i'm. israel bombards a syrian military post calling it an act of retaliation after a stray projectile landed in the disputed golan heights. russia's foreign minister warns of the latest u.s. threat against the syrian government could encourage rebel groups to use chemical weapons as a form of competition. c.n.n. presenters caught on hidden camera calling the network's coverage of russia stories a big enough thing is the latest scandal that hit the channel and recent days. would. towers expose the disastrous effects of a stereotype and the leader of the u.k. opposition fires some tough questions of the prime minister and to some a spurs parliamentary test since the election. for more on these stories go to our

team dot com stay with us for cross talk asking with the russia allegations are undermining trust in the u.s. media and going. hello and welcome to crossfire we're all things are considered well while the liberal mainstream media serve up an endless menu of trump bashing in russia gave the democratic party in the so-called resistance to continue to lose elections or the attempts to destroy trump at all costs destroying the democrats and undermining the credibility of the liberal mainstream media.

cross talking why democrats keep losing i'm joined by my guest david polk in new york he is a democratic strategist and former co-chair of the new york state democratic party in washington we have michael flanagan he is president of flanagan consulting and a former congressman and in montgomery we cross to deice he is president of mrs institute are gentlemen cross-talk rules and effect that means you can jump in anytime you want i always appreciated david i suppose on this panel you are the democrat so can you answer why democrats keep losing elections i mean we can look at the georgia election and we can look at the other special elections a lot of expectations are a lot of money being spent a lot of kollywood names and they still don't come through i know that you know like in georgia it's a red state and they the republican should win there but i think you know where i'm going there needs to be some soul searching i think now after the election after the inauguration he's in the white house ok deal with it go ahead david. well first

of all i mean so you're absolutely right there needs to be some soul searching and the election of donald trump was it should be a teaching moment for the democratic party chair of the republican party to bear but i think we can dispense pretty quickly with the special elections which were all in red districts i think you know there's a new jersey governor of action this year a virginia governor election is this year that will likely have different roles so i think the teaching moment is more a teaching moment was more the last presidential campaign as opposed to these special elections in if they were in democratic districts the democrats would have won if they were in their own republican districts so the republican won but your point is a good one i'm just not sure the georgia special election is a good example of it ok michael i would still slightly disagree i mean this was turned into a litmus test it was a referendum the mainstream liberal mainstream media really covered it in soon as it was called well never mind nothing here to see move on ok i mean it was obvious it was very very obvious ok but you know the thing is is that at what point

do you stop deal with the president i mean look at that last harris harvard harris poll seventy three percent. respondents think that this russia gate these investigations are preventing congress from doing any work sixty four percent think these investigations are damaging the country now if you're a democrat you know that's your only mantra ok and i'm not saying that there isn't legitimate reasons to look into these that every country needs to protect its security even quoting russia ok but i don't see the soul searching here and you know i think that you know nancy pelosi and chuck schumer have to have some soul searching to go ahead michael. oh i correct a dissertation or question i'm sorry i think i think that it's ok there's a long way to go but i'm going to i'm going to distill it down for you politics is a reflection of the culture around us and a lot of the culture is shaped by the media and what they choose to cover and i

think it while john bloomfield and c.n.n. yesterday was busy confessing that russia gate was nothing he also said at the same time it was about ratings and i think they had to build up the story in georgia well if the democrat wins it'll be a giant story so let's build it up let's build it up let's pull in some ratings and i think that's really what drove it at the democratic party really didn't talk about that election is the bellwether and we're going to win this this was a media driven thing and an effort to collect radiant enough to collect ratings and in an effort to to make money and to shape the political discourse i think the producers who run the media these days are very young very biased they don't have the rules of journalism they don't have the life of seasoning that they need in their business and i think you have a kind of a corrupt if you will if you allow the term and its most definitional sons corrupt young people who desperately want their point of view to prevail and they work the media to make it happen and it's sad and it's wrong and it needs to stop ok i think we're having problems with montgomery so i'm going to go right back to new york

with david here does the democratic party need new leadership because i've heard that a middle ranking lower ranking members in congress have beginning to say that i mean . you know it's really odd that nancy pelosi stayed on when the republicans i'm sorry the democrats lost control of congress she should have stepped down and walked away and now she's they've lost the presidential i mean ten years of losing congressional elections and a down take it and she still wants to say i think i have to think that that's selfish in many ways other than her fund raising ability and we can talk about that too go ahead david. this is much bigger than nancy pelosi or who the leader of the democratic party as of this time let's not forget when donald trump first ran in the republican primary no one no one took him seriously he took out michael how many twelve significant republican candidates including jeb bush then then then defeated hillary clinton this was a giant reaction against the establishment against establishment democratic politics and against establishment republican politics people in the united states

are not happy big campaign contributions big companies big interests are controlling our government and they sent donald trump to drain the swamp i can't speak for the republican lessons to be learned that's something they need to figure out but for the democrats the democrats need to figure out how they lost touch with the working class person that didn't see the democratic party as the solution to their problems in the modern economy democrats need to look inside themselves and i think our values are very much in the right place get back to a focus on jobs education health care and come out with some real proposals you need to resist you need to resist president trump where you think its policies are wrong but you also need to provide an alternative ok michael let me read something that chuck schumer said on a.b.c. news this is just the last news cycle or so democrats need a strong bold sharp edged and common sense economic agenda policy platform message that appeal to the middle class that resonate with the middle class and that show and show that and unite democrats why didn't you say that seven months ago why

didn't they say that a year ago i mean i was dumbstruck when i heard that it's a why not why didn't you say it before go ahead. well and still i mean i served with chuck schumer in the house judiciary committee years and years ago and he was bloviating then as well it's not to say you need these things is important as david has observed and i wish the republicans would talk about these things too because they've become the party of the middle class and they need to talk about these bread and butter issues as well instead of you know the grand once over the world pieces of legislation the consumer views but chuck doesn't offer this view because he doesn't really believe it i mean that's the problem the democrat has the subject an area an octogenarian leadership which which really you know could make way for mr ryan of pennsylvania or i think pennsylvania he sounds like a break i you know put him in there and we can go back get rid of some of the polemics and go back into talking about good solid issues compromise on some legislation build some good legislation that's bipartisan and move move some work

for the american people and i think a new leadership in the in the congress for the democrats is going to have to be part of that equation changed and some bending by the republican leader but they need to change personnel let me go to jeff i think we got jim can i just jump in and say let me go to let me go to jeff because we haven't heard from him and we have some problems of the connection or jeff i don't know how much of you heard there but i mean what what michael just said makes sense what david said makes sense but what we heard for the last six months a last ten months russia russia russia russia will turn on c.n.n. right now i mean there they have they're totally red faced right now right now with this revelation that they're producer talk to. baritones so ok but i bet you anything in their first five minutes i could be talking about russia so they're not listening to david they're not listening to michael go ahead jeff. but i agree it's not a left and right thing it's really a populist versus elite thing and the thing about trump's victory is that it really shook up progressives in

a way that they weren't ready for it psychologically damaged them and so they've been lashing out ever since trying to find the issue of. the day that's going to bring trump down in flames and now that the russia issue doesn't appear to be their vehicle do impeachment it's starting to settle in psychologically the trumps going to be here for four years but here's what i would say to people on both sides is that we've become so one hinge politically that the democrats were actually willing to resuscitate the cold war because they hate trump so much i mean to have saber rattling with russia just because you hate the current occupant of the white house so badly strikes me as something offensive really deeply offensive i mean we're not trying to create a cold war when in fact your problems are internal ok it's dangerous more than anything else you know david this is the speak to that look i don't understand why

we have a special council there investigations why can't they go along and do their business are they because it seems to me that you know the media and these these leaks here all they're trying to do is inflame the situation inflame it i think it's perfectly normal for any country to want to investigate any process of its democratic process that's perfectly fine but it's just a circus ok and i think it's hurting democrats very badly and it's undermining the credibility of the media and when people do not believe the media that we have chaos go ahead do. well if i understand your question i think you're asking me about the circus of the media for ratings i guess that's what the media has to create a certain this so they know you know no one's going to run around no i don't know that i don't know that's not what i'm saying is i agree with you take ratings are all nice and find everybody wants great ratings but i mean what they end up generating is this narrative of hate of disbelief and ultimately it's violence we

see a lot of violence being committed right now and i think the democratic party has to take responsibility the media has to take responsibility. and of course every individual has to take responsibility but the kind of environment that we're in is there we're going to have a very slippery slope here if you're going down a very slippery slope here if you say if you say the democrats are responsible for violence you know let me remind you about gabby giffords so i don't know like the you know i don't want to be here to point out somehow that you know it's an absurd to say that some other way in a crowd to respond violently labor will win liberal media calls the president of the united states a traitor ok that is going way too far ok without any evidence michael j. to call barack obama a traitor. before we got over a bomb a traitor yes or no did they call him a socialist trying to destroy our system ok go ahead by called last twenty seconds we're going to go. i think we have had such a terrible problem conflating the media with the democratic party i know it's only

because the media declared itself so but but i don't have the right leadership here to say and they sound the same but they really need to be viewed differently and i think that's to david's point is that it's not the democrats doing this it's the media aren't generally the tool. will of the day we have to go to a hard break and after that short break we'll continue our discussion why democrats keep losing elections stay with.

economic development is all about numbers really leads to more of this quarter we heard one hundred six points. but what do we know about the other figures. when i think about the fact that i see. over twenty million dollars last year more than one thousand times the average wal-mart associate. with all due respect i have to say i don't think that's right. just a free market works. people went from pretty simple financial lives pre nine hundred eighty to the point now where people are. just totally submerged and their financial accounts and they're all in debt and what exactly devoted society from the protests of the government tried to do. might be making things worse.

by saying this is not how capitalism works but lose one goes hopelessly disastrously wrong. welcome back to crossfire we're all things considered i'm peter lavelle to remind you we're discussing why democrats are losing. you know one of the interesting things in montgomery that i find particularly in the in the last few days here is that this investigation mania that keeps going on it's it's turning inward now it's the democrats who are having a lot of problems read a lynch what did she know when you see how the issue of leaking on masking even bernie sanders is having problems right now this mania and all these leaks and anonymous sources it's turning in on everyone everyone is getting investigated by

everyone and this is not what people go to elections to vote for politicians who go to washington that's not that's not their agenda their gender is the fix the country go ahead jeff. well it's true i think social media's intensified this i'm sure there are lots and lots of things that administrations used to do twenty thirty forty years ago that could have been investigated by special councils then but they weren't because people they broadly accepted the notion that if an election is more or less valid the man or woman who's elected gets to stay in for the term of their office absent some really traitorous conduct and we jettison that because we've become so partisan and i as a libertarian i just see this is the politicization of the u.s. everything's been politicized and right now that's biting the democrats because they've turned sex and sexuality and race and even income into you know they've turned every element of life into a political matter so who's in charge becomes life or death. just constant put it

may i remind you and may i remind you of a dad jap i'm david david a person named bill clinton he was once and it was once bill clinton was president united states and bill clinton was impeached for what having a sex scandal impeached by who the republicans so if you want to point the finger at some party and i want to get into this fall but if you want to point to where all this started how about the republican party not accepting the legitimacy of bill clinton get elected and impeaching him over a personal affair. jeff you want to reply to that well i think first of all he was going to act i think first of all he's impeached over over. but i mean i would consider bill clinton's bill clinton's presidency as part of the modern era it's part of the partisan era it preceded social media but it everything after the sixty's or seventy's became identity politics and that radically changed the scope of what government and congress was going to do and as

a result i think people are really pissed at each other because they fear losing we have a winner takes all system especially with respect to social issues and so. so it's no wonder people are angry because they view the stakes is so high michael if i would let me give a premise here i suppose you would like the democratic party to stay exactly the way it is with the same leaders and it's a message i bet you would michel. well for the tiny bitter selfish reason of winning elections yeah sure ok but it's not helpful to the nation i grew up with you know you want to run we had elections i will try to hold you to ever ok david. what do you does the democratic party need to reinvent itself here because the identity politics have been already mentioned here everyone's put in the little box and then all the little boxes have to be fed and you know it and what happens is that you have some people that don't feel that they're part of that

process it's a lot of white americans white men and women that voted for donald trump the demographics say it all here and they felt that their little boxes being the collected in donald trump spoke directly to it if you like it or not you liked his message or not or his delivery a lot of people picked up on it here and i blame that on identity politics go ahead david in new york. i think you are missed in the problem nine million manufacturing jobs were lost in this economy after the great recession nine million and those nine million jobs weren't scattered broadly across the country they were focused mainly in the midwest and people are desperate and people blame the system they blame the elites in washington's democrats and republicans and all those voters voted against jeb bush and against hillary clinton and they said donald trump as to washington as a big finger in the share of the establishment a lesson that needs to learn here is not about identity politics it's about jobs and i don't think the democrats need to reinvent themselves i think the democrats

heart soul and mind is in the right place on jobs we just need to refocus and understand what the priorities are and get back to talking about how we're going to provide. provide jobs for people this country and. it's not that i'm rooting for donald trump to fail but i think is programs are going to fail and convert they're going to fail unfortunately and so the democrats need to work really hard to put an answer for ok i'll tell you the answer david that's a fair answer but then why doesn't the democratic party work with the president the united states to create jobs jobs and jobs the democrats don't can you answer that . well because if you're talking about getting rid of medicare and giving huge tax cuts to the rich i don't know how you co-operate with that because that's not how the democrats see the answer the democrats have real there's nobody getting ready medicare and there's not going to go where it was just a really i mean that's an insane point to provide so much like let me at the end if i say it's really serious about providing care should the democrats cooperate with the republicans go ahead mike where should the democrats i'm asking you seriously

where are the democrats operate with this i'll answer the question if you give me a chance to get in go ahead but i'm a christian the republicans can can actually work together on providing jobs instead of actually having rancor over programs that are settled and solid now and into the future i read some latest democratic rant that trump is going to get rid of social security it's insane the energizing of the base of the democrats by the democratic party itself is absolutely craziness we can work together to provide jobs and have got some good programs to the provide jobs unfortunately it's going to involve dismantling a large portion of the large social state built up by obama and a lot of what's got to go away is the national affordable healthcare act has got to be broken down it's a budget killer it's a job killer we've got to get rid of died frank which is standing in the way of everything and there's been some reports out today talking about how the fifteen dollars minimum wage actually hurts the very people that was designed to help this mindset that has to be ok so we actually had working with actually now if you're

saying to us any answer to jobs is you're saying the answer to jobs if you say he has their jobs is deregulating wall street and getting rid of the minimum wage we can't work with that because it's wrong. so it's not a matter of just i mean there's a fundamental disagreement here so the return time to throw this is the word there is no way that you just heard our critic. about them while this is going to be one give them in a way i can't say i'm a crime gentlemen let me see your part let me just. let me jump in here jeff you've listen to the republican and the democrat as a libertarian please my friend. go ahead hey i like that crosstalk but look i'll tell you what we could save a few trillion dollars right off the top by just getting the hell out of a stand in iraq how about we start there ok and ask for obamacare look why does all this stuff have to be top down why can't different states have to provide it like california have single payer which by the way it can't seem to budget because it's

going to cost forty billion dollars but let california try it and i hope i hope it works i don't think it will but why does california and montgomery alabama have to have the same rules for everything in this is this is this this is the story that the twentieth century and now twenty first everything is federalized folks we're not there's more deplorable is out there than the democrats thought ok their program their doctrine of inevitability is going to take a lot longer than they thought but if we can break up some of this federalization let different states do different things we're not we're just never going to agree with a guy if you think raising wages doesn't drop demand for something that you're right i just find a million disagree with that i don't know how we get around that other than saying let's states do it themselves david answer the following question how do the democrats how can they win in the midterm elections next year what's their strategy ok chuck schumer seems to have woken up a little bit we'll see if he keeps his word what do the democrats have to do.

it's a two part it's a two part answer and i think it's not to be any great insight but you need to oppose the president on policies where you think he's wrong i would agree with you and say you need to focus on the policies and not focus on the man i will say a lot of that is driven by the media and not by the democratic party and then you need to provide an alternative vision for how this country is going to address education jobs infrastructure the economy health care mental health addiction these are big big problems people are suffering democrats need to robustly and energetically provide various solutions and allow it and allow it to the court of public opinion also known as elections to decide and i'm confident it will prevail you know michael we heard from jeff the word deplorable there are a lot of deplorable there and if the media continues its tsunami against trump that will i think the republicans will do just fine next year and i think there will be a second term for donald trump if they continue down the path the more the

mainstream media the liberal mainstream media insults the president of the united states the spill the insult as well the election proved it go ahead michael. i think you're right i think the the i'm from the chicago model of winning elections and that's getting yours out and keeping the other guys home there is no center to persuade and donald trump gets the republican base out period and the media helps him do that yet by trashing him and when when the president replies and tweets and and other things taking on the media we just love it it's terrific and we and we cheer lead for him and we hope for good things for him so i'm not sure the president even wants the media craziness to and because it helps him in the long run because turning out your base is what wins elections but i certainly hope from what david said i certainly hope he's right and if the democrats do just that i hope they make you their chief strategist david and i hope they do which they do because we're going to have a much better discourse in this country if they do and we're going to be able to talk about issues important things he did and sometimes the democrats are going to

be right he did it's going to be true david he just complimented you so take advantage of. i was going to thank you but i didn't want to interrupt if i wanted to keep going all right let me let me go to you know they wouldn't let me go to jail because well honestly i really. can be his own worst enemy on this sure sure donald trump could be is own worst enemy i think i think he could be out there actually he is not a democrat not a republican he could be doing things to break down what the institutional barriers have been put up but honestly he's own worst enemy draws all this attention and this ire some died on the stand it's all self-inflicted let me give jeff the last there's a jeff last thirty seconds and what i do worry about we've had a nice little banter here but i do but i do believe that the divisions in the u.s. are growing wider and wider and it's very dangerous twenty seconds go ahead. it is dangerous but trump has been able to do what the republicans couldn't do for decades which is put the democrats on their heels and force them to explain and

when you're explaining you're losing so at this point i think trump is the only person who's winning and the democrats republicans are both losing ok on a very interesting note there thank you gentlemen we've run out of time many thanks to my guests in washington new york and in montgomery and thanks to our viewers for watching us here at r.t. see you next time and remember crosstalk.

here's what people have been saying about redacted in that it's you know i think it's full on awesome well the only show i go out of my way to launch you know a lot of the really packed a punch at least yampa is the john oliver of archie america's doing the same we are apparently better than two thousand and six and see people you've never heard of love redacted tonight not the president of the world bank will take time to write me seriously send us an e-mail. and i think david cameron was so convinced that he would. live to keep the british people would forget. that he felt justified in taking the gamble and i think that was an irresponsible well i think he was playing russian roulette with british future because in europe it's in a radical change it's not like an ordinary election unless i guess later you could vote for. if you take an

economics course you're taught that markets are based on informed consumers making rational judgment suppose you turn on the television show to. take a look at the. i mean are they trying to create informed consumers making rational choices. true or they're trying to create an uninformed consumers who will act irrationally in the so huge industry one of the biggest industries in the country. takes. a look i'm. going to. pick up yeah i'll think that's what i'm going to say pleasantly plump.