>> we'll look at that as we get there. >> he's changed his position so much, he doesn't know what he's started. >> i think immigration is a really important spot. >> the white house never called us about this. >> so much for a romney/rubio ticket. >> rubio is not getting vetted. >> not being seriously vetted by the campaign. >> they are not asking for his financial records. >> he's been thrown under the bus anyway. >> i know he's going to make a great choice. >> marco rubio missed the window if hhad one. >> the story was entirely false. marco rubio is being thoroughly vetted. >> if this wasn't so real, it'd almost be funny. let's take a look at their value system. >> corporations are people, my friend. >> i like to be able to fire people that provide services to me. >> corporations are people, my friend. >> i like to be able to fire people that provide services to me. >> you think i'm making this up? just listen to romney. >> i'm not here because i'm some

spectacular speaker, y'all know me better than that. >> i give him points for honesty. >> if this wasn't so real, it'd almost be funny. [ laughing ] a new bloomberg news poll, the first poll taken since president obama announced his new policy of stopping deportations of some undocumented people under the age of 30, shows that 64% agree with the president's new policy, 30% disagree with it. and 6% are not sure. among the coveted independent voters, a full 65% of them say they support the president's policy announcement. republican senate leader mitch mcconnell, who has done everything in his power to prevent any positive steps in immigration policy from coming to a vote in the united states senate now has no idea what he thinks about the president's new policy. >> both the presidential candidates, both the incumbent and the challenger, are going to be addressing this issue thursday at an important meeting of hispanic americans.

i think most of my members are interested in learning what governor romney has to say about this issue. >> i think we're going to wait until we hear what governor romney has to say on this issue. he is the leader of our party, from now until november, and we hope beyond. and we're going to wait and see what he has to say about it. >> after mitch mcconnell left that opening, senate democratic leader harry reid quickly found his way to a microphone. >> romney's had four or five days and he was asked four different times on the schieffer program this weekend what he wanted to do, and he wouldn't answer. it's too bad that he's campaigned for a year and a half. he should have some semblance, an idea what -- how he feels about that. >> sean hannity asked romney about it tonight. romney avoided answering the question, of course, but sean hannity is too irreversibly stupid to realize that. >> do you believe it's constitutional and

substantively, where do you come down on the issue? >> well, with regards to the law, does he have the capacity to do what's been proposed or what he's asked the department of homeland security to do, that's something we're going to let the lawyers and i presume it will be challenged in the courts, determine. my own view is we need to have a long-term solution for those that have come here illegally, having been brought by their parents. so through no fault of their own, they're here, they've gone to school here, how do we deal with these folks? what's their long-term course in america? and that requires a long-term solution. he described what he did as a stopgap measure. these kids don't want a stopgap measure. they want some permanence in understanding what their status going to be. my own view is, with regards to illegal immigration, we have to secure the border first, we have to have an unemployment verification system, and number three, we have to give these

kids an understanding of what their long-term future in america will be, and those that serve in the military, for instance, i think should be given a green card with the occasion to stay in this country the rest of their life, if they'd like to. >> yeah, sean hannity is no bob schieffer. >> well, what would you do about it? >> well, as you know, he was president for the last 3 1/2 years and did nothing on immigration. >> would you just repeal it? >> we'll look at that setting as we reach that. >> joining me now, krystal ball, democratic strategist and msnbc contributor, and john heilemann, national affairs editor for "new york" magazine, and an msnbc political analyst. krystal, the republicans, including mr. romney, are tied up in knots by this announcement by president obama, still, days later. >> yeah, absolutely. and the polling you referenced that shows how popular the proposal is, i think, underscores the challenge for them. because the other piece of that

is 56% of republicans say that they do not support, so a majority of republicans say that do not support the proposal. so it's very difficult for the republican candidate for president and the republican party to stake out any sort of position that will be even moderately acceptable to their base and the american people. so that's a problem for them. and you have this beautiful thing of they have no idea what to say, from mitch mcconnell to mitt romney to everyone else. and on the one hand, you've got the republicans talking about process, how we need that long-term solution, you know, is this okay to do, was it constitutional? on the other hand, you have democrats who can tell stories about young people whose lives have been changed by this decision, who were brought to this country, who are aspiring, who are achieving, who are honor students. so that is a political narrative that is a beautiful thing, if you're a democrat. >> john, sean hannity doesn't know this, but mitt romney is a graduate of harvard law school. and when asked, is this constitutional, he had absolutely no idea. couldn't even begin to venture an opinion. when we read your campaign book about this campaign, there will

be a behind the scenes story of how the romney campaign dealt with this thing. what is your guess about what's going on in the romney campaign, the political calculation about the latino vote that's at stake, their formula for getting an electoral college win, the politics of this that krystal just mentioned, within the base of the republican party, and in the mainstream of the republican party. how are they calculating all of those things and how romney handles this? >> uncomfortably, is the answer. >> clearly. >> look, i think that they were enjoying the possibility of right to, as they are trying to throughout this campaign, keeping the focus on president obama and the economy. that is an answer, a macro answer to a lot of problems. if you look at the hispanic communities in important swing states, in florida, in new mexico, in nevada, in colorado, those communities are hurting economically. and in some of those states, are some of the biggest foreclosure states in the country.

and the romney campaign wanted to just talk about how the obama economy is hurting everybody, and it's hurting hispanics particularly. barack obama's primary imperative, they would say, is to fix the economy. secondarily, help with the housing crisis. the obama administration has not done those things, and so, hispanics, you are like everybody else, you are hurt by barack obama's mismanagement of the economy. among the many brilliant political effects of this move on friday, in addition to blunting a lot of attacks that could have been made by republican super pacs on obama on immigration and so forth, it focuses back on what is an issue that hispanics care a about specifically as hispanics? and once you start having that conversation, republicans are in a world of hurt. and they find themselves in the place that krystal was describing, which is there's no good place for romney to go on this. he can't take a position that is both popular with the country, popular with hispanics, and also

popular with his base. there is no good answer. >> well, and frankly, it's not like their strategy prior to this was working out that great with the latino community. i mean, they were -- the president was being supported by somewhere between 60 to 70% of latinos already. but the question for this is, does it inspire more people to go out and vote? does it inspire more people to register? and not just in the latino community, but more broadly. this is an issue that really energizes people like me, the base, as his stance on gay marriage did. >> we saw a polling that very specifically energizes the latino vote in this country. >> absolutely. >> we saw polling indicating that something like 50% are more enthusiastic about supporting president obama. >> and remember, what the obama campaign has been worried about for the last three months is that -- they like, obviously, their huge lead in the hispanic population, the hispanic vote. their concern was that the romney campaign and affiliated super pacs would give up on trying to close the gap and focus on trying to suppress the hispanic vote. try to keep hispanics from coming out. how would they do that? they would run a relentlessly negative campaign against the president, from the left, by saying he deported more hispanics -- more illegal immigrants than any president in history. in the center, on the economy, and from the right on gay marriage. because a lot of hispanics are culturally conservative. they would attack him from every possible angle. and by throwing so much mud and drawing the obama campaign into

a battle of that kind, they hoped they would just turn off a lot of latino voters. so you couldn't close the gap, but you could push down the vote totals. this is the kind of thing that foils that plan. because not only does it take away one of the key arguments they could make against him in a negative campaign, and it also energizes hispanic votes in the way you're saying. >> one thing i will add to that, though, is the piece that is in place, all these states that have passed restrictions on voter i.d. laws, restrictions on day before voting, all designed to also suppress minority turnout. and latino voters as a subgroup have one of lowest levels of voter registration of any subgroup. so that's -- those are things, the voter i.d. requirements in particular, that do have an impact on the latino community. >> what's very clear about this tactically is that it has thrown the pal into the republicans' court. as soon as the president did this, bob schieffer starts asking mitt romney, okay, what do you think about it? he continue to get asked what he

thinks about it, still doesn't know what he thinks about it. mitch mcconnell gets ask what had he thinks about it, and says, i don't know. and this is the guy who's always opposed to anything president obama's in favor of. let's listen to boehner handling the same question. >> i think we all have concerns for those who are caught in this trap, who through no fault of their own are here, but the president's actions are going to make it much more difficult for us to work in a bipartisan way to get to a permanent solution. >> you could just -- just the slowness with which he kind of works his way to that, oh, the president has somehow made this worse. you can just see, he knows he's stuck. >> well, when he started off with the, you know, we all have concern for people who are caught in this trap, i was sort of wondering if he was talking about himself. but, i mean, that's the case. and it's just patently ridiculous, on its face, to think that the president taking action here is what's standing in the way of congress getting

their act together on action on illegal immigration and undocumented workers. i mean, the other thing that's patently ridiculous is their whole commentary, oh, we need a long-term solution. okay, well, what is your long-term solution? is self-deportation all that you have to offer here? because that doesn't make a lot of sense to most people. >> john, you can tell how it's working when you see which side is feeling pressured by the questions. president obama has faced no tough questions about this since the announcement. he had one heckler, made some, you know, rose garden history with having a heckler. that's it. these guys are the ones facing the tough questions. and they make the questions even tougher by not having an answer. >> yes, not having an answer. and as many people have pointed out, as soon as you start saying, the president is playing politics, that usually means you're playing politics well. it means you're winning the argument. they don't have a good answer here. and you know, i often -- it makes me smile to think about the time when the republican

party was run by visionaries, like george w. bush and karl rove, who recognized that the hispanic vote was a really important thing. now the republican party, in the person of its nominee, and of its leadership in congress, has not been able to get to grips with that basic demographic reality. you cannot be a national governing party if you have 30%, 32%, 28% of the hispanic vote. it doesn't work. the math doesn't work. and this may be the thing in the end that is the reason why mitt romney doesn't end up becoming the president of thenitis. >> crystalball and john heilemann, thanks for joining me. the day began with the romney campaign saying that they were not vetting marco rubio as a possible running mate for mitt romney and ended with mitt romney saying that he is vetting marco rubio as a possible running mate. the romney campaign is losing control of the romney vp search. and later, the official chaplain of the colbert report is here to talk about how jealousy is of the nuns on the bus this week. and in the "rewrite" tonight, the latest step to rewriting our marijuana laws, one of the most conservative states has taken a first step towards the complete

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the romney campaign couldn't talk about jobs today, because it got stuck talking about one job, the unenviable job of being romney's running mate romney was forced today to reveal the name of one person he says he is vetting or has to pretend he is vetting for that job. we'll discuss how the romney campaign is now losing control of the vice presidential nomination for its own ticket. that's going to be next. and later in the "rewrite," a new move to decriminalize marijuana for everyone, not just provide medical marijuana, but completely decriminalize marijuana. and the official chaplain of the colbert report will join us later. i'll find out how much steven is paying him and i'll make him an offer he can't refuse. that's coming up. the veep stakes game began today with this report from abc news. "knowledgeable republican

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the veep stakes game began today with this report from abc news. "knowledgeable republican sources tell me that rubio is not being vetted by mitt romney's vice presidential search team. he has not been asked to complete any questionnaires or been asked to turn over any financial documents typically required of potential vice presidential candidates." marco rubio was then immediately asked about the story in an interview with fox news. >> i'm not commenting on the vice presidential process. and that's been, basically, what we've said the whole time.

because out of respect for governor romney. i think everybody should just take a deep breath. governor romney's going to make a great choice. >> but rubio's allies were more than willing to talk about it. former governor jeb bush's adviser, ana navarro told buzz feed, "whether it's true or false, who knows, but it sure is dumb. it's going to take them off their messaging for the day/bus tour and they're going to have to do some damage control. they unnecessarily dissed a very popular figure of the conservative base and the most prominent hispanic republican." and damage control is exactly what mitt romney tried to do exactly 11 hours after the abc story broke. >> i can't imagine who such people are, but i can tell you this, they know nothing about the vice presidential selection or evaluation process. there are only two people in this country who know who are being vetted and who are not. and that's beth myers and myself. and i know beth well. she doesn't talk to anybody. the story was entirely false. marco rubio is being thoroughly

vetted as part of our process. >> in an interview with john hannity, when asked what he was looking for in a vice presidential candidate, romney immediately ruled out sean hannity. >> the most important factor is whether this is a person who could lead the country whether that were necessary. >> a romney adviser who works directly on the campaign tells the "washington post," "romney officials conducted a preliminary review of rubio, mostly using documents, statements, and news reports that are publicly available. the team did similar public vetting of a large number of other candidates. other vice presidential possibilities including senator rob portman of ohio, former minnesota governor tim pawlenty are undergoing a more intensive review, according to two republicans close to the campaign." joining me now is manuel franzia, writer for "the washington post," and author of the new book, "the rise of marco rubio," and jonathan capehart, msnbc analyst and "washington post" opinion writer. manuel, it sounds like the romney campaign began the day

just trying to get the word out there. no, rubio isn't going to be rubio, and then romney has to go out and say it is going to be rubio. obviously because of what navarro was saying about, this is a huge dis against the most important national political figure in the republican party who's hispanic. >> what we saw today in twelve rather strange hours is marco rubio's appeal and the great danger of marco rubio. it's that wherever his name comes up, people get pretty worked up and pretty excited. and what were people talking about today? not romney's economic plans, not the complaints that they have about obama, which they really want to focus voters on, they were talking about whether he was vetting a potential vice presidential candidate, something that is, in the scheme of things, not that important. >> jonathan capehart, the romney campaign lost control of this today. the romney position being only mitt romney and one other person knows who he's vetting. and then by the end of the day, mitt romney has to reveal, or

pretend, at least, that he is vetting marco rubio. this is getting to be an out of control process for them. >> well, for the beginning, it is. and as manuel said and as phil, i think it was phil in his story talking about, you have this lightning rod, for better or for worse, for the republican party and for mitt romney in particular, who people -- marco rubio has been talked about for months now. ever since he got into the senate as a possible vp nominee. that anyone, no matter who the nominee would have been, marco rubio was supposed to be at the top of their list. and for all of those characteristics that manuel laid out, i mean, that's the reason why. and the idea that he's not being thoroughly vetted and the idea that mitt romney says that only he and his vp selection chair are the only two people who know, but you've got unnamed sources at two news organizations talking about what exactly is happening. yes, lawrence, it does show that he is -- he, meaning mitt romney, has lost control of his vp selection process, for the

time being. it's still just june. >> and let's get somethinging straight. mitt romney's lying when he says that only he and one other person knows who's being vetted. the accountants for everyone being vetted knows, they're handing over tax returns, there's 100 people who know names who are being vetted right now. and manuel, the romney campaign staffers who are leaking today, first leaking to abc news and then leaking later in the day, later in the day, they were saying, look, the only thing that's going on with rubio is a routine thing that, you know, interns can do, of checking public records and looking on wikipedia. with pawlenty, we're really doing a serious vetting search. they were saying -- they were trying to say, look, there are some people who are doing the real vetting on rubio is still not one of them. >> well, a rubio vet would be a long and an intensive process. and it would be a matter of weighing some very strong pluses that he has, great speaker, i talked to a lot of people in florida who are just blown away every time that he gets in front

of a microphone or every time that he shakes somebody's hands. they have to weigh that against a lot of other things that i encountered in my research. >> well, listen, the rubio vet begins with reading the rise of marco rubio, okay? everybody down there in romney headquarters up in boston who's pretending to vet him, you better at least have this book. if i read this book, "vetting marco rubio," what is the worst thing i find out in terms of vice presidential qualified. >> well, it depends on who you are. if you're somebody who's looking at -- >> well, i just mean from political liability. i'm not saying there's a scandal in there, or maybe there is, but from a political liability standpoint, when you're thinking about what you're rolling out here, in a vice presidential candidacy, what are the cons that i put on my pro/con list. what are the cons from this book? >> well, the first ad that you're going to see is about his credit card spending when he was in florida and when he was speaker of the house. >> oh, boy. i don't like that.

okay. >> they gave him a credit card -- >> whoops. >> and he used that credit card for some stuff like buying wine at a wine shop near his house, getting an expensive haircut, which reminded some people of john edwards. >> it doesn't look like an expensive haircut, his haircut, i've got to say. >> a lot of people like his hair. >> yeah. >> so, you know, he is going to say that those were inadvertent personal expenses that when they were brought to his attention, he repaid. but there were a series of these sorts of expenses. and then there are the two big ones related to his family history. one is that he had been saying for a long time that his family came over in 1959 from cuba. they were pushed off the island by castro. i found documents that clearly show that they came in 1956, before castro invaded, 2 1/2 years before castro took over the island. and then there is the other one that has gotten less attention, but given what's happened recently, is really interesting to put in context. and that is that his grandfather, pedro victor

garcia, was ordered deported from the united states of america. he came from cuba in 1962, stopped at the airport, judicial proceedings were held. he was ordered deported and he did not return to cuba as he was supposed to. with the obama administration changing the way that deportations are handled in the united states, and with marco rubio being one of the leading hispanic voices in the united states, you put those two things together and it means that people are going to be asking marco, senator rubio, i should say, about this grandfather and what happened with him. >> jonathan capehart, quickly, before i go, the reason i asked for the negatives, that's what knocks you out of contention. everybody knows what the basic political positives are. and with these kinds of negatives, the thing that they have to follow up with is, how well does marco rubio handle questions about these? because he might be able to handle questions about these things successfully. what is your guess of how the romney campaign would bet on marco rubio's ability at this

stage in his public career to handle high-pressure questions about these things? >> i bet they think that he can't handle high-stakes questions like that. he's just 41 years old, and that's not a determination of how well you are able to answer questions, but when you're the republican nominee, coming after the debacle of the mccain/palin vetting process, you don't want to leave anything to chance. you don't want to take any risks whatsoever. and that's why you hear names like governor tim pawlenty, senator john thune, senator rob portman as potential running mates for mitt romney, because these are all folks who have been in the public eye for a very long time and have been vetted in some way. >> manuel roig-franzia and jonathan capehart, thank you both very much for joining me tonight. >> good to be with you. coming up, the nuns on the bus tour went to paul ryan's congressional district today. the catholic priest who is the official chaplain of "the colbert report" will join me to tell me what jesus would think

of the nuns on a bus. and in the "rewrite" tonight, a saner step towards drug laws in this country. one political party wants to completely decriminalize marijuana. make marijuana possession for anyone completely legal. that's coming up. republican congressman paul ryan is both a catholic and a staunch believer in the economic philosophy of atheist ian rand. we'll ask the catholic chaplain of "the colbert report" what he thinks of paul ryan's economic philosophy. and in tonight's "rewrite," a new step toward the decriminalization of marijuana. that's coming up. in the spotlight tonight, the story of barack obama. the first public political speech of his life came on a and in the "rewrite"

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republican congressman paul ryan is both a catholic and a staunch believer in the economic philosophy of atheist ian rand. we'll ask the catholic chaplain of "the colbert report" what he thinks of paul ryan's economic philosophy. and in tonight's "rewrite," a new step toward the

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in the spotlight tonight, the story of barack obama. the first public political speech of his life came on a wednesday afternoon, february 18th, 1981. it was a sun-splashed day in southern california. the microphone was too low for him. he had to hunch over to project his voice. but once he started speaking, he built a cadence. "there's a struggle going on, i say, there's a struggle going on. it's happening an ocean away, but it's a struggle that touches each and every one of us, whether we know it or not. a struggle that demands we choose sides. it's a choice between dignity and servitude, between fairness and injustice." and he started to feel that magical surge of energy and power that comes when a speaker has an audience wrapped and buying in. an observer said, "it was startling good, it was much more than we expected. it was genuine, it was very passionate, very heartfelt. it was not dramatic. it was just calm but passionate.

even days afterwards, people were just saying how impressed they were with his speech." all of that is from page 378 of "barack obama: the story," a new book by david maraniss, associate editor of "the washington post," who joins me now. david, that scene of his very first time in front of a microphone, with a crowd, saying something political. it was a protest about investment in south africa, and it really was that moment where you could see something magic happen. >> he felt that spark for the first time. but there are two other interesting aspects to that speech. one is that he was not supposed to be serious. it was a pantomine, where he was hauled off the stage by two other students playing cops who were going to shut him up. the point was you couldn't

express yourself on that campus. the second interesting aspect was after the speech, everybody was praising him, and barry obama, as he was called then was saying, well, we can't really change anything, so he had a certain sort of skeptical observer, which is part of him as well, observation about that whole process. but, yes, you're right, that he started to feel it right then. >> i feel like i'm reading about a realist. i feel like i'm reading about someone who has ideals, who has watched idealists in the past, like martin luther king -- >> and his own mother. >> and his own mother, stake their claims on history going forward. but has the advantage of looking at that history and making calculations about where realism lies? >> i think that that's part of the process with obama. his mother was an idealist. his grandmother was a pragmatist. so he had both of those elements to him from the beginning.

but, also, as he started to understand power, he became even more pragmatic. when he was a community organizer in chicago, he saw the limits of what he could do as an organizer and started to understand for the first time how to really exert power and that he had to go into politics. so my bookends right when he's driving up to harvard, realizing what he has to do to get where he is today. >> this is the early life. this takes us up to harvard law school. and one of the things that is fascinating about it, i think, for a lot of readers is you're watching this character who has some very exotic and, one would think, possibly conflicting background elements. >> oh, absolutely. >> we can understand that. beginning with being biracial, we obviously see that. but it's not unusual in the american experience, for a person to have more than one current in them. i think there was a wonderful moment -- >> that is america.

>> yeah, in the jfk inauguration, after the fact, robert frost, who was the poet who delivered his -- he also spoke at the inauguration. he said something to kennedy that right after the inauguration that has struck me when i first heard it, when i was in college. he said to him, "be more irish than harvard." and that spoke a lot to me, being from boston, being irish and harvard. harvard was, in frost's view, this old wasp institution. and kennedy, who people think of as aristocratic, frost knew he wasn't, because he's boston irish, he comes from something else. and he knew there were two different currents, he said, use that irish side of you, use that common touch side of you. you don't need to use the harvard side of you in where you're going. and it seems that obama has many -- more than just those two sides. >> he has all of the elements. there's a letter he wrote as a young man where he's describing

that all of his friends are going into little niches. and he said, for me to exist, i have to try to embrace it all. that's why he wants to be great and has the potential to be, but it also creates problems for him at various times. >> and this is the story of a young man figuring himself out. >> very much so. >> and as i say, he obviously has these famously complex components, but i'm reading about this guy in his mid-20s, you know, figuring himself out and saying, well, that's what i was doing in my mid-20s. i mean, i had to learn to speak american, i had to learn how to drop the boston accent when necessary, in order to be understood outside of my zip code, so he has just a really heightened version of something that a lot of people go through in their 20s. >> everybody has certain dysfunctions in their family backgrounds, probably. everybody has to work themselves

out. he had more of that than most people. and the interesting thing is that he worked at it so hard. i compare him with bill clinton, who i also wrote a book about, and clinton, essentially, they both came out of dysfunction. bill clinton advanced by just plowing forward. not really dealing with the contradictions in his own life. and he became such a preternatural survivor that it got him to the white house, got him in trouble in the white house, got him out of trouble in the white house. with barack obama, you see ten years of his life, really the last third of my book, from the time he got to college from going to harvard, really introspectively trying to resolve all of the contradictions within him. racially, the family, all of that. and he does a pretty good job at it. he becomes a very integrated character in the largest sense of that term. that's what helped propel him to the white house. and he gets there into the

miasma of the political system today, and some of that stuff doesn't work anymore. not in the same way. >> here's what i want to do another ten minutes on, which we don't have the time for, which is this notion of dysfunction, which i think is really just complication. i mean, i think every family -- there is no simple family. there is no family where, oh, look, that was the perfect family. he had a flawless upbringing -- >> that's a fallacy. >> i think it's complication and challenge and everyone has different sets of them and seemingly, easy life, rich kids have a whole different set of challenges and complications. it is a fantastic book. it is that section of president obama's life that is, i think, most fascinating, because it isn't public record. david maraniss, thank you very, very much for joining us tonight. >> thank you, lawrence. coming up, paul ryan's budget drastically cuts aid to the poor while preserving tax cuts for the wealthy. tonight, a tour bus filled with nuns has arrived in ryan's home state in his congressional district to maybe teach him something about what they think are the errors of his ways. and a step toward the decriminalization of marijuana is next in the "rewrite." which is actually quite fitting because geico has been serving the military for over 75 years. aawh no, look, i know this is about the troops and not about me. right, but i don't look like that. who can i write a letter to about this?

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or double miles on every purchase, every day! what's in your wallet? into paul ryan's congressional district today. the catholic chaplain of the colbert report will join us to tell us just how jealous he is of the nuns. [ captai another important step toward . [ crowd chatters and groans ]

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recent polls show over 50% of americans believe marijuana should be decriminalized. while arrests for marijuana since 1965 have been over 20 million citizens, marijuana is more prevalent than ever before. there is no evidence that marijuana is a gateway drug leading to the use of more lethal drugs. 75% of citizens arrested for marijuana are under 30. minorities account for a majority of those arrested for marijuana. criminal conviction permanently scars a young citizen for life. those are not my words. not one word i've said is one of my words. every single word you just heard, every one of them, is in the platform of a state democratic party. a few years before he became a presidential candidate, barack obama called the war on drugs, quote, an utter failure. and earlier this year, president obama called the debate on decriminalizing marijuana, quote, entirely legitimate, end quote. in the meantime, however, medical marijuana is currently

legal in 17 states, and the district of columbia. california was the first to legalize medical marijuana by popular vote when proposition 215 passed on november 5th, 1996. connecticut is the most recent state where legalization will take effect in october. laws to legalize medical marijuana are being considered in seven other states, either through state legislature votes or public referendum. in illinois, massachusetts, missouri, new york, new hampshire, ohio, and pennsylvania. but the state where democrats want to go beyond allowing medical marijuana and go to full decriminalization of marijuana for everyone is one of the most conservative states in the union. in their state party platform, they write, "texas democrats urge the president, the attorney general, and the congress to support the passage of legalization to decriminalize the possession of marijuana and regulate its use, production, and sale as is done with tobacco

and alcohol." now, we all know that texas democrats don't often get their way in texas, but it is not exactly a fringe party in texas. it is not the green party or the libertarian party. the democratic party in texas controls 48 state representative seats, 12 state senate seats, and 9 seats in the united states house of representatives. every important movement requires a first step. and now the texas democratic party has taken its first step toward fairness and justice in our drug laws. don't tell me what you value, show me your budget. and i'll tell you what you value. well, romney, ryan, and the new republican party in congress, they have shown us their budget, and it's clear they don't value you very much. >> the nuns on the bus agree with what vice president joe biden had to say today in los angeles. the nuns took their bus to congressman paul ryan's office in his congressional district in janesville, wisconsin, today,

led by sister simone campbell, who joined me here on the show last week, the nuns are on day two of a nine-state, 15-day nuns on the bus tour, protesting the impact of the ryan budget. 62% of the proposed cuts in the ryan budget come from programs that help poor children, the elderly, and disabled americans, according to the center on budget and policy priorities. joining me now, father james martin, contributing editor for the publication of "america" magazine. father martin is also the official chaplain of "the colbert report." and from washington, ezra klein, a washington columnist and msnbc [ male announcer ] wouldn't it be cool if we took the nissan altima and reimagined nearly everything in it? gave it greater horsepower and best in class 38 mpg highway... ...advanced headlights... ...and zero gravity seats? yeah, that would be cool. ♪ introducing the completely reimagined nissan altima. it's our most innovative altima ever. nissan. innovation that excites. ♪

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find your sleep number. only at the sleep number store, where queen mattresses start at just $699. don't tell me what you value, show me your budget. and i'll tell you what you value. well, romney, ryan, and the new republican party in congress, they have shown us their budget, and it's clear they don't value you very much. >> the nuns on the bus agree with what vice president joe biden had to say today in los angeles. the nuns took their bus to congressman paul ryan's office in his congressional district in janesville, wisconsin, today, led by sister simone campbell, who joined me here on the show last week, the nuns are on day

two of a nine-state, 15-day nuns on the bus tour, protesting the impact of the ryan budget. 62% of the proposed cuts in the ryan budget come from programs that help poor children, the elderly, and disabled americans, according to the center on budget and policy priorities. joining me now, father james martin, contributing editor for the publication of "america" magazine. father martin is also the official chaplain of "the colbert report." and from washington, ezra klein, a washington columnist and msnbc contributor. father martin, just a little business -- ezra, excuse us for a moment. we've got a little business to conduct here. so how did you go -- in fact, i have a clip of you and your friend, stephen colbert, i just want to show quickly here. >> please welcome the official chaplain of the colbert nation, father jim martin. papa j., what's going on? >> now, how did you go from a

mere friend of the show, which i am, having done the show exactly once, and never been invited back, stephen -- how did you go from friend of the show to official chaplain? >> he elevated me one night, you know, the way that a cardinal is elevated to the -- >> just right there, during the production, without checking with you or anything? >> right. >> so how much does he pay you for that? >> zero. >> we can do this in latin. people don't have to hear. >> feel free. >> okay. he pays you zero? >> he pays me zero, and i've taken a vow of poverty, so even if he gave me money, i would have to pay it to the jesuits, anyway. >> so you can be pouting, with a contribution to the jesuits. >> i cannot be bought. >> can you be the chaplain of more than one show? >> i'd be happy to be your chaplain. >> let's redo the intro, the official chaplain of "the last word," father james martin. this is a fascinating time in american catholicism for the

politics of catholicism. and it kind of started with paul ryan claiming a catholic and theological justification for his budgeting, which is not something i'd seen a catholic politician do before. >> correct. and i don't think he counted on people actually reading the budget and responding. >> there's that. >> which is what a lot of catholics did. so he can claim it, but it's not based on catholic -- >> what is he missing in catholic teaching? >> he's missing that catholic social teaching depends on the gospel, and the gospel says that jesus says we have to take care of the poor. he says, basically people can do that individually. but, really, the government is an extension of the people's will. and so the government itself needs to take care of the poor and vulnerable. in fact, it's often the only group that can do that. you know, frequently individuals cannot do that. so that's what he's missing.

>> ezra klein, paul ryan is officially now double teamed. he's being double teamed by budget wonks like yourself and then by catholics like father martin and the nuns on the bus. just from the budgetary standpoint that you've looked at, and without having any reference to catholic teaching, this is very clearly a budget approach that lands in an extremely unfair way. >> yeah, it's not what you'd call proportionate. look, the thing that people don't always know about ryan's budget, is that on the front end, it costs lots of money. it actually costs trillions of new dollars. so one thing it does is spends trillions more than obama would or than the defense budget baseline would on the military. so you've spent $1 trillion there. then he's got tax cuts in the trillions of dollars. and an enormous a lot of deficit reductions on top of that. so pay for your deficit reductions, pay for your

defense, pay for your tax cuts. the only thing the government really spends money on beyond the military is social insurance. that's the big chunk of money. it's for the elderly and for the poor. and as such, he has to take trillions of dollars out of that. not just as much as he needs to reduce the deficit, but also enough to pay for the new spending on tax cuts and the new spending on the military. >> father martin, the ryan justification is, hey, when jesus was sharing the loaves and the fishes, he was not a government official. >> uh, that's, uh, true. but he also said that at the end of our lives, we're going to be judged not on what church we went to or, you know, whether or not we cursed, it's how we treated the poor. so he's pretty clear. i mean, jesus talks, i think, you know, dozens of times in the gospel about helping the poor. he couldn't be clearer. and you can say this budget is republican or democrat, but you

really can't say it's catholic. >> father james martin, you will be coming back as the official chaplain of "the last word" and some other show -- >> i'm honored. >> yeah. and ezra klein, you are the official. re-election. let's play "hardball." good evening i'm chris matthew in washington. let me start with politics. how do you win elections? start with your base. they are the ones. you lock them in. then go to the reachables. those inclined to vote for you. they're the twos. then the undecided. the threes. leave the fours to the other guy. watch obama run. he worked hard recent weeks to lock in women voters with equal pay. underlining his issue on women's issues with a push from biden, he has done the same on gays backing full marriage he qualities. last week, he