been by road democratic strategist and former obama campaign regional field director he's also retired u.s. army ranger welcome to the program thank you matthew good to be with you thanks for having so let's jump right in 1st your reaction to this federal reserve cutting interest rates by a quarter percent does this lend credence to a coming recession let's start with you chris. well i think the fed is clearly concerned about some type of downturn but let's face it recessions are notoriously hard to predict and if we tried to bet every time the federal reserve cut interest rates it was going to lead to recession we've lost a lot of money i'm betting that way i think what is probably more correct to say is that the fed doesn't see any signs of looming inflation and they don't want they want the economy to continue to grow without it with this passed off without inflation but what you will see if there's one assumption made from this is anyone who is not refinance their home in probably the last 18 months is going to get out and do it because you're not going to find much lower interest rates ever again robin do you agree oh i definitely agree with chris's point about refinancing i'm

in the middle of one myself so this is good news for me not today but all joking aside i think this is a prudent move right now because there is somewhat of a slowdown when i'm not doing political punditry analyzing the economy and i've been seeing the prices of gold going up there's other telltale signs that there's some some confidence waning in the economy i'm a little bit concerned about my party just getting ahead of the horse ahead of the game here and talking about recession we just need to be more careful and mindful of what's happening right now with the economy but matthew i'm concerned that if you notice that last democratic debate there was not one question asked about the economy which is always the paramount issue of importance to voters. chris chris want to you talk to us a little bit inform our audience about the this level of drop in interest

rates what's the context of this historically is this sort of unprecedented how low the rates are or is this kind of par for the course well i think. the fed doesn't see any looming size of inflation so you do get concerned about some level of potential downturn at that but the cup bottom line is the reason why you drop these rates is not for it's not just bring on or to stop a recession it's to continue the growth that is going on and right now we've had on president growth going back to the end of the last administration and i think that's what the fed would like to see continue we've got on president unemployment the lowest unemployment in history for overall the most important one for african-americans most on one for women almost on a point for spandex and i completely agree of rob and i said the same. when i as well because we're going to ask you to can text your allies your answer there because i think that's i think that's really interesting then we'll have robin respond is that unemployment rates have been declining steadily during the obama administration and that decline continued in the trump and ministration and

actually under the trumpet ministration the rate of decline slowed a little bit so now you could argue well you can argue whether or not you could only get it all grow under but the decline has slowed so is this is this an effort to to battle what is obviously a change in the decline rate. well know contextually you can only get to such a so to the such a level level of unemployment there's only so many people can actually get to work at this point you are almost at full employment i mean some level people who are changing jobs but really when it's down to it we have never had unemployment this level and so i think it's it is you can only get to a growth level where everyone is working and we're almost at that point and what's great about it is because it is not just been at the highest of society you've seen wages continue to increase and you've seen unemployment go into or into areas that have historically been not seen the same level of growth and i think everybody should be excited about that but i do want to finish the point i was making where i

where i think republicans in 2012 went out of their way to sort of point to a recession that they hoped would come that might defeat obama and elect mitt romney and i would caution i think robin is exactly right is that whenever you see that level people pointing to a recession or trying to claim the recession is coming when frankly the economic signs don't i don't imply that to be the case it is really dangerous because you can bring one on just by bringing down our confidence robin could speak to that and also do you agree with that analysis of the unemployment rate we also have the underemployment rate to consider as well yes and that is exactly what i was thinking matthew about that the under employment rate we're more party needs to move tactically on this is to analyze the areas that we lost in 2016 the rural areas the heartland all of those democratic strongholds that we lost the union voters because their wages aren't doing they have been stagnating for years and yes

we're seeing growth so much economic growth right now but if you analyze where it's where it is can textually it's pretty much in the top 25 democratic performing metropolis cities so my party just needs to get back on the tactical message of bringing the growth out to the heartland. and and rural america and the farmers and we can both agree that the farmers right now are hurting let's sift gears for a 2nd we've got this n.b.c. wall street journal poll that was released on wednesday that says joe biden and elizabeth warren both gained ground since july and this is after the last debate any surprises chris. well it's it is surprising to me how quickly bernie sanders the story has been dropping and i i really thought camel harris after the 1st debate would rise more than she has and she's now completely fallen off the map as well i think what you see is it's become

a 2 person race between joe biden and elizabeth warren and the question is does it remain so there is i think you really have a couple of lanes right now you have kind of the left of center moderate lane that joe biden is occupying and you have sort of the far left of center socialist lane which will lose warren is occupy and there's only room for one person in that socialist lane and it's kind of between warren and sanders now is does biden stumble and i really believe the attacks from who in castro in the last debate helped joe biden and it probably created a situation where he's had a little bit of a false inflation a sugar high if you will and the question is is he able to maintain that and it'll be interesting to see is there it does tom styer for instance and i find his campaign fascinated make the last debate he will be in the next one he has unlimited money he has a huge list behind him a large organizational structure they can put to place in the in the in the early states is he able to go compete with joe biden and is more moderate in that for the democratic party line right now but i would caution anyone who makes too much analysis of a poll in september of 2015 or so to i'm thinking back 4 years ago p.t.s.d.

there of 2019 that it probably is irrelevant to what happens when we get to iowa and new hampshire and south carolina nevada and that's really whatever whenever they're going to start to see this race develop more and it's fast and if you look back how many times you had candidates leading and i could quote back over and over again leading at this point in the race i mean hillary clinton was up by about 30 points right now in 2008 and then ultimately falter and are unable to maintain that lead and that's lou that's i think the question to be decided is is joe biden able to maintain that strength right now it appears like he is but does that does it hold for another 3 to 4 months robin what do you think. there's several good takeaways here 1st for the viewers specifically i want them to understand to not just dismiss the polling this go around because it was flawed before but now they can poll bay and poll cell phone numbers whereas they couldn't a few years ago so now if you look at the methodology of these polls about 2 thirds

of the people contacted our by cell phone which is great news because i know that the only person in my life that's the has a landline is my 96 year old grandma so i do expect the polls to be more accurate this go around now i'm not surprised that joe biden did better this time he didn't stumble as much he was solid i didn't see anything particularly outstanding so i'm a little bit surprised that elizabeth warren rose as much as she did but look at the numbers that she's drawing at her rallies she just threw in her biggest audience at the rally in new york city was over 20000 people which rivals the biggest trump rallies that there are so i think that she's got the enthusiasm behind her that maybe joe biden doesn't if you go back to the iowa state fair she was strong and crowds 3 times what joe biden was so i think that he might like chris said have a sugar high right now. based off of some sympathy by by the julio castro attacks but i do expect to see maybe elizabeth warren running away from this want to point out too that at this point in 2008 obama was still in single digits so there's

still some room for one of these other candidates but i'm not sure who so let's just pretend for a 2nd that we are advisers to the sanders campaign what would you advise them to do to regain their their position against war and against biden chris. you know it's a tough place to be whatever you were a leader in a prior campaign and they find yourself stumbling in a new campaign i think sanders is his real challenge is you going to be an insurgent once and he kind of had that chance in 2016 i think a lot of people who who were with him in 16 have now moved over to warnings of looking for you know a younger step to generic if you will but she does of elizabeth warren comes off a little more reasonable and a lot of a little more energetic than i think that i think sanders does and i agree with robin's point about rallies and i disagree about drawing more than troubling troubles getting 68000 people in some of his rallies in the south trust me i was up

against him and still i'm going through therapy over my experiences there but in. many everything those rallies matter a lot i'm sorry you know go on. as you say those rallies matter a lot and he drew 20020000 in new york and the difference is in 2016 trump was drawing 20000 in manchester when war 30 drawing those types are rallies it's going to be really impressive but she's good she is getting and robert the point about how many more people she is drawing than by this i think is important to point is important it matters because it shows the enthusiasm behind her candidacy right now and frankly standards had those same level rallies in in 2016 i'll never forget he had a rally the same day trip ted cruz did in oklahoma city where i happen to you right now and he drew about 20000 bernie sanders did in his red state like oklahoma city so but you're just not seeing him and engender that type of enthusiasm so in terms of what i would advise them it be a it's it would be a tough place to be one visors right now because i think it's really tough to reignite enthusiasm that you had before and you seem to have lost what do you think

. there's not a lot more than i can offer christian is pretty much nailed it here one thing that i want to point out is that bernie sanders isn't giving us anything that we haven't heard from him before and 2016 to use the same montra even that we need to it's time for a political revolution he had that chance in 2016 he needs to at least change that slogan give us some fresh ideas and not just steal ideas from the other candidates and retool them and say that he's improved upon them we need fresh ideas from him and self that would be my advice robin chris stay right there more politicking right after the break.

aeroflot russian and lights. you know world of big partisan movies lot and conspiracy it's time to wake up to dig deeper to hit the stories that mainstream media refuses to tell more than ever we need to be smart we need to stop slamming the door on the bats and shouting past each other it's time for critical thinking it's time to fight for the middle for the truth the time is now we're watching closely watching the hawks.

aeroflot russian airlines. tensions between the masses and classes have existed ever since modern states came into being they often serve as a driver earth political change with russian civil society growing larger and louder against the excesses of the government leaks what does the future of the political system look like. join me every foes on the alex salmond show and i'll be speaking to guests of the world of politics sports business i'm show business i'll see you then.

welcome back to politicking i'm matthew cook sitting in for larry king continuing the conversation with our political panel they are chris wilson he was director of research and digital strategy for ted cruz's 2016 presidential campaign he's in oklahoma city and in atlanta robin by row democratic strategist and former obama campaign regional field director do you guys think that donald trump is going to debate the next democratic nominee and should he chris. you know i don't have any insight into what the trump campaign would do in this situation but i would be shocked if he did not i mean dollars from what dollars trump in 2016 was a surprisingly. agile debater and he never went in and really knocked anybody off the stage if you will the use of metaphorically of course although he had bush may have comforted pretty close figured early but having said that i will say having worked for ted cruz who was

a former national champion and runner up in world champion debater we really didn't expect trump to be as good as he was and you know that he is a fighter he's somebody who doesn't shy away from a head to head battle with somebody so to think that he would miss the chance to debate a joe biden or it was before and i would be shocked if he did anything other than go with and then excitedly jumped up on that stage robin what do you think. it depends matthew on who the you nominee is i would say that strategically he wants it to be joe biden and if the nominee is in fact joe biden he absolutely should debate him and would because he. we could probably get him off of his game and get him to stumble and make a few of these infamous gaps that he makes almost on the daily so that would be a good strategic move for him now if that nominee is elizabeth warren i don't know she's much more quick on her heels she is a fighter i think that his best move for teacher glee and what he would ultimately

do would refuse to debate her and say that he's just going to hold rallies and stead and take his message out to the american public which would be a good message for his base just to say that he's just not giving her time but ultimately if she were the nominee i do not think that he will debate her do you guys think that joe biden's age which a lot of people talk about his energy and the gaffes that we're speaking of which some people talk about that that being evidence of a lack of mental acuity is that all fair game in the 2020 alexion and i mean trump constantly refers to him as sleepy joe chris. so there's not a big age difference between the 2 of them but it's different between a primary and a general election and i would say that either way i think what went on in the democrat of a with whom castro what he did was was completely off the table and that was should not have occurred and i think casseroles we pay a price for that but i will say i mean the most recent attack and i'm sure it means

attack was from jimmy carter who said he could not have been president at the age of 80 that it was too big of a lift and that was back in the seventy's so you can imagine what it's like today and i don't think that. any favors so i is it going to be an issue that is debated i mean it was debated with ever reagan was running it was debated when trump ran the 1st time i mean there's any question it's going to be on the table and is it fair i mean it's fair in the sense that a deal to the with mental acuity and as. joe biden is kind of a mental is mental is a gaffe machine i mean talking about making sure the record player is running for your kids is probably go i mean you had more people googling reppert record player that night than probably in the last decade and it just it's you can always count on whenever biden takes the mike that is going to pop a moment in something strange is going to come out of his mouth that you're going to go and look up and walk back later and i can only imagine what his staff must feel like every time he talks and there's probably just chewing away on their nails hoping they doesn't do something else that's going to make them feel look silly

well i guess chris just pointed out that if there's one good thing that came out of that debate it's that the youth are now introduced to to vinyl again there you go that's why you're right rob do you agree that this is fair game to talk about his mental acuity in this fashion matthew i think it's fair game and the election not just because it's joe biden running i want to say that joe biden is someone that i know personally of course i worked in the campaign and. this is part of what we love about him his his authenticity these things are seen by the members of my party the party faithful as just him being joe biden under. garnished he's not polished he's far from perfect but he is his authentic self and he is full of gaffes it's part of what made for some great memes during the entire obama presidency so you know it's part of why we love them and i want to say that trump makes gaffes too and we even come to love some of those when he made the mistake of

saying about seizing airports in colonial america i think we could all just kind of have a good chuckle at that so you know i think some of these gaffes cancel cancel each other out i don't think they're really taken all that seriously but i agree with chris it was definitely a low blow for who will be on koster to go there and i think that he's going to suffer the same fate as anyone else did who made that same comment in the previous debate they're gone from that debate stage now i expect the same for him soon robin and chris thank you both thank you so much for your time today. you bet thank you thanks much possible new u.s. sanctions against iran and donald trump names his latest national security advisor his 4th since taking office joel rubin joins me now for analysis on these he's a former member of the obama state department and currently president of washington strategy group and he joins me from washington d.c. joel welcome to the program great to be with you matthew so donald trump is named a new national security adviser following the ouster of john bolton robert c.

o'brien is his name he's been a frequent guest on this program he's anti iranian nuclear deal it's fair to say he's pro america 1st when it comes to foreign policy but he wasn't a trump supporter in 2016 what's your reaction to his nomination while this seems to be a smart pick certainly he is someone who is aligned with the president on policy but unlike the immediate predecessor john bolton he actually seems to have a personality that can work with others and in the interagency process as we call it which is managing the state department of defense department the intelligence agency all of those 'd entities it's really important to be good at process and have a thick skin and not push people away and that's what john bolton did and that's what led to his downfall to milly hopefully with o'brien he'll be able to manage the process more effectively and what's your reaction to president trump ordering new sanctions on iran well it feels like it's more of the same sanctions upon

saying the united states we've essentially saying ship out iranian oil from the global markets but they're not creating the kinds of outcomes that the president says he wants in particular a calming of iranian behavior in the region a return to the negotiating table by iran pulling back on their nuclear program all of those objectives of the same since policy the maximum pressure policy is the administration calls it are having the opposite effects and so more sanctions you. yesterday it's not really going to make an impact on iranian behavior were really headed in the wrong direction what direction do you think we need to head in i think we need to flip the switch and get back to the diplomatic dynamic that we had in the obama administration and that was available to the president for the 1st 18 ish months of his administration when if you remember at the time secretary of defense madison secretary state tillerson kept the president from ending the iran

nuclear deal and ever since then we've only seen tensions ratcheting up words and it's not as if iran can't do things in the region can't restart its nuclear program they can do all of this and so when that happens it's very difficult to roll back to a calmer place and we're on the precipice right now of military action and that is not something that americans are ready for and are we at a point yet when we can look back and say that it was a definitive mistake to leave the nuclear deal. i think that from my perspective it's clear but there are people of course who oppose the nuclear deal who are very troubled with the running behavior as they should be a as i am as well and that's why i supported the nuclear deal to try to lock in iran because what we've learned from decades of experience with iran is that there is no military way to lock iranian behavior in it's going to require their

acquiescence and that means getting them to agree at the table to roll back their behavior in that in the case of the iran deal of its nuclear program and that was painstaking and they committed to it and so at this moment right now the question isn't can we bomb iran the question is how are we going to stop iran behavior from getting worse and the military action is not a guaranteed outcome that's going to work we've seen in iraq we see how those types of actions do not guarantee the outcomes of one once but we do know what's worked most recently and that was diplomatic arrangement we need to find a way to get back to the table and cut a new deal so now we're in this new situation where there have been attacks on saudi oil facilities water u.s. options now so in the near term on the oil facilities what's most dangerous and frightening quite frankly about this attack is that this was the largest facility in saudi arabia it's not as if it wasn't protected but drones were able to

get in there undetected and essentially cut its production in half and they're more vulnerable fields out there so we need to get with our allies we need to have them engage the iranians we need to ensure that the saudis don't take any provocative actions and make commitments to the iranians that there are upsides to their pulling back in their behavior and not just more punishment and so the president seems like his his modus operandi. is essentially to add more penalty in hopes it'll break the other side and that's not happening in this case and so it only takes us into a further negative cycle rather then an opportunity to reverse the negative behavior making this even more complicated the white house is saying that the trumpet ministration can't say definitively that it was iran who was behind the attacks but that in all likelihood it was so where does that leave washington in

dealing with tehran. well there are a couple things to look at 1st and foremost secretary of state went out to saudi arabia to confer with the saudis which is upset congress quite frankly because rather than going to congress to brief congress and seek authorization potentially for further action he's going to saudi arabia looking like he's asking for their permission secondarily there are countries in the region like the united arab arab emirates that until recently were very hawkish on iran and are now pulling back they're very concerned about what iran can do so the options are to avoid major conflict the saudis and the u.a.e. and others in the region understand that iran is right there and if iran launch attacks are there there who lies in yemen law she attacks we're going to have to try to change the trajectory and one of the key areas of risk right now is the war in yemen there have been major efforts in congress bipartisan efforts to end american support for the saudi war in yemen that would be

a good starting point to try to pull that back and shift the dynamic and get some behind the scenes talks going that is how you can change this dynamic jol thank you so much for your time today thanks matthew my pleasure and thank you for joining me on this edition of politicking and also thanks to larry king for letting me sit in this chair today remember we love hearing from you so join the conversation on larry's facebook page and as always you can share your thoughts on twitter by tweeting at kings things and using the politicking hash tag i also invite you to subscribe to my channel on matthew cook dot com and that's all for this edition of politicking.

aeroflot russian and lights. you know world of big partisan movies lot and conspiracy it's time to wake up to dig deeper to hit the stories that mainstream media refuses to tell more than ever we need to be smarter we need to stop slamming the door on the bad and shouting past each other it's time for critical thinking it's time to fight for the middle for the truth the time is now we're watching closely watching the hawks.

aeroflot russian and lights. and the big pain years since cross-talk started to ask 10 years i think it's time to shake things up maybe change the branding maybe the format here is what i've been thinking about next season related episodes filmed on an island it's 10 experts fight it out for a trophy what do you think ok a more affordable option $25.00 text for. one red rose another suggestion political jeopardy parody no political will we will literally. be elites. late night show it's a rare form of peace and it's cheap all you need is an old microphone in a printed banner. to leave me with i guess i can do this campbell after

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what he's called the highest ever level of sanctions on iran in the wake of the strikes. that we can't get in washington could have hit the country with 15 strikes of its own but instead chose restraint. identity crisis facebook claims it's a publisher not just a platform and. legal case that could have a major impact on some. of the major international military exercises. taking.