with no disclosure. in fact, more than a third of all ad spending is by anonymous super pacs, accounting for all -- or about $5 million in extra ads, all of which are viciously negative. not to mention, it's all more money than any individual candidate has spent themselves. tonight that effort boils down to an electorate the size of charleston, south carolina. sitting in a room for an hour over coffee and cookies, and this is how we pick a president. we start with nbc news political director and "daily rundown" host, chuck todd, who's on the ground in iowa. >> hi, dylan. the lucky thing for us as political analysts is mitt romney ran four years ago, so we have actual data to compare four years ago to see how he did then, running against a social conservative, and how he might do tonight, where his chief competitor is another social conservative. and of course, iowa's electorate is that way. i just want to take people through, this is what the map

looked like four years ago. the darker red was where mitt romney did well. he did well in places on the iowa coasts, if you will, where there's more moderate republicans on the eastern half of the state. that's dubuque, quad cities, things like that, and the omaha media market, sioux city media market, he did there surprisingly well. but in the center of the stay, in des moines, for instance, he lost it. huckabee did very well in the more rural portions of the state, where there is a lot of social conservatives. and so tonight, what will be interesting is, look at what mitt romney got last time, dylan, 25%. that's what he's polling in the polls today. it's taken him five years to go from 25% to 25%. but is that a winning number tonight? you had four years ago social conservatives sort of coalescing around mike huckabee. that gave him that nine-point victory. will it happen this time? can santorum get that? i think that's the question. where's the rick perry number? where's the michele bachmann number? if they keep fading, as it

appears that they're doing and those numbers go into santorum, that would help. you brought up the ad spending. i do think it's fascinating to note the campaign that has spent the most money is rick perry. he may finish fifth tonight. the campaign that has spent the least amount of money on tv ads is rick santorum, and he may finish first tonight. >> thank you so much, chuck. i do want to bring in politico's chief investigative reporter, ken vogel and neb martell, political reporter for "the washington post." we find ourselves, gentleman, at a point where poverty statistics are at or near records, at least as far as the census is concerned. unemployment levels are at an atrocious level. the capital of the world flows away from america, not to our country. do either of you see anyone in this presidential race that is discussing anything with the fact that money is being taken out of america as opposed to being invested into it.

ken? >> ron paul certainly has more of an isolationist foreign policy and economic policy. so to the extent that that's what we're talking about, we're talking about free trade and, you know, sort of isolationism, more generally. you'll hear a little bit of an economic populist message from ron paul. that's not really very consistent with the gop orthodox. in fact, that's one of the many ways in which he is outside of the gop mainstream, and probably one of the things that will hurt him, if not in iowa, then certainly as we go forward here in the nominating process. >> it's interesting, ned, of all the presidential candidates, when it comes to the dysfunction in our economic system, and when it comes to the perception of america as a global military predator, sort of reigning fire from the sky with american tax dollars, ron paul seems to be the only candidate discussing these things. at the same time, why do you think no other candidate wants to deal with those issues? >> they're complicated. ron paul likes to go into an historical context that dates

back to the creation of the federal tax system, the federal reserve system. he talks about a much less discussed depression, before the great depression, and he offers often to these young crowds, that we see especially in places like ames and iowa city, a message that there's been hard time before in the united states, and he has a method and a model to get us through it. and it's often a level of complexity that you don't see in the other campaigns, which tend to be sort of tonal, and say, end of special interests, get the economy going again, but he has really specific radical ideas. >> it's interesting, though, when you look at the political climate, specific radical ideas don't seem to be the best political fodder out there, have been at a time, ken, of great dissatisfaction. if you look at the statistics, obama does not poll particularly well. none of the republican candidates poll particularly well. everybody likes to talk about the unemployment problem or the poverty problem or the occupation, obviously, and the tea party likes to throw in fire

at the banks and what not. and yet this presidential race, at least at its outset, does not appear to have much of an interest in debating the very things that everybody claim to be upset about. >> yeah, that's right. and that sort of sound bite politics 101. if you're running against an incumbent president in this case, and you think that he has bad numbers, which president obama does, then that's going to be your target. it's going to be president obama, to the extent that you're a front-runner and you feel threatened by some of your rivals. you're going to train your fire on them, as we've seen mitt romney, and more particularly, the super pac supporting him, doing here in iowa in the last several weeks. but i don't think that there's going to be much of an appetite among the campaigns for getting into the nitty-gritty of global economic policy. i should say, having just said ron paul is somebody who has addressed some of these issues, jon huntsman has as well, and certainly he is the background to speak to some of these things internationally, perhaps more than some of the other candidates in the field. >> it's interesting, as you guys

know, i like to focus a lot of my journalistic attention on the flow of money and the roll of money, obviously, in the electoral process. $16 million is a ton of money. we're going to talk about all the things you could do in iowa with $16 million, other than buy campaign ads, like fix bridges or hire teachers, this sort of thing. but i don't want to overly diminish it. picking a president of the united states is a very important thing. it is critical to actually invest resources, whether it's capital resources or human resources, but as a country, we -- really, it's all of our self-interest to make a significant commitment to making these decisions. how do we find ourselves, need, spending this amount of money or seeing this amount of money spent, and yet having such a frivolous conversation? it would seem if you were going to spend the money, we should have a serious conversation. if we're going to have a frivolous conversation, keep your powder dry. >> iowa does offer a level playing field to candidates like

rick santorum who didn't have a chance. that's why these ads at the end, in the des moines market in particular, there were about $3.5 million spent just by those top candidates and top acts. we saw, as you mentioned ron paul and rick perry were the two top candidates in this market to spend about $1.5 billion. and two pacs barraging money, one connected with rick perry, one connected to ron paul. just doing these attack messages that really don't have to do with how voters live their lives, but really trying to position in these last moments and make a final impression before people go to the caucus sites. >> if you were to look at iowa's relevancy, it's obviously not by virtue of being a meaningful statistical sample. it's obviously not by being some broad indication of america, per se. it is -- it would seem relevant, obviously, because it is first, but also because being first

gives iowa the opportunity to really influence future fund-raising. how much does how anybody does tonight influence their ability to raise money going into the next batch of primaries? >> it has a huge influence, dylan. that's really one of the main factors. that's one of the main reasons we see such importance put on iowa. yeah, it's sort of a gauge of social conservatives, evangelical voters, that's important. yeah, it's also a gauge of ground game and how well candidates' campaigns can kind of organize their supporters to get out to vote. but it's also crucially important in terms of fund-raising. that's why when folks say iowa doesn't necessarily pick winners, but it does pick losers, if you finish poorly in iowa and you're already struggling, that's going to really hurt your fund-raising and strain your ability to go on out of iowa. and it's also why these super pacs are going to be so important. say, a candidate like rick perry, if he finishes fourth or even fifth, well, that might really hurt his fund-raising,

but he does have this big money super pac behind him that can at least keep him going for maybe another couple of contests if he chooses to go that route. >> ned, you get the last word, but i want to tie the policy things we see in this country to the primary contest. right now we subsidize putting our breakfast in our gas tank by virtue of ethanol. we have a wide variety of agricultural and corn subsidies, specifically, that a lot of people point to for the relative cheapness of corn syrup in diabetes, in the sugar poisoning of poor people, specifically, in this country. again, some of these things are very well documented, others are speculative. but how determinative is a policy like the ongoing subsidies for corn in this country, to the fact that politicians are forced to pander to iowa specifically if the presidential race? >> yeah, it's not just an economic issue like that. we hear a lot of connection to

social conservatives that they probably won't be uttering or emphasizing the same kind of messages when they go to the coasts or to larger urban areas. you also saw some of these issues get more specific in debates than they ever do in campaign appearances or in ads. and debates have obviously had an enormous impact on the topsy-turvy nature of this primary process. so i think a lot of the money sort of stayed out until the debates sort of shook out a few candidates. and the money actually is most influential in these last days before the vote. >> listen, thank you for the insight and the conversation, guys. ken vogel and ned martell. coming up here on "the d.r. show," the mega panel gets their say on the caucuses. plus, the showdown with iran intensifying. and at the center of it, a u.s. aircraft carrier. and a little later, listen to this book title, "how do you kill 11 million people?"

the author with the answer will join us, and let's just say it does tie into the politics of the day. we know $16 million can buy an election in iowa, but all this hour, i'll also be showing you what else $16 million could buy iowa, including 592 new teachers. you're watching the dylan ratigan show on msnbc. [ male announcer ] wouldn't it be cool if you took the top down on a crossover? if there were buttons for this? wouldn't it be cool if your car could handle the kids... ♪ ...and the nurburgring? or what if you built a car in tennessee that could change the world? yeah, that would be cool. nissan. innovation for today. innovation for tomorrow. innovation for all. ♪ we have to thank you for the advice on phillips' caplets.

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we're back covering the auction in iowa. and the need for an electoral

process that actually measures the true intent of the electorate, instead of getting bought elections where money is spent to annihilate the reputation of a given opponent or gerrymandered districts created by politicians to preserve their jobs, or a slew of bogus debates that ignore the real reasons behind unemployment, poverty, and fundamental extraction of wealth from our country, something we talk about a lot in our new book coming up next week, by the way. tonight, a couple of people, well, a group of people, about the size of charleston, south carolina -- is that where you're from, jimmy, charleston? >> yeah, baby. >> those people will set the tone for the republican field. and karen, susan, and jimmy are here. and susan, you have a very interesting observation, which is the person that has spent the least money in iowa, rick santorum, is the person who is actually now the one surging, which has a rather rich irony. >> and the person who's spent the most is stuck in fourth. and i think five days ago when we -- >> being rick perry. >> being rick perry.

>> and when we looked five days ago and we thought this was kind of a done deal and we were looking at ron paul or romney walking away with it, or maybe even gingrich, that you didn't have to play in iowa anymore. but with santorum doing so well and spending so little money, when you look forward to 2016, people looking at running for office, people will say, i can play in iowa now too. >> so to susan's point, jimmy, is this an indictment of my philosophy, or for that matter, the data from 2008, that suggests that money is determinative when you can see the emergence of somebody like rick santorum, who's not spending money in iowa. >> the postulation that rick santorum is winning in iowa because he spent very little money would despite into that. >> not because he was such a frugal man and didn't spend it -- >> he didn't have it to spend. but here's the problem, rick santorum wouldn't be anywhere

close to where he was if all that romney super pac money didn't beat the living hell out of our very close, personal friend, speaker gingrich. that's where that support came from. the money does actually effect -- rick santorum would have no -- >> i guess the simplicity is -- it's not just about whether -- so the three of us are running in a primary. it's not just a matter of whether susan, jimmy, or dylan spend the most money, it's a fact that money will be used by jimmy and dylan to annihilate each other, and that may benefit susan or whoever else -- go ahead, susan. i can hear you champing at the bit. >> having been involved intimately and having the scars to prove it in make it changes to the primary process the last time around in the democratic primaries, a couple of things i would say. number one, money absolutely matters. it's part of the reason that the democratic party decided to add south carolina and nevada, because the feeling was, you've got to continue to create a pathway for someone like a rick santorum, who doesn't have a lot of money, but spent a lot of

time, and it kills me to say this, but he deserves the credit. i mean, this is a guy who put in the time and went and talked to voters. it will be interesting to see, in the outcome and the analysis of this election, of tonight, whether that's what made a difference. and i agree, certainly, two guys attacking each other, depressing some votes certainly helps santorum, but i also think this idea of going after the electorate, and personally, i think expanding the electorate, which is part of the reason why we wanted to add nevada and south carolina, so it wasn't just iowa who had a say so early in the process. dylan, in the intro, there are over 600,000 registered republican voters in iowa. about 110,000 of them are going to participate. now, that means all that money was concentrated on a small number of people. that means that when we don't vote, we're participating in keeping the power in the hands of a small number of people. >> but here's the kicker. the purpose of winning iowa is to raise money. >> i know! >> really, that's the whole

point. >> so if rick santorum wins, then he can raise a lot more money that he can spend in south carolina. >> rick santorum even if he comes in second or third, he's still going to raise a lot of money. >> the purpose of iowa is to figure out who's going to raise money, but rick santorum's going to get a chance to raise money -- i get it. karen, you get the last word. >> that's the way the rules are working. the delegates are not going to be awarded. if delegates were being awarded, it would have something to do with the actual election and not just raising money. but that's a whole another part of the auction. >> when we're done with this, we're all going to get jobs at sotheby's, i tell you. let's talk about iran for a second, shall we? we've got a fine mess brewing in that part of the world right now, just to catch you up to speed. today crude oil prices rose 4%. there, that little circle is the lovely straits of hormuz, a fine vacation spot in a different millennium. at this moment, it is an

opportunity for saber rattling from our neighbors in the middle east, as they are trying to leverage themselves against ongoing sanctions against iran. at the same time, karen, we're watching an aircraft carrier rotation that has the ambience of an american sending a carrier into the gulf, but the fact of the matter is we always have a carrier in the gulf, but sometimes we swap them out. it's a good opportunity for iran to make it appear that america is sending this area in. at the end of the day, is there anybody that is truly of the belief that iran is prepared to actually shut down those straits? >> you know, i think the problem is, we don't actually know. we know that, i mean, there were reports over the weekend about a new round of unrest within the country's political system, so we know that creates an additional volatility outside of the relationship between the united states and iran. and so whenever there's that kind of volatility, i raise that to say, veteran individuals then

may feel like they have to puff up their chests and show that they're tough and stand up to the americans. i think all of these things are the kinds of things that folks in the state department and others are trying to gather intelligence on, to the try to get a sense of what's really going on in iran and how serious is this threat? and also, what would be the appropriate way to deal with it? i certainly think, though, i think you mentioned this before christmas. you know, it should remind us that our dependence on foreign oil, not a good thing, because here we are, one little country could really screw us. >> well, not only the strait of hormuz, 40% of the world's oil. 40%. four out of every ten -- so we're goofing around here, this is great, i make a little joke about a vacation spot a thousand years ago, all the rest of it. you mess with that, it's an act of war. unequivocally -- this is not a vague issue. i shut down 40% of the world's oil supply, i don't care whether you're iran, whether you're america, whether you're saudi arabia, whether you're russia, if i step in to the western world and shut down 40% of the

world's oil supply, that is an act of war. >> and the question is, so what? what happens next? who's declaring war on who? and what actions are you prepared to take? and i think that's what iran is trying to do. it's trying to pick a fight with us, frankly. i think they would love to get israel to try and take them out and do something. i think thar doing for that fight. but they want to see how far the west is going to go. and frankly, they're also pushing the arab league quite a bit. because they're looking at the relationship with them and syria right now, how far they're ain't to go, and they're testing every boundary. >> and this goes, jimmy, to the talk of iran's generally expanding sphere of influence, the power vacuum in iraq. all these issues, as we're sort of watching iran continue to test its muscle. >> when i was in -- i think i've said this before, i was in israel in april, everyone was running around saying, we have to have conversations with the palestinians. and i'm thinking to myself, no, you really don't need to have conversations with the palestinians, because they don't really have any assets. you might want to have conversations with the iranians,

because they're your biggest threat. and here they are, trying to do this crazy stuff about shutting off 40% of the oil that goes to the world. most of that goes to europe, by the way. >> that's what i was going to say. really do we need to talk to iran? or do we need to talk to our friends in western europe, who are buyers of iranian oil, who are nato allies, who if you really want to have a conversation about dealing with iran -- >> -- libya, frankly. >> right, we invade libya to protect all of this. it's the same we can talk about north and south korea until we're blue in the face, but we need to talk about china and choo china's control of them. and then we're invading libya. just saying. anyway, just ahead, doing democracy better. our specialist who says we've learned a few things since 1776, meaning all the people, and it's high time our political process got a 21st century update after all the two-party political system does date to the butter churn. but first, what else $16 million could buy for the great state of

iowa besides an election, that, by the way, apparently didn't need the money for, rick santorum, 301 firefighters for $16 million in iowa. we're back after this. ♪ we were skipping stones and letting go ♪ [ female announcer ] nature valley granola bars, rich dark chocolate, toasted oats. perfect combinations of nature's delicious ingredients, from nature valley. ♪ nature valley granola bars, nature at its most delicious. how about both? with covergirl lashblast fusion. our biggest brush meets our fiberstretch formula for a blast of volume and length. lashblast fusion. from easy, breezy, beautiful covergirl. but my nose is still runny. [ male announcer ] truth is, dayquil doesn't treat that. really? [ male announcer ] alka-seltzer plus fights your worst cold symptoms, plus it relieves your runny nose. [ deep breath] awesome. [ male announcer ] yes, it is. that's the cold truth! [ male announcer ] yes, it is. at liberty mutual, we know how much you count on your car

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america's broken democracy ushering a wave of social turbulence. think occupation. we actually had one at the rink this afternoon. interesting. our next guest says there's a way to repair it, however, but it can't be done without realigning our interests. nick hanour is the author of "the gardens of democracy: a new american story of citizenship, economy, and the role of government." nick, you sound like a man preaching my kind of gospel. walk me through it. and really one of the cores in "greedy bastard$!" is a documentation of the misaligned interests in major industry and

every, really, major apparatus. walk me through your rationale as to why that is so central to the dysfunction. >> right. so american politics is hostage to a lot of crazy stuff, not least of which is the comic, tragic circus which is the republican primary, that we're seeing unfold. but it's also hostage to a set of old obsolete, and terrible ideas. and what few americans realize is that over the last 30 years, there's been a scientific revolution in the way that we understand the social systems that we inhabit. social systems like our democracy and our economy. and with we know now with scientific precision, that, for instance, the economy isn't a closed linear system, sort of like a machine, but rather it's an open complex adaptive system, like an ecosystem. and here's the point. when you understand something like the economy, as it truly

is, as an ecosystem, you come to very different conclusions about what's important and how you might arrange the pieces in order for it to work best. let me just give you one example. so if you have this sort of 19th century mechanistic view of how the economy works, it is possible to believe that if you pour money into rich people on the form of tax breaks and loopholes, that jobs and prosperity will squirt out the other side of them, sort of like a doughnut machine. and, in fact, there's this very central idea that almost every american has bought, that rich people, in general, and businesspeople in particular, are job creators. but once you understand the economy ecosystemically, you realize that it's characterized by feedback loops that, in fact, jobs are a consequence of a feedback loop between middle class customers and businesses.

look, i'm a businessperson and i've ran a dozen, two dozen different businesses, and i'll tell you, there are two things that businesspeople devote themselves too. the first is trying to create more sales in every possible way. but the second equally important thing is how to contain costs. that is to say, how to not create jobs. and the defining characteristic of a successful business is your ability to create more sales with fewer jobs than your competitor. and in this sense, you know, for capitalists to claim that they are job creators isn't just inaccurate, it's actually disingenuous. it's dishonest. >> karen? >> there's another very important point here, and that is the language and metaphors we use to describe the world. so the language -- when a capitalist like me claims to be a job creator, we're not just describing how the economy works, although that's what it

seems like what we're doing. what we're actually doing is something much more important. we're making a status claim. and by doing so, we're asserting that we deserve special privileges. dylan, this is the only way you can end up in a democracy with a situation in which middle class hers pay a tax rate of 233% more than capitalists like me. this is the only way you can create a culture in which it's okay for capitalists who earn dividend income, capital gains income and carried interest income and are taxed at 15%, but working people are taxed at 35. >> it's good to have a good lie like that going. you can make a lot of money that way, it would seem. >> you can make a lot of money that way. >> yeah. >> you can make a lot of money that way. and what i'm not saying is that capitalists are bad, inherently, or that capitalism is bad. capitalists are an essential part of an economic ecosystem. but while there is great glory,

for instance, thinking about ecosystemically and being a lion, a lion is not one wit more important than the zebra it feeds on, which in turn is not one wit more important than the grass that it feeds on. and what we have done, we have systemically, as you point out every day, what we have done is we have systemically restructured the economy to kill all the zebras and the grass to make a few fat cats fat. >> we put the lions in charge of the jungle, and then we go, hmm, i wonder how come the lions are eating everything. >> right. >> karen, go ahead. >> particularly this idea of thinking of the economy as an ecosystem, i have long thought that we as individuals are the job creators, because we create the need for the products that the companies make. >> right. >> but also this idea that we're clinging to these old ideas. some of the old ideas that i think we're seeing clung to and play itself out in this primary is the realization that our country is changing dramatically from a demographic perspective, in terms of african-americans, latinos, people of color in

general, women are now 51% of the electorate. and i feel like this ecosystem that you're talking about, what we see currently being shown on television doesn't adequately mirror what's really happening in our culture, and instead, you know, you get people like rick santorum saying stupid things like he didn't want to make black people's lives better because, you know, based on welfare, when the reality is more white people are on welfare than black people. so how does race and demographics play into what you're talking about? >> you know, i think that what's super interesting -- what's been super interesting about the project of writing this book is to push yourself to reimagine things in this new way makes it clearer and clearer how these old paradigms and metaphors make reality -- let you see reality in a new way. and old metaphors essentially -- essentially, the evidence that you see bounces off your head. and i think that, you know, guys

like rick santorum and ron paul are rooted in 19th century ideas that essentially make them immune from facts, that make them immune from the evidence around them. you've got a guy like ron paul out there talking about limited government, as if there is one example on earth where that's worked. right? as if there was one libertarian utopia, where nobody paid any taxes, nobody followed any rules, and everybody lived like a king, right? and what's super interesting is that if you are mired in that 19th century world view, it is possible to hold these views and actually think that they make sense. but once you move beyond them, once you start looking at things ecosystemically, all of this collapses. and this is the point of our book and why, you know, i think it's important. >> yeah. listen, i could not agree more. nick, thank you so much for the time today, and thank you two

for sitting here so patiently for that conversation. jimmy, susan, have a good rest of the day. we'll see you later this week. >> welcome back! >> thank you very much. happy to be here. happy year of the dragon, nick. >> thank you very much. >> and karen, happy year of the dragon to you too. next up, what is more dangerous? malevolent politicians or a too-trusting electorate who lets them lead? the author of the thought-provoking new book, "how do you kill 11 million people?" our guest in just a moment. but first as we head to break, something else that $16 million in campaign spending would get you in iowa -- 363 police officers. look! the phillips' lady!

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are sick of it. given a choice, 70% of americans say they cannot wait for this election season to be over. i don't know what the other 30% are lack forward to, maybe collecting some campaign cash. take a look at the enthusiasm between republican and democratic voters, nearly half not interested in casting a ballot for either president obama or any of the gop candidates. it is no wonder that in the past quarter century, at least 100 million eligible voters have stayed home during each federal election. it's something that has our next guest concerned. and he believes that while the american people are asleep at the wheel, politicians are the ones getting the free pass. andy andrews is the author of "how do you kill 11 million peop people: why the truth matters more than you think." a very brutal tight. >> it is. >> this is coming from a man who wrote a book called "greedy bastard$!" so it takes one to know one. what's your point?

>> the point started five years ago when i was looking to create something that would either scare people or make people mad enough to do something. and i thought, can i write something that doesn't say "republican" or "democrat," doesn't say "liberal" or "conservative," yet everyone would agree with. and the idea came while i was working with some world war ii. and i thought, how did they do that? not what weapons did they use or what mind-set does it take, but how do you get 11 million people to load themselves on to boxcars and allow themselves to be killed? and the answer is very simple and it's being used today in deferent forms. the answer is very simple. the answer is, lie to them. so i realized that the one thing that we all agree on, you could walk down the street, dylan, and anybody, do you think it's okay for politicians to lie or should they tell the truth? every single person will say, oh, they should tell the truth, even if they're lying about it. >> but the interesting thing is, we don't -- we obviously have a

system -- forget the politicians right now. we have a system that rewards them for lying! >> it rewards it. >> if you are a good liar, if you are a good manipulator, if you are a good character assassin of others, you can become the president of the united states and in fact, we are selecting for the most manipulative, the most weasely. we are literally running a system that seeks to find the most competent weasel we can find to run the country. >> you're exactly right. and it's said in such a way that even the good guys, whoever they are, know that if i don't tell these people what i want to hear, i'm not going to be elected. and we know we're being lied to, but we will elect them because of their lies. so it's a scary situation, in which the final thing, and this is in the book too, is when you look and you realize, there are 545 people in america who are legally, morally, in every way responsible for every problem this country has right now.

one president, nine supreme court justices, 100 senators, and 435 members of congress. according to our last census, there are 311 million of us. so 311 million of us, 544 -- you would think we could be able to do something, and we can, but not with that statistic you just last quoted, about 100 million people not voting. >> i want to bring in a comment earlier today from tom brokaw, offering his characterization as to why it is the voter an thipas as high as it is and then we'll talk about it. >> i've been all over the country the last couple of years talking to the folks on the main streets of this country. and they've pretty much given up on the idea that main street is going to help them very much. and i think that's reflected in their absence of enthusiasm for these candidates that are promising to change the world for them. >> so how do you tell somebody with my world view that democrats are bought by special

interests, we watch obama give the banks a massive path, extraction continues on that front. republicans are the only thing that makes barack obama look attractive as a political candidate, because they're so darned nuts, you can't even believe that they're serious. how do you -- and there are a lot of folks who are sit wrg i'm sitting, or with a version of that world view, and how do you convince them that they need to, that they have to, that they must overcome that cynicism, they must overcome the frustration and disenchantment that comes with that, even if it's a correct evaluation? how do you get over that hump? sell me. >> i think one way we have to get over the hump is to let people understand that they really can make a difference. see, you know, he is right to a great degree, in that people have decided that they can't change anything. they can't do anything about it. but with 100 million people of voting age not voting in the past 25 years in federal elections, not a single election was won by more than 10 million

votes. every one of them was that close. >> fair enough. but if the election, the districts are gerrymandered, 75% of the districts are controlled by the politicians, like kings over their own fiefdoms. i can't throw anybody out of those. 2010 was the biggest wave election in american history. and more than 75% of the congress people kept their jobs because the districts are gerrymandered. >> right. >> so you're up against a sense that even if i do engage or if i paycheck george bush or if i pick barack obama, and we thought there was a huge difference, they couldn't be more different between these two guys, yet president obama is just as willing and able to perpetuate the banking system that's sucking money out of this country as george bush was. how do you overcome the sense that the game is rigged? >> you could make a great point that -- and a great conclusion, that the only thing we can do is tear down the tinker toys and start over again in some way. >> but we also know that that's not realistic. so somehow, we have to go back

to the very basic, which is what i'm trying to do with my book. i created this book as a weapon that people could use to give to mare mothers and brothers and sisters, this takes 15 minutes to read the entire thing, cheap little book, read it before you go to bed, promise me you'll read it, because the truth stands on its own. it's not owned by my political party, it defines itself. and will define a group or an individual when we determine what that truth is and where we want it to be set into action. >> so your anecdote to the concerns that i would offer up would be that an awakened population would force even the most corruption politician to offer their lives? >> it is the only thing that ever has. it's the only thing that has ever kept -- i mean, and on the opposite point, it's the only thing that has ever led governments to disaster. i mean, because this 11 million,

how do you kill 11 million people, that's referring to the nazi thing that we all know about. but we could have used 61 million. that's the number that the soviet's own record shows that they killed of their own citizens, in that same period of time. there's countries all over the world, and it's still happening. >> i'm going to stop you there. because you're making the most significant point there is to be made. which is, it's easy for somebody like me or a protester of the tea party or a protesters in the occupation so artick late how royally screwed up everything is. >> right. >> it's royally screwed up! what is more significant, however, to understand the stakes if we don't find the compassion to work with each other, however brutal -- this is a brutal -- this is brutality and compassion to work together. because if we do not do this, it was money printing in germany in the 1930s that led to the inflation that led to the rise of hitler that led to all those -- >> exactly right.

>> and now we're in money printing. it was money printing when niro was running rome in 200 that led to all the massacre and murder that really led to that -- do you think teem understand how the high the stakes are? >> i honestly don't believe they do, but i honestly believe they better. we're getting very close -- and history shows, you know, i'm not trying to scare people unnecessarily. but i am saying that this is not any more about a republican or a democrat. this is about the very country -- my parents, dylan, died 30 years ago. and if they came back today, i'm not sure they would recognize this place. and i have little kids. i have a 9-year-old and a 12-year-old, little boys. and you know, i'm an old dad. i'm 52, but i have great hopes and dreams for my children. and i don't want to let certain people control this to the point that those cannot come true. >> and the most important message is, this and problems

like this have been fixed. we have had global debt restructurings. we have had amendments to the constitution, 27 different times. we have freed slaves, freed women, freed youth. so for all the horror, and i'm running out of time, but i want to leave it on the point that this is -- these problems have been fixed before and we can fix them now. >> absolutely. absolutely. >> and i would like to work with you to do that. along with every other person in this country. >> i'm honored to be a part of what you're doing. excited about your book coming out next week. >> yeah, gr"greedy bastard$!" "w to kill 11 million people?" the books of 2012. it's brutal out here! and perhaps the corollary book, "how to save 300 million people" could be your next book. coming up on "hardball," as we close in on the caucuses, chris live in iowa. but first, david goodfriend with the daily rant. and one last thing that $16 million spent to win the auction

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well, with the caucuses beginning in three hours, in this the year of the dragon, david, take it away. >> thank you, dylan. yeah, today is caucus day in iowa. i think allhis iowa press coverage is a big pile of cow pies.

a parade of pygmy republicans scarring around iowa, none of whom can muster more than 30% of republican support? no, iowa is not the story, my friends. which is why this past weekend, i stopped just to the east of iowa in neighboring wisconsin, my home state! caught the last regular season packers game. packers won using their second string quarterback, they not only beat the lions to send the season 15-1, but broke a franchise record for the most touchdown passes and yardage in a single game. once again, america's only fan-owned team in professional sports sets the standard for greatness. but as i sat there in lambeau needle in the snow flurries, drinking beer and singing "roll out the barrel" with my son, it hit me, the circus in iowa better take a good, heart look at wisconsin. let's not forget that wisconsin's republican governor, scott walker, set off some of the largest protests in state history when he jammed through bills written by an out of state conservative group funded by the

koch brothers. the laws to dismantle public unions, roll back voter registration, and gut public education were part of a conservative effort to end wisconsin's progressive tradition, and it's backfiring. in just a few days, we expect to see enough petition signatures to force a recall vote on governor walker. that almost never happens, but people in wisconsin are fuming. you know, while in green bay, i took an informal poll of people tailgating, in line for brats or driving cabs, a remarkably accurate cross section of the state, really, and was amazed to find so many anti-walker cheeseheads. this actually fits with a larger pattern throughout the midwest. people were disillusioned with the president in the 2010 midterms and created a wave of republican victories in the statehouses. then the republicans rammed through a bunch of super conservative legislation. now that people see what the billionaire-funded super conservative republican agenda looks like, they're pushing back.

we saw it in ohio. there the union-busting legislation was reversed in a remarkable statewide referendum. so, enjoy today's circus in iowa, but remember, the real battle in the midwest is not about which republican gets the most tea party votes, and when november comes, it will be up to the middle class and working americans to decide who works in the white house for the next four years. dylan? >> isn't the tragedy of what you're describing, david, the definitive characteristics of a race to the bottom or a lesser of two evils voting? so i feel that whoever the person is, president obama is not addressing the screwed up banking system, screwed up trade agreement, screwed up tax code, screwed up unemployment markets, et cetera, so i go to the other guy, because that's the only other choice i have, the other guy. so i go to the other guy, the other guy's worst than first guy. now, hang on a second, i've got to go back to the first guy, but the first guy is still bought by the banks, still fundamentally not willing to address those

structural issues. it just strikes me that what you're describing -- what you're narrating is the tragedy of a race to the bottom. >> yeah, if you look at other countries who have been in a similar pickle, there's been this back and forth in political power, but i actually have hope, dylan, if we just listen, listen to some of those folks i talked to the lambeau, listen to the middle class, listen to those who are hurting most, we can get something done. i am holding out, but for now the circus in iowa just ain't cutti inting it. >> unthing that's inspiring from my perspective is that there are so many people that agree with what we're talking about, that the emperor's lack of clothing is more observed than it has been in a very long time, but it's unfortunate he looks so ugly naked. that'll do it for us. i am dylan ratigan and "hardball's" up next. i decided enough is enough. ♪ [ spa lady ] i started enbrel. it's clinically proven to provide clearer skin. [ rv guy ] enbrel may not work for everyone -- and may not clear you completely, but for many, it gets skin clearer fast, within 2 months,

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