>> saw him in a speedo? >> yes. david -- >> oh, camp david. >> can we do this all over again? >> sure. this "morning joe" guy was here on the program. how do you get along with him? >> well, the show has been on the air about five years and i think he has let me complete about five sentences. >> well, i'll tell you something, he made me very uncomfortable. >> why? >> well, he's big and loud. >> well, yes. >> yeah. and i felt in danger. >> you did? did you feel threatened? >> threatened ill logically. >> don't worry. >> like if i looked at him cross-eyed, that would be it. >> no, no, no. >> is he a hothead? does he have a hair trigger? >> no. >> has he ever thrown a punch? >> well -- >> have you ever seen him in a speedo? >> that is funny. good morning, everyone.

it's wednesday, may 9. welcome to "morning joe." with us on set, we have the former governor of pennsylvania and nbc political analyst ed rendell. and msnbc analyst and visiting professor at nyu, former democratic senator harold ford jr. >> you were great on david was night. you were very, very good. >> i was nervous. he was very nice. >> i think he liked it. >> i tended to blurt out things. but i was nervous. >> what was it like? >> well, you've done it. i don't remember it. it's nerve-racking. but he's very nice. >> the funniest part, willie geist, was when they got her to spell her last name. >> and she nailed it, to her credit. >> it was fun. >> and dad's name. >> it was actually dad's name,

that's right. so, willie, as you know, you know 3:00, we're working at the orphanage. >> i do. >> and i rush up here, because, you know, you want to help little tad and little kip and all of the other little kids. but i'm running in, and i'm seeing this story out of west virginia that you do on "way too early." >> are you talking about keith judd? >> tell americans just waking up who is keith judd. >> he is on our list of ones to watch. >> oh, come on. >> this young man is serving prison time currently in the state of west virginia. >> why are you talking about keith judd? >> the ponytail. >> he's got the rat tail, he's got it all going on. he won last night in the democratic primary in the state of west virginia. 41% of the vote. now, president obama won -- >> the presidential primary? >> the presidential primary. >> excuse me, he is serving time in texas and won in west

virginia. 59% went to the president of the united states. 49% went to an inmate in texas. >> and he pulled a few counties. >> he did. 10 of the state's 55 counties went to that gentleman, keith judd. >> now, hillary won west virginia -- >> by 41 points. >> after the race was over, by the way. >> after the race was over. so, ed, does barack obama put west virginia in the undecided column? >> i wouldn't spend a lot of time there. but you can't always judge those type of elections. mayor nutter in philadelphia, he's done a good job, very popular. in the primary, he ran against a guy who had just gotten out of federal prison and who owed $500,000 in back taxes. that guy got 26% of the vote. >> how does that happen? >> but the mayor wins big in the general election. >> but west virginia is one of those weird states. west virginia used to be a solid democratic state. it's going more republican. >> we hadn't lost -- until al

gore lost west virginia, we won six straight times in west virginia. >> so a lot of things going on. paul crudeman coming up. we'll get together hits of my greatest hits and all of my compliments of the nobel prize winning journalist. a lot of that. and also of course, boy, this is your neighbor. >> yeah. >> mclean, virginia. we're talking of course about dick luger who lost last night. i guess the problem is, mika, he was your neighbor. since 1976. >> excuse me? >> and not a neighbor of somebody from indiana. >> well, that's the problem, yes. >> living in like a red roof inn or something in indiana. his residence was in indiana but he lived in washington. >> that didn't bother anybody for 36 years. >> it does now. >> all of a sudden, that was a problem for people. >> maybe a tea party angle to

this. >> maybe. but i've got a feeling if someone ran against him six years ago saying he doesn't live, mr. mayor, he doesn't even live in his home state, that's an issue for anyone. >> it was an issue when rick santorum ran for re-election against bob casey. it was a big issue there because rick didn't live -- he rented a house, and yet he got money for his kids to go to a charter school from the pennsylvania school district. >> right. >> so that was a big issue. people take that seriously. >> big problem. >> i think it's more, joe, symptom attic of what's going on. there's two things that happened last night that are bad. one, we lost dick lugar. one of the guys that could put simpson boles together after the election. and two, it will have a chilling effect on anybody out there that tends to be a moderate republican. >> before we go to news, i hear that we have a guest on the news maker line. >> exactly. >> "the morning news" news maker

line. harold ford, lead story in "the new york times" today, boy, the cia. a lot of times when they do great things, you don't hear about it. but the cia, man, they infiltrated al qaeda. the highest reaches of al qaeda. and scored a huge victory over al qaeda in yemen. >> no. it speaks to -- i mean, the political dimension is obvious. the president will have a lot to talk about. >> and we're talking of course about the airline plotter that we heard about yesterday was actually a double death. a plant of ours who got all of this information from al qaeda in yemen as well as this device, this advanced device. >> it makes the point also -- refutes the point that some have said that we've not done a good job of training those who are able to infiltrate overseas because perhaps more people look like you or me or willie. in fact, we've done a much better job than many have thought in training people who

can credibly and convincingly and successfully infiltrate organizations that want to kill us. >> we'll have more on senator lugar coming up. but first -- >> news to a lot of people actually off the campaign trail. mitt romney. who knew? >> i know. now that i know that about him, i might have to change my point of view. >> well, he's from measuichigan. >> i know. >> if there's a candidate that will save detroit, that's who it would be. he stepped forward to explain how he saved the car industry yesterday. >> mitt romney is facing new criticism from democrats over his position on the auto bailout. it follows these comments by the presumptive republican nominee during a campaign stop in cleveland. >> my view was that the auto companies needed to go through bankruptcy before government help. and frankly, that's finally at the president did. he took them through bankruptcy. it was the right course.

i argued it for in the beginning it. it was the uaw and the president that delayed the bankruptcy. finally when the managed bankruptcy was done and help was given, the companies got back on their feet. so i'll take a lot of credit for the fact that this industry has come back. >> there you go. >> romney's position on the auto bailout has been a frequent campaign topic. >> wait a second. that headline doesn't match up with what mitt romney said yesterday. >> no. given his 2008 op-ed in "the new york times" entitled let detroit go bankrupt. >> well, i don't understand. is this what psychiatrists call cognitive dissidence? because that headline just doesn't match up. >> that's the left wing "new york times" headline writers spinning an article. this is such a losing argument for him. i know he was asked the question and he gave his answer. but, boy, he is just getting twisted in knots on this. >> man, you know, he's not nimble on his feet. somebody accuses the president of the united states -- >> in fairness to him, i think he's dead wrong.

but the headline would be great because he doesn't seem to be telling the truth. >> mika has it actually. and she's going to read it now. look at mr. straight man over here. >> i like the facts. i mean -- >> harold wants the facts, mika. you just give us the headline. give us the facts. >> i'll try just to get you to shut your pie hole. >> go ahead. >> if general motors, ford, and chrysler get the bailout that their chief executives asked for yesterday, you can kiss the american automotive industry goodbye. it won't go overnight, but its demise will be virtually guaranteed. the uaw slams mitt romney saying, mitt romney has made a long list of absurd statements but this one might be at the top of that list. this one is hard to believe. the statement is tone deaf and blind to reality.

>> maybe it was a ghost writer, willie. maybe he was going around on his yacht with that sailor's cap. >> the one that jimmy carter chose. >> that they were talking about yesterday on letterman. >> he ought to just change the subject when asked about that. the evidence is out there. >> absolutely. you know, this is a bigger problem, though. i was talking to craig shirley. craig is a conservative guy. i asked craig yesterday. i said -- >> the author. >> the author, yeah. he writes a book every three days. but very conservative guy, like me. and i said, craig, if you are giving a speech and somebody accuses the president of the united states of treason, what do you do? he says i call them out and say let's win on ideas. mitt romney had that chance a couple of days ago and didn't seem to have an answer. it doesn't come to him naturally. >> you know, it's a little bit to al gore, who in 2000 was scared of making a mistake so he couldn't say a thing in public. he couldn't be the al gore who

was smart, resourceful, which he was in private. when we had the press in at our fundraisers, al gore would deliver a speech, and it was as bland and as stolifying as could be. as soon as the press left, he was warm, on, engaging. he wasn't afraid of making a mistake. they have twisted mitt romney up. i know the governor. the governor in person, off the air, he's charming, he's decisive. >> you like him. >> absolutely. and he's smart. >> plays a mean harmonica. >> right. and he's smart. the guy on the campaign trail is nervous, stiff, is humorless. and most importantly, he seems to be dumb. >> he is afraid to make a mistake. >> and you can't -- >> and he's a really bright guy, and a likeable guy in person. >> you know, in politics, you have to have one thing going in and you know this, joe. you can't be afraid to lose. once you're afraid to lose, you're done. >> let's go right now to our news maker line brought to us this morning by oval teen.

is there still ovaltine? if there is, i'm afraid i just ran into a standards issue. if there's not, then it's brought to you by ovaltine. >> joining us, the man who oversaw the auto industry bailout for the obama team, who would know a thing or two about this. steve rattner. good morning. >> there you were in the white house. and i never knew -- you never told us mitt romney was sitting right next to you -- >> at the controls. >> at the controls, whispering in your ear telling you what to do. >> i've been sitting here for the last 10 minutes imagining what joe looks like in a speedo. i haven't been thinking about much else, about autos. >> seriousl come on. get past that image if you will and focus on autos and the auto bailout. what was your reaction when you heard mitt romney saying that he was the credit for the obama policy of bailing out detroit? >> on the one hand, i was dumbfounded because as you have

been saying there's just no argument or support for his position. he has said as recently as february he wrote in the detroit newspaper that the auto industry would have been better off if president obama had never gotten involved in it. and now he's taking credit for what president obama did. it just -- i think i have read every word or heard every word romney has said about autos. and i think the broader point, besides autos, which i'm happy to talk about, is it's just another example of this guy not being able to say the same thing twice. he is just all over the place. >> by the way, steve, you also -- you actually admire mitt romney as a businessman, like ed rendell. you think he has a lot of great qualities. are you surprised by the disconnect between mitt romney the person and mitt romney the politician? saying something here that just seems to completely contradict everything he's ever said before about the bailout. >> i'm surprised because mitt romney had the reputation among

many people i respect as being a very, very capable businessman, a strong leader, saved the olympics, a great ceo. great ceos do not have this muddled message where every day it's a different message, and nothing makes much sense. they have clear consistent messages. and i don't really -- whether it's the reasons ed rendell was saying or not, some of what romney has said that's been the most ridiculous about the bailout, he said in op-ed pieces where he's presumably had time to reflect and say what he really thinks as opposed to off the cuff statements on the campaign speech. so i really can't explain the difference between romney the ceo and romney the candidate because they seem like two different people. >> one time question. the romney campaign will probably come out today trying to justify these statements, explaining the statements. what will you say to the suggestion that what the obama administration ended up doing was creating a sort of managed bankruptcy that allowed the u.s.

government to renegotiate union contracts? >> well, mitt romney was in favor of that too. look, the fundamental -- when you cut through all of his verb yaj, the fundamental difference between what mitt romney was saying and what president obama did is mitt romney said, let the companies go bankrupt, deal with their union contracts on their own. and on the way out somewhere, maybe the government could provide a little financing. that was a fantasy, because there was no financing. in late 2008, early 2009, there was no private financing. that's why the government got involved in the first place. by the way, under president bush, who certainly did not want to put money in the auto companies but felt he had to because otherwise, what would have happened, and this is what romney is in denial about, what would have happened would have been that they would have run out of money, shut their doors, and liquidated and it would have been no auto industry. so the process that president obama followed was the only process that could have worked, which was a managed bankruptcy, with government help from the beginning, and using the

government stick to force major concessions by the uaw, by the bondholders, by all the stakeholders. >> all right, steve. thank you so much. >> thank you, steve. >> for calling in this morning. >> yeah. thanks for the clarification. >> can you hear the rustles in the background? >> was he in the bathtub with money? >> he was in the bathtub wrestling around with money again. >> does he print it? >> some guys, whatever hotel room, they turn on the faucet and it just starts coming out. >> that's weird. >> this is a big problem for romney. >> it is. >> he is now giving the administration and giving the campaign the opening to really point to -- because this will symbolize every floip flop. >> you're right. he's not going to win michigan anyway. >> this hurts him in ohio, iowa, and indiana. >> basic campaign rule, move on. >> move on. up next, the top stories in the politico playbook, including the impact of senator dick

lugar's big loss in indiana last night after 36 years in office. and in a few minutes, "new york times" columnist paul krugman will be here onset. also, lawrence o'donnell. retired colonel jack jacobs. and cy young award winning pitcher john smoltz. >> that's a lineup. a nobel prize winning economist and cy young winner. >> medal of honor winner. and then a really crazy guy from the west coast. >> uh-huh. >> the piercing blue eyes. >> very handsome. >> he is. i love him. but first, let's go to bill karins with a check on the forecast. bill? >> good morning, everyone. it's a little slow weather day out there. not a lot of interesting stuff going on. let's step back and take a look at what's happened so far this year climatewise in the united states. really an unbelievable start to the year. we just got done with the third warmest april ever recorded. this is officially now the warmest start to any year we've ever seen. one piece of good news, we've only had one $1 billion weather

disaster this year, that march tornado outbreak. last year, remember, we had 14 billion dollar weather disasters. as far as looking there, a little bit of good news. storm tracker this morning, it's a rainy morning, i-95 boston to philadelphia. new york city about to get wet and will stay that way pretty much all morning long. pretty gloomy in new england today. but again, just light rain. thunderstorms this afternoon in the southeast. the mid of the country, fantastic today. all the friends on the west coast, no trouble in your weather world. jefferson memorial on this wednesday morning. you're watching "morning joe" brewed by starbucks.

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22 past the hour. time now to take a look at the morning papers. we'll start with "the washington post." the senate race in virginia is deadlocked with six months to go before election today. election day. a new "washington post" poll shows former republican governor george allen tied with former democratic governor tim kaine in what's shaping up to be the most competitive race in the country. the rematch is on for the governor's race. democrats chose milwaukee mayor tom barrett to challenge scott walker in the june 5 recall election. barrett, who lost to walker just 18 months ago, now has 28 days for another shot at walker. from "the new york times" business section, the original motorcycle cop from the village people has won a federal lawsuit allowing him to reclaim the copyright on songs that he wrote decades ago and signed over to record companies. a copyright law from 1978 allows

artists to reclaim their material after 35 years have passed, meaning songwriters like bruce springsteen, billy joel, and other big names from the '70s will soon be eligible to reclaim ownership of their recordings. >> that's big money. big money for names like that. let's go down to politico. j let's talk about what happened in the state of indiana last night. senator lugar losing his republican primary race by 22 points to richard murdock. and i want to read his statement afterward. i think it was fascinating. lugar said, talking of murdock here, his embrace of an unrelenting partisan mindset is irreconcilable in my philosophy of governance and my experience of what brings

>> that's dick lugar after 36 years after he lost the primary. what do you make of that, jim? >> again, dick lugar is not a moderate. he say pretty conservative guy. has been for the bulk of his career. and murdock is very, very conservative. if you are a gop senator, if you're running in the senate now, and you show any hibnts of moderation or cooperation, you're probably toast. i think that's the new reality of politics. and that's different. we saw this in 2010. we have seen it in 2012. we didn't used to see that. the senate used to produce a lot of folks in the middle or a lot of folks like dick lugar who want to compromise. folks like murdock come in, just like johnson did in wisconsin, and they are not here to compromise. they are here to push for a much smaller government. they don't care if they get compromised because they feel like they are there because the tea party, their base, wants a radically different government than the one we have. they are very clear with voters about what they want, and it's much different than dick lugar and creates a much different

institution. congress is going to become more polarized, not less polarized. and given the popular iteratings today, that's probably not great for the institution. >> does murdock have a shot in the general election, but more broadly about changes that could be coming to congress? >> in this race, i think indiana is a tougher race obviously for republicans. dick lugar probably would have won that race easily in a general election. indiana tends to be more republican, but still can be a toss-up state. and given what happened in maine, given what we're seeing happen in massachusetts with the tight race, i think republican prospects for winning back the senate are probably a little more difficult today than they would have been 24 hours ago. as far as the new senate, you should anticipate more gridlock and more partisanship. i think people think, it can't get worse. there can't be more polarization. yes, there can. look at these primaries. we saw it with democrats in the house in pennsylvania where conservative democrats who like

to compromise got ousted themselves. it's happening on both sides. >> also interesting for the presidential election where barack obama won by a sliver in 2008. jim, thanks so much. coming up, josh hamilton goes absolutely nuts in baltimore. hitting four home runs off o's pitching. sports is next. [ man ] i think this is a good time to tell you:

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incredible night for josh hamilton last night. camden yards. josh hamilton, two-run home run to center field. pretty good. hamilton, though, just getting started. two innings later, again deep this time the other way, to left field. another two-run home run. in the seventh, the orioles try a different pitcher. bring in a left toe face hamilton. he leaves it in the zone. zach phillips. that's just a bomb to center field. his third home run of the night. one inning later, hamilton enters the history books. >> you're kidding me. >> his fourth two-run homer of the night. this one off darren o'day. also had a double. he was five for five, four home runs, eight rbis. the 16th player in baseball history with a four home run game. rangers beat the orioles 10-3. the last player to hit four in a

game, carlos delgado, september of '03. hamilton leading the majority with a .406 average. 14 home runs and 36 rbi. >> what say you about this? >> well, he is a remarkable athlete. the problem with josh hamilton is he can't stay healthy for a full year. if he did, he could win the triple crown. he's not only a power hitter, he is a great average hitter too, joe. probably the most talented guy in baseball. but i don't think he's ever played a full season, ever. >> willie, you look at hamilton and the american league. you look at kemp in the national league. leading in just about every category. >> you hate this talk about triple crown this early in the season. but those are the two guys who could pull it off. >> but has hamilton ever played 150 games? >> i have to look it up. he seems to be hurt every year. i'm not sure. by the way, the devils won last night. i'm sorry. >> flyers got upset. >> you could have a rangers-devils final.

still ahead, we'll talk to john smoltz right here on the set. and coming up next, "new york times" columnist nobel prize winner paul krugman. he'll join us for mika's must-read opinion pages. and there's joe klein too. >> what's he doing here? we're not inviting him on. joe, what are you doing? with the spark miles card from capital one, sven's home security gets the most rewards of any small business credit card! how does this thing work? oh, i like it! [ garth ] sven's small business earns double miles on every purchase, every day! woo-hoo!!!

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where their wild ancestor was born. there we discovered that cats, no matter where they are... are born to be cats. and shouldn't your cat be who he was born to be? discover your cat's true nature. purina one. live shot of the white house as the sun comes up. 6:35 in the morning. welcome back to "morning joe." joining us now on the set, this is big, columnist for "the new york times," paul krugman, author of the new book "end this depression now." great to have you here. >> paul got up too early and then stumbled into the wrong studio. >> we're glad to have you here. >> whatever. >> so let's start with the title of the book.

you had to make a decision to call what we're in a depression. you say it's not a great depression, but if you look at the numbers, it's a depression. >> yeah. so my way of putting it is a recession is when things are heading down. when things are done. and although, you know, we have some upticks, some months are better than others issue it's terrible. there's 13 million people out of work in this country. 4 million who have been out of work for more than a year. this is an ongoing depression, just like the 1930s. not as bad as the '30s, but that's not a great slogan. >> put that on the back of your car and see how that works for the campaign. but listen, even in good times, you say you can have four, five million people unemployed. but they are unemployed for a much shorter period of time, and that's a big difference. they bounce from one job to another. >> it's one thing to be out of a job for a few weeks, a few months, whatever. people have resources. we can get through that.

our benefit system is basically designed for people not to be unemployed more than six months. and the whole society is basically built around the notion that if you want to find a job, you can find it. and in not too long. it may not be the best job, but that's not the world we live in now. now we live in a world that you have four million people out of work for more than a year. lots of guys my age, almost 60. lots of guys who cannot find anything -- can't find fulltime employment in many cases. certainly can't find anything that makes use of their skills. this is a disaster, and it's cumulative. the damage grows with each month this goes on. this is not something to sit by and say, hey, you know, it's difficult, it's hard. let's not -- you know, no easy answers. actually, there are easy answers but the main thing is we need answers. >> so your goal in this book to take the focus off of debt and turn the focus toward jobs. and one of the reasons why you cite a study called economics of

happiness. and it struck me because my father was unemployed for a year and a half back in the early 1970s. and you describe how, yes, money is important to people, but money doesn't necessarily determine satisfaction and happiness. but you say take a job away from somebody, and that shatters their being, and has economic repercussions. >> yes. you can measure this stuff, which is, you know, i'm a numbers guy basically. so it turns out that money matters for sure, but not as much as people think. not having a job, when you want to work and you can't find it, is totally destructive. i know people who are again sort of my age, who have in fact got enough savings they can manage, but they are not done with working. and not being able to find that job is killing them. in many cases i think quite literally killing them. this is enormous. the amount of damage we're doing to our society, the amount of damage we're doing to the people, you know, which is what a society is, is huge. and this is solvable. that's the point.

we actually know how to fix this. or we would know if we were willing to pay attention. >> we'll get to the solutions in a minute. but make your pitch on why our government and governments across europe should be focusing more on creating jobs than lowering the debt. >> well, there's actually two things there. one is, you know, the crisis is now. the unemployment crisis is now. we can worry about debt later on. i mean, a lot of us are quoting st. augustine these days. give me an economy that's somewhere closer to full employment and i'll become a deficit hawk, but not now. and the other thing is -- >> and you do by the way talk about long-term ramifications of big debt. >> sure. >> and you do say this is something we need to be concerned about. >> of course. and it's not good. you know, i was actual very much opposed to the bush tax cuts and the unfunded wars because that was building debt at a time when debt was not helpful. but right now is not the time to worry. the other thing, it's almost certain now given the evidence

coming in that trying to cut the deficit right now doesn't even work in purely fiscal terms. you cut spending, that depresses the economy. revenue falls. so a lot of whatever you cut from the top gets lost on the bottom of the budget. and further more, it hurts the economy long run. those workers who are being cut off in the work force will never be employed again. those young people who will never get started in those careers. those are the future taxpayers of america. so what you're going to lose through both immediate revenue loss and through a weaker economy in the long run, means that even the budget is made worse by spending cuts now. this is not the time to do that. >> so you call for a decisive action. what action would that be? and what is a good time to deal with debt and deficit? it seems to me there never really is. >> no, there is. so just the second part of your question first. when the economy, when the private sector is strong enough that it's actually very specific thing. when the private sector is strong enough that the federal reserve starts raising interest rates to head off possible

inflation, that's the point you can make a deal. say you know what? how about you don't raise interest rates and we'll cut the budget instead. then you can do a deal without depressing the economy. so that's a specific criteria, and that would probably happen if the unemployment rate drops into the 6% range. and the private sector will if we give it a chance heal. it's paying down the debts that built up. so that can work. now what to do is actually pretty easy right now. we're depressing this economy by having massive layoffs of government workers, cutbacks in spending at the state and local level, which are destructive and not, you know, the wrong thing to be doing. so now we don't need any sort of grand plan. we just need to have an influx of money from the federal government, which can borrow at very low rates, to the state and local governments to rehire those workers, get the ordinary -- the school teachers, the policemen, the firemen, back to work. that in itself is almost certain enough to get us most of the way back to full employment.

>> and you talk about cane's magneto. >> that's that's right. he said we have magneto trouble. old-fashioned term for an electrical system. it's like having a $30,000 car that isn't running and you say there must be something total wrong with the car. it might just be a dead battery. spend $100 and this thing will be going again. no one will believe that, but that's the kind of crisis we have. these are very small problems that could be fixed very fast. >> paul, the media to a large extent and the politicians are obsessed with the unemployment number. the white house will say, oh, it ticked down to 8.1%. that's progress. mitt romney looks at different metrics. what do you look at as the take away number? what's important to paul krugman inside those numbers? >> i'm mostly looking not at unemployment but employment. unemployment, if someone giving up looking, then they are not in the number and a lot of people have dropped out because the job

prospects are so bad. i look at the fraction of adults that are employed, and because demography moves a bit, i like to look at the employment population ratio for prime age, 25 to 54. gosh, i'm not prime age anymore. but you look at people in that range, and that's not because those are the people who matter but that's a pretty stable number. so that number plunged in the recession. it was flat for a long time. it ticked up a bit in the last six months. now it's flat again. that number tells you we are still very deep in the hole. >> so when the president and the white house says we have added jobs every month for x number of months, do you look at that as something to take -- >> it's better than losing them. but remember we have a growing population. you have to add a certain number of jobs, something like 100,000 a month, just to tread water, just to stay in the same place. so that's not good enough. it's better than hemorrhaging 500,000 or 600,000 a month.

but not what we need. and the basic story, just step back, take off your glasses. the story is that we had a terrifying plunge in the first six months of obama's presidency, which was a continuation of a plunge that began before. and since then we've been basically in a sour plateau, right? and things are bad, they are not getting worse but they are not getting noticeably better. >> do you tweet? >> no. i have a bot that tweets when i put up a blog first. >> that's a good thing. >> but i don't have 140 character thoughts. >> good for you. >> that's gent. good for a lot of reasons actually. go ahead. >> one of the things that's concerned me over not only the past couple of years but for quite some time is what you describe in the book as the liquidity trap. it seems like every time we have a problem, the fed drops rates, and it seems like those rates have been dropped down to 0 for some time to kick start the economy. but we have gotten to the point

now where as you say in this book, 0 is not enough. it's not low enough. >> that's at the heart of this. we have had this kind of -- we were able to be pretty lazy about the business of stabilizing the economy because we could leave it up to the fed because the fed could also cut rates. >> you have a crisis in '99. lower interest rates. you have 2001. september 11. you kick start the economy by lowering the interest rates. but we get to a point now you can't go below 0. >> that's right. it's much harder to make stuff happen. it can't be just a narrow technocratic thing. ben bernanke -- >> who you compare let us say to chauncey gardener. >> he happened to make a speech in which it turned out to be almost verbatim the words of -- >> by the way, that's a reference to being there. if you haven't seen the movie, you need to see the movie. >> as long as the shocks aren't too big, that system works.

but what we got was the mother of all shocks. an enormous housing bubble and buildup of consumer debt. and then when the bubble burst, you're left with a private sector that is just not ready to spend for a while, even as you have a zero interest rate, which is why we need the other stuff. normally you just take two aspirin when the economy is having a hard time, but now we need the prescription antibiotics, which is what i call for in the book. >> how do you spend money wisely? i am a small government conservative. certainly over the arc of time, i'm concerned about long-term debt, medicaid, medicare, defense, et cetera, et cetera. but i always said, i wasn't so concerned about the size of the stimulus package as i was the scatter shot sort of reductionism idea that any dollar spent is a dollar that helps the economy. that's just not true. so where do you put that money? >> first of all, in times like this, it really is true.

not that i advocate spending to just anything. but what got us out of the great depression? it was spending on war. that was destructive spending. we had to do it. but that shows that even spending that doesn't do anything for the productive side of the economy can help you get out of a depression. but, you know, this is much easier now. three years ago, the question was, what are the projects? what do we spend on? we have had three years of savage cutbacks at the state and local level. just hire back those hundreds of thousands of school teachers. hire back the police officers. fix the potholes that have been accumulating certainly in the roads around me because we have been deferring maintenance. >> you're talking about spending $600 billion, sending it back to state and local governments. >> we have made some progress, in spite of everything i have said. we are not in free fall anymore. i think we can get -- not i think. my math says we can get a long ways back to prosperity just by doing that. >> you say europe is in trouble right now because of the framework. you say it's an awkward

combination of unity and disunity. you have germany really running things there, and i would guess that you're not a big fan of angela merkel's austerity plans. >> i understand there's a new verb in german, which means to muddle through without a workable strategy. look, europe went for a single currency. the truth is, if you want to have a single currency, you really want to have a single government. nevada and ireland both had housing bubbles and busts. but nevada medicare, social security are paid for by the federal government. in ireland they are paid for by the irish taxpayer so you have a debt crisis. the europeans -- and their answer has been just austerity. more austerity. the only answer. the debtor countries are sinners and they should pay for their sins. >> one of the things that surprise me if you talk even to labor leaders in great britain, they are not saying cameron is wrong because we want to spend 20% more.

it seems to me that both sides of british politics and even french politics i think we're going to find in the long run, they are still working in the same margins. they both feel they are restricted by the realities of long-term debt. >> but they're wrong actually. certainly in britain they are wrong. the british are basically in the same situation we are. they can borrow cheaply. they have their own currency. you say, back in the '30s did, we have debt levels like this? yes, they did. they had higher ratios then than they do right now. unfortunately labor has been pretty weak on opposing this stuff. the other countries on the euro have a problem. they don't have their own currencies. they are borrowing in somebody else's currency. it's all somebody else's currency. or maybe it's germany's currency, whatever. so there has to be -- either they have to leave the euro or there has to be a europewide solution better to do the europewide solution, better to have a little more inflation, better to have the germans not

be doing austerity. they need to do the opposite. we'll see if anybody is willing to do that. >> we have to go. but the atlantic wire suggests that you and david brooks take it outside. they accuse both of you of engaging in a passive aggressive war between them. willie, there really is nothing earlier. >> things were going so well. >> an editorial writer on editorial writer here. it's sad. >> "the new york times" is so much the dominant place for intelligent discussion in america that of course both sides of any issue is going to be two "new york times" columnists. what else can you do? >> so there's no passive aggressiveness. that's a positive spin. there you go. very chipper. >> it's explicit. >> it is explicit. >> no passivity there. >> paul krugman, what a fantastic conversation. >> thank you. >> we appreciate it. >> definitely don't go on twitter. the book is "end this depression now." you can read an excerpt on our blog, mojo.msnbc.com. up next, willie's "news you

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televise it to the country. that's what you do. a little pickup hockey. he was on the amateurs against the all-stars. broadcast nationally. >> no. >> look who's in the crowd? you'll love this cut away. look. silvio berlusconi in the house. watch the defense. putin gets the puck. >> oh, that is -- >> he's going to walk in and score one. then in overtime, the shootout. this is putin. this is weak sauce by the goaltender. a little backhander. >> no! >> and putin scores the game-winner. >> no way. [ laughter ] >> it's sort of like golf with donald trump. >> oh, my god. he's got an entire country as just like a prop. >> it's north korea. what's the difference? >> what's the difference? [ laughter ] >> can we show again? that break away again? >> what do you think is going through the goalie's mind right

here? >> do i let the puck go through or get a bullet in the side of my head? >> spread the pads and let it through. there you go. congratulations, mr. president. >> oh, my god. >> at least he wore clothes. has he been shirtless yet in public? >> oh, he will be. no question. >> he'll go hunting wolves shirtless today in the arctic. >> yes. siberian tigers running around him. >> of course. look who's here. joe klein, "time" magazine. >> and look who we woke up early. he's got the last word every night. this morning, the first word. >> lawrence o'donnell in a moment. >> he can't be happy. i went to a small high school.

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the auto companies needed to go through bankruptcy before government help. and finally, when that was done, and help was given, the companies got back on their feet. so i'll take a lot of credit for the fact that this industry has come back. >> what? [ laughter ] >> first of all, that was awesome. [ laughter ] >> you can just take credit for [ bleep ]. hey, i remember saying to a friend of mine, i wish toll booths weren't such a pain in the ass. and they slowed down traffic so much. so you know what? easy pass, you're welcome. that was me. a few years ago, mitt shared this touching childhood memory. >> my dad marched with martin luther king.

>> now. while technically it turns out that wasn't true, it feels true. in fact, [ bleep ], as a boy, mitt romney marched with martin luther king. fine. let's do that. as a direct result, the barriers that could have kept a certain young black man out of law school fell away. so without romney's help, america would never have elected its first black president, which means that said president would never have given the order to kill osama bin laden. so who killed osama bin laden? >> i'll take a lot of credit. >> and we thank you. >> this was a tough one. welcome back to "morning joe." harold ford jr. is still with us. joining us on the set political columnist for "time" magazine joe klein. and host of msnbc's "the last word" lawrence o'donnell. where to begin. >> well, it's hard to say,

because i want to hear from these guys on mitt romney. harold ford jr. is just jumping out of his seat to rebutt paul krugman. i don't know where to begin. >> i'd say we start with mitt romney. and then i'd love to get to the reaction to senator dick lugar losing. >> yeah, losing last night. >> big story this morning. >> start with the news. >> ok. mitt romney facing new criticism from democrats over his position on the auto bailout. it follows these comments by the presumptive republican nominee during a campaign stop. >> was that the auto companies needed to go through bankruptcy before government help. and frankly, that's finally what the president did. he finally took them through bankruptcy. that was the right course. i argued for it from the very beginning. it was the uaw and the president that delayed the idea of bankruptcy. i pushed the idea of a managed bankruptcy. and finally when that was done and help was given, the companies got back on their feet.

so i'll take a lot of credit for the fact that this industry has come back. >> yeah. >> so there you go. >> well, his position on the auto bailout has been a frequent campaign topic. given his 2008 op-ed in "the new york times" entitled, let detroit go bankrupt. the former massachusetts governor wrote in part, quote, if general motors, ford, and chrysler get the bailout that their chief executives asked for yesterday, you can kiss the american automotive industry goodbye. it won't go overnight, but its demise will be virtually guarantee. united auto workers president bob king responding. >> he disagreed with it. >> well, he said it won't go overnight. so it could be that we are in the process of kissing it goodbye. >> maybe it was a long-term thing. >> despite the fact they are doing quite well. >> i think this is a moment where jon stewart speaks for america. it's just -- it's comedic at a level that -- i mean, you just kind of throw up your hands.

i think if we're going to take it beyond the comedic, it is now time to bring in a shrink. that's what you need for this question this morning. a homicide detective would be good to talk about what people look like when they're lying and how you kind of read their faces. >> how about it's time for a new campaign staff? >> this guy is -- >> it's really peculiar. >> i think a lot of it has to do -- and we were talking about this yesterday with craig shirley, very conservative guy, like me an author. and i asked craig, how would he respond if he were giving a speech and somebody accused the president of the united states of treason. i would say he's not guilty of treason. he's wrong on every issue, but he's not guilty of treason. and romney didn't do it. and not because romney is a coward, but i think he is so stiff and awkward and tied up in these moments he says things that defy -- >> he is totally freaked out by his own mouth right now. >> yeah. >> he's afraid every time he opens his mouth that something really stupid is coming to come out. and that's no way to go into --

you know, the interesting thing about that auto bailout clip is that it happened in ohio. and president obama has been in the lead in the polls in ohio. why? because of the auto bailout. they are running triple shifts at lordstown where they make the chevy cruz. you know, honda in mariesville is doing well. they have all of these parts companies in ohio that are humming because of the auto bailout. and romney continually or his handlers continually think that we have the institutional memory of fleas. that he can say outrageous things and people will forget that he said them. >> i think the big problem is he's really deeply afraid of you. he's afraid of republican conservatives because he isn't one, ok? so when one of them stands up in a crowd and says, so the president is guilty of treason,

romney isn't even sure what's on the checklist of what they believe so he is afraid of contradicting them, thinking if i contradict a conservative, what does that mean? i better not say anything. >> and what he's saying also is, oh, conservatives must think that the president is guilty of treason. no, i don't think he's guilty of treason. i just think he's wrongheaded on economic positions. two very different things. >> and he misses an opportunity to be a nice guy. he would look like a nice guy if he just said -- >> that's it right there. >> we have been talking about this too, harold ford, this past week, whenn mitt romney will fid something -- no matter what the president does on foreign policy, mitt romney will criticize it whether it's russia or whether it's osama bin laden or whether it's china, the middle of a diplomatic crisis. when i guarantee you ronald reagan, because ronald reagan knew who he was, bill clinton, because bill clinton knew who he says was, they would say that the president got it right this

time. this is a diplomatic crisis, and i think we should just let the president and the administration handle it. you get points from independents from swing voters for looking like an adult. but it's almost like mitt romney since he's not a conservative himself is afraid to not constantly be on the attack. >> it's almost as if he thinks the primary is still underway. message to him and his team, they have won the primary. in the general election, you pivot traditionally back to the middle. or pivot to the middle. for those who believe that mitt romney is a moderate or has been on different sides of the issues, they are probably confused right now because he remains stuck on the far right side. i hope he remains there. perhaps that's who he has actually become. >> this is the broad of the pivot i have ever seen in politics. this is a pivot of a 95-year-old man creeping towards the middle but not being able to make it. >> he can't seem to find his way back to talking about the things that made him successful as the

head of the olympics, as head of a large business in the boston area. if he's not able to do that, this spells i think not only an easy victory but a victory for president obama. >> obviously there is a michigan connection here. but show how easy it is. first of all, you're sitting there and being interviewed. was the auto bailout a good idea? >> if i'm mitt romney? >> yeah, sure. uh-huh. and then i have a follow-up. >> he's written an op-ed saying it was a bad idea. >> so now you're confronted about it. how do you handle it? >> you have to stick with it. you can say i think there are better ways to do it. detroit is doing well now. but if they had followed by advice, it would have happened a lot faster. we would have been able to negotiate with the unions more aggressively and detroit would have been six months ahead. i'm not arguing that. but mika asked me if i'm running what would i say. and this is what irritates me not just about mitt romney but republicans in general this year. there are so many times when there are so many easy answers that will help you with swing

voters. and every time, they swap the easy answers away. there are a thousand different ways to go with that question to say, i'm being consistent. and if they had listened to me, guess what, we not only would have saved detroit but detroit would be thriving in a way it hasn't thrived since 1960s, because i have more faith in the workers of detroit than washington, d.c. let the company run its course. there are a thousand different ways to do it. why aren't they doing it? that remains the question in may. we've got an election six months from now. they better find their sea legs. this guy has been running for five years. >> he could say the government still owns 25% to 30% of general motors. things are going well now. but do we really want to have a country where the government owns the auto companies? >> right. >> or ask the simple question, will we ever get our money back? the taxpayers have made this investment. did we get our money back? i happen to think that the

president did the right thing. but there's a way to answer this question. >> people get confused easily. this is all just for argument's sake. how mitt romney could have done something that didn't make himself look stupid. >> instead of stepping in it. >> do you know what he said specifically yesterday about the automobile industry? he talked about the demise of olds mobile. oldsmobile, which was merged into buick, which was a redundant brand. they were exactly the same car with different words with them. it was merged into buick before barack obama was a united states senator. and romney is talking about the demise of oldsmobile, a word that not many people even remember, as if president obama just killed oldsmobile. >> but romney is against creative destruction, right? >> let me tell you something else. i predict that if the policies of barack obama continue for another four years, we will even see a company like eastern airlines go bankrupt. let's move on now and turn our focus to the other side, and

lawrence o'donnell, please justify what "the new york post" is calling the rainbow deception. it seems to me if you're barack obama, and you believe that gay marriage is a civil right, protected by the united states constitution, then really there's nothing to evolve about. if you don't come out in favor of a civil right, then you're just immoral. >> yes. if you're barack obama. but if you're president obama, if you're politician obama, you think about that a little bit longer. and this is a pure political calculation. >> this is all about north carolina, right? >> when he was running for state senate in illinois, state senate in illinois, he said he was for same-sex marriage, ok? so he used to think this. and he's now evolving again. he is evolving politically and just sitting there making the political calculation. >> wait. >> he's not the only one. >> using his terminology, then he deinvolved? >> that's right. >> and now he is evolving.

i'm confused. >> he's not the only one. 99% of democrats and 99% of liberals at this point in the democratic party have done exactly the same thing, with the death penalty. which is also considered a moral issue. none of them believe in the death penalty. none of them. none of them want to see it used. not one of them will run against it. not one. >> they have done the same thing on gun control. >> mario cuomo was the last person to risk an election over the death penalty. >> you're talking national democrats. because up in connecticut, they actually just banned the death penalty. >> sure. but if you have any national aspirations, you will never, ever take a stand against the death penalty either on policy or morality ever. and that is purely political. >> you're a massachusetts guy. joe klein, you could can back and look at ted kennedy quotes on abortion in 1971, 1972. a year before roe. he sounds like a pretty good practicing catholic. >> he does. >> this has been going on for

some time. >> these are vexing issues. >> what is that? >> look at what the democratic party has done on gun control. >> yeah. >> they have rolled over and died on gun control in the most reprehensible way. >> yeah. they don't have a position they believe in. their position is we're not going to do anything. and that wasn't their position 20 years ago. that wasn't their position 25 years ago. and so we're -- there's a certain focus on this that i think eitherpretends or just doesn't have enough context to understand. the politicians do this all the time. they hold back on private views that they have because they don't think their political calculation is -- they don't think that the voters that they need are ready for that. >> ok. we just previously had paul krugman on the show. very well behaved. >> and lawrence said i agree with everything he says. >> and i cede my time to paul krugm krugman. >> look, i think krugman is a smart guy. >> nobel prize in economics.

>> yeah. >> but here is the question. you can have long-term debt control, short-term stimulus. at the same time, help people who are responsible for creating jobs. have you $2 trillion on the balance sheets of u.s. corporations. at some level for the unemployment number to come down, the money has to come off those sheets and people have to be willing to spend it. but if you and i have a business -- >> hold on a second. >> he takes a very different position. >> specifically talk about -- because when you came on the set, you were bothered that. >> his body of work is broader than the 10-minute interview. >> he is a great interview. i loved it. >> i think you can engage in short-term stimulus, long-term spending control. and you can go about providing a tax reform package that would encourage spending, job creation plan in the private sector. that's where i disagree with mr. krugman. i think he could emphasize that more. no disrespect to my friend

lawrence. but at the end of the day, the country could use a little more certainty in the marketplace. could use a little more certainty in the regulatory environment. and if you ran a big business, you had shareholders you were responsible to, you would answer differently than krugman did. >> canesian economics. he believed when you had good times, you ran balanced budgets. you paid back the debt that you owed. and the democratic party for over 40 years controlled the united states congress, and they never, ever tried to balance the budget in good times. >> hold it. >> and so they gave -- and so they gave -- until clinton. and until actually george h.w. bush. but through from lyndon johnson who really was the original culprit here till george h.w.

bush, no one really was a canesian. they were just spending money. >> but the government hadn't come around for, hey, we better do a cost model for medicare. they tried but it wasn't a serious model the way they do them now. but in 1993, bill clinton did the biggest tax increase in history, as the democrats did. it included medicare cuts in the very same bill. the biggest medicare cuts ever done. >> actually, it wasn't the biggest tax increase in history percentagewise. the biggest tax increase was ronald wilson reagan, 1982. no, not social security. tefra, which mostly raised taxes on, businesses. biggest percentage tax rate increase in history. >> i like to call the clinton -- >> but you all are making my point. if you cut spending you can grow

the economy. >> joe, you want it to be -- >> well, you actually had in five years, i think, three very tough political decisions. you had bill clinton's budget deal in '93. and then in '95, you had republicans cutting. so you actually really cut. >> yes, you did. and then george w. bush happened. >> and by the way, those three tough decisions, which cost george h.w. bush his job, which cost bill clinton the congress, which cost a lot of republicans their jobs in '96, actually led to balanced budgets. for the first time since 1969. and a surplus of $155 billion. and then george w. bush got elected. two wars. two tax cuts. a $7 trillion medicare drug benefit plan. the largest increase in domestic discretionary spending since lbj. the largest increase in defense spending since lbj.

and this is what people need to realize. we just don't look at the big picture. you could go from george washington to the beginning of george w. bush's term, and we added $5 trillion in debt over that entire time period. right? over the nt eight years, we added another $5 trillion under george w. bush. over the past four years under barack obama, we've added $5 trillion more. these numbers don't add up. >> but the depression will do that. >> when you lose $500 billion in tax revenues a year because of a depression, that's what happens. >> how does this relate to krugman? you can engage in long-term spending controls. you can undertake short-term stimulus stimulus and the economy can grow. that's where i disagree with mr. krugman. >> krugman says he is in favor of long-term deficit control.

this is not the time to start cutting spending. so, you know, you could theoretically do some legislation now that involved additional spending for jobs with a longer window on when you would do some -- >> i didn't interpret it that way. >> i think people like krugman have to be deficit hawks in good times. >> and he is a deficit hawk in good times. >> you have to reform the tax code as well. >> we have to go. i've said it before and i'll say it again. hopefully the parties will get to this at some point. if we make the tough decisions in the long run, if we do what we have to do to save medicare, to save social security, save medicaid, to cut national defense, reform the tax system, then the markets will allow us to do a short-term stimulus over the next couple of years. >> not only that. the job market will perform better because the companies will behave differently. all right. joe klein and lawrence o'donnell, stay with us. up next, thas the decline o

america been greatly exaggerated? our next guest, daniel gross will join us on "morning joe." it's very important to understand how math and science kind of makes the world work. in high school, i had a physics teacher by the name of mr. davies. he made physics more than theoretical, he made it real for me. we built a guitar, we did things with electronics and mother boards. that's where the interest in engineering came from. so now, as an engineer, i have a career that speaks to that passion. thank you, mr. davies. but when i was diagnosed with prostate cancer... i needed a coach. our doctor was great, but with so many tough decisions i felt lost. unitedhealthcare offered us a specially trained rn

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our conversation about the economy continues now with economics editor for yahoo fans daniel gross, author of the new book "better, stronger, faster," the myth of american decline and the rise of a new economy. you know, this is a concept we've talked about often. but there are still a lot of people hurting as this transition takes place. is that part of what you put in here? >> no question. we took this very deep question, better, stronger faster, for those old enough to remember is a reference to steve austin, the $6 million man. we can rebuild him. we have the technology. my point is, in 2009, which was like a 1933 moment, everybody

left, right, center, futurist, historian, said we have lost the capacity to get back on our feet. we're finished. we're going to be like japan. but the reality is we had started digging out of that deep hole almost immediately. obviously, the markets have essentially doubled since then. our economy is now larger than it was in 2011 at its peak. and obviously, you know, a huge amount of pain. but we have been digging out pretty good especially compared to the rest of the developing world. >> and you focus on the private sector. paul krugman more on the public sector. the auoughtauto industry is roa back. and american companies more proficient, productive, and debt free. it sounds positive. why does american feel so lousy? >> part of it is companies really haven't been giving it up. so corporate profits were $1.2 trillion. they are now $1.9 trillion in 2011. they have more cash than they

have ever had. that to me does not speak of a nation whose private sector in is decline. there are 3.7 million job openings at the end of march, the highest number we've had since '08. we are now at a stage in the recovery where, you know, a lot of the easy stuff was companies restructuring, cutting costs, getting more efficient. now they have to give it up in the sense of increasing wages and filling positions. >> why, we hear this time and time again, why are american companies hoarding cash? where are they afraid to invest right now? >> that was going to be my question. >> i don't actually have that answer. >> no. we hear that all the time. $2 trillion to $3 trillion on the balance sheets. >> there are two pieces to than. one, a lot of the money is being made overseas. i talk a lot in my book about the reason we are not in decline is because we engage the world. the u.s. exports more than anybody else. >> or we just keep our money elsewhere. >> a lot of the u.s. companies are keeping their money overseas and investing overseas. but we also lead the world in

foreign direct investment. everyone thinks the future is somewhere else. we get the largest share of foreign direct investment, people buying condos, fiat bying chrysler, people building new factories. a lot of foreigners want to be here. krugman talked about the lack of demand. have i been to north dakota and virginia and north carolina talking to business people large and small. i rarely hear people talk about obama care or regulatory uncertainty. people are concerned about whether the demand will be there if they open that new store. will people be there to ring the cash registers? >> and that's what businessmen have been concerned with since the invention of business, is can i actually sell this thing, is the demand out there. >> but there's another piece to this now. business people know in their heart of hearts they don't need as many employees as they used to need. and so while they -- you know, it's a better thing for them to take the profits that they have, rather than risk an expansion, because they don't think that the unemployment rate is going

to come down that much. >> which of course undercuts demand. >> yeah. productivity, which is really what saved corporate america's bacon -- >> atms don't buy houses. >> that's right. >> but would you want your child to work as a bank teller for 20 years? it frees up a large percentage of our labor force. >> i would have no problem with that. >> by the way, much better that than to be chronically unemployed for 12 of those 20 years. >> true. but we are figuring out other things to do. people focus a lot on -- one thing i talk about is our ability to create very large businesses from nothing. google, apple, facebook. combined market value of $800 billion. 10 years ago, combined market value of very close to zero. they employ collectively 100,000 people. which isn't that many. but they have created other industries. think about facebook for all of

the developers. google has changed the way everybody markets. we still create these systems. >> you can say that about gm in 1980 and the systems it created and yet you can add up the number of jobs that you find at apple, at amazon, at google, at yahoo, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, it's not even 1/3 the number of people that worked at gm in 1980. think about the ecosystems there. i guess that's the big challenge, how do we reengage the working class and the middle class in the evermore productive world. >> by the way, you know, when i go out into the country, and talk to small business people, they are very concerned -- >> can i just say you're shameless? >> i know. >> do you want to put up this map? joe klein was complaining -- >> i was going to get to it. >> i was going to make a good point actually. >> this is his tour, the red dots. >> no much, t. >> that is actually -- the reason he is doing this is it's

the 30th anniversary of a grateful dead tour in the midwest that went through there. >> no, no. the point is this. >> the bus tour, right? >> bus tour. >> if people call in and want to set up meetings with their neighbors or their co-workers to talk politics, please email me @joe underscore klein at "time" magazine. >> and my book is available for sale, "better, stronger, faster." >> when i that you can to people out there, especially small businessmen, they are very concerned about overregulation. small businesswomen as well. they are very concerned about the impact of dodd frank on their ability to get loans. and that's the value of these road trips, that i actually talk to people. >> when does it start? >> it starts -- [ laughter ] >> may 31, right? >> it starts may 31. >> and how long is it going.

>> three weeks, thank you. >> do you think you could extend that? >> so what is the take away, though? how do we rebuild the middle class in a country that's evermore productive? >> we've got to invest and engage the world. we are a service economy. but people don't want to spend here. but we have 63 million tourists each year. a record number of foreign students. we have to get more comfortable with dealing with people outside of the country, whether it's exporting, going abroad to work for a bit or letting people come here to shop, spend, visit, get educated, use our system. the book is "better, stronger, faster: the myth of american decline." thank you. >> what's the motto of joe's bus tour? >> and your bus tour again starts the 31st? >> it starts the 31st. if you want to talk politics, get in touch. >> it's too short. >> if i wanted to get in touch,

how would i do that? >> email me at joe underscore klein @timemagazine.com. >> why didn't you say so? >> i just got really tired. up ahead, should college football be banned? >> yes. >> we have a pulitzer prize-winning author here who says that the cost is too high and education ends up paying the price. that's just ahead on "morning joe." ♪ if loving you is wrong ♪ i don't wanna be right [ record scratch ] what?! it's not bad for you. it just tastes that way. [ female announcer ] honey nut cheerios cereal -- heart-healthy, whole grain oats. you can't go wrong loving it.

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[ flo speaking japanese ] [ shouting in japanese ] we work wherever you work. now, that's progressive. call or click today. we've got a big show coming up. look at that green room. >> that's amazing. >> how about a cy young award winner and a medal of honor recipient? >> i think smoltz also won the nobel peace prize. i think they are saying that i won the masters, willie. i've got the green jacket to prove it. >> '86, and you jack. in that famous playoff. >> alex, i should have done this. >> that was wrong. that was his sunday and you ruined it. john smoltz, colonel jack jacobs next on "morning joe." easy label, right?

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welcome back to "morning joe." 40 past the hour. here with us now, msnbc military analyst and author of "basic," colonel jack jacobs. did i get it right? >> you got it right. >> colonel, thank you so much for being with us. you talk about basic training. ed rendell talking about when he went through basic training. how important do you think it was that at one time american males shared this same experience? >> i think it's the most important thing in the world. we as a country don't have very much in common. we don't even all vote. a greater percentage of people in iraq votes -- a place where you can get shot if you vote -- than votes in the united states. we don't even have that in

common. >> what would bringing basic training back, let's say your idea, a three-month or a six-month draft, national service, what would that do for the spirit of america? >> it would give us a common experience. everybody you see, everybody you know would have all been through the same experience, which you don't have now. and i think it's vitally important we have something in common. in addition, it's not that hard to do logistically. it just takes some political will. college starts in january. everybody graduates from college -- or graduates from high school turns 18, goes in for three months and we send you home and that's the end of it. >> and you talk about how it changing their lives. what did tom seaver say about it? >> he said he would not have amounted to anything as a baseball player, let alone a star pitcher, had he not gone through boot camp and became a marine. it totally changed his life. his attitude about everything. he grew up not as a result of getting yelled at or anything like that, but as a result of

having some common experience with a bunch of other people at the same time. >> walk us through, jack, if you would not just the physical aspect of basic but what happens to you mentally from the time you start until the time you get out. >> you start off being some self-centered, self aggrandizing jackass, and you leave a couple of -- really a couple of weeks later, a very short time in the life span of a young person, with an appreciation of what it means to be for something besides yourself, for being part of an organization and from working hard not for yourself, but for somebody else. >> it strips you of your worst character traits. >> it does. and i'm convinced, we were talking earlier -- >> if you look at these pictures of colonel jacobs, it also strips you of your shirt. >> tell us about the pictures. >> that was me last tuesday. >> there the shirt comes off. you and vladimir putin have something to talk about. >> but i'm not a dictator, you see. that's the difference. >> well, you could be, my man.

>> but i was talking with joe klein, who had this -- he said there's nobody better qualified to have a job than somebody who's been in the service not because it's charity but because these people have had authority and responsibility at an early age. somebody who goes through basic training in a couple of weeks is a completely changed person. >> ed, what did it do to you? >> it made me realize for the first time that you're part of something. in those eight weeks, the trainees band together. we band together. all of a sudden, you're helping each other. some guy is falling behind on the mile run, you stay back and encourage him. it builds comradery that we don't have in society today. >> would you like to see it come back? >> i would like to see universal service. >> me too. >> everyone at 18, chooses peace corps or the army. >> i agree. >> everybody serves this country. >> if you're lucky in up to live in a country, you owe it something.

>> i would do more than three months. 18 months, two years. >> is there any downside to that? >> i think people come out the other end are better americans. by the way, it's not all serious stuff like that. in the book are lots of hilarious stories. one sticks immediately in my mind. it was a flight leader in air force boot camp. he said some guys were not shaved, you know. very first day of training. he says everybody get into the head and go shave the hair off your face. i don't want to see any hair. stop that. you're not civilianing anymore. and of course they all came out with all the hair shaved off, including their eyebrows. >> i resolved after basic i would never shine my own shoes again. and even when i was making my first salary was $5,900. i still paid to get my shoes shined. >> really? >> very nice. all right. the book is "basic: surviving

boot camp and basic training." colonel jacobs, thank you so much for everything. >> great to have you here. >> my pleasure. >> one guy out of step and he's in big trouble, no doubt about it. up next, winner of the cy young award john smoltz will join us here on the set. you're watching "morning joe" brewed by starbucks. >> thank you, colonel. civili uncer) most life insurance companies

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welcome back to "morning joe." here with us now, former major league pitcher and eight-time all-star cy young award winner first ballot shoo-in for the hall of fame, john smoltz. he is out with a new book. john, great to see you this morning. >> thanks for having me. >> when you look back on that braves run, i lived in atlanta from '98 to 2004, and by the time i was there, the fans were already jaded. we win every year. 14 division titles in a row. now that you have some perspective on that, can you we reflelkt on how remarkable that was to win every single year for a decade and a half? >> when we started winning, no one could imagine it was going to go that long. i think the one thing people don't understand, we won 14 years in a row. there's about five of those

years we shouldn't have won. when you lop them all together, say why didn't you win more? i was the most spoiled baseball player in the world. to turn it around gives you incredible perspective. >> did you it with one of the four of the five best rotations in history, smoltz, glavine, maddux, steve avery there for a while. >> the best part of it was every one of the guys played golf. there's no way i could have played 21 years of baseball without an outlet of golf because baseball is a long season. pitchers pitch only about 30, 35 times a year. we had a blast. we learned and pushed each other and one day, you know, maybe a reunion in ireland. >> the couple years that avery was at the top of his game and, you know, curveballs would just

fall oft table, glavine, maddux, you, avery, it would be pretty incredible to realize you were part of something that special. >> we wanted it to last forever. ten years is a long time. i don't think it will ever be duplicated ever. they're going to shatter some of those record but not in over ten years. i don't know guys that will stick around that long. >> you mentioned, john, the one world series title, 1995. offer 14 years, some point to that as disappointing. >> there's about a three to five year period that we should have won three. a hit here, pitch here, play here, we went. we lost 17 games by one run in the world series, something like that. when you get that close and you're judged on the end result, '96 was the hard one. we had the yankees down 2-0. that's the gut punch that for me

i can't get over. >> leaves one up in zone -- >> i was flying home to pensacola, florida. i read the paper. i read a column talking about comparing the atlanta braves to the '27 yankees and i read that saying we're going to lose. i said you know what, the curtain just went down. sure enough, we lost four in a row and it was 1991, though. let's talk about 1991 because i don't think any of us had seen a greater world series tactically than that. that's one of them. up know, hate to bring up his name but lonnie smith. sort of lost the ball in center field. that's one that the braves should have won. but tactically that was one of the greatest of all time. >> it was one of the greatest periods we could ever db it certainly ended in an historic game seven between myself and jack morris.

and we fought for the last month of the season for our lives. every game was a playoff game. talk about exhaustion. when you get to that point, it was -- we claim that we won the outdoor world series and -- i don't know if that's going to go -- >> do you remember that one? it was one of the few times where you were following every tactical decision over nine innings. even if you weren't a close followers of the braves. just remarkable pitching, remarkable coaching. >> what you love about that series is two small market teams and everyone thought it was going to be terrible and it turned out to be one of the greatest world series ever. >> other than the fact i passed out screaming at thend. >> i'm trying to think of any pitcher in baseball who were as successful as you were as a starter and as good as a closer as you were. what was the difference? which did you like better? >> well, dennis eckersley made it look the most famous as a

reliever because he went on to be one of the best all-time closer. i wanted to pitch a game, i wanted to pitch it to the end. over 162 games i'd say a closer makes your team a bit better because can you effect it more. but if i had my druthers, i'd be starting. i like my structure, the in between and i like going up against everyone at the end of the season. >> you go from john rocker, veins popping out, a maniac. and you just kind of jog out there coolly. what do you think makes a better closer? >> whatever one has a bad memory. you're going to get interviewed three to five times a year and that's the three it five years you're going to blow a game. some guys make get a sack and mt

a show. i didn't want to draw attention other than i wanted to have the edge when i went out there and use it as long as i could. >> your faith has always been very important to you. 1995 was a great year because the braves finally won the world series but that year was more important to you for another reason. >> it changed my life. i think in life we in athletes always think we're in control. i'm going to do this, i got my life planned. then you come to find out you don't. and the faith i entrusted in '95 to let go of all the junk and all the things bogging me down do not make a perfect road but allowed me to do with what was coming down the road. up until that point i thought hi a boring life. if got really after accepting my personal faith in god. i wand to honor him and everything could i do. sometimes people use a lot of word. i wanted to use action and if words were necessary, be consistent to the message that i believe so dearedly affected me and pass that on and have a

fragrance of there's something different about this guy. we're not perfect but that's the one thing athletes realize, you're not in control. if you can let go a of that and understand life is much bigger than a baseball statistic, i hope to make a difference and share a message that's important because it's not your typical oug autobiography. >> thank you for coming. one final question. what was it like pitching with crazy fans around you in boston? one of the most suffocating experiences in baseball, could that -- >> i loved it as a visitor. i didn't like it as much as a home starter. i talk about it in the place. it was a very unique place to be part of my career after spending 21 years of atlanta. >> phase it would have his career, tiger woods called john smoltz the best pga golfer he'd

ever seen. you may have another career. >> senior pga. >> may be coming. >> john, thanks so much for coming. the book looks great. "starting and closing, perseverance, faith and one more year." >> coming up, 36 years of service in the senate ends for dig lugar, that's coming up next on msnbc. (spoken in mandarin)

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did you get to know jimmy carter? >> i did. i saw him in a speedo. i don't know why i just said that. i'm a little nervous. >> you saw him in a speedo. >> can we do this all offer again? >> you know this morning joe guy was on the program. how do you get along with him? >> well, the show's been on the air about five years and i think he has let me complete about five sentences. >> i'll tell you something, just between you and me and what's

his name, he was here, he made me very uncomfortable. >> why? >> well, he was big and loud -- >> did you feel threatened? >> threatened ideologically. like if i looked at him cross-eyed, that would be it. >> is he a hot head? does he have a hair trigger? did you ever throw a punch? have you ever seen him in a speedo? >> good morning. it's 8:00 on the east coast, 5:00 on the west coast. >> you were great on david last night. you were nervous but you were very, very good. >> i was nervous. he was very nice. and i just tended to blurt out things but that's what happens when you're nervous. >> what was it like for you? >> you've done it.

i can't remember it. i was just watching it there trying to remember what happened. it's nerve-racking but he's very nice. >> i thought that was so funny, when they got her to spell her last name. they nailed it. >> also, this is your naeighbor. >> 1976, we're talking about dick lugar, who lost last night. i guess the problem is, mika, he was neighbor since 1976 and a neighbor from somebody of indiana since 1976. >> that's the problem, the hotel room. >> living in like a red roof inn or something in indiana. his residency was in indiana but he lived in washington. >> that didn't bother anybody for 36 years. >> it does now. >> all of a sudden that's a problem.

>> maybe a tea party angle to this. >> i got a feeling somebody ran against him since years ago saying he doesn't live, mr. mayor, he doesn't even live in his home state. that's an issue for anybody. >> it an issue when rick santorum ran for reelection against bob casey. it was an issue there because rick rented a house and yet he got money for his kids to go to a charter school from the pennsylvania school district. so that was the big issue. people take that seriously. >> big problem. >> i think it's more symptomatic of what's going on. there's two things that happened last night that were bad. harold and i were talking about it. one, we lost dick lugar, one of the guys who could put simpson-bowles together after the election and, two, a moderate republican. >> you hear that we have the guest on the newsmaker line, the morning show newsmaker line.

so harold ford, lead story in the "new york times" today. boy, the cia, a lot of times when they do great things you don't hear about it but the cia, man, they infiltrated al qaeda, the highest reaches of al qaeda and scored a huge victory over al qaeda in yemen. >> it speaks to -- i mean, the politics -- political dimension is obvious. the president will have a lot to talk about. >> we're talking of course about the airline plotter that we heard about yesterday was actually a double agent, a plant of ours who got all of this information from al qaeda and yemen as well as this device, advanced device. >> it makes the point also, refutes the point that some have said that we've not done a good job of training those who were able to infiltrate overseas because a lot of people look like you or me or willie and we've done a much better job of

training people who can credibly and successfully infiltrate organizations that want to kill us. >> let go to the news. big news off the campaign trail yesterday. news to a lot of people off the campaign trail. mitt romney, who knew. >> well, now that i knew that about him, i might have to change my opinion. >> well, he's from michigan. >> the guy from michigan. he stepped forward to explain how he saved the car industry yesterday. >> mitt romney is facing new criticism from democrats over his position on the auto bailout. it follows these comments by the presumptive republican nominee during a campaign stop in cleveland. >> my own view was that the auto companies needed to go through bankruptcy before government help. frankly, that's finally what the president did. he took them through bankruptcy. that was the course i argued for from the beginning.

it was the uaw that delayed the idea of bankruptcy. i pushed the idea of a managed bankruptcy. finally when that was done and help was given, the companies got back on their feet. i'll take a lot of credit for the fact this industry has come back. >> there you go. >> romney's position on the auto bailout has been a frequent issue on the campaign. >> that headline doesn't match up with what mitt romney said yesterday. >> no, given his op-ed in the "new york times" entitled "let detroit go bankrupt." >> is this what psychiatrists call cognitive dissidence? >> i know he was asked a question and he gave an answer but, man, he's just getting twisted in knot ps. >> he's not nimble on his feet. >> in fairness to him, i think he's dead wrong but the

headline -- >> as former massachusetts governor, he wrote in part this -- >> mika has it actually and she's going to read it now. >> all right. so harold wants the facts. come on, you just give us the headline. give us the facts. >> i'll try. shut your pie hole. if general motors, ford and chrysler get the bailout that they asked for yesterday, can you kiss the american automotive industry good-bye. it won't go overnight but the idea -- its demise will be virtually guaranteed. and then mitt romney has made a long list of absurd statements but this one might be at the top of the list but this one is hard to believe. the statement is tone deaf and

bloond to reality. >> maybe to his defense, maybe he was a ghost writer, maybe he was going around with his yacht wearing his sailor's hat. >> he ought to just -- >> this is a bigger problem, though. i was talking to craig shirley. he's a conservative guy. i asked craig yesterday -- >> the author? >> the author, yeah. he writes a book of three days. very conservative guy like me. i said if you're giving a speech and somebody stands up and april cu -- accusies the president of te united states as treason, what do you do? he said i call them out. i call them out. mitt romney is so calculating, it doesn't seem to come naturally. >> in 2004 al gore was so scared ofmaking a mistake so he couldn't say a thing in public.

he couldn't be smart and resourceful, which he was in private. we whether we had the press in at fund-raisers, al gore would deliver a speech and it was as bland as could be. as soon as the press left, he was on, he was warm, he was engaging. he wasn't afraid of making a mistake. they've twisted mitt romney up because i know the governor. the governor in person off of the air, he's charming, decisive and he's smart. >> he play as mean harmonica. >> and he's smart. >> the guy on the campaign trail is nervous, stiff and most importantly, he seems to be dumb. >> and he's a really bright guy and he's a likable guy in person. >> in politics you have to have one thing going, and you know this, joe, you can't be afraid to lose. once you're afraid to lose, you're done. >> let go to our newsmaker line

brought to us this morning by ovaltine. is there still ovaltine? >> joining us now from houst ho texas, steve rattner. >> so there you are in the white house, you never told us mitt romney was sitting right next to you at the controls whispering into your earring te, telling w to do. is that how it went down? >> i don't know. i was just sitting here for the last ten minutes trying to picture what you look like in a speedo. >> well, get past that image. we heard mitt montana say he was the credit for the obama policy bailing out detroit. >> on the one hand i was dumbfounded. as you all have been saying, there's just no argument or

support for his position. he has said everything at every time, as recently as february. he wrote in the detroit newspaper that the auto industry would have been better off if president obama had never gotten involved in it. now he's taking credit for what president obama did. i think i've read every word or heard every word that obama has said about autos. it just another example of this guy not be able to say the same thing twice. he's all over the place. up. >> also admire mitt romney like a business man, look ed rendell. you think he has a lot of great qualities. are you surprised by the disconnect between mitt romney the person and mitt romney the politician? >> i'm surprised because mitt

romney had a reputation among many people i respect as being a very, very capable businessman, saved the olympics, a great ceo. great ceos do not have this muddled message where of day it's a different message and things don't make sense. some of what romney has said that's been the most ridiculous about the bailout he's said in op-ed pieces where he's presumably had time to reflect and say what he really thinks as opposed to off-the-cuff comments on the campaign trail. >> the romney come pain will probably come out today trying to justify these statements, explain these statements. what will up say to the suggestion that what the obama administration is doing was creating a a sort of managed bankruptcy that allowed the u.s. government to renegotiate union

contracts? >> well, mitt romney was in favor of that, too. look, the fundamental -- when you cut through all of his verbiage between what romney is saying and president obama did, mitt romney was saying let them go bankrupt, deal with it on their own and on the way out maybe the government could provide a little financing. that was a fantasy in in late 2008, early 2009, there was no financing. that's why the government got involved in the first place. nd president bush -- what would have happened, this what romney is in denial about, they would have shut their doors,ly which dated a-- liquidated and there would have been no auto

industry. he used the government stick to force major concessions by the uaw, by the bond holders, by all the stake holders. >> all right, steve. thank you so much for calling in this morning. >> my pleasure. >> could you hear the rustling in the background? he was in his bath tub rustling around with money again. >> he takes it wherever he goes? >> some guys, they turn on the faucet and it just starts coming out. >> weird. >> this is a big problem for romney. he's now given the administration and given the campaign the opening to really point to. this will symbolize every flip flop. >> you're right harold. he's not going to win michigan. not at this point. >> basic campaign rule, move on. >> move on. >> coming up, our next guest worked side by side with mitt romney at bain capital and now

he's written about the positive effects of income inequality. in what the "new york times" says might be the most hated book of the year, edward conard joins us next. can't wait to talk to him. >> and what happened on the west coast last night. >> what happened? >> well, we're going to talk about it. >> that's pandering in the worst way. do you have like the weather forecast? if you do, you don't want to hear this because bill just takes a dart and throws it at the map. >> makes stuff up. >> i could send everyone to weather.com and hang up the phone. who knows. let try to give you an overview, save you from having to do that at this moment. we're watching rain up new york city. so far no weather delays. from boston to d.c. we've been

watching the damp conditions. we're just about done in philadelphia and d.c. right now down through alabama, mississippi and georgia, we have light rain coming down. eventually that will work its way up through the mid atlantic and northeast later on tonight. so once again the east coast is the stormy half of the map. beautiful conditions in the middle half of the country. if you're waking up in the west coast, we're looking at another gorgeous day today. mother's day coming up this sunday. the only trouble spots on the gulf coast, alabama, mississippi, we could have rain for your outdoor plans. everywhere else on the east coast, your mom, i think she'll be happy with your present of sunshine. a look at the bay bridge. season fran, a gorgeous shot. people starting their days early why us here on "morning joe." we love gardening...

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that is a really great price. even though santorum's endorsement seemed half hearted, he did pay for this ad himself. >> you just don't have credibility, mitt, when it comes to repealing obamacare. your plan was the basis for oba obamacare. obama has been dead wrong on the issues for years and year and

years. he's the worst republican in the country to put up against president obama. >> rick santorum was just kidding. >> here with us now, former managing director of bain capital, he's out with a new book "why everything you've been told about the economy is wrong," edward conard. completely wrong? >> we saw it in the 1930s, we saw it in japan in the 1990s. we're four and a half years into it now, we could get ten years of slow growth and high unemployment if we don't take steps to improve things. >> you say the system is rigged. completely rigged? rigged against who? >> i didn't say the system was rigged. i thought that was the other side of the argument.

>> well, what is wrong with the system now or not wrong. >> when you say system, i'm not sure what you mean. when you talk about the banking system, losses on subprime crimped the banks with institutions withdrew their money long before they defaulted. the world recognize there's much more risk of damage from defaults than there was prior. they dial back their risk taking to compensate. unless we make structural changes to reduce that risk we'll have a decade of slow growth and high unemployment. >> where do you think the income inequality in this country comes from and how do we solve it? >> i think it's a bit of a red herring. it's something used leading up to the election. where does it come from? it comes from innovation. one more steve jobs are a mill steve jobs are the things we need to grow the economy. if this increases income

inequality in the short run, we have to ask what's more important to us, growth and jobs or income inequality. i say growth and jobs. >> you do believe income inequality exists and is a problem? >> i think it exists. i don't know if it's a problem. i don't know what it says about -- tell me why steve jobs being successful is affecting income -- >> let not talk about steve jobs. you don't worry about the middle class disappearing, creating two classes in the country, the very, very rich and those who used to be the middle class is now frankly in poverty in many cases. >> i don't believe that. i think we can debate the complexities of the numbers. if you step back and look at the bigger picture, the u.s. has grown significantly faster than

europe and japan, we've brought 20 million immigrants into our country, given them education, it's hard to make the case that our success hasn't helped the working poor and the middle class. >> all of that may be true except 10% of americans are on food stamps. you think that's a good situation? >> no, i don't think it's good. >> and poverty is on the rise. >> i don't think that's a good situation. >> you said we're growing. sure, we're growing but we're growing in my judgment in the wrong way. when 10% of americans are on food stamps, when middle-class families who used to think food stamps is only for the poor, that's wrong. >> we had near zero unemployment, we had record levels of workforce participation and we were growing faster than other -- >> what was happening to real

wages? real wages were going down. during this period of growth for the middle class, for the workers wages were going down. >> i don't think that's true. if you look at the data more carefully, you'll see if you made adjustments for demographic shifts in the workforce toward hispanic immigrants, for example, you'd see wages grew 30%. there's a recent cornell study and if you make adjustments in that study for taxes and nontax benefits, it shows the median wage rose about 30%. >> i don't man to argue with you but every statistic i've seen shows that the wages for the working public, for the middle class, have gone down significantly over the ten years. first decade they have gone done. normally they grow. we've got to do something to take care of the people who work in this economy. >> we absolutely do. but i think when you use the ten

years, you're starting at a period when we were at the peak of the internet boom and 2012 what we're at the bottom of the recession. if you step back and look over the long run -- >> what's the solution in the long run? >> we make comparisons to the 1950s all the time. in the 1950s, we were capitalizing on the volume of cars. individuals don't matter as much in that economy as they do in this economy where 13 people can create instagram with $13 million in value. when you look at the growth of europe and japan in comparison -- >> how do we do that and create good jobs for our people? >> we should be careful about not lowering the payoff for successful risk taking in the long run. in the short run, there are many more complex steps we have to take. one example would be paul krugman.

borrow money from the chinese and spend it today to pump up employment today. i would make a proposal slightly different than his, which is we got to insist that the chinese use their debt to buy good in the united states. >> i agree with that. >> i just want to back up because i think there's some fascinating arguments that are laid out in this book, including about the banking system and the fact that the financial crisis is not dude dew e to greedy band they were not trying to sell sketchy products. is that 100% true do you believe sp. >> when we dig to the micro, all kinds of things are true. >> do you think there were microproblems? >> i don't think that's led to the finance crisis. i think people believe defaults on subprime loans crippled the banks but long before homeowners defaulted and the defaults have been much lower lower than we

expected at the time of the crisis, institutional did aal d withdraw the money from the bank. we've seen it twice before, ten years of slow growth if we don't fix that problem. nobody no one is doing anything to fix that problem. >> i'm thinking about the politics of the book. you worked closely with mitt romney at bain problem. here you are coming out publicly doing something just as bad as defending ax murderers, defending the 1%. do you worry about the impact on mitt romney? i'm surprised there aren't ads saying mitt romney's right-hand man is defending the 1%? >> i wouldn't describe myself as mitt's right-hand man. i did work at bain capital and

did work for mitt. i don't speak for bain capital, i doesn't speak for mitt. i speak for what's in this book. >> you have spoken to him? >> i spoke to him brief after the book came out. >> and he told you? >> you're going to be. next ann rand. >> if you read the book, it not all conservative ideology. you argue for a stimulus, a fiscal stimulus. >> the book is a lot more moderate and serious. >> talk about the stimulus. >> let not kid ourselves. taxes are running at 15% of gdp, spending at 25. we are pumping an enormous amount of stimulus into the economy. my proposal is a little different because i don't want to have long-term consequences from running up huge deficits. so i make two recommendations. one is strengthen the government's guarantees of banks that were making impolice it guarantees, we should make them

explicit and start charging the banks. the second is that we got to get the chinese to start spending their savings. and we shouldn't be borrowing their savings and spending it for them. >> the book is "unintended consequences" by edward conard. thank you for being here. >> thank you. >> keep it right here on "morning joe." [ female announcer ] e-trade was founded on the simple belief that bringing you better technology helps make you a better investor. with our revolutionary new e-trade 360 dashboard you see exactly where your money is and what it's doing live. our e-trade pro platform offers powerful functionality that's still so usable you'll actually use it. and our mobile apps are the ultimate in wherever whenever investing.

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you'll find the technology to help you become a better one today is gonna be an important day for us. you ready? we wanna be our brother's keeper. what's number two we wanna do? bring it up to 90 decatherms. how bout ya, joe? let's go ahead and bring it online. attention on site, attention on site. now starting unit nine. some of the world's cleanest gas turbines are now powering some of america's biggest cities. siemens. answers.

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help raise our flag, add your stitch at teamusa.org. welcome back to "morning joe." with us pulitzer prize winning journal journalist buzz and tim green. we're going to have a debate here. buzz says we have to get rid of college football altogether. >> that's a little extreme. >> makes the case we we ought to get rid of it altogether. >> it's a two-pronged attack.

there are seeious medical issues we're just beginning to stand about football in johnson. the concussion issue and they're more dangerous the younger you are. and i think there's the academic issues. i think universities are there for a reason, which is academ s academics. we're 14th in math, 14th in s n science, 14th in reading. it's a global competitive economy. i love football but i don't see what academic purpose it serves on college campuses. >> how does getting rid of college football improve our standing in the world in terms of math and science? >> because i think college is too much about distraction and i think football is the biggest distraction. there was a study done that

surveyed nonathletes. drinking goes up and studying goes down because of the the excitement of a football program. >> you can't blame football for everything, i'll tell you that. i do agree with buzz that our nation is -- there's a decline in our graduation rate of the general population. that's at 56% now, which he said is 14th in the nation -- in the world. football player graduation rates are on an incline. from i played they went from 60% to 70%. maybe football should be mandatory,maybe everybody should play football. >> i want to read an excerpt. buzz provides the thickest layer of distraction in an atmosphere when college universities are all about distractions, nursing an obsession.

cup really lay all this at the feet of football? >> i think can you lay it -- as i say, football is the biggest distraction. can you lay it at the feet of all football? no, you can lay it at the feet of other ancillary activities. the thing about football, it's very, very expensive. some schools make money. 43% of the bcs colleges don't make money. you're talking about 95 kids, not talking about the entire student body. tuitions are going up. of course offerings are being cut. penn state has been through hell in terms of the budget cuts by the governor. as i say, universities are there for academics. they're not there for sports, they're not there for ancillary activities. if we're satisfied to be 14th, if we're satisfied to lag behind china and india in the global

economy, that's fine. >> i come at this from a football player's perspective because i played football. it's not just me and it not a small number. there are 23,000 full scholarship football players in this country every year and the money that they generate not on pays for their own education, and a lot of them be able to ha otherwise but the surplus pays for a lot of the title 9 -- i think that's fabulous. >> what's really the point here? >> i think buzz is right about the problems, identifying the problems but i think he's wrong about the cure. getting rid of football is not going to cure it. it might have a little bit of an effect but we have to restructure from prekindergarten on our education system. >> with that i agree. >> we've got to motivate kids to learn and motivate women to go into science and math.

>> i agree. >> we're fighting this global economy with one hand behind our back because we don't get women in math programs. 2% of women earn math ph.ds. we have to restructure the whole experience. i think getting rid of football wouldn't cure much. i think the biggest problem is the medical part. would you let your kid play -- >> everyone is talking about the damage concussions do. how much damage? there's no study that says this much football creates this much risk. we don't know. alcohol creates bran damage as well. there are all kinds of things that create brain damage. you've got the junior seaus and people on the fringe of the extreme examples. we don't know what other kind of substances they've had throughout their lives or

environmental impacts they've had. you can't just lay everything on the feet of football. when you look at statistics that we do know, which are mortality rates of athletes indirect and direct mortality rates, football is sixth, number six in each category in the ncaa in sport behind sports like hockey and lacrosse and water polo and skiing and gymnastics. so football really -- if we're going to eliminate football, i think we've got to say we're going to eliminate any sport that's a risk. it much more risky to drive a car or ride your bicycle down the street. >> i'm not going to make the suicide link, suicide is very complex in in each of the 44 brains that b.u. has studied, they founded that the brain was ravaged, which would indicate it

leads to early alzheimer's and depression. andre waters, was the first. no one hit harder. i don't know how many countless concussions he's had. they looked at his brain at the age of 43 and it was the shrivelled brain of an old man. >> honestly, i'm hoping there isn't a connection. there are thousands of football players out there. do they have cte or don't they? i hope they don't. you can't say right now definitively it's doing all this tremendous damage. remember ten years ago no one wanted to talk on their cell phone. then they did the study and found out, gosh, there is no connection between cell phone use and brain cancer. so it's -- >> it's clearly a problem that

should be study. >> this athlete at penn, the family wanted his brain studied, it wasn't the concussions, it was the amount of repetitive hits. he had advanced cte. i love football. i love the violence. i'm one of the few people who say that's why i like it. it's not just concussion. it's repetitive hits. it could be as much as 40 gs. >> quickly, do you think duke should get rid of basketball? >> no, duke should get rid of football. >> why isn't basketball a distraction? >> at least in basketball they do well. in football -- >> i'll tell you what, though, buzz and i are in agreement on some things. the state of football is not perfe perfect. we think college athletes should

have a nominal stipend. >> they should be rid of it. a one and done, kentucky wins in the national championship, all five players are leaving. they don't care about education. >> by the way, we won the debate. >> okay, gentlemen. >> i want a rematch. i want a rematch in ann arbor, michigan. >> no way. >> tuscaloosa, ann arbor, austin, forget it! >> we'll be right back. [ horn honks ] hey, it's sandra -- from accounting. peter. i can see that you're busy...

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so they can focus on keeping the world moving. recently, students from 31 countries took part in a science test. the top academic performers surprised some people. so did the country that came in 17th place. let's raise the bar and elevate our academic standards. let's do what's best for our students-by investing in our teachers. let's solve this. hi, i just switched jobs, and i want to roll over my old 401(k) into a fidelity ira. man: okay, no problem.

it's easy to get started; i can help you with the paperwork. um...this green line just appeared on my floor. yeah, that's fidelity helping you reach your financial goals. could you hold on a second? it's your money. roll over your old 401(k) into a fidelity ira and take control of your personal economy. this is going to be helpful. call or come in today. fidelity investments. turn here. welcome back to "morning joe." brian sullivan is life across the river on the cliffs of new jersey. >> look at him.

are you all right, brian. >> yeah, i'm good. i listened to your guys' conversation before the break. >> what do you think? >> listen, i played rugby for ten years. you don't get a nose like this from the grace of god. >> no, no you don't. listen, here's the thing, reduce the helmet, make the pads smaller, make the impacts hurt more when you give them. in rugby we get fewer injuries because we know you don't have anything on so you tackle a certain way, hit a certain way. >> you're right. we have the rugby championships before philadelphia. they tackle with the shoulders. >> you never lead with the head. let me do the business news. down 91 on the dow futures indicating the sixth possible down day for the stock market. not good. a lot of concern about greece. you think we've got problems? i'll make your audience feel

better. greece has 36 political parties. they can't form a coalition government. so they got a lot of problems there, a lot of concern about will they really default? that's been impacting us certainly. european worries. europe as a whole is bigger than the u.s. in terms of gdp. it's hard to believe but it's true. there's also a positive report, a technology company servicing banks came out with a note that they believe that housing prices, not everywhere, but housing prices will rise slightly for the next five years on average. so maybe finally some sort of a housing improvement. remember, mika, don't lead with the head. >> i won't. brian sullivan, thank you. west coast papers next on "morning joe." [ male announcer ] if you have yet to master the quiet sneeze...

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>> you heard it here first, mitt's vice president selection will be rob portman. you heard it here first.

we have a segment called "rob portman: vice president." roll it! >> 54 past the hour. the los angeles times, his illustrations influenced kids born at 1960 died yesterday, maurice sendak. he might best be known for the classic "where the wild things are." >> and working for the saudi government, he helped thwart a bomb that was going to teak down an airliner. he provided key details about a

key u.s. drone on sunday. >> and a man in prison received 41% of the vote in the democratic primary as an opposed to the president. keith judd had more votes than obama in at least ten of the 65 counties. up next, what if anything did we learn today? this is genco services -- mcallen, texas. in here, heavy rental equipment in the middle of nowhere, is always headed somewhere. to give it a sense of direction, at&t created a mobile asset solution to protect and track everything. so every piece of equipment knows where it is, how it's doing or where it goes next. ♪ this is the bell on the cat. [ male announcer ] it's a network of possibilities -- helping you do what you do... even better. ♪

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time to talk about what we learned today. wi willie, what did you learn? >> i learned we will to get rid of college football. >> and i learned i was the only soldier that didn't know how to march. >> i learned that there are no real men left and they could use a little basic training. >> wow. >> i think we need it, guys. >> no offense taken. >> it's "morning joe." stick around now for chuck. >> after almost four decades in the united states senate, dick lugar, richard nixon's favorite mayor, gets