so, josh barrow, you've written about this.they feel that they need to talk about the social safety net and poverty in broad terms. but there actually is not a fundamental ideological commitment to fighting poverty, at least from within the federal government. >> right. republicans, they don't like poverty. they would like people to have jobs and incomes and good livings. but republicans really only have one economic idea, which is you cut taxes and cut spending and reduce regulation and this is supposed to spur the economy and lower unemployment and create jobs. the problem is it's not clear that this is true over the long run. lower taxes and things like that are supposed to reduce the long-run rate of gdp growth. but what that really doesn't do is address business cycles. situations we're in right now where we have elevated rates of unemployment, weak demand and a persistently weak labor market. so with their one economic message not doing anything to address that, the only thing that's left is how do they express concern wi

joining me now is josh barrow and nick. nick, i'll start with you first.ristie shedding any tears over ken saying he should give up his chairmanship with the rga? >> i don't think so. this guy is very popular in circles. this just happens to dove tail with the broader criticism of chris christie. >> we have new polling showing that christie has lost 26 points among democrats. is he going to have to be more reliant on conservatives and republicans if he's losing support? >> he does. think about it. if you're a republican governor in a blue state, your support is really based in republicans and independents. but also they look to you as their flag bearer. this is a democratic state with democratic majorities in the legislature. there's nowhere else for them to go for republican statewide office. everything i heard at the inauguration says that people at the grass roots love this guy in jersey. >> josh, as always you have an incisive and a column out today that goes against the conventional wisdom. maybe it doesn't go directly against conventional wisdom, bec

joining me now is michael and howard dean and josh barrow.to what this evidence might be? >> no, we haven't. what does david wildstein have to say? i said on one of the shows last week that david wildstein could be the john dean of this affair, at least his lawyer was hinting that from the beginning saying that if he got immunity he had a story to tell and the legislative transportation committee would get the answers they needed. now this seems to be david wildstein's bid to become the john dean of bridgegate. he's saying he's got evidence that could contradict what governor christie has said publicly. so, look, we have no confirmation of what evidence it is. we don't know what david wildstein's lawyer is talking about. we don't know what he has to say. we have yet to hear or get a response from governor christie's office. there's still a lot of unanswered questions here, but clearly this is about the biggest development that there could be in this case. >> what wildstein's lawyer is saying now is that he has evidence that the governor knew

and the brilliant josh barrow, and host of disrupt, the equally brilliant karen finney. you were laughing out of pride. you're right. the republicans, we are in a post-policy feerd for the republican party. there are institutions that generate ideas, they have the enterprise institute and other conservative idea-generating institutions, but somehow the politicians that serve them in washington aren't interested in the ideas. is that it? >> yes. it's not they're without policy. they favor lower taxes and less regulation. and the smaller government. but the thing is they push those ideas at all times and have a theory about why to grow the economy, lower taxes give incentive to produce. although tax rates have to get quite high for that to matter a lot. the economic theory si says nothing about the labor market being slack. people find nobody will hire them because there are three job applicants for every job. or the depth of the recession. the agenda doesn't have anything to say about that. you see the kernels of the ideas at american enterprise institute. we should have

i'll quote josh barrow. conservatives favor the same set of policies when the economy is work and when it is strong. the implication is conservatives believe there is nothing in particular the government should do about economic cycles. this is a big problem. i would tend to agree with that, mark. >> look, the president right now is losing in some ways. if you look at his approval rating and chances of moving his agenda against a very weak team. there's no doubt there's frustration not just in the white house and on the left but in people who judge these things as political theater, barack obama very talented guy. he is pushing popular things now. there are elements of the affordable care that are popular. he's still not having that much success, i think because unlike e.j. who can spin a narrative that is less microand more overarching. he still has not found his voice and state of the u.nion is a great opportunity to say what is it about going forward the successful implementation of the affordable care ac

let's bring in partners founder chris malone and business insiders josh barrow. i want to start with you. assume the governor is as good as his word and had absolutely no idea what was going on. you say, that's almost as bad. how could he not know? >> right. a story that broke 117 days ago. it's been building through the fall. he's been taking a lot of political pressure over it. was he really not able to figure out until yesterday morning somebody in his own office had been involved in this? he's basically out there saying my staff is out of control, i don't know what they're doing and lying to me, which is not a good talking point to lean on. >> so, chris, i mean, is this a possibility that maybe a culture has been created under governor christie where this kind of behavior is, let's say -- hmm -- tolerated? >> it's new jersey, mandy. [ laughter ] >> that's right. it could be the case. i would take a different perspective. research suggests that actually lapses in competence are much more forgiving, forgivable and that lapse's in intention. crises and bad news

. >> i want to bring in our company, steve kornacki, host with "up with steve kornacki," and josh barrow, the politics writer for "politics insider." i listened to hours a s s and f analysis, he did well enough maybe he's bought himself some time. i guess if the question yesterday was, do people believe him, steve, is the question today, what happens with this drip, drip, drip of information that's clearly going to keep going? >> that's exactly it. it's a great, powerful performance that could be career saving, even career enhancing performance if it's true. the wheels are in motion on multiple tracks right now, where you've got the state assembly, there was an issue up until earlier this week about whether the subpoena authority of the state assembly would be extended past next tuesday. not an issue anymore. that's going to happen. you have the u.s. attorney from new jersey talking about potentially opening up an investigation, looking into this, as well, so you have those three fronts. you also have every reporter, you know, reporter in new jersey, maybe in the country, now looking int

josh barrow assesses the situation, gop anti-poverty agenda, cut food stamps and blork medicaid expansion cut off insurance benefits, sure fire seller. senator grassley, thanks so much for joining us. >> i'm glad to be with you, of course. >> senator grassley, if the farm bill -- the farm bill we're talking about now, u.s. farmers receive $23 billion in subsidies and 14 billion of that goes to the largest 10% of farms. does that jive with your notion that millionaires should no longer be coddled? are you happy with the numbers as they stand in that version of the bill? >> what we're trying to do is on payments that are direct to farmers like if you have low prices and you make up some from the taxpayers for those low prices, then what we're trying to do is make sure that those programs are targeted towards medium and small sized farmers. that's why for the first time i've been fighting for ten years to get a hard cap in so that the wealthiest farmers can't get more than that hard cap. because you laid out that the wealthiest farmers are getting most of the payments. let me quantify that.

. >> josh barrow was watching last night along with all of us. four ideas the president could've pushed last night but didn't. we're going to get to that in just a moment. but first, josh, you're a finance guy. let's talk about my-ra. what is it? when is it? and why is it? >> yeah, so basically -- >> and how do you pronounce it. >> that's the first area of dispute, is it myra or my-ra? it's a retirement account. and the idea is to reach people who don't have a 401(k) option through work now. they'll be able to save in this. you can save as little as $5 a pay period. and you don't get to pick stocks or bonds, you just put it in this special kind of government security they're creating. and it's a pretty good deal because it'll have all the features of a short-term treasury bond. it's completely safe. there's no risk that any change in the markets or interest rates will change your returns. but you get paid about 1% or 2% more than you'd be able to get in the market. the idea is to get people who aren't saving for retirement to save a little bit. yo

. >> let me read something from josh barrow at the business insider. he tweeted this out.t your response to this. he wrote the case for clemency for snowden is a radical case against our diplomatic and intel apparatus which people make oddly casually. if snowden had only revealed the reach of nsa inside the u.s. and not divulged the methods, extent, et cetera, do you think then there would be a better case for clemency? do you think that by going as far as he did, he undermined his ability to come back to the united states? >> he could have taken -- he could have done a little bit and started the debate, is i guess the argument josh is making. >> well, first of all, the united states indicted him under espionage statutes and charged him with crimes that would put him into prison for three decades before the fourth or fifth story was even published, when just the first couple stories had been published. secondly, as all kinds of journalists including from ruth's own paper have continuously pointed out, the obama administration is more aggressive and more vindictive when it