of the deficit through cutting social security benefits and medicare is just wrong. and it's not going to fly. we have to go forward and provide for prosperity in this country and not cause the middle class to be thrown overboard. >> congressman dennis kucinich, great to have you with us tonight. thanks so much. let's get rapid-fire response from our panel on these stories. white house is hitting back after reports said that the president was ready to cave in for the tax cuts the wealthy.

the pentagon says repealing don't ask, don't tell would have virtually no negative impact on the troops. so what will the new majority do with that issue? and a new poll shows that sarah palin is, by far, the most polarizing of the potential 2012 republican presidential candidates. joining us tonight, bill press, nationally syndicated radio talk show host. and michael medved, also a conservative and nationally syndicated radio talk show host. gentlemen, good to have you with us tonight. where is the administration? are they wavering, and what do you think the expectations are of the base? >> i think it's pretty clear, ed. two things, number one, barack obama has just handed john boehner his first big victory. and the second thing is that president obama, one more time, is caving in before he's even had a vote, before there's even a fight. look, ed, if the president in his news conference last week says that he's willing to compromise, if robert gibbs told us that at the white house, if david axelrod told "the huffington post" that, this deal

is done. they've decided they will fold just like they folded on the public option. >> well, this is the response this afternoon from mr. axelrod. the white house response to axelrod's story in "the huffington post." "this story is overwritten, nothing's changed from at what president said last week. we believe that we need to extend the middle-class tax cuts. we cannot afford toboro $700 billion to pay for extending the tax cuts for the wealthiest americans. full stop, period, end of sentence. does this -- >> now, ed -- >> does this clear up the issue, bill? >> no, no. i don't think that it does. i think what it means is that david axelrod mistakenly, he got out a little ahead of the story. he realized that he shouldn't have said everything that he said to "the huffington post." but ed, this is the big difference, the president was saying a week ago, no way, no how. we're going to extend the tax cuts for the middle class and not extend the tax cuts for the wealthy people. >> okay. >> because right now it's

changed. we're open to extending. ed, they've given up on this thing. >> all right so, the headline on "huffington post" this morning was "white house gives in on bush tax cuts." >> sam stein got it right. >> michael medved, is that an appropriate headline, what do you think? >> it seems to me that it is and it's a good thing too. look, the one thing where the white house says we cannot afford to borrow $700 billion, they're not going to have to, because no one is talking at this point about making all of the tax cuts permanent. i know that republicans are demanding it, but they're not going to get it. what they're going to do is extend this for a year or two and then take up some of the recommendations. the excellent recommendations of the deficit commission which call for a total restructuring of taxes, lowering tax rates for everybody, rich and poor, alike, and getting rid of loopholes i think that's a great thing. >> bill? >> well, i was going to say, ed, you know what will happen, they will extend it -- michael is right to this, extend it for a year or two years. they're going to extend it for

another year or two years for the same old phony argument. this is a permanent extension, just disguise as a temporary extension. >> gentlemen, this lame-duck session that we're going into is a defining moment for the democrats when it comes to a gut check. why do you stand on social security and medicare with this reduction deficit commission? why where do you stand on the bush tax cuts? all extend or some and how much will they fight? i mean it would seem to me after all that we went through getting the obama administration where they are, getting the majorities, bill press, why are we having this conversation again? don't we know where what in the hell that we stand for? what do you think? >> no, no, no, we should not be having this conversation. look the democrats have to stand for what democrats have always stood for, ed. no political clamor for cutting social security. there's no political clamor for cutting medicaid. >> kent conrad a member of the commission who is a democrat commission. you know him well. kent conrad said it very well, if you don't go along with our recommendations, okay. what's a better plan?

there has to be a recognition that we have a deficit crisis. we have to deal with it. it's a threat to the national security. as admiral mullen has said the head of the joint chiefs. okay if you don't want to have trim in the growth of social security -- >> michael, all that we have do is get government out of the way and let the legislation expire and go back to the old tax rates and we've got everything handled. that's $3.7 billion over ten years. we're looking for $3.7 trillion. and we're looking for $4 trillion. we can suck it up and do some belt tightening, can't we? not a heavy lift for the americans if we just let the legislation expire. michael, what's wrong with that. >> let the legislation expire, ed, what that means for an average american family earning about $50,000 a year is $2,000 more a year af in taxes. nobody wants a middle-class tax hike in the middle of the recession. maybe except ed schultz. >> it's called sacrifice. everybody has to sacrifice for eight -- now it's ten years. we haven't been asked to sacrifice anything.

we're putting it on the backs of the kids. and so now when the legislation is expected to expire at the end of the year, we as a country, don't have the guts enough to say you know what, we're going to take care of our house and we're going lot to this go. >> let me tell you why. >> the let's extend social security and cut medicare, where they want to go. fellows, i have to ask you about don't ask, don't tell. what will happen. >> don't ask, don't tell is eventually going to go go away but i think that it will only go away when the military brass and every branch of the service say that it should. and right now you have people in the marine corps totally against moving that policy. >> quickly, bill, what do you think? >> i think that the comandeer -- this is the bad policy, the president ought to -- >> bill press, michael medved, always a pleasure, you guys are great. coming up --

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in my playbook tonight w. confirms in his book what i thought all along. shooter's been calling the shots in this administration. bush explained it to matt lauer. >> in a conversation i think over lunch you had with dick cheney in the period of buildup to the war this iraq, he said to you, are you going to take care of this guy? >> yeah. >> or not? first of all i was surprised by the tone that the vice president

would use with you, was it surprising to you? >> no. i mean that's -- we have a very frank relationship. and we would give me his unvarnished advice. >> but his comment leads to the question, was dick cheney pushing you to to war with iraq? >> it doesn't matter whether he was or not. he might had been saying let's go, but i said, no. >> bush can say he was the decider, as much as he wanted. the fact is shooter ran the show. let's bring in john nichols, washington correspondent of "the nation" the author of the book "dick: the man who is president." well, is this new information and does it shed more light on what you wrote about john? >> actually i think it does shed a little bit of light. there is -- something that we should focus on here. the vice president of the united states was saying to the president before any declaration of war, are you going to take care of this guy? there was a clear pressure there to take out a foreign leader without any sort of investigation or authorization.

i think that this is the sort of stuff that we should pay attention to. we should listen closely to what bush is saying. you're right it suggests that bush was not in charge that cheney was driving an agenda. and i'm intrigued this point where we have darrell issa talking about launching a whole bunch of investigations into manipulations within the obama white house. i'd like to see some democrats in congress move some resolutions, maybe in the senate, use the judiciary committee to take a look at exactly what dick cheney was doing. i don't think we've sorted that out. and remember, we still have troops on the ground. people dying. >> yeah. >> because of cheney's manipulations. >> do you think that bush's telling the truth, when he says he was thinking about dumping dick cheney off of the ticket? >> well, here, you know, look, i think george w. bush tried to, you know, man up a little in this book, and suggest that he was actually in charge. the fact of the matter is, the way that that section was written, it sort of, well,

cheney said that he'd go if i wanted him to but i told him to stay. the reality is if you look back at the whole story line it was cheney who put him in that vice presidency in the first place and he was deciding whether he was going to go. >> john nichols, always a pleasure. the tan man says he's going to fly commercial when he becomes speaker of the house. he said he's been traveling back home to the district like this for years. he promises to keep the air tan habit alive. we're going to hold you to that, john. and fox news host, megan kelly, totally lost it. talking about a man who was saved from a heart attack with a cold blanket. >> isn't that incredible? don't you want to know about that, it gives you a little hope you keel over from a heart attack and get the frozen blanket and maybe you have your spouse and stuff you in the freezer. not really. you need a big freezer. and really, you know, your spouse isn't going to want to do that.

that won't -- >> all right, moving on. >> moving on. >> megan, if you really want to get a good laugh, you should watch some of the other shifts on your very own network. coming up, glenn beck, well, he can't help but bat crazy bachmann get power orand paul is stomping into steal her thunder. more on the power plays with this new group. trouble getting around, i

any finally tonight, congresswoman michele bachmann is out of the running for the number four leadership position in the house. she dropped her bid for republican conference chair, it turns out that she needed, i guess, more than glenn beck and a couple of tea party wackos on your side to win this thing, but bachmann's failure doesn't nin these folks are going to be fade away anytime soon. senator-elect from kentucky, rand paul, wants to lead caucus in the next congress. jim demint you better watch your back buddy. this guy means business. bring in jonathan alter for "newsweek" and msnbc political analyst. i have to give rand paul some credit, jonathan. this would be change. a bicammeral tea party caucus. what kind of problems do you think that would pose for republicans in a sense might have their heads screwed on right? >> well, that's going to cause them a lot of problems, it's going to be very interesting for those of us in the press.

because they are going to be noisy. they're going to be going on cable tv. they're going to be standing up for their interests even though rand paul is a lowly freshman in the minority. normally when you're in that position you have no power. he will get plenty of attention we'll see whether he can turn that to their advantage. but i think when they move forward with their agenda, ed, it's very important for the folks who don't think they're necessarily taking the country in the right direction to come back at them and expose them as hypocrites in areas where they might be hypocritical. for instance and this is a really big issue that doesn't get very much attention in the eastern media, but you know from your neck of the woods how important it is. farm subsidies. >> no doubt. >> farm price supports. bachmann comes from minnesota. rand paul has a lot of farmers in kentucky. you've just got the deficit commission that recommended deep

cuts in farm subsidies. they are -- farm subsidies are socialistic by their definition. they should be against them. we'll see when their ox is getting -- and their constituents are suffering from what i think is the often legitimate cut of those subsidies and see how they react. >> you make a great point. these tea partiers want to go after these billions of dollars in subsidies but we have a cheap food policy in this country. minimum wage earners can go into the grocery store and feed themselves. we're not subsidizing the farmer, we're subsidizing the consumer and making it easier for everyone to buy food. >> when it comes to disaster relief, price supports and everything is cyclical. there will be some tough times and this is where it's going to cost some conflict for some these tea partiers who are out in the middle of the country. >> right. >> because that is their economy. but i have to say that for rand paul to do this, it is going to be separate him away from the republicans and you know how the

narrative is, this is what the american people want. this is what -- and he's going to get a lot of attention. he could be a major player and politically it's pretty brilliant putting him on notice. >> yeah he could be in the same way that demint became a big player and colburn shortly after they arrived. so seniority's a little less important than it used to be but you have to remember how much these guys loathe, demint, colburn and even rand paul. they helped him in the general election but remember, mitch mcconnell is from his state. he was a strong supporter of rand paul's opponent in that kentucky gop primary. so there's some bad blood there between the regulars, the republican party establishment, and these tea party folks. it's not quite civil war yet but there's some serious strife in the grand ole party. >> and point out on the other show the other night you called it spot on about michele bachmann. thanks, jonathan. >> good to see you, ed. earlier tonight we asked in our telephone survey, would you like to see geor