doug brinkley joins me from washington.e's a presidential historian and a professor of history at rice university and i'm pleased to have him on this program. welcome. >> thanks, charlie. >> charlie: set for us the context of tse tapes and how many were they and what did they say. >> many times they focus on the grassy knoll or book depository or the memorial hospital but the tapeof air force one and flying all t just craziness that ensued in dallas people trying to get kennedy's body on air force one, get the nurse lady, lyndon johnson and these tapes pick up a t of that. the warren commission had access to it but mysteriously enough a lot got edited out so this new discovery is about 43 to 44 minutes of brand new material. and so for scholars of the kennedy assassinationt's a lot of new puzzle pieces to kind of put in there. and it tells more of a story less about who killed kennedy than the way the u.s. government responded to the death of kennedy. >> charlie: you are a believer that oswald was a lone assassin. >> i boug

doug brinkley, thank you for being on.now whether hillary clinton will run for president. it's up to her. she could easily win this thing. >>> we'll finish with a milestone tonight. what a time we're united behind. think about john glenn. think about how popular he was. 50 years ago today, he went around the world three times. you're watching "hardball" only on msnbc. this was the gulf's best tourism season in years. all because so many people wanted to visit us... in louisiana. they came to see us in florida... nice try, they came to hang out with us in alabama... once folks heard mississippi had the welcome sign out, they couldn't wait to get here. this year was great but next year's gonna be even better. and anyone who knows the gulf knows that winter is primetime fun time. the sun's out and the water's beautiful. you can go deep sea fishing for amberjack, grouper and mackerel. our golf courses are open. our bed and breakfast have special rates. and migrating waterfowl from all over make this a bird watcher's paradise.

joining me to talk about former president bill clinton, about him -- or actually current historian doug brinkleynd "the washington post's" eugene robinson who is also an msnbc political analyst. i want to start with gene on this. covering politics on this. you look ahead to spring and summer, as the democrats come alive and when obama starts hitting on all the pins, all the pistons start popping, what role does bill clinton play in that? >> well, bill clinton can be an emissary to democrats in places like pennsylvania and ohio and places that the president really wants to win. maybe he's a little soft among traditional democrats. >> older, whiter? >> older, whiter, more blue collar, more -- clinton has that sensibility. obama doesn't. obama didn't do that badly among voters last time. >> those who cling to their guns and religion as obama said out in san francisco, they like bill clinton better. >> right. bill clinton, he has the -- he has that touch. >> yeah, i agree with that. i don't know how you improve on that, doug. he has that touch they're looking for in the presidency right now. >> he's

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doug brinkley and doris kearns goodwin.morning. >>> we had this conversation about president clinton. you listened to that. >> i did. >> get a sense of how you assess and the way he put the lewinsky scandal. >> i'm looking forward to watching the documentary. pbs does a great job. you can't write about clinton without graping with the lewinsky -- it's the blue dress. not the thing that people want to see, that's a pity. there's so much in the presidency. the economy turned around and started humming. the fact that he -- the cold war well. jack kennedy could get away with an affair but by the time 1993 rolled around, from e-mails to a billion going around the world in an hour and the dna did him him in the end. >> doris, on this president's day, bill clinton? >> i think he's probably one of the most natural politicians we've had, much like theodore roosevelt. loved the job, loved being president. we have a sadness of the monica lewinsky thing comes in is the loss of time. time is the most valuable innth to a president. serio