. >>> still to come, chuck todd and kelly o'donnell delving into the political fight over financial reform in today's news from goldman sachs and the s.e.c. >>> plus, 15 years after oklahoma city, rachel maddow joins us. >> he's got this adrenaline pumping, but you force yourself to say calm and -- >> and send me your thoughts. you can find me on twitter at mitchell reports. [ woman ] nine iron, it's almost tee-time. time for new zyrtec® liquid gels. they work fast. so i can get relief from the pollen that used to make me sneeze. with new zyrtec® liquid gels, i get allergy relief at liquid speed. that's the fast, powerful relief of zyrtec®, now in a liquid gel. zyrtec® is the fastest 24-hour allergy medicine. so i'm ready by the first hole. with new zyrtec® liquid gels, i can love the air®. [ male announcer ] this week only, save up to $12 on zyrtec® products at zyrtectv.com and in sunday's paper. >>> monday marks 15 years since the oklahoma city bombing, the nation's worst home grown terror attack taking the lives of 168 people. up until now, timothy mcveigh has never been heard publicly

kelly o'donnell, nbc news, the capitol. >>> when we come back, a whole lot of shaking going on in onef this country. you know, when i grow up, i'm going to own my own restaurant. i want to be a volunteer firefighter. when i grow up, i want to write a novel. i want to go on a road trip. when i grow up, i'm going to go there. i'm going to work with kids. i want to fix up old houses. [ female announcer ] at aarp we believe you're never done growing. i want to fall in love again. [ female announcer ] together we can discover the best of what's next at aarp.org. but with advair, i'm breathing better. so i can join the fun at my family barbeque. (announcer) for people with copd, including chronic bronchitis, emphysema, or both, great news. advair helps significantly improve lung function. while nothing can reverse copd, advair is different from most other medications because it contains both an anti-inflammatory and a long-acting bronchodilator, working together to help you breathe better. advair won't replace fast-acting inhalers for sudden symptoms and should not be used more than twice a

let's get to nbc's kelly o'donnell on the hill for thus morning. okay, kelly. what can we expect? >> this will build like any good drama with three different panels where they break up these seven witnesses building toward the current chief executive officer lloyd blankfein there to answer perhaps the toughest questions. a lot of what we'll hear about today will deal with the product of an 18-month investigation by a senate committee that is headed by carl levin, democrat of michigan. they have been pouring over documents, examined e-mail. they've looked at all kinds of evidence that they say shows that goldman sachs a premiere banking and investment firm, really engaged in practices that amount to selling a security and then betting on that security to fail. and misleading clients. of course, goldman sachs says it did not do anything wrong. it followed appropriate practices, but would in fact agree that maybe it needed to be a little clearer about some the things it has done. that sort of sets the outline. but one of the things that makes this all interesting is when you get to l

nbc's kelly o'donnell joins us now from capitol hill. a lot of interesting talk on those sunday morning programs. kelly, where do we stand now as far as a possible compromise? >> reporter: well, it's going to take more time according to republicans. they say they, too, want financial reform but they don't like the version that democrats want to bring forward today. so what they will vote on at 5:00 is whether or not the bill can move to the next phase in this process. as we understand it republicans have enough votes to stop that. democrats seem to think that's okay because they can paint this in a way that really works for them politically, to suggest that republicans are too friendly to wall street and don't want changes at a time when so many people in the country are very upset about what's happened on wall street. that's sort of the political environment where we are and you know this is complex. there is a lot in it. so republicans say they want to make some parts of it a little tougher in their words. democrats say it's time to get

our own kelly o'donnell on capitol hill has obtained an internal e-mail written by a company executive here in the u.s. just five days before toyota announced a massive recall. in the e-mail, the company executive acknowledges the company has accelerator pedal problems. goes on to say, "we are not protecting our consumers by keeping this quiet. the time to hide on this one is over. we need to come clean." look for a lot more on this story tomorrow. >>> second story tonight concerns the airline business. news of a possible blockbuster merger combining two big brand names in the air, cnbc's david faber is with us to talk about it. what are the names and what is the likelihood here? >> the names are ual and usair. most likely it will probably happen, although it is weeks away and there are plenty of things to come in terms of hurdles they have to overcome. the airlines are still facing a prospect of not make anything money. you can charge as many people as you want for their bags, ultimately one of the best ways they perceive to actually be in a position to profit is by merging. consolida

nbc's capitol hill correspondent kelly o'donnell and nbc's luke russert both joining us now. o both of you. kelly, first to you. you've been following every twist and turn of financial services. they're going to have a cloture vote to try to get it on the floor monday afternoon, negotiations, barney frank was on earlier from the house perspective and says the two bills are a lot closer than the health care bills were. if the senate does get this through he thinks they can reach agreement on a compromise. >> democrats feel pretty good about where they are right now because they've got a plan a and a plan b. if the monday vote does not go their way they can criticize republicans for not being against wall street sufficiently and then they can go right back, top aides say they'll be working on negotiating it through. they've got a political play there. there is a lot of agreement on a big chunk of financial reform. details are always where they get hung up and they're still negotiating so democrats may pull off some bipartisan deal even if it is a little painful to start off. >>

let's go to kelly o'donnell on the hill. cnbc senior analyst and ron brownstein. kelly, first to you. you've got the action on the hill. how would you score today's hearing in terms of getting to the substance of this and political theatre? i guess right now, it's political theatre. >> tremendous political theatre and both sides came ready to play. members of this panel, is senate team, has really done homework. there is clear evidence that understand the kind of complex securities they're talking about. their staff has done tremendous research to help prepare them, so it is in some ways, the fairer fight. they understand what their talking about. this first panel from goldman sachs also appears to be prepared to stall and to delay and that's certainly the impression that senators gave because they repeatedly asked for documents to be reviewed and what's the page number and seemed quite hesitant to answer questions. some of that of course is in an attempt to be specific and some gives the appearance of not wanting to be fully cooperative. there's real tension here.

. >> let me bring in nbc's kelly o'donnell on capitol hill tonight. ere any climate for cooperation on this? what do you think? >> reporter: well, some of the calmer voices here, ed seem to indicate there might be a chance. that there are some conversations between democrats and republicans, behind the scenes, looking for ways to maybe make changes to the bill before it would come to the floor that might satisfy some of these concerns. now, democrats will tell you there are a lot of republican ideas in the dodd bill. most republicans that we're talking to, in fact, all of them say they're united in their opposition to the bill in its current form. they say you'll hear it from both sides, everyone wants to say that they believe wall street needs some reform and the financial institutions need to be changed and that the public has to be protected. it's all about how. now, the politics involves a lot of strategy and the republicans are united at the moment to try to stop this bill from coming to the floor. and part of the reason for that is if it were to

nbc's kelly o'donnell on the senate floor. already the democrats have a few republicans on their list they would like to talk to, perhaps persuading them to come to their side of this argument. >> reporter: exactly, tamron. they need at least one to bring this financial reform package to the senate floor to begin debate. democrats have the 59, they need one. so likely target susan collins of maine, bob corker of tennessee, judd gregg of new hampshire. although judd gregg has been very critical of the bill that is being talked about right now because he says there have been real attempts at bipartisan negotiations with different groups of senators working on specific language. he says that's not what this bill is. democrats counter and say this is an opportunity to really change the way some things happen on wall street, to end too big to fail, that concept that caused so much trouble. one of the issues, a sticking point between the two party is what democrats call a bailout fund that would be using money from financial institu

nbc's kelly o'donnell joins us now from capitol hill.do we hear and see on the senate floor, kelly? >> reporter: there seems to be, tamron, a feeling of more friendliness between the two parties on an issue that's important to the public and one where both sides have plenty of land mines to deal with politically. also a lot to gain if they can work something out. they're trying to come up with a way to add new reforms and regulations on the financial industry to try to avoid, prevent, really head off any kind of a disaster like we saw a couple of years ago when big institutions failed. now, there had been some real tough talk earlier in the week between the parties. today we're getting a sense that negotiations to work out a bill that could get more than just one or two republican votes, but a good number of republican votes that would really qualify for a bipartisan support for a bill. republicans say that they scored a little point by having unity among their group to get more time to talk about this. and democrats feel they are on the

. >> bill: now, the nbc news reporter kelly o'donnell's question was legitimate.ut coming on the heels of nbc's unrelenting racial attacks on the tea party. the question also illuminates the left wing liberal strategy. by the way with 95% of african-americans voting for barack obama, you would not expect them to sign up in great numbers for the tea party, would you? going forward, the tea party movement will face some challenges. will it become a legitimate third party or will it stay as an anti-obama protest group? or will it expand its passion into other areas? there is no tea party leader. sarah palin comes closest but she doesn't want the designation. so it will be interesting to see just how the tea party evolves. but, for now, these folks are scaring liberal america big time and that's the memo. now for the top story tonight, reactions joining us from washington chris wallace the anchor of "fox news sunday." am i wrong here? i just see a lot of fear. >> no. i think you are right. i'm no obama-barber but i saw that clip of the president at that fundraiser las

nbc capitol hill correspondent kelly o'donnell joins us. pia snowe and bob corker, republican senators from maine and tennessee respectively, both hinting they may not be there for a filibuster vote. >> well, isn't it interesting the tea leaves are able to be read this morning and it leads exactly there, to maine, perhaps susan collins, as well, and to tennessee. one of the things we think could be cast along the side of the trail is that $50 billion fund that originally democrats wanted. it would be used to under wind big banks that would fail in the future to keep the whole system from coming apart. and it would be funded by large financial institutions. republicans didn't like that idea. and said that it would ultimately be passed down to the consumer. they saw that as a problem. so that point of opposition seems to be melting because the white house ha