and jen palmieri and my friday date, the rev al. we are laughing because this has been an extraordinary week. it's been a whipsaw. we're communicators who follow and craft the words that politicians say. but no laughing matter to hear general mccaffrey talk about donald trump's words literally bringing us to the brink of the nuclear standoff and to hear about the leader of north korea who can be the one to avert the war. >> there are two things about the locked an loaded thing that have to be addressed. one is whether mccaffrey who's doing a rational analysis that is what -- a rational -- listen to the word, you say this is what a military commander would assume. is that what donald trump means when he says those things, is that what his intention is? i'm always skeptical that donald trump means what he's saying and then that's the other thing which is just that it's ridiculous. it's like movie language. this is the language of comic books. >> like he's playing a president. >> we have lived in the nuclear age and for the better part

. >> jen palmieri, george will, as always, great to see you both.llerson speaking out about north korea and former nato supreme allied commander james devrides joining me next. the first survivor of alzheimer's disease is out there. and the alzheimer's association is going to make it happen. but we won't get there without you. visit alz.org to join the fight. i knew at that exact moment, whatever it takes, wherever i have to go...i'm beating this. my main focus was to find a team of doctors that work together. when a patient comes to ctca, they're meeting a team of physicians that specialize in the management of cancer. breast cancer treatment is continuing to evolve. and i would say that ctca is definitely on the cusp of those changes. patients can be overwhelmed ... we really focus on taking the time with each individual patient so they can choose the treatment appropriate for them. the care that ctca brings is the kind of care i've wanted for my patients. being able to spend time with them, have a whole team to look after them is fantastic. i emp

jen palmieri and former cia operative and former independent presidential candidate evan mcmullin ando joining us is msnbc contributor, my pal steve schmidt. rev, i haven't talked to you all week but i have been dying to know what you thought about everything. i want to know on today's news on getting rid of steve bannon, do you think that makes a difference? >> i don't think it makes a difference at all. i think the difference that it does make is that it means that all of the things that we heard president trump take back on tuesday that he said monday in terms of charlottesville was straight donald trump. let's be real clear. that bannon and i'm certainly the last one to defend bannon, bannon was blamed as he's a guy that went in there after the conciliatory that i didn't consider that conciliatory by the way, but when many people felt it was conciliatory and turned him around tuesday to go the way he went. now we know bannon was not in position to do that. this was pure raw donald trump that came back praising the confederate statues, talking about that this was the culture of our

joining us at the table is former clinton campaign director jen palmieri and commentator and msnbc analyst sykes. let me start with you, about the big little lies. it's not a big deal, right? i mean, look, i have been to this boy scout jamboree. they are so excited by the whole spectacle of an american president. frankly any american president but don't tell trump. but the idea he's on day eight fighting over how he was received is ludicrous, is it not? >> well, look, these are not just lies. these are like diarrheas of lies and i think it's contributing to this trump -- this on set of trump fatigue that we're seeing here. but what's extraordinary about it is how petty and unnecessary and easily verifiable the lies are. you know, so how fragile must his ego be that he has to continually make up the stories? the real problem as you're touching on, while some are pretty and really ultimately insignificant, some of the lies are purposeful. they're consequential and some of them are deeply ugly. i think that again this is going to affect obviously his relationship on capitol hill. but i also t

jen palmieri. >> denial, denial, denial. >> as somebody who has issued statements, apart of being noence, the characterizations are inaccurate and not pertinent. >> that is not saying that the report is not true that in no way says the president didn't dictate the statement. that just said there are things in the story that aren't true, and we don't think this story matters. that's not saying that donald trump didn't actually dictate the statement. and it makes sense to me that trump would be the person who dictated the statement, because it was a very -- it was a transparently stupid thing to do. so the only person who would have the means of overruling everyone else is the president himself. >> because lawyers wouldn't be that stupid. >> because lawyers wouldn't be that stupid. because everybody would understand "the times" isn't telling you everything that they have. you have to assume that they actually have the e-mails. you've got to play few step ahead and assume that "the times" is going to come back to you and have all this information. so it's a very dangerous thing to do. i

. >>> speaking of perfect guest, joining me by phone, jennifer palmieri, for hillary clinton's presidential campaign. jen, let's talk about what happened when she walked off stage, because i'm told that she really was overcome a bit by that moment where he was looming over her and she said, you know, it always -- it is tough. this is really hard. that was really hard. >> it was a hard debate in general. the -- it was set up to, you know, you talked about the facebook live press conference, that trump did ahead of time. it was the whole setup with the debate was to intimidate her. and coming on the heels of the access hollywood tape, that had been released two days before, we were very concerned, we knew that trump could be unhinged, that he would try to make it very uncomfortable for her in any way he can. so, she did doubt, you know, in the moment, and then she did share with us later if that had been the right thing to do, to not call him out on it. and i think it is a -- i think of it as a riptide that she has constantly been caught in, in her adult life, where, you know, as a woman on the national st

palmieri, former communications director to president obama. and we have retired thad allen from the coast guard with us. for all of you, jen to talk with you about mike pence and his visit here. the meeting with victims. this is a different tact than the president took when he visited the region monday. is he just trying to make up for a mistake the president made in your view? >> i think that it was pretty telling that the white house staff themselves, not even the vice president and staff themselves said it is important for the vp to go down and talk specifically to victims, that's probably something that would have been better for the president to do. i imagine even if trump had done it, pence would be doing it today, too. the magnitude of the storm, i worked in white houses when you had to deal with things like this, nothing the magnitude of houston, but they're going to be dealing with this for years, not just months but years. admiral allen can speak to that with his experience with the bp spill. it will impact a lot of issues like the daca decision, you may not want to do that while dreamers are under water in houst