sam stein, i have to start with you. i was stopped in my tracks when i read those paragraphs in "the new york times" and read them aloud to anybody who would listen to me last night. it is jarring, no matter what you think of donald trump, to read the coverage of him that sounds like that. >> yeah, i mean, it was jarring to watch it in realtime, honestly. i took, you know, a tab at it and he uttered 8,300 words before taking his first question. it was rambling. there was no cohesion to it. difficult to follow the actual point, other than sort of inferring that he's really desperate to hold campaign events, can hold campaign events, and so turned the rose garden into a campaign event. so there were times where you sort of -- >> can i stop you right there, can i stop you right there? >> sure. yeah, yeah, yeah. >> i worked on campaigns. that wasn't -- if that was a campaign event, it was a crumby one. i mean, that was neither a presidential address, worthy of the rose garden, nor an effective political message. and i worry

just pick up on sam stein's question.idge there saying, it was an agency created to protect the american homeland from threats of terrorism in the months after 9/11. it is now being used by donald trump to among other things create a b-roll arkchive for hi campaign advertising. >> we have an authoritarian president out of control. he's long admired the tactics of putin and duterte and erdogan and other strongmen around the world and has brought their tactics to the streets of our country. i was thinking at a recent protest that involved a march from capitol hill up to the fonte plaza can across from the white house, people were chanting, which is what democracy looks like, and they were referring to the peaceful protest of citizens expressing their feelings before the most powerful place in the world, the white house. and i thought, it's not quite what democracy looks like, because the president had shut down l'enfant plaza so the protesters were way out of sight of the white house. and it was shortly after that that he p

back with me are susan page, sam stein, and michael steele.rominent republicans saying they won't attend the republican convention. i feel like i'm back in 2016 here. tell me, what do you think this republican convention in jacksonville, given what we're looking at coronavirus wise, what do you think it's going to look like? >> there's a plan. let's have a national convention in florida, jacksonville, in august outdoors. this sounds like a good, sweating time. you know, seriously, i mean, the way the president has whip sawed this national committee into doing the most asinine, craziest thing. it's just amazing to me. the planning, the preparation, the money, the organization, the infrastructure. so where do you go next with this? and i suspect quite honestly, as florida continues in the throes of coronavirus, that there are going to be serious conversation inside the rnc, if it's not already, and certainly among some in the administration. but they do like the democrats like a virtual event or a one-night type of event on a limited basis. but

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also with us is our friend sam stein. doctor, what is the fork in the road for us now?t people who stayed at home for three months, followed those laws, sending them back home if they started to inch out, or do you think we're looking at legislating or mandating or looking to strengthen our ability to force people to wear masks and social distance? >> nicolle, i think probably has to be a combination of those two. w.h.o. said 60% of all of the cumulative cases have occurred in the last month in this pandemic. this is accelerating. majority of those cases that are occurring in the united states the 40,000 are actually coming from the states that you mentioned -- arizona, florida, california, texas. and so, you know, when -- it's got to be a strategy where you have to have requirequire mask . think about the fact here in the northeast when we reached the kind of capacity you're seeing in california and in florida we were already locked down for a couple of weeks and then that's when the peak came, we made the space and then the peak came. when you look at florida and the

let's bring in sam stein and yamiche alcindor. yamiche -- we're going to get to the effort to discredit dr. fauci in just a moment. but it does leave us with, if they find a way to discredit him, it looks like it's backfiring, if they find a way to do so, is the president going to be our scientist in chief? because everything he says about the coronavirus seems to be a bit off, if that's -- if that's not an understatement. >> there are multiple -- obviously multiple examples of the president saying things that are just plain wrong about the coronavirus. i think the president is seeking to be not just the commander in chief but the chief scientist in this country. he's telling americans all over the country believe me over people you're talking to, including your own local officials, governor, in this case the president said in march anyone who wants a test can get a test, it wasn't true then, not true now, continues to not be true. he's the only one talking about testing being as double edged sword. people want to know who has the

we have sam stein and jonathan lemire as our ivy league eli elitists and football reporters for thisoes this mean for the run to national championship? >> it puts on a great pause. dartmouth football is pretty good now. that being said, this is not a surprise to me in the slightest. i have a hard time envisioning collegiate sports, at least in the fall going forth. it's one thing if it's a professional sports league where you have virtually unlimited resources, create a bubble like the nba, try to manage the disease and people are being paid, compensated to at least incur this risk, which is a real risk. it's another when you're asking student athletes to do it for profit for the school and ncaa. although we can set aside whether the ivy league fits in that category. i don't see the rationale forcing stundents to do this. i think we're delusional as a society if we think sports are going to come back in any way like we're used to. it's hopeful, something we all want as sports fans, but it is remarkable prayer if you think it's going to happen in the collegiate level. >> jonathan, obv

sam stein, there is no doubt this is being war games.ard the senator and tom talk about, this was being war gamed. ed luce was on talking about organizations that were war gaming this. what would happen if donald trump lost the election and then tried to hold on to power. this is obviously something that many democrats, many progressives are concerned about. >> yeah. it's a little bit of political fan effect. it's a bit of whiplash because the last time we were talking about trump not making it to the election, now we're talking about him staying past the election. >> right. >> we'll go with it. if i'm going to step back and speak about this, i think generally speaking what these conversations expose is how much of the american political experience and enterprise is built on a consensus around accepting legitimacy of our institutions and results, that there's no sort of -- the checks and balance system is there but it's also dependent upon people buying into it. if one person with an immense amount of political power, in this case the pr

redleter and sam stein. been focused on this here since march, since the shutdowns first began, every parent in america contemplated, learning with joblessness and learning how to teach third, fourth, fifth grade. we're looking at the fall, no matter what happens, shocked by donald trump's political approach to this really important decision. what do you make of his pronouncements in the last 24 hours? >> well, let's say, what do we make of his pronouncements the past 3 1/2 months? >> it's been one ignorant statement after another. the latest. he seems to be getting some sort of kick out of refuting all of his experts on every matter having to do with this. the waving his hand at the cdc guidelines, this is all an absurd kind of showmanship, resulting in incoherent policy recommendations coming from the white house. it's absolutely intolerable. especially on an issue affecting our kids. we're dealing with very complicated problems. trying to keep the students safe, we have older teachers and staff, this cann

it has been pointed out to me by sam stein, who's also covering the president, the administration's moveso cut funding to reopening in the fall, regardless of where the pandemic stands and where the surges and spikes are come september. where's this coming from? it was sam's theory and he was still reporting this out that it was tied solely to his burning desire and dependence on the economy churning back up ahead of his campaign intensifying in the fall. >> you know, nicole. there could be a couple of factors at play here. certainly, the economy is driving the president's push to reopen the schools. and it's for a very simple reason. you can't reopen the economy. you can't have people go back to work if they have nowhere to send their children during the day while they're trying to work. so if the schools are going to be closed in the fall, it becomes then very difficult for economies to get fully back up and running. but there's also a political consideration at play. the president has been losing ground to joe biden in a lot of suburban areas, among a lot of educated white women. many

the rev, kim atkins and sam stein are still here. what do you think when you hear that?k they're telling the absolute truth. they turned their back on the oath aside from the fact that the confederates were fighting to keep slavery and in many ways have racism and bigotry continue in an institutionalized fashion. i think that we've got to remember this was, as he said, treason against the united states. they were killing united states members of the military to overthrow the government. eventually john wilkes booth, one of their sympathizers, killed the president of the united states, abe lincoln, and we're honoring these people that booth and others followed? i think he made the point better than anybody. we're talking about treason here, and if you put it in that framework, how could any president in any way justify naming an army base or having a statue named after people that committed and promoted and incited treason? >> general milley making news on the russian bounty story as well. here he is talking about protecting the troops. >> the issue is at the strategic le