. >> next, austin goolsbee on his last day of work at the white house tells us what he's learned and boy, he sure seems ready to go. >> once you get to washington, there's only so long you can go. i mean there are a number of people there whose trade tables are not in the full, upright and locked position and eventually, you know, you've got to get on with it. i -- look, i just feel bad the president's got to, you know, stay there, around these folks for years to come. ears old. is it the new forty, i don't know. i probably feel about thirty. how is it that we don't act our age? [ marcie ] you keep us young. [ kurt ] we were having too much fun we weren't thinking about a will at that time. we have responsibilities to the kids and ourselves. we're the vargos and we created our wills on legalzoom. finally. [ laughter ] [ shapiro ] we created legalzoom to help you take care of the ones you love. go to legalzoom.com today and complete your will in minutes. at legalzoom.com we put the law on your side. so i took my heartburn pill and some antacids. we're having mexican tonight, so anothe

christina romer gone, austin goolsb goolsbee, friday his last day.cretary geithner as the president said when he first appointed him, was uniquely qualified to handle this. he does understand wall street, spent a lot of time at the new york fed and he is truly an important part of this administrationp. symbolically, if nothing else, it makes good sense for him to be able to stay. i'm not sure substantively what it does. i know michele bachmann on the campaign trail is calling for his immediate resignation after he says he's going to stick around, so i guess that this will also wind up playing somehow into the debate this week and also into the ames straw poll this week. >> have a great show. tim farley host of "morning briefing" on sirius xm. >>> london's "daily mail" reported lyndon johnson was behind the assassination of her husband. said to be in secret audiotapes sealed in a vault at the kennedy lie brashry. revelations of affairs. the paper reports it's in an upcoming special on abc. >>> a sex tape supposedly staring a young marilyn monroe went

. >> analysis this morning from austin goolsbee, outgoing director of the white house's counsel of economic advisers, and former chairman of the federal reserve, alan greenspan. and the rest of our panel, the focus, with the rest of the economy in distress how will our troubles effect the race to the white house? >> when i said change we can believe in, i didn't mean change we can believe in tomorrow. >> with us, msnbcs rachel maddow and alex castellanos. first, the washington debate over jobs, growth and the economy. what can government do? after the toxic debt debate, will america trust their leaders to make the tough choices ahead to cut the deficit? with us, two former presidential nominees for their parties, senator john kerry, democrat of massachusetts and senator john mccain, republican of arizona. >>> good morning. all eyes will be on the stock market tomorrow after the s&ps announcement friday night of the unpresented downed grade of america's credit rating. the ratings agency called the outlook negative signaling another downgrade is possible in the next 12 to 18 months. officials

absolutely so obama let's first talk about his appointment of alan krueger he is going to replace austin goolsbee if everything goes as planned he's touted as a labor economist with expertise in unemployment at a time when obama is about to roll out this jobs plan but as journalist mark ames said today he wrote that this guy is larry summers favorite tennis partner and i think the point of getting at is that this new appointee represents the kind of it's dalgleish mitt d.c. elite so the way you see it does he mark a big departure from past obama economic advisors or can we just fix that kind of more of the same. right well the key for me loring is that of all the president's economic advisers so far i would actually have the most the strongest liberal credentials of any of them and recall that even though christina romer and larry summers were good friends they often disagreed on economic policy and christina romer by the way was actually the kind of an economic moderate until until the debates of two thousand and nine and two thousand and ten when suddenly she found herself on the liberal wing o

as i told him, it will be tough to fill the shoes of austin goolsbee but i have nothing in the -- nothing but confidence in him as he takes on this role. i realize the economic council of advisers to provide valuable information based on the best evidence. based on what will do the most good for the most people in this country. and that is more important than ever right now. we need people in washington to make decisions based on what is best for the country, not what it is best for any political party or special interests. that is how we will get to this time of economic uncertainty -- uncertainty. is that spirit that i will call upon for the coming days. next week i will lay out a series of steps that congress can take immediately to put more money in the pockets of working families and middle class families to make it easier for small businesses to hire people, to put construction crews to work rebuilding the nation's roads and airways and airports and all the other measures that can help to grow this economy. these are bipartisan ideas that should be the proposal that everyone can get

and austin goolsbee to his consider goes on hannity and says let me contex tell you about those thingsnst president obama much as the read my was used against h.w. bush. >> i would never run for president but if i did i would say this is the plan i v. then again there might be some acts of god, which tsunamis, earthquakes, hurricanes coming up the coast right now. i hope all of you will be safe at fox, there megyn, that the president didn't expect. during the burke administration as well as the obama administration when you have gas at $4 a gallon that is going to affect the economy negatively. when you have a congress both sides that are not willing to bulge one bit and when politics becomes more important than the bottom line literally. megyn: is it that, or is it as hannity was contending excessive spending. >> reporter: shaun is absolutely right. the numbers have been there, we have been talking about them for months. the net result is down t million jobs. the president's policy on jobs is like hurricane irene, it blows and leaves wreckage in all directions. it's a problem the pres

if confirmed by the senate kreuger will replace austin goolsbee who is returning to academia. >>> stockstoday. the nasdaq and s&p were higher. investors were encouraged that damage from hurricane irene wasn't worse, that consumer spending is up and that europe's debt crisis may be easing. >>> anderson, it is official. beyonce is pregnant. she confirmed rumors last night at the mtv video music awards. she said she wanted to have a baby at age 30. and she turns 30 next week. she and husband jay-z were married in september 2008. how's that for having a plan and sticking to it? >> good for them. congratulations. time for tonight's the shot. people were glued to the coverage of hurricane irene. one intrepid young reporter from dia doylesdown, pennsylvania. this clip got a lot of air time. if you have seen it, it's worth watching again. >> jane haubrich reporting from doylestown, pennsylvania. the rain is coming down more than it was before. the wind is probably going faster. i think this is just the starting of it. i definitely feel it on my head just a tiny bit of rain. i think that this is

i'll speak with alan greenspan, an obama economic adviser and austin goolsbee about what it all meansain. it's all coming up on "meet the press." thank very much. >> that will do it for us. our thanks to chris warren and tom young. thanks for being here, guys. >> we will see you next week for nbc "nightly news." have a great sunday. take care for now. -- captions by vitac -- www.vitac.com

krueger is expected to be nominated to lead the white house council of economic advisors replacing austin goolsbeet the post this month. >>> americans pulled in more money last month than spent. >> let's check in with jason brooks with kcbs and cbsmoneywatch.com. happy monday. >> reporter: good morning. a report that we like to see. consumer spending rising .8% in july. that reversed a drop from the prior month. saw a sizable spending on durable goods like cars and computers while services were down a bit. consumers make up two-thirds of the economy so we do need to see some lift there. and it's a decent indication that perhaps the 3rd quarter is better than the 2nd quarter. we have seen a number of other economic signs showing improvement. slight improvement in the job market. if the august jobs report which comes out on friday is a little bit better than expected, then maybe the 2nd quarter has gotten bet -- the 3rd quarter has gotten better than the 2nd quarter. the economy only grew 1% of the 2nd quarter and that led to fears of a potential double dip. apple continues to win in its patent batt

friday was the last day for austin goolsbee who did head up the president's council on economic advisors. really geithner was sort of the last man standing on his economic team. certainly the argument for continuity is there. the president asked timothy geithner to stay on and we're told that he'll be here into the fall of 2012. of course very important, there is a little election right around there, carol. >> you know, i'm just thinking about it. timothy geithner has his share of critics who want him to go, but when you think the president would have to nominate a new treasury secretary, which would have to be approved by congress, and can you imagine what that would be like? >> it would be quite the fight and you can imagine just the optics of going through that in a time right now where people are raising concerns about whether there might be a double-dip recession. we should say here at the white house, officials say they do not believe that is going to happen. of course that times are tough, that they don't think that's going to happen, carol. >> brianna keilar, live in washington,

the guy behind that idea is alan krueger, he would replace austin goolsbee who decided to leave in june. >>> and then good news for the economy. a new report says personal spending was up almost 1% in july, and that translates to an increase of $88 billion. new car sales could be the biggest reason for that jump. >>> and the man convicted of blowing up the plane over lockerbie, scotland. he was found under the care of his family in tripoli. the son says he could die anytime. the bombing of the jet liner killed 177 people. he was released and returned to libya on compassionate grounds. much more on nic robertson's exclusive story when he joins us from tripoli at 2:30 eastern time. >>> and then all the astronauts could leave the space station soon. they could run out of supplies. the spacecraft carrying tons of supplies crashed after launch last week. there are two crafts already at the station that would be used for the evacuation. >>> we're just getting word that polygamist leader warren jeffs is in critical condition. he was hospitalized after refusing to eat. as you know jeffs was con

earlier i spoke to austin goolsbee, i asked him where he thinks we are in this recovery. >> i think wherey is we had a month of encouraging data that came in better than expected, but i always say when the numbers were bad, i'll reiterate again, when they're better than expected, never make too much out of any one month's numbers because they move around a lot. even in this report you saw they revised up quite substantially the last two months, so they weren't as bad as was first thought. i think where we are in the recovery is, if you take a step back, over the last 17 months the private sector added 2.4 million jobs. that's pretty good. we've got a long way to go, however, and it's not near enough. jenna: so if it was a baseball, if it was a baseball game, would you place the recovery in, like, the fourth inning? the second? where are we? >> look, i don't know. try not to predict the future, that's my, that's one of my mottos. the thing is it's not a secret that we took some heavy blows the first half of this year, i think. with gas prices, with europe, with the events in japan, and so

host: let's listen to austin goalan goolsbee. >> rating agencies thatid not make a $2 trillion errornd what warren buffett said, i think with the s&p downgrade based on questionable mathematics is the root of why the treasury said that. if you get away from -- was a mistake in what they did, the broader point being, we've just gone through a period where members of the u.s. government were standing up and saying maybe it would be ok if the u.s. default on some of its obligations. that's a deeply unsettling moment. host: how typical is it for people to protest when they get the downgrade? is it normal to see the leaders of the nation and people like david axelrod going after their and waging a campaign against s&p's decision? guest: is extremely common. what we've seen in europe, and in many ways, is a preview to what has happened here. there have been some furious riles with the ratings agencies. this is almost routine story downgrade to go like this. -- routine for a downgrade to go like this. sometimes there's an element of truth and sometimes it's the natural response to push back

host: let's listen to austin goalan goolsbee. >> rating agencies that did not make a $2 trillion error and what warren buffett said, i think with the s&p downgrade based on questionable mathematics is the root of why the treasury said that. if you get away from -- was a mistake in what they did, the broader point being, we've just gone through a period where members of the u.s. government were standing up and saying maybe it would be ok if the u.s. default on some of its obligations. that's a deeply unsettling moment. host: how typical is it for people to protest when they get the downgrade? is it normal to see the leaders of the nation and people like david axelrod going after their and waging a campaign against s&p's decision? guest: is extremely common. what we've seen in europe, and in many ways, is a preview to what has happened here. there have been some furious riles with the ratings agencies. this is almost routine story downgrade to go like this. -- routine for a downgrade to go like this. sometimes there's an element of truth and sometimes it's the natural response to push ba