said that he does plan to sit down with former president clinton to talk about his trip to north korea and we're also told by a senior administration official that former president clinton will be debriefed by the national security team. lou? >> and president clinton showing a lot of class and constraint. he said nothing upon his return, whatsoever. did he? >> reporter: he did not say anything at all. perhaps he'll talk in the future, but letting today be the day where the family can speak out about enjoying, you know, their relatives who have returned home, talk about their experiences, and for now, he sort of stays in the background a bit. >> dan lothian, thank you very much, from the white house. >>> president obama tonight is facing rising criticism of his domestic agenda, particularly health care. >>> three senate democrats today said republican opponents of that legislation are con cocking what they call phony arguments. but critics are refusing to be intimidated. refusing to be silenced at town hall meetings. >> kill the bill! >> president obama even accused cable television hosts of inflaming opposition to health care. >> t

unfortunately, when the clinton administration came in, they backed way away from the effort that had been made and, really, try to deal with great britain and libya to allow abdel basset mohamed al-megrahi to be tried in scotland and i think it is very unlikely it proves, many of whom were around at the time of the shift in policy will want to do anything to raise the profile of it now. >> eric: talking about the cutting a deal for the trial en scotland and what about a deal to free megrahi and great britain saying there was not a deal though gadhafi's son says they raised his name in meetings when talking about doing begin with britain. >> senator shoupers right to be out raged at the hero's welcome they give him when he returned to libya and we should be outraged the government of great britain in letting this mass murderer go free, you know, the clinton administration agreed back in 1999/2000, scotland could try megrahi, knowing that scotland didn't have the death penalty, had he been tried in the u.s., if we could have apprehended him we wouldn't be worried about clemency now. >>

ambassador bolton, i recall during the clinton administration -- and we are obviously talking about president clinton here -- that there was a sort of similar agreement. wasn't there some sort of trade in return for inspection? in other words, north korea got something in return. >> absolutely. and that was really caused by the intervention of former president jimmy carter who went to north korea in 1994 with the access yens of the -- access yens of the clinton administration, not happy acquiecense led to the agreement called the agreed framework that you're referring to. that basically provided for the construction of whitewater nuclear reactors, shipments of heavy fuel oil in exchange for one of many promises north korea has made to give up its nuclear program. shepard: is it possible history is repeating itself here, that there's a quid pro quo here? >> i doubt that. i think the administration has been very clear since these two journalists were detained that they wanted to treat this separately as a humanitarian mission. by all accounts it looks like they've succeeded in that regard. keep

at the end of clinton's administration, there was talk he might go to p'yongyang.im jong-il has finally gotten that visit. he got three hours with the former president and husband of the current secretary of state, pouring out whatever message you wanted to give to president obama. even if there is nothing else behind the scenes, i judge north korea to be the victor. sean: is a ludicrous to suggest he went as a private citizen? is it wrong that -- here is the moral dilemma. the 12 years of hard labor were given to the girls, but we have to give legitimacy. they got the u.s. to agree with one-on-one negotiations. if it was my family member, i would probably want the u.s. to do this, but i kind of think that is probably a bad precedent. >> it is a difficult discussion -- difficult decision for the president. as commander in chief, as president, he has to look at the bigger picture. the bigger picture is the security of all americans, not making millions of tourists overseas more advantages targets for terrorism. kim jong-il has an advanced nuclear weapons program. wh

this goes back to the clinton administration when al megrahi was first taken.e were arguing who would charge him first. whether it would be the u.k., scotland, or us. the clinton administration agreed that scotland could carry the prosecution and that was a very important decision for many reasons, one is that they don't have the death penalty. if we had prosecution in this country, we would not be talking about clemency. this is because of our agreement against double jeopardy. i think this is it for him. greta: i thought that that has something to do with us trying someone twice. this is light being tried for something in a state court and a federal court. i don't see how double jeopardy prevents us here unless we cut a side deal. why would we have done that? >> i have to go back and look at the original deal. we might have given up our prosecutorial authority in order to make sure that he was only tried in one place. i think of that was a mistake but what you see happening today is a further example of that mistake and an example of why treating terrorism as

>> at the end of the clinton administration, bill clinton decided he wanted to be a real guy. and so he started creating national monuments as an afterthought. they all do it towards the end, the democrats. so i was part of a group that got the government to create the sonoran desert national monument, which is 480,000 square acres, a big piece. in doing that, at the end i figured i'd either have to kill somebody, which was not a good decision because then they put you in a cage, or write this rant. so i went and wrote that. kind of a detoxed. >> i'm trying to picture you with bruce babbitt and a bunch of government officials. >> we go back a long way. he doesn't like the image either. i have known him for a long tiger tees to be the governor. arizona used to be a small state, you know. >> you basically were lobbying the government. >> yes. the government created that monument because they cut a deal in california. so they had to give up some other land as part of the deal. this land is under the wing of where fighter planes come in to train at the barry goldwater range. and s

and it started with the clinton administration. the clinton administration to bush 43, now the obama administration. >> jonathan? >> well, i'm a little uncomfortable. you know, with all due respect to the victims' families and also to you, dylan, you know, until -- apparently there's a story in the guardian newspaper about how there are people who are accusing prime minister gordon brown of being the one who's pushing british oil interests with libya. and that's what led to this decision. and i would like to see more reporting on that before we go the extra length to say that this one man was released so that britain could get now 80% of its oil from those reserves. >> here's the statement, in fact -- >> i think what we're looking at is it's hard to identify another reason why this happened. >> but then it gets to my other point, and that's something that the moms there on the panel, i'm sorry, i can't remember your name -- >> kathleen. >> kathleen. you raised a very good point. how many other people have been released due to compa

under the clinton administration in the private sector we created 21.8 million new jobs. that was 214,000 per month. why is that figure important? because you need 100,000 to stay even. what happened during the bush administrations? eight years, they created an average per month 96-months, 4,240 jobs. that meant they were 96,000 short of staying even. is there any wonder why the legacy of the last administration was so dire? economists warned us that it would take longer to dig out of the hole. but stopping the economy slide, which appears to have happened, is the necessary first step in turns around unemployment. obviously, a great deal of work remains to be done. we're not out of the woods yet but we're on the right path. all of those facts show that democrats were right. and republicans didn't see the value apparently in the recovery and reinvestment act. but it continues to fund job creating projects across america. it continues to keep public servants like police officer teachers on their jobs, and continues to spark economic demand. let me say although we're not wher

if you challenged the clinton administration, they went after you, your family, your business. it is a viciousness that you see on the left. glenn: i mean, look, i'm a political talk show host and anchor. i have said vicious things. that's different than the administration coming out and saying these kinds of things. you have an official endorsement of this kind of talk is dangerous in this country, is it not, frank? >> this is what happens when there is no accountability. the republicans are so weak in washington that it is so hard for them to hold the democrats accountable and the american people are legitimately afraid. they're scared that they're going to lose their freedoms. they're losing their economic freedoms over the past six months and now they're afraid they're going to lose their healthcare freedom, and that generates this passion i have seen all across the country. glenn: frank, help me out. you have been to these town halls, right? or you have been to some of these meetings, have you not? >> i have been to the town halls, and even better than that, glenn, i have

greta: during the clinton administration, that failed, too. >> they came up with a bill almost as big as that, and they did it behind closed doors, and they came to congress and said, "pass this big." there were turf battles that broke out, and they wanted to have their way, and it collapsed. it was kind of a top-Ñidown exercise, and this administration is haunted by this because there are so many clinton administration people there. they want intellectual ownership of this, and they want to feel connected. greta: any lobbyists helped to put this together? >> i would say maybe a few. greta: any citizens helping out on this? thank you very much. thank you. up next, a load of this. now, this is the health-care bill that everyone is talking about. i can hardly lift it. it is not like reading, and that is the least of the problems. we are going to report, and then you can decide. we are going to redo part of it. and 50 million americans, all galling for the exit door. the president is not going to like this, at all -- all going like this, at all -- all going [ female announcer ] introduci

and kim jong-il came very close during the end of the clinton administration to getting bill clintonr to that country. madeleine albright and bill clinton's nuclear envoy -- or north korean envoy at that time, wendy sherman, 19 days before the clinton administration ended, bill clinton was going to go to north korea and essentially sign some semblance of a nuclear deal with north korea. that got disrupted by other issues, particularly middle east peace talks at the time so that gain never played out. to some degree this has been sort of a delayed movie of bringing the big prize. kim jong-il has always wanted to get a president of bill clinton's stature over. and one thing i think is really important is that barack obama, his magic is being able to speak beyond dictators to publics. north korea is a place that hasn't really worked. but bill clinton is the one guy who does penetrate north korea. he's extremely popular there. this helps us but it also gives kim jong-il a huge prize. those photo-ops are going to be a big issue for kim jong-il and he's going to want to show some positive

and he served in clinton administration as u.s. ambassador to the european union as well as in other capacities. recently, he's been working in the area of holocaust-area issues, restitutions and so on. and has written a very well received book on that subject called "imperfect justice: looted assets, slave labor and the unfinished business of world war ii." the third member of our panel up here who will be participating in the discussion during this session is bruce reed. bruce reed currently president of the domestic -- democratic leadership council, famously served al gore as chief speechwriter when gore was in the senate from 1985 to 1989. became a part of the clinton/gore campaign in 1992, serving as deputy campaign manager for policy, and then for eight years of clinton's presidency, serving as domestic policy advisor or close to domestic policy advisor during the first term and particularly associated with the clinton reforms in the area of welfare reform. and then finally and finally republican in this group today, margaret

forgive me, jeff, with some problem with the clinton administration as well. those 12 years of bush plus rates again before that. i am a little cautious about criticism but i think we really need to look hard at what we have to do and there is a lot that house to be done and we will have a chance to discuss it at greater length [applause] >> i want to say what an honor it is to me with this distinguished group of pple and my job here is to briefly open up a very big questions like capitalism v socialism and things like that. [laughter] and 2. dodd as if it was not sufficiently noticed, 2008 was the year of the global financial meltdown, that was also the 160 anniversary of the communist manifesto publication. [laughter] who knew that the capitalist would celebrate the anniversary by shooting themselves? [laughter] it is always folly to say this is the end of capitalism. you have to admire it is so dynamic, resilience, it comes back and is terrific and that white and reno said jokes about the economists that rrectly predicted "meltdown" out of last three recess

they use the defeat of health care as a vehicle for basically painting the clinton administration and democrats in congress as incompetent and untrustworthy. they are not going to be able to do that this time. partly because there's enough momentum behind health care, partly because the public is much more ready to do something about health care than they were in 1994. >> but secretary rice, you say that even though we see what's happened to the president's poll numbers both his own poll numbers and specific numbers on health care just over the last two or three months, clearly there's been a meaningful dip in the president's individual numbers and on health care. i guess i'm not as convinced that republicans can't use this as a galvanizing fight as they look to regain some momentum. >> they will definitely try to do that, carlos. remember, the republican party today is very, very defensive. their major spokespeople are people like dick cheney or sean hannity, rush limbaugh. they don't have the stature they once had. they don't stant stand with anything. they haven't come out with the

administration. >> anne, if bill clinton was auditioning for a surrogate role in the obama health care campaign, to go out there on the road and help him sell it, i would say he failed in that particular audition. >> yeah, i don't think that's going to happen. i don't think it was going on happen in any event. i think they're going to leave him doing diplomacy and rescuing people in foreign countries. >> thank you, ann corner but and jeanne cummings. chris matthews will be back monday at 5:00 and 7:00 eastern for more "hardball." right now it's time for "the ed show" with ed schultz. >>> i'm ed schultz. this is "the ed show." good evening, americans. live from 30 rock in new york it's "the ed show" on msnbc. tonight the president's in big sky country selling his health care plan. he was all hat and plenty of cattle. the governor of montana will join me in just a moment. plus, the dumber than joe the plumber crazies are ratcheting up the madness. congressman adam schiff, he drew a crowd of 3,000 people to his town hall. he'll join me to talk about it at the bottom of the hour, what he ran into. >>>

look at what happened with the clinton administration and the bush administration..wo representative policies, democrats and republicans, democrats we had higher taxes, 39.6 tax rate in the clinton administration and the economy grew, the longest peacetime economic boost in husry. history. >> we keep talking about the old days. >> that tells you that we followed the policies of the past, the clinton path, we might be able to find our way out of this. >> george -- >> let's look at why health care alone might derail. >> do you think, julie, that we have a basic right to health care and that it has to be provided by government? or is health care a personal responsibility? >> dennis, i think health care is the most fundamental right and if people have the right to attend public schools in this country, taxpayer expense, they certainly -- they certainly -- >> give me a break.k. >> let me tell you, one of the problems the health care industry, we've got the best health care in the world. and it needs some fixing, but we don't need to throw the baby out with the bath water.

bill clinton consulted with the obama administration, with his wife, secretary of state hillary clinton, and decided if he was going to go he had to be sure there was going to be a successful outcome. i think what we are seeing is a lot of people working very hard for a long period of time and bill clinton pushed that ball over the goal line. >> reporter: you talked about the former president consulting with his wife who is also the current secretary of state, but the obama administration has been careful in saying this was a personal visit, not a formal administration representative, but there are reports that president clinton may have talked to kim jong-il about other issues beyond the release of these women and other americans being held in north korea. is that a problem for the obama administration? >> not necessarily. this shows great despairty between how the north koreans reported this meeting and how the u.s. government reported the meeting. an entire range of issues were discussed and president clinton conveyed a personal message from obama. the state department denied that pr

the clinton administration did a good job of resisting british pressure to normalize relations with gadhafiade basically a plea bargain agreement with gadhafi. he would give up terrorism and they would relax pressure on the issues surrounding the lockerbie case. now it's up to the obama administration to take a position and perhaps to finish this act. right now, we're still in the plea bargain phase where gadhafi gets a pass because he has decided to stop terrorism. >> and also stop any kind of nuclear experiments, his nuclear program, which the bush administration was able to trade down. you know, the other thing about what gadhafi has done, though, according to the families, is that he's got oil and he's got a lot to trade. and that is their suggestion, that this is really a very mercantile decision. >> well, i don't think that the u.s. administrations, beginning with the clinton administration, have really been bought off by the oil interests. i don't think that's fair. i think, internationally, qaddafi has been given a lot of slack because of the importance of oil, but i don't think the

. >> that was the way to do it, which was not to go back to the problems of clinton administration and let congress. chris: most people here are thinking something will pass. one measure is whether the president will get something big enough to be called historic, a historic victory. he set health care out there as his major going goal this year. we asked 12 of our regulars, at the end of the year, will obama be seen as a change agent? in the same they say f.d.r. was and ronald reagan was. and a bare majority, believe he'll end in that category. seven say yes. and five say no. and do you think he'll have something to sign and it'll be historically significant? >> lots of democrats are giving him problems on the plan but they could if necessary pass a pared down bill. so he could have a signing ceremony and victory. chris: you're with it is historic. >> we'll stick with where we are. here's the thing. all of us think there will be a bill signed by the end of the year. and there will be something in this that the obama presidency will be able to claim as historic. i think it'll be. they'

senator kennedy was also not in favor of welfare reform, signature issues of bill clinton's administration. he resisted that. it passed. and the results of all that depend very much on your point of view. in many instances people believe it's helped to move the country in a different direction and in helping those who are less fortunate than others find their way in the workplace. for all his wealth, and it was considerable, no one knows for sure, very privately held, but there are a lot of cousins, nephews and nieces, that continue to livo of the dividends, very privately managed from a small park avenue office in new york. it is obviously in the billions of dollars right now. for all of his wealth and all of his privilege, senator kennedy was the most consistent, outspoken advocate on behalf of those who really had no representatives. he was the champion o those who had none was the expression today, used by president obama. michael, i think it's fair to say, however you feel about senator kennedy's ideaiology, he always walked the walk and taed the talk when he got on the senate floor.

. >> it started in the clinton administration. >> but it really got spun out of control during the rumsfeld years many one of the things we have to do is reconstitute the navy acquisition force, get economies everywhere we can, train them up on what a lineal foot of weld ought to cost, what a pound of steele ought to cost. what is that weapons program really worth? i'll spend time with senior navy brass looking at korean shipyards, some of the best in the world. we build some of the world's best ships but we can do it better. we have the world's greatest ship builders but need better tools in their hands. we need to work hard within the industry to help them control their costs. if it means government furnished equipment, if i can show the taxpayers we're getting a better ship with less money by furnishing equipment to that shipyard then i'm more than willing to do that, too. >> the navy used to specify specifically what should go into each ship so there was a certain degree of commonality, so virtually the pumps, fans and motors were -- >> we're getting back to that. >> is that the key? >>

times" that the north koreans have a lot of nostalgia for the clinton administration. >> you hear thater president clinton was not the first choice. who would have been? >> we're hearing from that north korea balked at the first two suggestions. president obama's administration offered to send former vice presidential gore to start, the founder of current tv, where the two women work. she also says that new mexico governor bill richardson was offered. he helped secure a release of an american in 2003. >>> a big name in the senate has come out against the nomination of sonia sotomayor. john mccain says sotomayor is a judicial activist. >> an individual who doesn't appreciate the common sense limitations of judicial power in our democratic system of government ultimately lacks a key qualification for a life time appointment to the bench. for this reason, and no other, i'm unable to support judge sotomayor's nomination. >> the senate could begin debate on sotomayor's confirmation. >>> you know what? doctors are doing as well as they have done since november. a three-week rally. we're feel

and then health care on top of it, it is not like this problem just started. >> when the clinton administrationeft, there was a surplus. when the bush administration left, there was a $500 billion deficit. that being said, you are right, there is an increasing deficit. we live in the real world. we have to pay for it one way or another. if you have massive increases in spending, which are proposed by stimulus and health care, you have to do something. democrats are looking for a way to get out of that jam. martha: the three most unappealing words for democrats were "no new taxes." we all remember the saturday night live routine. what do we have here? >> we have the president in a pickle. he said in the campaign that he would not raise taxes. now his senior economic adviser is putting a huge crack in his plans. it will be new taxes, not only on the rich, but for every american. directly or indirectly. forget about health care. what about the trillions of dollars added to the deficit just on the economic program? look at what has happened as you reported earlier on the town hall meetings. people

clinton. that... i understand that the north koreans themselves raised this idea and the obama administration seemed to agree with it. the other possibility was former president george h.w. bush, but clinton was deemed to be closer to the obama administration, a more appropriate figure. >> rose: there's also... go ahead, glenn. >> my understanding is that gore was kind of the choice the administration offered. north korea didn't want gore, they wanted someone else like clinton and it's not that it's any kind of disrespect of gore will, but becauseore was so closely associated with these two journalists, they worked for a ty program that he co-founded that perhaps the north koreans viewed him less as a representative of the united states and more of a representative of a company and therefore they preferred someone like president clinton. >> rose: it clearly--... from what you have said, kim jong il was looking for a way out of this. this had become bigger and more of a problem than it had anything else, correct? >> i think that's true. and... go ahead, glenn. >> i agree. i would agree with that. that..

secretary, you were the defense secretary in the clinton administration, when the embassy bombings took place. and i can't tell you how emotional the moment was today. i was with hillary clinton at the site of what was our embassy here. it was a 14-year-old boy, michael macria whose parents were both killed. he's being raised by his grandparents. and hillary clinton said to him, with his devotion to education, she was going to tell president obama what he is accomplished so far and what he wants to achieve. was it a real moment, as we stood in this empty area, which has been turned into a memorial park. what have we learned and what have we accomplished in these 11 years that would better protect our assets abroad, other countries, and our, of course, our homeland against these terrorists. >> well, andrea, i remember that day very well, and i remember when the bodies, the american diplomats who lost their lives in those two bombings came back to andrews air force base and we had a chance to meet the families. my wife, janet, and i spent time with all of the families, and it was a very e

the clinton administration blocked that and as a result of that recently mexico slapped tariffs against 90 different u.s. products. that is beginning to bite . they are cutting the labor force because there is a 10 percent tariff on them and they can't compete with the other products. the administration said before the summit, they don't expect anything resolvedful even though businesses have appeal to both of their leader to move it off of the back burner and get something done. >> canada is actually america's largest trading partner. what about the controversy over the buy american provision. >> this is coming to a head. not only hurting canada but hurting american. let me explain the canadian hurt first. under the stim tim bill all iron and teal and marfed goods have to be bought in america. meaning purchased there. that shuts out the canadians. it is shutting out some u.s. businesses who can't figure out if components that they have built elsewhere can be used in the self same infrastructure projects. canadian business representatives and u.s. business representatives are appealing

we haven't had anybody there since the clinton administration, so at least bill clinton can now go back and his wife and others in the state department can debrief them and ask him, what was the guy like and it will be the closest we've come to him. in that sense, it takes us a couple of inches forward. >> is that the case in general, that if you run into a thorny situation, you have americans being held captive, you've got to try and negotiate their release, with a country who on one hand, you're trying to use the stick to make them behave, how helpful is it then to have a well-known emissary show up, do photo ops, negotiation, and have a happy outcome? >> i think it's helpful because it begins to open up another channel. josh bolten, bush ambassador to the u.n., saying this is negotiating with terrorists, even though this is a nation state. the problem is their policy failed. it utterly failed. moved toward the development of six nuclear devices in the period when we had no contact. this administration has a different policy. a policy of engagement, even with really bad guys. and the

that he went in on the bag with china and treasons and trying to buy our election during the clinton administration and gave marc rich a pardon, one of the most e sill men to ever walk the face of the earth, and now the black panthers who carry guns into precincts should not be prosecuted but to say that he is going to have a special prosecutor today and i'm going with it. who's running the show here? for the first time here, i have asked myself, is barack obama really in control? either he is disingenuous, which i wish not to believe about the president of the united states, or maybe the question is really who is in control here? glenn: explain with what makes you say that again? >> he has said his policy is -- the attorney general is appointed by him. let's understand this thing over here you did is not one party. glenn: oh, i know. >> this is everybody doing this. glenn: i think it is on wednesday we are doing some things on some of the framework that has been put in. it was put in by the bush administration. >> washington is corrupt. washington has made itself the enemy of the american people i

i have to watch the clinton administration and now have to see president obama shaking his hand. maybe we're the guilty ones and we had this report wrong all along. gregg: this has to do with oil and politics and has nothing to do with justice. >> 100% right. for 20 years, i have dealt with our government. if the united states wants something done, it is done. all this rhetoric from secretary of state clinton, please do not insult my intelligence. gregg: you think that this president was also complicity in allowing him to go free? >> ad best, he was. at worst, we're losing complete control in the world. gregg: some families feel strongly that he should be released because they are better than terrorists. we have mercy and compassion. >> if you take that philosophy, you will continue to lose. gregg: thank you for coming by today. our condolences. it is a tough day. what do you think? should it convicted terrorists have been released today? log on to our website. tens of thousands of people have voted already. we want to hear from you. and least one major area now under a hurricane

>>> it wasn't an administration official who rescued the women but former president bill clinton, whooped into north korea. his administration negotiated on at communist country's nuclear program in the 1990s but why send the former president now? brian todd has the answer. >>> who is the reclusive leader of north korea? kim jong-il is accused of letting his people starve while he enjoys the joy brigades. i'm suzanne malveaux. wolf blitter is off today. you are in "the situation room." >>> so, why did it take a former u.s. president to win freedom for the two journalists held in north korea? could the obama white house pull this off with its own officials? our cnn political correspondent candy crowley is joining me now. candy what do each side get out of this going forward? >> not sure it is not so much about politics as getting the two women out of north korea, that has been what the behind the scene negotiations have been about. what does north korea get? north korea gets the photo ops coming out of that country. bill clinton very, very popular overseas, very, very revered. and neve

also famous for sinking the nomination of lani guinier for--during the early years of the clinton administration, a civil rights appointee. so he's a--he's an anti-affirmative action activist as well. ralph reed is also very familiar to your viewers, i'm sure. he was--built the christian coalition into a major political powerhouse in the 1990s. c-span: where'd you get this idea? >> guest: i got this idea--i was with the sunday magazine of the los angeles times and i had written a number of pieces about the conservative movement. in fact, i'd written about bill kristol and bill bennett and charles murray at one point, sort of the early stream, really, of the compassionate conservatism we hear so much today. they were using a lot of those same ideas in the welfare reform debate. but i--i wrote about libertarians, and i wrote--wrote about pieces of the movement. and i found, brian, that it wasn't being covered in depth. it was fresh territory. and i found it quite interesting. i think there is a lot of working press--there is--does tend to be a liberal bias. and there does--and certainly among libe

the clinton administration had a single payer. >> it had a gigantic bureaucracy between the doctor andnt. there is a lot of interest in single payer. everything ought to be on the table. but the bureaucracy which was set up on the clinton plan that was detailed in that chart with all the agencies, boards, and commissions, so what we're talking about now is totally different. >> as you know, your role in that debate back in 1993-1994, it's one of the things that the man now challenging you in the democratic primary, conman joe sestak, raises when he questions whether arlen specter is really a democrat or whether you decided for political survival reasons you had to leave the republican party and go to the democratic party. we had congressman sestak on this show. this is what he said about you. >> is he a good enough democrat? >> i'm not sure he's a democrat yet. what i need to know is what are the principles you're running for? >> he is suggesting you were running from the democrat party and he wasn't sure you were a democrat. >> i've been voting more with the democrats all during my te

the clinton administration had single pair. gigantic bureaucracy between the doctor and the patient. there is a lot of interest in single payer. everything ought to be on the table. but the bureaucracy which was set up on the clinton plan that was detailed in that chart with allst agencies, boards and commissions. so what we're talking about now is totally different. >> as you know, your role in that debate back in 1993-1994, it's one of the things that the man now challenging you in the democratic primary raised what he questions is whether arlen inspector is really a democrat or whether he decided for political survival reasons he had to leave the republican party and go to the democratic party. this is what he said about you, sir. >> is he a good enough democrat? >> i'm not sure he's a democrat yet. >> what is the principal you're running for. he is suggesting you were not a democrat. >> i've been with the democrats all during my tun you're. pro-choice, support a woman's right to choose. i broke with bush on embryonic stem-c

in the mid-1990s, in the second clinton and administration, we had this notion that we would set up these things, and information sharing would be a way to cooperate, and this is where the ownership of the infrastructure came out, and we are still working on that model from the late clinton administration, and maybe it is time for a new model. >> alan? >> i think there is a tiny spark that might need blowing on to make a fire, but i think there is a tiny spark to a new partnership, which is along the lines of what ken was talking about, which is that the government has knowledge and it does not share very well about what the actual threat level is. it has its own team. in a certain knowledge that only one other organization in the world has, which is visa, because they clean up after all the major attacks on the credit card companies, but they are at the center of excellence that does not get into product, and what if they were to change this for the products we buy and the services we by on a continuing basis? there is knowledge about the attack. if you do not have something to fix it, i

dialogue with us. >> governor richardson was ambassador to the united nations during the clinton administrati administration to the bigger picture. why is north korea dealing with governor bill richardson and bill clinton and not hillary clinton and the obama administration? richard bush is the director for center for northeast asian policy studies. first of all, does it matter who the north koreans are talking to as long as they're talking to somebody in the united states? >> dialogue is better than no dialogue. the important question is the basis of the discussion and i see no signs that north korea has moved off the position it took earlier this year, that it doesn't want a return to the six-party talks and that it wants to be treated as a nuclear power. that's a non-starter for the obama administration. >> would that suggest then that talking to bill clinton, bill richardson, that this is a side show? that they're not changing their position and we're talking to these other people and you guys can figure out what it means. >> this is a pattern we've seen before. when they aren't getting the resprons the

the administration outsmarted itself in an effort not to repeat the clinton administration with health care. they decided to leave it as an open question. that's why they were so eager to have this very short time frame for passing the legislation. it has backfired spectacularly. right now the president is out trying to sell a nonexistent plan. and in that open space, all the concerns and fears about people, about all the subjects including the national deficit and the national debt come flooding into that open space. >> hank, the president and his press secretary had to acknowledge a misspeak i guess is the way to put it. at the time he's talking about misrepresentation in that very speech, is this simply going to put further weight on sinking poll numbers for this president? >> it's going to be hard to get change done. any successful president has broken with the past administration, created his own way and taken on congress when necessary. the scholars are clear about that. the problem is his agenda is too ambitious for the amount of time he's been in office. people are nervous abou

andrea, as you know, this process of rehabilitating gadhafi started ten years ago in the clinton administration, through the bush administration that really moved it forward it. the oil interests were just too strong. so 21 years after that pan am flight went down, basically, it's business as usual for gadhafi and libya and that's really the story here. >> want to ask you about the cia acknowledging or at least there are certain confirmations that we're getting, the new york typist, "the washington post" that the cia program, that secret assassination program that was briefed to congress by leon panetta after seven year, an on again and off again program, that they were subcontracting, at one stage at least, to blackwater, the controversial contractor. what is the instance of that, if any? >> well, i think there's two significances. one is sort of a public debate, when you hear the term blackwater, this private entity that's being involved, and the term "assassination," it gets people riled up. but the actually the fact that the u.s. government was trying to find all ways to identify al qaeda a

clinton's trip to north korea. and tonight's presidential summit in mexico. we'll map out the administration's pressing global challenges in an exclusive interview with susan wright, the u.s. ambassador to the united nations. >>> congress heads home to face america divided over health care changes. to discuss the policy and political divides with two key senators. john cornyn of texas, dick durbin of illinois. >> our american dispatch from eugene, oregon. puts the squeeze on many support organizations just when struggling parents and hungry children need the help most. the state of the union report for sunday, august 9th. >>> president obama heads to mexico tonight for a summit with the leaders of mexico and canada, a reminder of the mounting international pressures even as he struggles to sell his top domestic priority health care here at home. >>> greater cooperation fighting mexico's deadly drug world. and elsewhere on the stage, afghanistan, iran, and north korea all present the white house with difficult policy choices. the full and often frustrating list for the president and for his amb

i saw that a little bit, no news organization tie-in in the clinton administration. this time was the lorail corporation headed by bernie schwarz. bernard schwarz contributed $632,000 in soft money to the clinton organization and the democratic party in the 1996 and 1998 election cycles. and in 1996, clinton granted lorail and hughes a waiver to permit them to help china launch satellites. and the u.s. government justice department investigated lorail because of charges that they actually provided china with technologies that were propriety to the u.s. bill: he couldn't do that because he gave the money. >> i don't think there is ever a quid pro -- quid pro quo, but i think the yachting together, the vacationing together, the speaking together, appearing at events together led to a long time association between him and that corporation. bill: now we have barack obama who under his administration is granted $139 billion in very low interest loans to general electric, who now has to pay $50 million to the government because it defrauded investors. i mean, how can we --

as i recall what happened in the bill clinton administration i thought, there was a movie over it? was going to say wag the tail. wag the dog. >> there is a new movie from england called "in the loop" telling stories along similar lines. if you want to be entertained there are some things that could entertain you. >> machiavellianism is on the present. thank you for letting me sound smart with multisyllabic words. thank you. >> thank you. >>> naked and confused. it is happening more than you think on airplanes. what the feds do on this case. >>> new details of a crash of a plane and helicopter over the hudson. we have a better idea why these two workers have been suspended. did you hear what they did? did you hear the conversation? we've got it for you. reading about washington these days... i gotta ask, what's in it for me? i'm not looking for a bailout, just a good paying job. that's why i like this clean energy idea. now that works for our whole family. for the kids, a better environment. for my wife, who commutes, no more gettin' jerked around on gas prices... and for me, well,

i was involved as assistant secretary of state for the middle east in the clinton administration when we first opened that effort. that was designed to get him out of the terrorism business and a toned get those two terrorists to trial, a scottish trial in the netherlands. we brokered that deal with the british, specifically with understandings from the british that the scottish trial would take place in the netherlands. if they were convicted as megrahi was, he would be incarcerated in scotland and held there. the idea that after eight years he could be released seems to me to go fundamentally against the assurance that we negotiated and received from the british government. back in 1998, this particular case believed to be quite angry as bob mueller in letting them go. >> kelly: you see that it's highly objectionable and so many feels lost their loved ones aboard that flight, what can america do moving forward in terms of the relationship with libya, with khadafy? >> there is not a lot we can do about megrahi at this point. british let him go. now with a hero's welcome in libya. the