traitor? even jon stewart is making fun of the media's lack of interest in ron paul. what gives? a "new york times" columnist throws his weight behind the creation of a third party. tom friedman on beltway gridlock, the economy and why the coverage of politics reminds him of epsn. yahoo! digs up allegations that money, cars sex were improperly provided to university of miami athletes. i'm howard kurtz and this is "reliable sources". he's an instant front-runner in some polls, but he hasn't had an easy ride in his first week as apartment candidate. he drew plenty of attention from veracious political pundits, most of it negative, especially true when he said if the fed chairman keeps printing money and said that would be almost treasonous. >> isn't perry crossing the line with all of this talking about treason, talking about black cloud over the country? isn't this way over the line? >> bad way to start. you don't want to accuse the federal reserve chairman of being guilty of a crime punishable by death which is what treason is. >> rolls like treason rolls off perry's lips because he knows that's exactly what the republican base is hungry for. base republicans want to crush everyone in their path. >> are the media giving perry a fair shake or giving them what some might call the michele bachmann treatment. joining us matt lewis from the daily caller, christina bell tone yeah at cq roll call and radio talk show host david serota. >> he didn't necessarily say bernanke should be lassoed and lynched. are the media blowing this out of proportion? >> i think the media has been culturalized by looking at more violent rhetoric in our political debate and look at it more as an issue unto itself. we've seen more and more coarsening rhetoric. it alludes to violence. the media is now on the lookout for it. i think it's fair to be on the lookout for it. when i heard what perry said, i was a little bit taken aback. i didn't really hear him call for violence. i think you're right in saying this is really a play to the republican base, a republican base that has shown that it responds to this kind of coarse, at least violently allegorical rhetoric. >> they say the press has an almost palpable blood lus to the bring this down. we're jumping on a lot of things about rick perry as he gets into the race. >> if you look at who the commentators are that have been critical. you've shown reverend al sharpton and karl rove who hates rick perry. the bush folks hate rick perry. it's interesting to see who is coming after him. this is more a product of the modern media age than anti rick perry. nowadays press, trackers, websites who weren't around five or ten years ago, so the scrutiny these candidates have. rick perry wants to talk about jobs. texas has created about a third of the jobs created, but when he slips up, they're there and that's what they show. >> it's not just commentators. this morning, as if to underscore my point, "new york times" front page story about perry raising millions from people he appointed to various state boards and positions. "washington post," front page story about how many of the jobs you mentioned in texas are actually government jobs. christina, when a lot of people start picking through your record, we saw this with bush 43 in texas and bill clinton in arkansas, it can seem prosecutorial. >> you asked a question about wanting to tear a candidate down. first you have to build them up. we saw multiple stories about the vacuum in the republican nomination. these stories were being worked on for weeks in advance. everybody expected it. it's also the media searching for how many times you've seen texas-sized in a headline this week. they're looking for narratives that feed into the fact that he's a cowboy from texas and it's so easy to give somebody a label like that instead of actually delving into the record. >> some of this obviously r resolves around the campaign trail. he said there are a substantial amount of scientists manipulating data, questioning the idea about man-made global warming. should reporters, not pundits or commentators, should report that straightforwardly or say this is a bit crazy compared to the scientific consensus? >> i think reporters have an obligation to put it up against what science is telling us. if there is a scientific consensus which there is about the fact that global climate change is happening and humans are contributing to it, reporters have an obligation to put up that science next to what rick perry is saying. to your point about whether that's prosecutorial or not, i would say if this guy is running for president of the united states, the public has a right to know as much about his rhetoric. trying to find out what this guy is all about. >> is any of this cultural? is any of this a reaction to another sexist governor with cowboy boots who drops his gs? >> i think so. we talk about this every couple weeks i'm sure on a media show. most of the media are folks who are educated at elite university who live in places like new york or washington, d.c. >> i twoent a state school, buddy. >> some of us. i went to college in west virginia. you know where i'm going. there's a cultural divide. i go to whole foods. other people go to walmart. there's a difference. sometimes i think that is the bias that i think is more insidious than liberal bias. >> okay. i think the press needs to hold candidates accountable, of course. for example, the "wall street journal" reported that when perry said again the other day that farmers are being required by some federal regulation to get commercial driver's licenses to drive their tractors. not true according to the "journal." you used the word narrative. could there be a narrative developing here that perry is a guy who shoots off his mouth and manningals the fact. every time he's off by 10% we fire at him. >> look at michele bachmann. people give her far more height and scrutiny to gaffs than male candidate gaffs. that's a fact of what's happened so far. >> is that ideological or is that because she's also had well publicized missteps? >> i think all of the above. in his case he's getting scrutiny because he's so new to this. people want to see him trip up and have him say so slang that will allow for a nice headline. eventually he's going to be on the debate stage like everybody else. he's been on the front page almost every day this week. >> that's not unrelated to the fact that he's shot up in the polls. on this program last week right after the iowa straw poll, the much-hyped iowa straw poll, i would say. roger simon was one of the guests and talked about how ron paul who almost beat michele bachmann, finished second by 150 votes, wasn't getting much attention. jon stewart is among those that picked up on that. >> we have a top tear, mitt romney, perry and bachmann. >> there's now a top tier in this race at least for now of romney, perry and bachmann. >> i think that's fair to say. really fair to say? you're not forgetting anyone, saying a 12-term congressman who came within 200 votes of winning the straw poll? >> david serota what ex-ron paul being shut out? >> we were talking about other narratives embedded in our media debate, political debate. ron paul is an anti-war, pro drug legalization, pro civil liberties republican. that doesn't fit into republican politics or democratic politics either. he's being written out of the story because he can't be put through the prism necessarily of that red versus blue summer camp color war idea that dominates so much of our politics. it's really sad. here is a guy who has had political success, who by every other metric would be included as a front-runner or at least in the debate about who is going to win or could win the republican nomination. >> i'm disagreeing with david on this. there's a couple things. first off, he's not well thought of in the polls. one reason he has a national presence, the media built him up in 2008, we got web traffic. any time you put ron paul in the headlines, we built him up. another issue is he's 76 years old. i think if this were a 55-year-old candidate who was making this platform, having this sort of liberal republican platform on social issues, he would have a much better chance. >> i think ron paul gets the press he deserves. it's not like we haven't been down this road before. he wins straw polls, raises a lot of money. >> that could be a self fulfilling prophesy to decide in advance he's not going to win the nomination. >> the last time there was a policy like ron paul was tom dewey, he's out of touch with the republican mainstream foreign policy. >> i have one more piece of videotape i need to play. i should mention we invited ron paul to talk about this subject, he declined. he declined an invitation from cnn's "state of the union." here is fox news' ma that mechanical lum talking to ron paul about an ad that ran in the paper. >> one question surfaced in the austin chronicle. that is from an ad that is said to be in a ron paul supporter. have you ever gone sex with rick perry, are you a stripper, impressed by an arrogant governor from texas. what's your campaign response to this coming from one of your support porters? >> i don't know hoye something like that qualifies as a question on national tv as being serious. >> should those kind of questions be raised? >> he had nothing to do with it as far as i can say. >> that was surprising. how many supporters of candidates are raising questions about other candidates. >> in the process smears rick perry by raising allegations that so far no one has supported. let me get a break. when we come back, president obama dares to take a vacation. why are some journalists carping about his martha's vineyard retreat. later, a conversation with tom friedman of "the new york times." them. it pays to switch, it pays to discover. ♪ we were skipping stones ♪ and letting go ♪ over the river and down the road ♪ ♪ she was waiting up around the bend ♪ ♪ smile at me and then you take my hand ♪ [ female announcer ] nature valley granola bars, where delicious ingredients like toasted oats, with rich dark chocolate, sweet golden honey, or creamy peanut butter come together in the most perfect combinations. ♪ i was thinking that i hope this never ends ♪ ♪ yeah, i was just thinking ♪ i hope this will never end [ martin luther king jr. ] i still have a dream that one day on the red hills of georgia, the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood. i have a dream today! [ male announcer ] chevrolet is honored to celebrate the unveiling of the washington, d.c., martin luther king jr. memorial. take your seat at the table on august 28th. ♪ let me make you smile ♪ let me do a few tricks ♪ some old and then some new tricks ♪ ♪ i'm very versatile ♪ so let me entertain you ♪ and we'll have a real good time ♪ [ male announcer ] the new hp touchpad starting at $399.99. ♪ president obama's vacation has somehow become a media controversy. anthony mason raised this with with president. >> a scary summer. the stock market, the economy struggling. should congress be back in washington? should you be on vacation? >> no. i think if all we're doing is the same posturing we saw before the debt limit vote, that's not going to encourage anybody. that's going to discourage people. >> christina bell tony, why is the press pounding away at this vacation? >> of course. if congress were in town and he was off vacations, that would be a different story. they're gone for four weeks. >> the city is deserted. >> i asked supporters on twitter about this. pretty much everyone says give the guy a break. not every american can have the opportunity to have a vacation on martha's vineyard. taking vacation with your kids -- >> matt lewis, i guess you could make a case that martha's vineyard is not the best setting when so many americans are hurting. but unlike bush 43 obama doesn't have a ranch to go to. >> i think in terms of substance, i do not begrudge the president, this could actually be healthy. i want to get the congress away from washington. let them think, let them relax. >> you're in favor of less government. >> yeah, i am. good ideas sometimes come from rest and relaxation. in terms of optics, it does look bad to go to this hoytity to itity place while other people are out of work struggling. >> which is one of the reasons why last year he made a point to go to the gulf coast after the oil spill to show the family this was a good place to visit with your family and then went to martha's vineyard. >> david, would the pundits prefer that president obama conduct a poll for where to go on vacation as bill clinton did before going to jackson hole? >> i think so. ronald reagan went on vacation for a 25-day vacation during 9% unemployment. george bush did three times the amount of vacation barack obama has done at this point in his presidency. but again, it's not just the vacation. it's the vacation at martha's vineyard. the fact that when bush went on vay kags, it wasn't reported he was going to his mansion in crawford. martha's vineyard says what wasn't said about reagan and bush. i think that's what this is about. >> don't forget the president goes to his home state of hawaii for christmas every year for two weeks. people don't complain about that because it's his home state. >> the president is always working, always getting intelligence briefing and always has to respond to events. the president also sat down with cnn's wolf blitzer this week. let me play that for you. >> when we spoke here end of 2008, hope and change. you know what i see in washington today? >> more of the same. >> the same old, same old. >> maybe a little worse. >> why? >> frankly, wolf, i think the media has changed. it's much more splintered. you don't have the entire population watching walter cronkite and hearing one source of news now. everybody is going off into their respective corners. >> obama mentioned other things, matt lewis, is this blaming the media, does it make sense to you? >> it might not make sense politically because complaining doesn't really work. as an observer, i think he's probably right. there's a double-edged sword to this. i don't want to go back to the days when my information came from "the new york times," "the washington post" and broadcasters. >> very polarized. >> he didn't answer the question. wolf blitzer was asking about the change since 2008. walter cronkite wasn't in the air in 2008. >> you actually listened to the question. >> presidents like all politicians hear the question the way they choose to hear it so they can give the answer they want to give. coming up, "new york times" columnist tom friedman on why he's suddenly pushing for a third party and what's wrong with the media's breathless coverage of politics. buzz business sin jer, allegations that university athletes got improper gifts of money, meals and sex. 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[ male announcer ] the new hp touchpad starting at $399.99. ♪ [ male announcer ] they'll see you...before you see them. cops are cracking down on drinking and riding. drive sober, or get pulled over. "new york times" columnist serve up plenty of strong opinions about democrats and republicans. thomas friedman is throwing his journalistic weight behind trying to create a third party. he's fed up with the political parties and wants to blow open the system. an unusual stance to say the least from somebody occupying the coveted real estate of the country's most coveted paper. "that used to be us, how american fell behind in the world it invented." i spoke to him earlier. tom, welcome. >> thank you. >> "new york times" columnist don't endorse candidates. you're backing an outfit whose mission is to get third party candidates on the presidential ballot in 50 different states. has tom friedman given up on the system? >> i think the two party system. definitely frustrated. definitely think it needs a shock. we're having an economic crisis and the two parties are having an election. they barely meet. it just overlaps with their election. >> it will overlap when the two parties seem unable to agree on basic way to raise the debt ceiling and keep the country out of default. that frustrated everybody. but this idea of a third party. it seems like pie in the sky in a way. >> it certainly seems like pie in the sky to some. the reason it's been pie in the sky is because it's so difficult to get on the ballot. so that's why third party candidates have rarely carried states. george wallace did. but if you have a third party, that's already on all 50 states and then you have an internet election that doesn't turn out to be good fi, ending up with lady gaga, i think it becomes very interesting. the key is to show the two parties tlas constituency for serious policies so they change. that's the shock i think the system needs. that's why i find americans interesting. >> you feel given the current system with the need to raise money and the need to play to your ideological base on both sides, that the democrats and republicans essentially are not very good at governing? >> you look at what's going on now and you say how could we how could we be here today? we're waiting for thanksgiving for these two parties to solve this crisis. >> a super committee. >> absolutely. and the markets say, no problem, we'll wait. get back to us on turkey day. that's part of a system that is so broken, it seems to me, it's dangerously broken. a friend of mine on wall street said to me the other day the politicians are dealing with this like it's a football. it's not a football. it's actually a faberge egg. you drop it and you can actually break it. i think that's the frustration in the country. >> you wrote a related column called "bring back poppy." the press didn't love him at the time. remember the bumper stickers, annoy the media, reelect bush? >> absolutely. i was a reporter there, i wasn't writing a column. i'm sure i had frustrations as a reporter. what did i admire about him? first is he believed in math. it's hard sometimes to find republicans who believe in math these days. that is, when his aides came to him and said, mr. president, we need to raise taxes. you need to break that vow you made to the american people, "read my lips, no new taxes," he did the right thing. >> possibly at the cost of his presidency. >> absolutely. paved the way to the good economy of the '90s. at the same time he believed in science. george h.w. bush was the father of cap and trade which he invented and installed to deal with the acid rain problem, incredibly successful. >> you also ask in one of your columns, tom, where have the adults gone? you like republicans like dick lugar, john mccain, lindsey graham, colin powell, not a fan of michele bachmann. you mention rush limbaugh, palin and grover norquist. some of that sounds ideological. you like the moderate republicans. the center of gravity in the party has shifted. >> in my next life, i want to come back as the member of the baerks whether the settlers in israel or the republican party. at some point someone has to talk straight to these people. when you have a party where it is an act of courage, the ultimate act of courage to say climate change may actually be real. that's nuts. that's so outside where the science is. and that's a dangerous place i think for the republicans to take. the country can't be serious if our biggest opposition party isn't serious about these issues. >> if the republican party has been highjacked by what you call the extremist tea party, has the mainstream press reflected that? >> i think certainly the commentary, when i see the columns, yes. >> in the straight reporting is there a little too much he-said/she-said and not reflecting what some would say is a historical shift? >> you would be in a better position to judge than me. >> i bet there are people watching, this is just a typical liberal media bias, won the election of 2010, captured the house of representatives and you, tom friedman, don't like that. >> first of all, i'm not suf v such a liberal, let's start there, as the left will tell you. i'm a pretty centrist kind of person, number one. number two, everyone said i won the election, now i have a mandate. so george bush junior wins the election, and he takes placicly the reagan revolution, tax cutting to its logical extreme and beyond. obama comes in and takes fdr's new deal in the form of health care to its logical conclusion and some would say and beyond. to which i say thank you very much, both parties have completed the agendas of their iconic lead overs the 20th century. could someone please build a bridge to the 21st? >> given the limitations we've seen in president obama's governing style, the fact he comes in late, his critics say too much of a compromiser. did the media blow it in the portrayal of obama in 2008? were we swept along by the emotion of the obama oration? >> way too soon to tell. >> really? almost three years in? >> what have i been calling for the president -- i think there is -- we've so desperately needed a grand bargain that involves restructuring of debt, raising of taxes and investing in the sources of our strength, from everyone from infrastructure to government-funded research to education. it's so clear that's what we need. my personal frustration with obama has been that while he certainly tried that grand bargain for a little bit, it just kind of went away. id dint on the work. he said boehner backed out. i don't know if boehner backed out. >> it takes two sides to negotiate. >> exactly. if i were obama, i would be out with the american people every day on that bus tour, i am for this grand bargain. here is what it means specifically. here is why it will work. my own frustration with obama is as a commentator, who wants to get behind solutions and come out against obstruction, i don't have a solution right now that i can say here is my guy who has got my plan out there, the plan i think will work best for the country. i think there's a lot of voters who feel that way as well. a lot of obama supporters who want to be supporting the president. they don't quite know what it is. >> what is the plan? what does he stand for? you have played golf with president obama. >> yeah. >> is that a journalistic benefit to you? >> yeah. any time you spend four hours with the president, with a spoon in your hand or a golf club in your hand or nothing in your hand, you learn something. >> for some people who say it's a cozy relationship? >> any time you get a clans to talk to the president in any context i find incredibly beneficial. >> you've done it with other presidents? >> with clinton. >> because you're a good golfer. >> i'm okay. after the break, tom friedman weighs in on michele bachmann's promise of $2.00 gas and why we don't get more serious economic coverage from the media. producers are committed to safely and responsibly providing decades of cleaner burning energy for our country, drilling thousands of feet below fresh water sources within self contained well systems and using state of the art monitoring technologies, rigorous practices help ensure our operations are safe and clean for our communities and the environment we are america's natural gas. more now of my conversation with "new york times" columnist tom friedman. stop friedman, among the things you've written about is economics, international economics. in the presidential campaign we have michele bachmann the other day saying that she will make sure that america gets $2.00 gasoline once again. she didn't offer a lot of specifics. her website says she's going to ease restrictions on drillings, roll back federal regulations on the shale gas industry. is that a responsible pledge for a candidate to make? >> it's flat-out nuts. there's no way that's going to happen. we're heading just -- i wrote a book, "hot, flat and crowded." i often hold it up when -- >> trying to sell it. >> no. i often say to audiences who don't believe in climate change. you don't believe in hot? okay. you better believe in flat and crowded. more and more people can see where we live in a hot world and live like we live. american size cars eating american size big macs. that's going on in brazil, india, china. the world is getting flatter and flatter. and there are just more people. when you put flat and crowded together, more people and more people and able to live like us, energy prices are only going to go one way, but not $2.00. >> you don't think there could be $2.00 a gas, you want to discourage consumption. that's not a popular stance which probably has something to do with why it hasn't happened. >> that's why she's playing to that. it's so unrealistic. let's think about it from the jobs point of view. if the world is getting flat and crowded, what's going to be the next great global industry? it's got to be clean energy that can satisfy that huge growing middle class market. do you want to be telling americans let's keep investing in this old technology and this fuel that's a diminishing resource or should we be looking to create this whole new industry. >> when we look at the coverage of the presidential campaign and the economic -- i guess you'd call it a crisis here in this country because we haven't made the budget cuts that is, andp needs to make, obviously we all as journalists tend to gravitate towards tactics and polls and strategies and attack ads. has there been enough focus on the fact that the candidates are not, some would argue, speaking candidly about some of the sacrifices that americans need to make, both in terms of serious spending cuts, entitlement reform, raising taxes? different people have taken on different pieces of it. has the press co-gotten serious about this? >> a very good question. that's what our knew book is about. our argument is we're not in the post subprime crisis. we're in a crisis that's 20 years old, that goes back to the end of the cold war. we dug this hole for 20 years living beyond our means, spending money we didn't have. >> exactly. >> financing wars without tax cuts. >> and not educating our kids, but giving them steroids instead of cheap mortgages and credit. so we're not getting out of this in one month, one year, with one presidential jobs program. that's the honest truth. and no one out there is telling the american people that. >> has there been enough focus in the press -- we have this big megaphone, you work for a big newspaper. i guess it becomes less news worthy because it happens every single day. but the unemployment rate in this country and the people out of work for maybe six months and the people who had perfectly good jobs that are not coming back, yet we get absorbed by the beltway game playing, who is going to play chicken on the debt ceiling. what about this long-term trend of americans not being able to find good jobs. >> that's why we wrote a book about it. basically what i see is so much politics is sports now. we have espn. now we have pspn, covering politics purely as a sporting event. who slam dunked who. all that's missing are the tarzan outfits and not stepping back and i think serving -- i'm not a press critic. all i can tell you is what we did in wanting to write this book is that. >> you say you're not a press guy. what you just described sounds like a colossal failure on the part of the media and establishment. you had time to write a book about it with your koe author. if we're covering politics like sports and at the same time you say we're in the culmination of a 20-year crisis of the country living beyond its means and we've got 14 million unemployed, it sounds like there should be a daily drum beat about a very serious matter. yet you say it's sports, it's espn. >> it's how i've tried to cover it in my own column. i do think drawing attention to these longer term trends is something very much part of the story, the news story right now. and again -- i'm not surveying the media. there's a lot of good journalism out there, too. all i can tell you is that's what i'm trying to focus on. you're in a much better position. a lot of the surface stuff does feel like politics as sports more than looking at the long-term trends. >> i'm sure a lot of people would agree a lot of politics is sports. given the magnitude of the situation we're in, there could be more -- tom friedman, thanks for stopping by. >> thanks, howie, pleasure. i also spoke to friedman about the recent turmoil in eej israel and egypt. up next, buzz bissinger on the story of the miami football team getting gifts and the coaches being accused of looking the other way. ♪ and we'll have a real good time ♪ [ male announcer ] the new hp touchpad starting at $399.99. ♪ [ male announcer ] they'll see you...before you see them. cops are cracking down on drinking and riding. drive sober, or get pulled over. [ martin luther king jr. ] i still have a dream that one day on the red hills of georgia, the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood. i have a dream today! [ male announcer ] chevrolet is honored to celebrate the unveiling of the washington, d.c., martin luther king jr. memorial. take your seat at the table on august 28th. energy is being produced to power our lives. while energy developement comes with some risk, north america's natural gas producers are committed to safely and responsibly providing decades of cleaner burning energy for our country, drilling thousands of feet below fresh water sources within self contained well systems and using state of the art monitoring technologies, rigorous practices help ensure our operations are safe and clean for our communities and the environment we are america's natural gas. [clucking] [clucking] [ding] [clucking] announcer: separate raw meats from other foods by using different cutting boards. 3,000 americans will die from food poisoning this year. keep your family safer. check your steps at foodsafety.gov. sports is an arena that attraction a lot of investigative reporting. yahoo! correspondent came up with a blockbuster. nevin shapiro a supporter of the university of miami sports teams who is behind bars for fraud, alleges he provided millions in benefits to at least 72 football and basketball players over an eight-year period. >> talked to multiple players who have told us, yeah, nevin shapiro -- on multiple days talked about prostitution, money, a lot of benefits that shapiro provided many players who took those benefits, admitted to us they didn't want their name attached and they said yes, these things did happen. >> joining us from philadelphia to talk about the story and the way the media portray college sports, buzz bissinger contributing the author of "friday night lights." 5,000 pages of cell phone records. took a lot to crack this case. >> took a hell of a lot. i read the story two or three times. i've done investigative reporting and i think they did a heck of a lot. a lot of people, boosters in miami, a lot of fans are saying it's just the he said, the guy is a convicted criminal. that's true. they did a lot of other reporting. 11 months, interviewed players who corroborated it, didn't want their names used which is understandable and thousands of pages of documents. i don't hear the university of miami saying this stuff is out of left field. the same with federal prosecutors who prosecuted him criminally. they seemed to corroborate it as well. i think yahoo! sports did a terrific, tremendous service to college football which is completely -- i'm no not saying this for hyperbole, is out of control. >> you put your finger on a potential weakness. it's true that he looked at former players and checks. nef slin shapiro is serving 20 years for this giant ponzi scheme and he said that shapiro had an ax to grind, that players abandoned him. he's ticked off. i guess it's perfectly natural for someone to question his credibility. >> it's natural to question someone's credibility. a lot of murder cases depend on witnesses who have unsavory reputations, who have committed crimes. as far as i know i don't think shapiro is getting a reduced sentence for this. as i say, they didn't simply take his word and put it out as a story which is very common today because a lot of stories are based on one rumor or one guy yapping hills mouth off. they checked records. some of what shapiro said did come up public -- i don't see weaknesses in the story. these players are missed off. these schools are making millions. why aren't think going to take a thousand bucks here. players like prostitutes. a lot of people take prostitutes. why are they going to partake in that? you see the pictures that they produced. this guy is all over these players and they used him as a tool. i think he is angry. when push came to shove, they all said, nevin, go away, you little 5'5" white guy, go away. >> we barely know that guy. it's striking this story did not break in "the miami herald." a lot of people must have known about this given all the players and former players who were involved. is there a reluctance by some news organizations to aggressively investigate the sacred cow of the local university teams which most of their readers, of course, are going to root for? >> well, you know, i don't know if that's true. i mean, a lot of the best stories, for instance, that have been broken by the kansas city papers because the ncaa is or was based in can kst fkansas fo time, i don't know if "the miami herald" was shielding this. it's a good question. "miami herald" is the hometown paper for the miami hurricanes. why they didn't do it, particularly when it came up publicly during the trial, seemed like everybody knew something was going on. you'd have to ask them. maybe yahoo! sports got an early bead on it or maybe shapiro didn't want to deal with "the miami herald." they didn't just do one or two interviews with the guy. they did 11 exhaustive interviews. >> right. i'm not implicating the "miami herald." i am saying i think any local newspaper that wants to take on this kind of corruption at the local university risks facing a backlash. now, you wrote in a column for my website, the daily beast, that the ncaa should now, as a result of these voluminous and troubling allegations, give the university of miami the death penalty, meaning end the football program. you also say that the president of the university, donna shalala, should resign. aren't you kind of jumping the gun here? there hasn't been an investigation of who knew what among the higher-ups. >> i am probably jumping the gun. >> you admit it. that's what columnists do, they jump the gun. >> but there was a picture that was produced during the investigation by yahoo! sports of donna shalala accepting a $50,000 check from nevin shapiro. that indicates at the very least she knows who this guy is. i also know for a fact that donna shalala finds and thinks that college football is enormously important to the lifeblood of the university. i know that. i interviewed her in the early 1990s when she was the chancellor at the university of wisconsin where she simply said it, football was very, very important. i was shocked she made it. they made a big change to barry alvarez and they became a top-ten power. i think at the very least we should find out what she knew. look what's happening with murdoch and the news corporation. all these hearings in front of par lam. we all assume he must have known. i find it hard to believe that shalala did not know what's going on when it seems like three-quarters of the athletic department knew what was going on, this guy is hanging around for ten years p. >> fair question. coming up, college football's ugly season facing scandals of every stripe. how widespread is this sort of conduct and do the media need to more aggressively investigate. i seem to have puzzled you with that one or lost the connection. >> no. i'm sorry. >> more aggressive investigation of -- >> there should be more aggressive investigation. these stories sort of pop up, you know, once every is six months, eight months, you know, 12 months. >> right. >> there are numerous programs that are under investigation, at least a dozen big-time programs that are under investigation. >> we've got to go. >> whether it's ohio state or university of north carolina. >> buzz, thanks for joining us. still to come, an msnbc show twists rick perry's words, and the political reporter who proved the president was wrong. the safety of onstar is now available for your car. ♪ [ recorded voice ] onstar. we're looking for city hall. i'm sending directions to your car. 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[ grandma ] yes. that's right. discover customersl are getting five percent cashback bonus at the pump... and at many of the places their summer plans take them. it pays to switch, it pays to discover. rick perry can be loose with his words, but the pundits better be careful about going beyond those words. there's plenty of room to scrutinize without leading to misleading ed didding. here's a clip of what perry said this week about the federal debt. >> getting america back to work is the most important issue that faces this country. being able to pay off $14.5 trillion or $16 trillion worth of debt. that big black cloud that hangs over america, that debt that is so monstrous. >> and here's how it appeared on msnbc on "the ed schultz show." >> getting america back to work is the most important issue that faces this country. being able to pay off $14.5 trillion or $16 trillion worth of debt. that big black cloud that hangs over america. >> that black cloud perry is talking about is president barack obama. >> no he wasn't. the very next words, as andrew brightbar's website pointed out, were "that debt." by cutting off the tape, schultz seemed to be suggesting the it was some kind of racial reference. perry may be blaming obama for the debt, just like every other republican, but he wasn't calling the president a black cloud. instead it was a black mark on the msnbc program. to his credit, schultz acknowledged his mistake and apologized. i think it's now fair to accuse rupert murdoch's news corp. of a cover-up. he and his son, james, insisted to the parliament they didn't know about the phone hacking scandal at their new-defunct "news of the world" tabloid despite mounting evidence that higher-ups were involved. but a letter released this week from the man accused of bag rogue reporter in the hacking made that harder to swallow. clyde goodman, who went to jail in the scandal, said hacking into people's voice mail was