jim cooper from tennessee had a few ideas about how to fix congress's record on popularity.e with you. >> are the american people right to be this frustrated or are they missing all the good goode work. >> the public is right. this is one of the worst congresses in all of american history. that says a lot because we had bad ones, but this sets a record low in terms of incompetence which is worse. >> one thing that is striking is we in the media, most of us and a lot of folks in the country spend most of our time talking about the president and not about congress. is barack obama doing enough or isn't he on the economy and jobs and they give you a lot more power on the issues and you can decide tomorrow to pass a stimulus and override obama if they try to veto them. when you don't act, nothing big can get done, right? >> you are exactly right. we are not only the coequal brarve of government, but we are superior because all laws and edge slagz comes from beginning. the president has a bully pulpit, but we are not using that power in a responsible fashion. >> you just came out

occupy wall street does not appreciate that this is grateful for that i said them many times to jim cooper the rector but please i asked him i asked him please embrace this dynamic quality of justice this is a this is the this is the time in history where we need to right the wrong there's this ache for justice in this country and you can be of any political persuasion and know that and so you're quite you're open question is is a good one tom i i don't know i didn't see many church leaders line up alongside of the occupy wall street although there's an occupy faith movement but it's not the mainline denominational let's hope we see it coming down the road fairly soon bishop george packer packard thank you both for being with us tonight thank you thank you for having at thank you. it's the good the bad of the very very court officially ugly the good senator ben cardin as republicans around the nation work to redistrict excuse me to restrict voting rights senator carden is working to expand voting rights democratic senator from maryland introduced legislation to restore voting rights to ind

. >> and if you can signal to the staffer -- jim cooper, democrat from tennessee, described congress as a form league -- as a farm league for k street. then you have a very valuable resource. his pay check may have been signed by congress, but he was already working for me, influencing his office for me. a perfectly correct arrangement even though no rules had been broken, at least not yet. is this just a jack abramoff innovation or is this a common practice? >> i did not indicate anything. as i look back on my career -- i did not innovate anything. as i look back on my career, i learned everything i did. i may have pushed some of them over the normal boundaries, which is what got me in trouble. but there are a lot of smart people in washington and they think about everything. one of the reasons that lobbyists laugh about the approach to reform the system it is because no matter what people throughout the system, they will overcome it. one of becomes immediately apparent when you are a lobbyist or when you're working with congress, the truth is congressman used to have no staff. the

we have other folks joining us, jim cooper. welcome, thank you for joining us. representative from tennessee, we appreciate it. we have some hanging on wall, and as you probably note, we're not as good looking as the current chair, but we hang there nonetheless. jim jones, welcome. chairman, thank you. john spratt, we need to figure out how to get you appear on the wall. we have not figured that out. welcome and thank you for being here. bill, thank you for being here. as the chairman of the committee for responsible federal budget and all of these folks, members of the peterson-pew commission, we want to thank you for your participation in this as well. with that, let me turn it back to steve, and he is going to be the moderator for our papers and the presentation here today. >> ok, thank you both for joining us. i know that you have very busy schedule so if you would like to depart now, we will understand. we will pause for just a minute and then we will have our conversation. [laughter] >> they're going to push these guys over. >> we are all here because we t

. >> and if you can signal to the staffer -- jim cooper, democrat from tennessee, described congress as a form league -- as a farm league for k street. then you have a very valuable resource. his pay check may have been signed by congress, but he was already working for me, influencing his office for me. a perfectly correct arrangement even though no rules had been broken, at least not yet. is this just a jack abramoff innovation or is this a common practice? >> i did not indicate anything. as i look back on my career -- i did not innovate anything. as i look back on my career, i learned everything i did. i may have pushed some of them over the normal boundaries, which is what got me in trouble. but there are a lot of smart people in washington and they think about everything. one of the reasons that lobbyists laugh about the approach to reform the system it is because no matter what people throughout the system, they will overcome it. one of becomes immediately apparent when you are a lobbyist or when you're working with congress, the truth is congressman used to have no staff. the

. >> and if you can signal to the staffer -- jim cooper, democrat from tennessee, described congresss a form league -- as a farm league for k street. then you have a very valuable resource. his pay check may have been signed by congress, but he was already working for me, influencing his office for me. a perfectly correct arrangement even though no rules had been broken, at least not yet. is this just a jack abramoff innovation or is this a common practice? >> i did not indicate anything. as i look back on my career -- i did not innovate anything. as i look back on my career, i learned everything i did. i may have pushed some of them over the normal boundaries, which is what got me in trouble. but there are a lot of smart people in washington and they think about everything. one of the reasons that lobbyists laugh about the approach to reform the system it is because no matter what people throughout the system, they will overcome it. one of becomes immediately apparent when you are a lobbyist or when you're working with congress, the truth is congressman used to have no staff. the gr

that would depend on jim cooper in tennessee, we haven't seen, i think will was the property will retain his seat. the group that was founded essentially by white conservative blue dogs may not even have one of those in their membership at the end of this cycle. so some continuing realignment. competitive districts, i think it's very hard to tell how many competitive districts will have in him. competitive districts, two types of competitive districts. districts. one would be where a party is trying to put an intel intel or something like a teacher or where republicans have made that historic district much more republican, much harder to win if keith sure to win that seat i think down the road that's a difficult seat for another democrats ever take over because it's heavily republican district. but in terms of relatively fair fight relatively fair electoral distribution of the votes is a little hard to say how many there'll be but the sense is i think there will be fewer of them. just to get a few thoughts on the last three decades, in the 1980s we had 367 of our 435 seats not change han

. >> and if you can signal to the staffer -- jim cooper, democrat from tennessee, described congress as a form league -- as a farm league for k street. then you have a very valuable resource. his pay check may have been signed by congress, but he was already working for me, influencing his office for me. a perfectly correct arrangement even though no rules had been broken, at least not yet. is this just a jack abramoff innovation or is this a common practice? >> i did not indicate anything. as i look back on my career -- i did not innovate anything. as i look back on my career, i learned everything i did. i may have pushed some of them over the normal boundaries, which is what got me in trouble. but there are a lot of smart people in washington and they think about everything. one of the reasons that lobbyists laugh about the approach to reform the system it is because no matter what people throughout the system, they will overcome it. one of becomes immediately apparent when you are a lobbyist or when you're working with congress, the truth is congressman used to have no staff. the

that would depend on jim cooper. i think he will probably keep busy but a number of them are retiring or in significant trouble. they may not even have one of those white blue dogs in their membership at the end of this cycle. it is hard to tell how many competitive districts we will have at the end. there are two types of competitive districts. one is where a party is trying to put an incumbent in trouble like a heath schuler where his district has become more republican. if he were to lose that seat, that becomes difficult for another democrat to takeover because it is a lay heavily republican district real competitive districts in terms of relatively fair fights, relatively fair electoral distribution of the boats is hard to see how many there will be. there'll be fewer of them either way. had 367 ours, we 435 seats not change hands. only 74 seats changed hands at all in the decade. in the 1990's, we have three of 19 seats that did not change and in 2000, we have 327 that did not change hands. the universe is the

they're hoping they will be at least as cooperative for letting them see what is happening in the city. >> jim give us more details about how much access and independence the monitors are likely to have. >> in theory, they will have full independence but in practice, they have to cooperate with the syrian authorities because they need security. they will need to coordinate with the syrians but they will only let them of the last minute or the same day when they want to go to a particular location. it will be quite difficult if there is combat or hostilities going on at the moment. in a way, what the regime wants to show them is that it is not one-sided. they're fighting armed terrorist gangs. it is fairly clear that there is some shooting or some armed resistance from the anti- government side. that is the challenge they face, seeing why so many people are dying. if the government is bombarding civilian areas of a lot of the youtube footage suggests. >> whole drug-orthodox jews have clashed with police near jerusalem as tensions mount over the call for public segregation of men and women. wome

jim cooper, we think he will keep his seat, but a number of them are retiring or in significant troublep was founded by a white conservative blue dogs may not have a membership at the end of the cycle. some continuing realignment competitive districts. it is hard to tell how many competitive districts will be at the end. there are two types of competitive districts. one would be where party is trying to put an incumbent in trouble, he schuler, where republicans have made is in north carolina district much harder to win. if he were to lose that seat, it would be a difficulty for another democrat ever to take over because it is a heavily republican district. but competitive districts in terms of relatively fair fights, relatively fair electoral distribution of the votes, it is hard to see how many will become of the senses that there will be fewer of them. a few thoughts on the last decades. only 70 seats changed hands at all and the decade was the first elections happened in the 1990's, 319 sees that did not change hands. had 370 that we didn't change his. we have 10 years to go to know

the show, but the interviews i cared outside washington, people like dorothy cooper, the 96-year-old who voted throughout the jimut voter i.d. law. >> i haven't had any problems at all to this time. this is the only time i've had problems. >> are you surprised that they would change and make these strict requirements at this stage of the game? >> no, i never thought it would be like this, ever. >> or when i spoke to spike dolomite ward, a cancer patient who spoke out to praise the affordable care act, despite the criticism it's gotten from the right. >> when i found out that this obama care's program was literally going to save my life, i owed it to the president to publicly apologize and humbling admit i had checked out, and that's wrong. >> you see, i never spent a lot of time four months ago answering a lot of critics, because i didn't come to do the show to join the political tv cable season. i came for a reason. we need to have everyone in america later, and we need to have people who may not fit the normal of the past, but have formed what we must deal with today and in the future. because the nation and t

jim vance. jack johnson apologized today. he said he has been haunted by his actions and asked for leniency. because he cooperatedh authorities, the judge did not give him the maximum punishment. johnson was sentenced to seven years in prison and ordered to pay $100,000 in fines. tonight we have team coverage of the sentencing and the impact on the county that johnson once served. we begin with chris gordon who is outside the courthouse. >> reporter: as jack johnson asked the judge for mercy he said i could never imagine myself in a place like this. johnson the former prosecutor found himself the defendant being sentenced after pleading guilty to corruption charges. jack johnson's lawyers say he has a form of earl parkinson's disease that could confine him to a wheelchair. johnson is 62 and his lawyers said prison could be a death sentence. but prosecutors said that johnson wyoming worn down by heavy drinking. prosecutors say that he shook down business owners for $1 million in bribes to do business in prince george's county. >> and with the group that he has, you could spy -- >> reporter: johnson was

so jim was the managing editor of "the chicago tribune", he's now writing for the atlantic monthly, the new york times, and you've started the chicago cooperativeall the time. like, well, what's happening and what's the future. so we're going to talk about what's happening now, and we're going to talk about the future. actually, just before i was coming on stage, cara saw i had a piece of paper stuck to my foot, and she said you better take that off, and joe said print media. [laughter] so, cara, let's start with you. what is going on? you've managed to migrate, you're tracking this both, you know, as a georgeist -- journalist, but you're also a participant. so you have a unique perspective looking at what's going on in media. >> sure. well, i was a reporter, again, for the was post and for the journal as their first internet reporter. when i got to the journal, i started covering it at "the washington post." i went on book leave to write a book about aol, the first book where things are going well for that company. the second one was down. and i was just very -- once i saw the internet for the first time, i realized it was going to change ever

the cooper girls, bella and katie, are growing up in canada with nancy's twin sister krista and her husband jimhey're doing great. like every other normal little toddler and little kid. >> their cousins were with them the day we came to call. so seven little girls scampered happily about their pleasure infectious. and for the adults, bitter sweet. >> i'm sad nancy is not here seeing it. >> absolutely. >> what do they understand about mother and father? >> what we've told them is that mommy nancy was killed by a bad man. and that she is in heaven. and then went to prison. >> and brad? she knows this may sound a little weird but -- >> i've told them that he is traveling. because he worked so much. it is pretty easy and plausible and that he is in a tent and has no phone. >> you know they'll ask someday. >> they will ask when they're ready. and us as a family unit will sit down with them and tell them what happened one day. >> tell them the tragic story of a man and a woman who sank in the undertow of what was once love. >> we got an outcome that nancy deserves but it is also not a winning hand fo