congressional investigators looking into russia's meddling into the u.s. election accuse the trumpet ministration of stonewalling the delivery of requested documents plus an up tick in the rhetoric between the u.s. and north korea we're discussing these topics and more on this edition of. the politicking on larry king scores of documents were related to the so-called russian probe have been sought by the congressional committees operating on a parallel track to special counsel robert mueller but this week comes reports of rising tensions between capitol hill and the trump administration over to a delivery of those documents related to everything from thomas discussions about the firing of james called me to jarryd cushion is security clearance leaders of the congressional committees of gone so far as secures the white house of

stonewalling their efforts so what's the latest and what does it mean for the russian investigation we'll talk about that first with richard painter professor was at the university of minnesota he was the chief white house ethics lawyer in the george w. bush administration he's currently vice chair for citizens of responsibility and ethics in washington he joins us from brighton massachusetts what do you make of these charges about lack of cooperation between the top administration and congressional investigators richard. well it doesn't appear that they ministration wants the bacon added about the russian investigation number of officials and administration of not being candid about their own personal contacts with the russians the administration had different stories for the reason james comey was fired until the president pretty much admitted in front of the russian ambassador right there in the oval office as well as on the national television in the last or

olivia that he fired me because of the russian investigators so the white house is . claiming that this investigation is a bunch of fake knows which on and has not been forthcoming and they certainly don't want to turn these documents over to congress because that could lead to erosion of support by a particular republican members of congress once they say that the white house and before the campaign out on disclose contacts with the russians and the people still aren't telling the truth about their contacts with the russians the ranking democrat. on the committee adam schiff of california said that they've made despite repeated attempts they don't get any this is beginning rashid to it it looks like a duck an excellent conductance a duck. well it's definitely a situation where they're not tell them the truth about contacts with the russians

we already know that though that's what general flynn lost his job the first waker to on the job why attorney general sessions was accused to give misleading testimony as confirmation here jericho starr left off several contacts with the russians on his forms his ethics forms and i believe his national security clearance forms and they list of problems this administration has high out. because of their undisclosed gone tax with the russians that list of the difficulties it's got longer and longer so it's a very serious situation and i don't think the white house is about to turn over documents to congress and till they're forced to politico reports suggested cushion to use private e-mails to conduct white house business this is specially given to him slams of hillary clinton for using private service what do you make of mr cushier and his involvement all this i think using

a personal lame out for official government but as this is sloppy we had to deal with the some of that in the bush administration. nobody ever threatened to bring in the app a i know but he said it was criminal but it's sloppy and the same with secretary of state hillary clinton i think that was sloppy the way that was handled the notion that it was somehow crime at all as a joke there was no. ground to charge clinton with a crime for having a private e-mail server and she may have negligently sound one or two basic last fight information she received some other classified information from people who were foolish enough to send it to her but once again there is no precedent for criminally prosecuting. negligent handling of classified information and particularly a situation or that even get into the has a power question now is making the same. it's the openness it's not criminal but

it's a stupid thing to do congress are ratcheted up after the clinton up the soda and up passed a statute two thousand and fourteen the presidential records act says you have to cough up a states government in mile when you use a private server. private e-mail account i hope he did that so he's at least in compliance with the law i've been none of those even our stuff is a criminal issue to buy get and whether that was just political grandstanding. really of a quite shameful home or how concerned should prison trim be about pullman afford and muller's investigation of him. i bought a concert. i don't know what the facts are there but that's the amount of four parallel has quite a few contacts over a russia various russian oligarchy and there also is accusations floating around and will just say what's true and what's not but i would think he would have been

vetted a little more carefully before he was brought in as campaign manager. they keep may very well brought some russian baggage in there wedeman and have yet to say what the bodies were between the camp can buy and the russians we already know about the undisclosed previously on this was waiting in the trump tower with the top brass of a campaign a russian zoo water to deliver the dirt on a hill or a well we'll just wait and see what comes out of this investigation but it does not look good for the for the president right now mr painter always good talking with you professor thanks for joining us today thank you very much larry let's continue the top gun russian get into some of the topics as well happening in d.c. with motley that chief national correspondent for the new york times magazine is the was political correspondent for the times washington bureau is a great writer and a great guy and mark joins me from our nation's capital mark what's your reaction

to reports that the former white house press secretary john spicer can't detail no books about his tenure with the trump campaign should the white house worry about that absolutely if the report is true i mean i think that was the report that came out first a few days ago i think actually as mike allen a column during a very highly widely read. through tip sheet writer for x e o's wrote that and spicer got very very. quick just very very brewed with mike threatened that if you kept harassing him asking him about this he would get the authorities on. and so i think that snippy response might be telling now again the question is if he in fact has kept copious black notebooks going back to the campaign that's a huge deal because it's exactly what white house officials are told not to do for exactly those reasons which is that they can be subpoenaed if there is any kind of

white house investigation these are goldmines for the you know whoever you know bob bob muller or whoever his predecessor a successor might be so yeah if it's true i think the white house has to be terrified of that politico article by nancy cote said in a growing number of white house staffers a latina get out even though the one year mark is months away that report is true. and you know you're on top of it is all that's what's going on not only is it true it's been true for a number of weeks if not months not only has it been a really rough start to this administration but it's also been a really tough place to work by all accounts there's been a lot of backbiting a lot of factions a lot of leaks a lot of people leaking bad stories about their colleagues and president trump has proven to be a pretty capricious boss to say the least so they really haven't had a coherent sort of launch off the ground and certainly the honeymoon period that

one would expect from a new president hasn't materialized so i think a lot of people are sort of making the calculation that before you get any deeper before you have any greater legal bills or exposure maybe the time to jump is just now and you know just sort of holiday general kelly don't you know he seems to be someone who is getting i mean so much as there are reviews are pretty good reviews i mean people certainly respect him trump seems to be at times chafing at his you know sort of hyper disciplined military sense of control which by no means is donald trump's preferred style and hasn't been how he's gotten to this point either through the campaign or the first months of his white house but people i mean even kelly is very much an organization man he's been very much in charge he's been a very disciplinary and he hasn't done any interviews to what i can tell and you know the big question is can a guy like that manage the president it's unclear to me whether he's even trying and certainly you know the behavior of the principal himself hasn't changed that

much over the last few months i know you're doing a book on the n.f.l. right. yes well the torrent of matter be a part of that book absolutely yeah i know this is sort of my sweet spot been writing a book about the n.f.l. in sort of the recent few years you know to mull to a history of the league and now all of a sudden it collides with my other full time job which is covering politics so you have this collision of politics and football that i'm writing a story about for the times magazine hopefully will be up later today but yeah this is a whole chapter and you know it's been fascinating to watch the league respond watch the players respond watch the teams respond and it seems like in some ways the way that football has banded together in many ways they have said look we don't have our problems but we can fight our own culture wars thank you very much why does trump get involved in all this i don't think there's any grand plan i mean first of all he has had

a longstanding. kind of obsession with getting into the national football league he's been wanting to be an n.f.l. owner for you know three four you know decades you know larry i mean he was a us a fellow owner he was you know the sort of big ticket owner of the new jersey generals in the eighty's and the reason he joined the u.s. at all to begin with is that he hoped there be a merger with the n.f.l. and that would be his way into the club since then he's made sporadic efforts to buy various teams the most recent coming in one thousand nine hundred two thousand and fourteen when the buffalo bills were set for sale he didn't get that team either and i think sort of a window into how the world works these days is you know he might not have gotten into this most exclusive club of billionaire n.f.l. owners but as a consolation prize he got the white house. what do you make of the players and their actions i know your friend tom brady did not support it and he was a supporter of trouble but my god there's a lot of people supporting it including the league as support of the players yeah

that's been pretty surprising i mean i think especially since a lot of the you know the owners have been big supporters of trump both financially and i've known him over the years roger goodell himself as a republican he's with a republican senator charles goodell and you know people like tom brady who's about as on a political as it gets even he today i guess i'm interview he called you know president trump's comments divisive he didn't agree with them he was part of a pretty large demonstration by the patriots and by a lot of teams either locking arms or kneeling during the storm spangled banner yesterday and that seemed to have the support of the teams and most of the teams at least and the league i think the real question is how in the wong term will the fans react to this mark stay right there we'll be right back after this quick break politicking continues after this. about your sudden passing i've only just learnt you worry yourself in taking your last. year at right up

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corporations corporations run washington washington controls the media the media and both voters elected to businessman to run this country business equals power you must it's not business as usual it's business like it's never been done before . i'm tom hartman and i'll give you what the mainstream media can't help the big picture. and when you question more find what you're looking for. will go deeper investigate and debate all so you can get the big picture. politicking we're talking with the age the chief national correspondent for the new

york times magazine what's going to happen with the repeal of obamacare this week. it seems like there is very little momentum for it you know it looks like it's going to be voted on either wednesday or thursday republicans as of now don't have the votes are they i mean john mccain has said he's not supporting it rand paul has said he almost certainly won't support it and that's fifty and if you know either susan collins or lisa murkowski who voted who voted against the previous iteration of the bill votes against it looks like they're both you know very possibly if not probably will the bill going to die and there will be no repeal of obamacare at least this year and you know republicans and the president will have you know essential really blown their last you know best hope at least in the short term to do this didn't mitch mcconnell say if he didn't have the votes he wouldn't bring it up he did although there is a counter narrative here and i think this baxley might be what happens that he

might actually just put it on the floor anyway just to put his caucus on the record and just so he will be able to say look i tried i put it on the floor a couple times and look these are the people who voted it down you know talk to them if this is defeated what will the effect be on the twenty eighteen elections well i mean it depends how you look at i mean there is a there is a school of thought that said that if in fact obamacare was repealed. the effects would be so catastrophic on so many millions of people who would be thrown off the health care rolls that you know it would be a devastation for for the republicans in the congressional races there's also you know the other way of looking at it now though is that a lot of the republican base especially republican donors people who are independents people who voted for trump even if they're not republicans might look at this and say look i mean this party has controlled all three chambers they have gotten nothing done why should i vote for an incumbent republican to have another

chance at this some plans to speak in indiana wednesday on tax reform tax negotiations a s'posed to unveil their broad brush proposal for overhauling the tax code where you see that gone well i mean tax reform especially comprehensive tax reform as the white house has been talking about and the hills been talking about is very complicated there are so many more constituencies beriah bowles. just sort of ways to look at it then you've been in a health care bill so that they will take forever it will be complicated and again it's actually i mean taxes are obviously a resident issue for many people but it's also an easier issue in some ways to you know critique i mean democrats can just say well republicans are giving a tax break to the wealthy again and then you know debt republicans seem to have more consensus on this at the very least than they do on things like health care and immigration so it might be an easier might be an easier road for them but yeah that could give up a good i could go that could give that could take up

a good deal of the next year and already we're almost into you know the well into the fall in twenty seventeen and there cupboard is pretty bare as far as big legislative achievements what's your read on his romance with schumer and palosi. well it seems to be a marriage certainly of convenience for now i mean i you could argue that the deal he cut with chuck schumer nancy pelosi to. weeks ago to do one keep the government open and keep the debt ceiling you know the least put off for a couple months and also to bring hurricane relief to the south southeast coast of texas was arguably the most popular thing that donald trump has done as president i mean the deal with the democrats got the support of maybe sixty seventy percent of the vote or the poll that i've seen which is overwhelmingly more popular than any attempt to appeal to to repeal obamacare any attempts to you know be a pull out of the climate accord the paris climate of course agreements so yeah i

mean i think trump has as close attention to that as anyone and i think he probably will see that as something that can work for him again the obvious question is how long will it effect be useful to the democrats and when will chuck schumer nancy pelosi who are very very sort of tough political tacticians when will they decide to play hardball and you know will they actually go go to the mat if trump tries to you know pass a budget that has a funding for the border wall on it or something that's much more divisive but for now it seems to be working for both of them i don't know if it's a one off or something we'll be seeing more of mark i know i'm so thirty five years you know i'm i asked is seriously is donald trump a republican. i think donald trump is a donald trump ian. i don't think he particularly cares about either party i think he cares about. you know his own brand he cares about his own presidency i think you know there is definitely an appetite for some kind of nonpartisan or or sort of

post partisan solution which i think is a big reason he got elected last year and i also think that the op otitis still there which is a big reason why you know things like his deal with with speaker paul were with the leader pelosi leadership. were very popular but so if he says this is that works for him yes but i don't feel like he has any great sort of ideological convictions or really great kind of loyalty to the republican party certainly not mark is always a pleasure thanks so much thanks for having me both a war of words between the white house and north korea is more incendiary than ever this while the president opens a new battlefront this week in the n.f.l. katrina vanden heuvel has been keeping up with all of it she's editor and publisher of the nation and the political commentator and she joins me from new york the war of words with north korea is getting more incendiary i think they're almost declaring war what do you what do you make of all of this everyone tone it down

there's no military solution to this problem larry i mean there would be millions of civilians and south korea japan killed if there was a preemptive strike by the united states people need to cool it out. the leader of north korea's reckless dangerous ugly but he's not suicidal and there have been and you know there's revisionist history out there and there have been diplomatic efforts to freeze north korea's nuclear program. carter clinton succeeded to a large measure george w. aborted negotiations so i think taunting doesn't do any good it's childish when we're confronted by this very dangerous moment. what do you make guns from getting involved in the n.f.l. well you gotta think about it larry i mean you've got know the danger of north korea the escalating rhetoric the escalation you have puerto rico devastated millions of people without water or electricity and the president of the united

states or the divider in chief decides to wage war on the n.f.l. you've got to wonder what's going on i mean people say he's the divider in chief in this case what's interesting to me is he's more of a unifier in chief in the sense that you brought together parties which weren't on the same page i mean you have roger goodell the n.f.l. commissioner you have those many n.f.l. owners are standing against president trump some who supported him so he's done a pretty good job over the last months of unifying democrats now is unifying the n.f.l. to a large extent not fully but i think more deeply larry this is a moment this country is not going to come together i don't believe that we're all going to be healed and move forward singing kumbaya i know there are differences but to inflame those differences i find so repulsive at a time when there are racial wounds when there is anger about the economy but i also keep my eyes you know the people who are protesting the people who are

protesting bending on their bended knee are protesting legitimate issues of racial injustice of police brutality the larger systemic issue is you've got a justice department or an injustice department which is rolling back consent decrees with cities around police brutality issues and a whole slew of badly devised policies to roll back the reforms that have been made on criminal justice so i think that's the larger picture but the president you know maybe if he bought the buffalo bills team a few years ago larry he wouldn't run for president as he claims he wouldn't have and maybe we wouldn't be facing this situation but why poor. you know it's just dangerous at this moment mark leibovich of the new york times was just with this and he says the the obamacare repeal is in big trouble do you agree absolutely i mean let's just sit back for a moment also and take a measure of the stark difference which is shown by the that this attempt now five

times to repeal and replace obamacare you have one party which wants to deprive americans of affordable coverage of another which just last week bernie sanders joined by sixteen democrats put forward a medicare for all plan it's aspirational it's a goal to unite around it's also incremental in interesting ways but that's the stark difference and john mccain disagreed with him on a lot of things but he showed some civic courage with what he did on friday and i think this fifth attempt is going to expose mcconnell ryan for the charlatans they are and i think more important a lot of americans are beginning to understand that we want to join the rest of the world and that health care is a right not just a commodity not a profit center not a privilege as a liberal democrat are you happy to see the president working in some areas was sort of schumer nancy pelosi. you know my sense of donald trump is that he is in

some ways an empty vessel he's untethered from some ideological commitments which establishment republicans have that doesn't mean he's not in the quiet of the darkness when we can separate the signal from noise rolling back regulations which are going to harm millions of americans giving tax cuts to the richest but when he sits down and wants to work i think largely out of frustration with paul ryan and mitch mcconnell he wants to work with nancy pelosi and chuck schumer i say go for it be careful be skeptical deeply skeptical to paraphrase ronald reagan distrust verify test not just trust but verify but i think work where you can but i don't know how far it gets he may backtrack but testimony other things he spoke about a big jobs infrastructure program when he ran for president he talked about rolling back endless war and test of on these so i'm i'm for you know pragmatism when

needed with verification and skepticism when demanded is bernie sanders those going to be a war in the middle of the mainstream democratic party i don't see it as bernie sanders versus mainstream democratic party larry i think bernie sanders represents a very strong wing inside the democratic party at this point even though he's an independent but look at that medicare for all vote you had sixteen democratic senators many of them potential contenders in two thousand and twenty for president joining bernie sanders so i think what he's done is recalibrate the valence of a democratic party that has been too close to corporate power to money power to a rig system which millions of americans are saying enough i think the larger issue in our country is whether we'll see a full recalibration of our politics i think it's an interesting moment a potential realignment moment which bernie sanders and to a certain extent in a way i. i don't agree with by any measure donald trump signaled there is

a there isn't could and unhappiness with a discredited bipartisan establishment certainly on foreign policy and bernie sanders foreign policy speech last week is worth looking at but on a slew of issues i think there is an interest in a different kind of politics and bernie sanders is speaking to a democratic party he moved the platform in progressive ways so i'd say it's bigger than bernie despite his age. because of his likability couldn't joe biden bring it all together. you know i want to publish i want to publish an essay larry i've been thinking a lot about this how to think about a in politics i think a lot about age but you know we all do. but listen the four leading contenders right now you have senator warren for well there are others bernie sanders joe biden i would submit jerry brown of california who's term limited out soon he's seventy eight so what do you do what do you make of age so i don't know i

think this country you know fifty seventy is the new fifty two week in politics you know can be a year a normal life so who knows health matters i'd like to see a younger generation and it is coming up and we're beginning to pay attention to it at the nation people in this country are looking and there are a lot of young people who are being motivated and moved by the trump years to run for office which is good but joe biden i think he's already decided to run i mean he has a i think a pac and he's working in the political landscape as always thank you thank you katrina vanden heuvel and thank you for joining me on this edition of politicking remember you can join the conversation on my page with page or tweet me at kings things and don't forget use the politicking hash tag that's also this edition of politicking. about your sudden passing i phone leaches learnt you worry yourself in taking your last wrong term.

care act to you as we all knew it would i tell you i'm sorry. so i write these last words in hopes to put to rest these things that i never got a chance to. i remember when we first met my life turned on each. but then my feeling started to change you talked about more and i keep my secret still some my. fond of you those that didn't like to question are are. they secretly promised to never be like it said one does not need a funeral in the same as one enters the mind gets consumed with this one to. speak to you now because there are no other takers. to claim that mainstream media has met its maker.

for decades the american middle class has been railroaded by washington politics. big money poker get the best road out a lot of boys that's how it is in the news culture in this country now that's where i come in. a minute still don't argue america i'll make sure you don't get railroaded that you'll get the straight talk in the straight news. to me. all the worlds and all the news companies merely players but what kind of part is r t america play marty america offers more artsy american personal. in many ways than use landscape just like the few real moves big news good actors

bad actors and in the end you could never know you're on so much parking place all the world's a stage all the world's a stage all the world's a stage and we are definitely a player. game playing. well i'm tom hartman in washington d.c. and here's what's coming up tonight on the big picture the signs are everywhere are we nearing the end of capitalism and if so what comes next columnist richard will use to.