Carried i believe is the commitment to a role for russia in the current conflict within and about syria. This has the capacity for good because putting putins prestige in line, putin is telling the world to watch him, watch what he can deliver in syria, watch him as he demonstrates his control over the government in damascus. If he fails, its because he, vladimir putin, stuck his head into this thing. If bashar assad uses chemical weapons from henceforth it is on putins head. Hes the guy saying hes got things under control. Hes the guy who says hes the goto guy to get this chemical weapons thing under control. Its not that putin has gone and gotten himself into an article written in the New York Times under his name. Its that putin has to find a way through this. In fact hes now put his name to doing it. Michael crowley is Senior Correspondent for Time Magazine and Peter Beinart is senior Political Writer for the daily beast and the editor of the open zion blog. Thank you. First of all ill start with michael, whos with me. What do you think is a fair look at this thing . Let me read from Vladimir Putins oped in the New York Times today. Its certainly raising eyebrows around the world. Besides backing the plan to disarm syria of its chemical weapons the russian leader also took the opportunity according to some to lecture america. It is alarming that military intervention in internal conflicts in Foreign Countries has become commonplace for the United States. Is it in americas longterm interest . I doubt it. Millions around the world increasingly see america not as a model of democracy but as relying solely on brute force, cobbling coalitions together under the slogan youre either with us or against us. Putin also chided president obamas exceptional nation comment this week. According to putin, it is extremely dangerous to encourage people to see themselves as exceptional, whatever the motivation. Your thoughts, michael. He certainly knows whoever helped him with this bit of ajit propp knew what they were doing. And i gather he did have a washington p. R. Firm helping. Any good foreign leader would. Chris, i see i think three key things going on here p one is he wants to undermine the support, theres not much of it to begin with, but the support for military action in syria in the United States. He doesnt like western, u. S. Led meddling in other countries. He sees us as going around the world trying to change rejeemds. He hates that. He wants to further weaken obamas case for war for instance by throwing a little smoke around the question whof did the chemical attack. He says it was the rebels. Doesnt seem very likely. Growing up it was the words of national liberation, that the soviets were all pushing. And we didnt like it. Now they dont like it and were involved. But he does still have he was a former kgb guy. Its an oversimplification to say thats his whole worldview but he does still have a k0e8d war mentality. Number two, he likes to take charge of the situation. He wants to show people hes a big man but to my question, does this put him in chinese handcuffs . Reaching into this thing does he get stuck . He has to show he can deliver. Thats the line youre hearing from the white house now. Hes invested in it, its on him its his credibility. They kind of love this. It deflects a little bit from how is obama managing it, can he deliver on his threats and promises and inwin the congress to what can putin deliver. Well, im an optimist. Im a liberal. Let me go to Peter Beinart. I can never figure out peter because i think youre somewhere awround the middle line politically. Ive been reading zwrufr and i think youre pessimistic about mr. Putins ability to be the middle man here and to get assad to stop using chemical in fact to turn them over. If the question is him not using chemical weapons again, i think you make a good point, chris. I think at this point thats pretty unlikely. But if the question is him giving them over, first of all, the logistics are just overwhelming. Even if assad and putin really did want this. I mean, remember how much trouble we had with this in iraq . And there wasnt a civil war going on. The pentagon estimated youd need 75,000 troops to protect the inspectors who were trying to walk around in the how critical is it that we collect all these weapons if theyre not going to be used . I think this whole thing is a complete red herring. What matters is not how the people of syria are killed. It is the fact they are continuing to be killed at horrifying rates what should we do . We should be working with iran and russia, with whom were in various stages of cold war, to try to cobble together a political solution in syria and thats going to require compromises on americas side. Thats the bigger issue here, much bigger than the chemical weapons per se. Lets stick with the chemical thing. The reaction in washington was swift, critical and bipartisan about putins big article today. Take a look. I was insulted. I think its the height of hypocrisy for putin at this point to lecture the United States of america. President putin should be the last person to lecture the United States about our human values and our human rights. And what we stand for. I got an email with what president putin had to say. And i have to be honest, at dinner. And i almost wanted to vomit. The reality is i worry when someone who came up through the kgb tells us what is in our National Interests and what is not. It sickened me that we would have to sit there and read that. But lets look at it through putins eyes. He now knows that we had to come to him to get out of a hole. And so i think hes enjoying it a lot more than menendez and i are enjoying it. I dont know about everybody personifying, this personalizing it. John mccain tweeted putins New York Times oped is an insult to the intelligence of every american. You know, i think sometimes president s and secretaries of state have to find their way through people. You dont negotiate with your best friends. You negotiate with your enemies. And sometimes theyre your best friends. And russia and the United States did get together on the most important issue of the 20th century. Together even when you never agree on anything else. And my question is whether we can still use putin. Im going to go back to Michael Crowley i mean to peter in a moment. But michael, is there a way we can get through this thing . Because it seems to me that putin now has stuck his head. Hes the big fish now. He has to i said in my opening statement, and i think peter agreed, if assad uses chemical weapons now, it looks like the man in russia has no power. Thats right. And that would lead to an outcome that putin doesnt want. Because i think if assad uses chemical weapons again the calculus changes. The use of force becomes much more a much more viable option for obama, well have more International Support p you can see sentiment change in europe, for instance. And i think youre really likely to see a swift reaction from the west if he does it again. And thats the thing putin wants least here. He does not want the west using its military intervening, trying to effect regime change. One of his key goals is to stop what he sees as the sort of westernled regime change around the world. Thats one of his key priorities. And we do have Common Ground with putin on the question of securing chemical weapons and trying to thwart radical islamists in syria. They threaten his regime as well. We saw that in the boston bombing. The Boston Marathon bombing. We saw the radicalism in the caucuses in russia. Hes very nervous about that. He doesnt want any spillover. I think we have a northsouth fight going on in the world right now. And its including the countries of old europe. And moscows still part of old europe, and its capital, and i think theyre afraid of whats going on to their south. In geneva today secretary of state john kerry began several days of meetings with his russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov and he stressed the Common Ground between the two countries on syria. But he also had a warning. Lets watch. The United States and russia have had and continue to have our share of disagreements. But whats important as we come here is that theres much that we agree on. We agree that no one anywhere at any time should employ chemical weapons. And we agree that our joining together with the International Community to eliminate stockpiles of these weapons in syria would be an historic moment for the multilateral nonproliferation efforts. This is not a game. And i said that to my friend sergey when we talked about it initially. It has to be real. It has to be comprehensive. It has to be verifiable. Thats true. But lets look at russias motives. According to the washington post, putin really does want to avoid a u. S. Attack that would have made it look weak, russia look weak. Theres a question of pride. Russia poses as the counterweight to the United States. Its Diplomatic Initiative helps to marinate that image. To be a relatively passive bystander to a u. S. Attack would be a moment of uncomfortable truth. Until this week any attempt to find Common Ground with the west on syria would have made russia appear to be dancing to the u. S. Tune. Now of course they caught us in our weakness. Peter, you and i may not be on the exact same page but i want to get to the page im not just for a minute. It does seem the president has no cards to play. The congress i think wed agree was not going to give him the authority to act. And that was going to be a terrible defeat. And perhaps even in the senate. Right. And most certainly in the house. And that i think would have left him empty with no weapons in his hand and no options. What would have happened if we didnt have the russian card to play . No, thats exactly right. I mean, regardless of what you think about the likely effectiveness of this russian plan in terms of getting rid of the chemical weapons in syria, its very understandable why obama took that offramp from the congressional vote because it was heading toward disaster. I think the question for the administration is now, though this would take a year at best. And its going to be hard for us to keep this cudgel of military force hanging over for this entire time. So i think for them as a a political matter the question is how are they going to be able to make the case to the American People that this is actually a meaningful process when once the threat of military force recedes which i think it inevitably will didnt it recede when anybody watching in moscow watching nerk knew the president didnt have the votes on the hill . Didnt they know that earlier this week when they gave us the lifeline the secretary of state threw out to them . We jumped on it because they thought they could do something. You think they did it because they were afraid we were going to attack . I think they already knew we couldnt. What shifted the balance of power here, and i think mikes exactly right, for putin its all about reasserting russia as a great power in the world and restoring the even said in his oped, we defeated the nats yisz together, we were friends in the he got that moment because the president of the United States happened to be at a particularly weak moment because he had misgambled in terms of the vote in congress. Do you guys buy into this this is a tough question for journalists. I want to start with you, peter, because its hard to read you sometimes. Do you buy the neocon argument that russians are bad people . Forget communism, theres something wrong with them. I hear that from people, and i go are you guys still fighting the cold war . What is it about the russians you dont like now . No, i think thats nonsensical. There may be certain reasons that democracy is harder to make work in a country of russias size and political traditions than other Eastern European countries. Whenever someone starts talking about the nature of different people i get nervous. I think its important people understand the russian experience over the last century has been horrible at times. They were invaded by the germans. You had the siege of stalingrad and leningrad. You had stalin. You had stalin. And the czars before that. A country who perhaps as a result the leadership of this country may be cynical, may be very hardened, may think that the world is a brutal and awful place. And chemical weapons in the general scheme of things, if they threaten us thats bad, but you know, we actually dont care that much about some of these other conflicts because weve seen a lot of blood shed and i just dont think you see quite the same moral outrage about some of these issues you see in the United States. Theyve had a much more brutal recent history. Interesting thing is from 1945 right till 91 the fall of the moscow coup the two countries never fought with each other. Thats one of the great realities of history. There is some rationality on their side. I think khrushchev was incredibly rational during the cuban missile crisis to the benefit of the world. And lost his job because of it. He was lopped off for being what he was. Thank you, Michael Crowley. Thank you, Peter Beinart, as always. Coming up, the commander in chief. To some president obamas changing positions on whether it strike syria or not has been a sign of weakness on his part. But others see the president as the antibush, unwilling to rush unilaterally into military conflict. And with a strike on syria looking increasingly less likely right now the focus turns to a big battle here at home on whether to shut down the United States government in order to kill obama care in its crib. Thats the fight were in right here. Once again its the republican leadership, unfortunately or not, out of step with the tea party crowd. With Anthony Weiner sxel yot spitzer going down in defeat tuesday night, why do some politicians survive sex scandals while others dont . Well finish with the family on whom new york voters, or at least the democrats, have set their heart. And this is hardball, the place for politics. This act will not stand. We will find those who did it. We will smoke them out of their holes. Youre with us or you are with the terrorists. There are some who feel like the conditions are such that they can attack us there. My answer is bring them on. Ah, the old days. Anyway, welcome back to hardball. The texas macho president , that was president bush, brought the Foreign Policy. Weve learned president obamas approach most visibly on display in the past weeks as hes considered and reconsidered action in syria. As peter baker writes in todays New York Times, to aides and allies mr. Obamas willingness to hit the pause button twice now reflects a refreshing openmindedness and a reluctance to use force that they considered all too missing under his predecessor with the texas swagger. But to mr. Obamas detractors including many in his own parties he has shown a certain fecklessness in his decisions instead of displaying decisive leadership. He has appeared reactive, defensive and profoundly challenged in standing up to a dangerous world. Like i often like to say, where you sit is where you stand. Peter baker is White House Reporter for the New York Times and author of the upcoming book days of fire bush and cheney. Or it should be said cheney in the white house. David gregory is moderator of course of meet the press. I want both you gentlemen, and this is an objective assessment, neither one of you guys take sides, so i want to start with you, peter, and the way you set this thing up. If you look at it, the way its getting set up is at its worst the other guy was shoot, ask questions later, that was bush, and at his worst obamas being compared to people like me whove been around a long time to adlai stevenson, bright mind, considers all the factors and considers so many factors he cant get back to making a decision. Is that the way its set up . Or say it your way. Thats a fair summation. Obviously, that oversimplifies as any newspaper article or any news show can do a complicated individual. In either bushs case or obamas case. But thats you do sort of see this very stark contrast on display these last few weeks, this sense from bush that once you make a decision boom, you go on, you never look back and keep pushing forward. Obama on the other hand is sort of at this point kind of reacting, changing his mind, thinking through what he wants to do, and under very different political circumstances as well, for that matter. You know, david, i was thinking, its not just the war in iraq we all talk about. Its the tax cut that bush came in with back in 2001. He was going to do a tax cut no matter what the Economic Conditions were. Im going to cut taxes. Maybe because his father raised him but im going to cut taxes. And dont confuse me with the facts. It was almost like that with the war. Dont give me the new information well, i youve been there. No, i think there there was a philosophical difference on taxes in terms of the impact on the economy. Heres the important thing to remember. Without bush you wouldnt have obama. What a lot of people disliked about bush is ultimately what made the public have an appetite define that. Because there was swagger, because there was certitude, because they were wrong on key facts like weapons of mass destruction, because there was a view of them being kind of impervious to outside information that could help guide decisionmaking, the american electorate wanted a more deliberative president , but you only have obama struggling because of what happened under bush. Lets also not forget, after 9 11, 67 support for going to war in iraq in october of 2002. The strength of bush after 9 11 was made him so politically successful and popular in the country at that time. We were in a much different place as a country. I think youre right. I think david is right. You think of the picture of president bush on the World Trade Center site that friday, afterwards, and when he put his arm around the firefighter and he said were going to get the people that knocked down these buildings. I had never seen a president so brilliantly reach into the heart, gut, and mind of america and be that being, that thing. The trouble for obama seemed to be that he was out of sync. That when he went to go to the hill this week to get support from the United States senate and the house for a war, he was not in sync with the country. Peter. Yes. I think exactly right. And i think david makes a very good point, that bush was in a different political environment. He had the support of the country. The country was angry because of 9 11. They wanted bush to do something. They wanted a guy who was going to get up there and say bring them on, dead or alive, with us or against us. That was the mood of the country. And president bush reflected that. As david said, i think president obama reflects the mood of a different country at a different time, a country thats tired of that, a country that doesnt really want to go to war anywhere, even just with a few missiles but heres part of the problem, peter. And i think just if we look at this analytically, this president , with such war weariness, who goes out of his way to say were so war weary, is basically saying heres a guy whos like adolf hitler, whos like saddam hussein, whos committed an unspeakable act, and america, because were exceptional and because were the anchor of global security, we must act. You know who that sounds like . It sounds a lot like bush. He didnt say that in 2008. He never said my definition is american exceptionalism is different, it has to do with what you can do in this country or where you come from. His idea is but im saying hes saying that now but at the same time this president is also saying, well, but lets also leave some room to be deliberative. And i people do celebrate this. Some people do. Some people say he seems a bit confused, he seems disorganized in terms of the organization of it. The leadership of it. Do you think, peter, when you look at the two National Security teams, the ones in between one and eight of this century and the new team thats in there under rice and the others, kerry, are they different in quality . Is there a difference in their studied ability to look at things, understand the situations, and advise accordingly . Or are they just different in ideology but the same quality . Thats a very good question. Hard to judge. I think it depends on how much your president wants to listen to and lean on and involve the staff. Did he involve them thats good stuff youre reporting today. You state as a fact, an established fact that this president walked on the back lawn almost like a road to damascus. Hes on the back lawn with dennis mcdonough, his young chief of staff who was deputy National Security adviser, and comes back with a decision to go to congress. Not involving consultation with the secretary of state, with any of the congressional relations people. Thats a profound way to behave. Im here like bush would have done Something Like that, i think. Its so unlike the way obama had handled a lot of other Big Decisions in his presidency we are didnt not only consult with aides and his staff but have an extended process of study, evaluation, examination. The process of deciding to send the troop surge to afghanistan in his first year went on for months. And even people who respected his level of deliberation also thought he was going on too long, should have made a decision. In this there was some daalying there. It seemed like dallying last week. In this particular case people ive talked to in the white house say this issue of congressional authorization was always on the table, that obama and his counsel were always concerned about a legal justification for doing this and they felt more politically isolated. So its not like it came out of nowhere but they did buck the system. One thing they did here is set a precedent. You first peter and then again you david quickly. It seems like theyre saying when it comes to a matter that doesnt directly affect an imminent assault or attack in the United States you need congressional approval for something that involves an International Norm like chemical weapons use. It seems to me that sets up the premise for six months or a year if now we have to make a decision about what to do with if the mullahs decide to weaponize their Nuclear Program over in tehran. Doesnt that set up a predicate now where he has to go to congress . I think thats a very good point. He says i reserve the authority to do this without congress. I dont need to go to congress. But im going to anyway. And its hard to say why a future scenario like the one you outlined would be different. That somehow he didnt have to go to congress in the other scenario. He has set a precedent thats going to be hard to explain if heres where i disagree. Couldnt he make the argument if all of a sudden we faced a threat from iran that america faces an imminent threat at any point because Irans Nuclear arsenal would be capable of hitting us or could pose an existential threat to israel yeah, but that wouldnt be what he called the standard he set was pretty high. He said it had to be an imminent threat to us. Right. Thats what he said in 2007. Presumably a Nuclear Armed iran could be at some point. I think it depends on the level of information you got and when you got it. This is a warweary country as you said, david. This is a time where youve got to make your case i think. I do. And i think the important thing to take away is we cannot forget the environment the country was in post9 11, 12th anniversary yesterday. So much different. 12 years later the isolationist streak is back as it was in other times of our history. I remember back then with the Freedom Fries and the country western music, remember how you felt. Everything was emotional. Our kurltd was headed to war. Thank you so much. I wasnt of course. Thank you, david gregory. You guys were objective journalists. Covered it as it was. Thank you, peter baker. Good luck with your book, by the way. Cant wait for this book about cheney. When is it coming out . Cheney and bush. Next month, october 22nd. Good. I got a 22day jump on you. Thank you. Gregory, my colleague here, we live just next to each other here. Thank you, david. Coming up, ted cruz pays tribute to one of his idols, jesse helms. He says i wish we had 100 of these guys. Well, if you had 100, you couldnt have a ted cruz. Do the math. Well be back after this. Ho ho ho [ female announcer ] at 100 calories, not all food choices add up. Some are giant. Some not so giant. When managing your weight, bigger is always better. Ho ho ho green giant back to hardball and time for the sideshow. Bill de blasio may have won the democratic primary for mayor of new york, but its his family whos getting all the attention. Its certainly clear that they have won the heart of at least one new york voter. Jon stewart. Check this out from the daily show last night. Photogenic doesnt even go anywhere near what these check out this Victory Party move they pulled. Ladies and gentlemen, and now the smackdown. Then the entire de blasio family, including son dante and daughter kiara did a weird gymnastic move that brought huge cheers from the crowd. Adopt me . Yes, somehow after 12 years of captain soda narc i think new york city might be ready for a charismatic biracial family with their own signature synchronized dance moves that appear to have been beamed here from their very own 1970s musical variety special. Who is better than this family . Nobodys better than this family. Wonderful. And on the other side of the aisle the republican candidate joe lhota has asked hollywood actress Jennifer Lopez for permission to use the name jlho for himself. Lopez has not responded. Diplomatic negotiations with russia over syria continue today. David letterman summed up the feelings about that last night. Do you know whose birthday it is . Evil syrian president bashar al assad. 48 years old today. 48 years old. Yep. Nice. Yeah, he got his present a day early. Vladimir putin saved his ass. It would be nice if he had a Surprise Birthday Party from s. E. A. L. Team 6. That would be good. And speaking of putin, take a look at him beside actor daniel craig. Were these two guys separated at birth . I always thought they could the either guy could play the other guy. Definitely bearing a striking resemblance to each other. Hollywood, take note. Finally, senator ted cruz spoke a lot about former senator jesse helms in his Foreign Policy speech yesterday. Helms, who was notorious for opposing integration, civil rights, and hiv aids research, was controversial enough in his own day but hed be considered even more crazy by todays standards. Nevertheless, heres what ted cruz had to say. The willingness to say all those crazy things is a rare, rare characteristic in this town. And you know what . Its every bit as true now as it was then. We need 100 more like jesse helms in the u. S. Senate. Oh, my god. Oh, my god. Anyway, 100 more crazies like jesse helms. The problem with the math there, senator, is if theres 1 huffman him there isnt a senator cruz. Theres only 100 senators. Up next its the republican establishment versus the tea party over shutting down the government and defunding the Affordable Care law. Youre watching hardball, the place for politics. Ive got a nice long life ahead. Big plans. So when i found out medicare doesnt pay all my medical expenses, i looked at my options. Then i got a Medicare Supplement insurance plan. [ male announcer ] if youre eligible for medicare, you may know it only covers about 80 of your part b medical expenses. The rest is up to you. Call now and find out about an aarp Medicare Supplement insurance plan, insured by unitedhealthcare insurance company. Like all standardized Medicare Supplement plans, it helps pick up some of what medicare doesnt pay. And could save you thousands in outofpocket costs. To me, relationships matter. Ive been with my doctor for 12 years. Now i know ill be able to stick with him. 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And learn more about the kinds of plans that will be here for you now and down the road. I have a lifetime of experience. So i know how important that is. We also will have a vote on the continuing resolution this week, and along with that vote we will send to the senate the provision which says, up or down, are you for defunding obama care or not . The house has taken a stand numerous times on its opinion of obama care. Its time for the senate to stand up and tell their constituents where they stand on this atrocity of a law. Atrocity . The law of the land called the Affordable Care act he calls an atrocity. Eric cantor there. Anyway, welcome back to hardball. The Establishment Republican Party and the Tea Party Wing of the Republican Party are waging an allout war over the Affordable Care act. As the government veers toward a shutdown come october 1st. And as you heard there from House Majority leader eric cantor, the republican leaderships strategy as they drew it up was to pass a shortterm spending bill to prevent a Government Shutdown. That bill would include a provision to defund the president S Health Care law, which the senate and the president would be free to basically ignore. On the face of it everybody wins. Conservatives get a vote to defund a law they hate and House Republicans wouldnt get blamed for a Government Shutdown. Problem solved, right . Not if Tea Party Leaders like ted cruz have anything to say about it. Here he is. Some House Republicans are considering procedural tricks to let them vote on defunding obama care and then to let harry reid strip it out and fund obama care. Let me ask you all a question. Is an empty symbolic vote enough . Are tricks and games acceptable . Rightwing groups like Freedom Works and club for growth and Tea Party Patriots have exploded in opposition to the plan of the house leaders. Theyre calling their own partys plan a grand betrayal, a bad joke, a trick and lie. Well, the ins rex got so bad that the gop leadership pulled a vote on the bill originally planned for today due to lack of support from its members. So no vote for today. Its far from clear what their next moves going to be or how theyll appease an increasingly powerful wing of the government thats willing to destroy the government and even the economy in their quest to demolish the law. Mat kifys the president of the conservative group Freedom Works and john fehr is a republican strategist. John, it seems to me what the leadership is up to, and you heard it in the side comment the other day from boehner that no matter what he puts up its going to be trashed because whats up here is an effort to basically bring down the u. S. Government so that you can kill obama care, the Affordable Care act, in its crib and anything that doesnt kill obama care, which has already been enacted into law, passed by both houses by 60 votes in the senate is a matter of u. S. Law like any other law, unless that is defunded, basically killed they want the government to come down around us and fail. This is serious revolutionary business. How is the house leadership going to handle it . Thats a good question. This is i think going to be a big kabuki dance. We all know what the result is going to be. We have to keep the government open. Matt might think its a good idea to shut down the government. I worked for the leadership in 94, 95, 96 when we shut down the government. Republicans are going to get blamed if they shut the government down p theres no doubt about that. Obama care is a bad law and its going to collapse at some point in time. The one thing matt and i agree on is we both hate obama care but i think that trying to shut the government down as a tactic is a huge mistake. What do you think . Im going to show you the polls here in a minute but im not sure polls affect your thinking. But what do you think about whether you should bring the government to a halt for two weeks, three weeks, four months, five months . How long are you willing to shut down the u. S. Government to make your point . And then what do you want to do . Are you going to say we cant have a government if it includes obama care . Is that the bottom line here . You cannot live with obama care . Well, of course, mike lee and ted cruz and the advocates in the house, they never, ever, ever supported shutting down the government. What they said was that obama care wasnt ready for prime time. The president himself has acknowledged that its not ready for prime time. Sort of arbitrarily delaying the pieces that he doesnt like. Every republican said they would repeal obama care. A lost democrats have described it as a train wreck. So what mike leigh and his house counterparts have suggested is lets fully fund every part of the government except this one piece thats not ready for prime time. Theres nothing about a Government Shutdown in that strategy. Everybodys freaking out so much ive got to believe were on to something here. Why would the United States senate, which is governed by the democrats, and the president of the United States, who is a democrat and the one who put this bill into action, who got it through the congress, why would he sign legislation which would kill his program after its already been enacted into law . Why would he ever sign such a bill . Why would the Senate Democrats ever agree to Something Like that . In other words, what are you talking about . The House Republicans dont rule the world. They simply rule the house. Well of course, attaching it to a c. R. Doesnt ultimately repeal obama care. It delays it for a year, it delays it until we get if right or until we take the is majority and repeal it ourselves. But you have to understand only in washington, d. C. Does it make sense to go forward with something that everybody says isnt working. Have you ever heard of a law that was totally ignored by the congress and the president . Where they had a law, they passed it, they signed it, it became the law of the land, the program became part of the government just like Social Security or medicare, but then said no, were going to kill it. And thats what you propose doing is killing it. Isnt that what president obama no. Hes delaying one portion of it. But you said its the law of the land. How can he because its his job to implement and to execute. Its not his job. Its the congresss job. The congress has passed this program. Its part of the law. And youre saying kill it in its crib. Im saying its not ready for prime time. I would love to repeal this law but thats not what were proposing here. You are proposing shutting down the u. S. Government. John, take over here because i think what were talking about is a reality here that matt doesnt want to face which is come october 1st either the government has a continuing resolution to continue functioning or it doesnt. It will not have a continuing resolution if the requirement is that includes killing obama care. It will not exist. There will not be such a bill. It will never get to the president. It will never get to the president s desk. Listen, chris, i agree with you but i also agree with matt. This law is not ready for prime time. Using the c. R. , a shortterm c. R. To try to come up with some language thats agreeable to delay it for a year, i think is something that could happen within the context of a negotiation. What will not happen is jamming a defunding legislation down the president s throat. Its just not going to work. The problem we have here, matt, is that the president won the election. Its something that i didnt like. I didnt want that to happen. But weve got to deal with that reality. And if we can find a way to Reach Agreement to delay, it im all for it. But shutting down the government is a huge mistake. It will take all the attention away from obama care and put it on House Republicans and the Government Shutdown. Ive been through this. And its a disaster. Lets take a look at the polling on that, how its been shifting in what direction right now. Who gets blamed if the government shuts down. Republicans apparently, a new cnn or the poll shows the majority of americans, 51 , would blame republicans if the government shut down. Only 33 would blame president obama. More importantly, blame shifting toward republicans. In march only 40 said theyd blame republicans. 38 said theyd blame the president. Matt . Well, i think you should look at the numbers on where americans are on obama care. I think all americans are righteously frustrated with the lack of basic budget regular order in washington, d. C. Why are we debating a c. R. . Why didnt they pass a budget resolution . Why dont they ill tell you why. Thats a rhetorical question. Let me give the actual answer. The Senate Passed a budget resolution. The house passed a budget resolution. But the minority in the senate, led by ted cruz of texas, said we done want to meet together. There will be no meeting of the house and Senate Budget committees to work out a compromise in conference. There will be no meeting because it has to include in it some commitment by the house and not conferrees, that will be no discussion of a debt ceiling extension. So in other words, he stopped it. He stopped the meeting, matt. You say why was there no budget . Because ted cruz led the effort to kill it. You cant kill something and then say too bad somebody killed it. Chris, in all fairness, actually, it was harry reids scheduling. He did not schedule the appropriation bills. Refused were talking about the budget. They could have marked them up and they didnt do that. But i thought he just said budget. Matt, you just said budget. The reason theres no budget is because the right wing in the senate is what the reason is. And you know that. Heres what were asking for. We would like to skip the trickery. We would like to know where all house members, all Senate Members stand on this bill that the president himself says is not ready for prime time. Thats what were asking for. I believe they want to know where these guys are. The speaker of the house has called for a vote on those very questions as part of this procedure. Right, john . An up or down vote in the house and the 123459 on this question. Listen, any way you skin this cat, theres going to be a c. R. Sent over. Either way its either going to be bounced back with higher spending levels from the democrats or its going to bounce back with the same thing that the republicans want. The fact of the matter is youve got to keep the government open. Two, three, four months, and well deal with obama care. Obama cares going to collapse under its own weight. The fact of the matter is labor hates it, the American People hate it, its going to collapse. Do not try to close the government as theres 30 Million People waiting in the emergency room now that would like to get health care anyway. Thank you, matt kibbe, thank you, john fehr for coming on to debate the right versus the center right. Up next, why some politicians survive sex scandals and others certainly dont, like that fella. This is hardball, the place for politics. Why can some politicians get passed sex scandals while others certainly cant. Morhardball, coming next. Were back. And 2013 was shaping up to be the year of political comebacks, but as it turns out, only one of three public redemption seekers was victorious. Mark sanford won back an old congressional seat by appealing directly to voters by forgiveness and it worked. Tuesday night, however, this week, former congressman Anthony Weiner and former governor of new york, Eliot Spitzer, failed to replicate sanfords success. Are there reasons to be learned here . Politicos Maggie Haberman wrote a great piece this morning, the socalled dance of the honest man is necessary, even if you have to fake it. A great line, a little cynical. Joy reid and steve mcmahon, we have a male and that female commentator here. Perhaps that evens it out. I may have a totally different view than both of you. Lets start with joy ann. Joy, it seems to me that i was stunned by two things this week. One, the absolute humiliating defeat of weiner, where he went down below where he belonged, where i always thought he belonged, and new york finally agreed, below five. I dont know who that was. I was looking at the people in his concession crowd there, who are these people . But they do exist and he got blown away. On the other hand, sanford comes back in, admittedly a conservative in a conservative district, but he got through the primaries and he won and hes a u. S. Congressman now. Your view about these two opposite cases . Chris, i think, first of all, when youre in a hole, stop digging. And Anthony Weiner continued to behave eare theically and strangely and make matters worse, after his scandal broke and he was sort of on the road to forgiveness, it turns out he was still doing the behavior that got him in trouble. Whereas with sanford, he followed the classic way you get out of a scandal. Whereas, if in the aggregate, you are offering the voters who are evaluating you what they overall want, in his case, it was fiscal conservatism, you can survive, because they want that more than they care about your personal life. Yeah, and let me ask you, as a guy as a guy . As a guy, when you think about the question of a guy who texts or sexts, which is ridiculous to me, its throwing your affections out the window, your person, your body, out the window, its weird. Its odd. Another guy does something in our religion youre not supposed to do, in society youre not supposed to do, he fell in love with someone besides his spouse. He clearly fell in love, theyre going to get married. Its different, but to me theres a difference of nature here. Who you are. Whats your thoughts . I thought sanford was a great example of something people could understand and to some degree perhaps even relate to, even though they may disagree with it entirely. A guy goes and falls in love with a different woman and leaves his wife. Its embarrassing and everything but you can apologize your way through it. But it wasnt something he wanted to take back. Hes going to marry her, apparently, the woman from argentina. Hes in love with her, he says, and its not like saying, i made a mistake. Hes not saying, i made a mistake. He says, i did something that i shouldnt have done, but its real and its there and you live with it something youve done, most people would interpret it as a mistake. You can say hes not taking it back, but he demonstrated contrition and he indicated remorse. Lets take the middle case, which i am very mixed on myself. Eliot spitzer, when im with him, i like him, i see the charm, i understand why people like him. But apparently the guy who ran against him, stringer, did a really good job of saying, hey, you were against sex trafficking, the toughest guy in the world against sex trafficking is and now you hire sex workers for you. This is directly analogous to david vitter, who survived the same thing, a prostitution scandal. And Eliot Spitzer is a brilliant guy, probably no more qualified than the job he was going for, but there was a certain amount of, i dont know if you want to call it arrogance, a certain amount of lack of contrition, an inyourface quality to him. And in vitters case, he finished state. I cant explain vitter. Maybe its new orleans, or louisiana. Joy, thanks for being on. And steve mcmahon, thanks. Well be right back after this. I dbefore i dosearch any projects on my home. I love my contractor, and i am so thankful to angies list for bringing us together. Find out why more than two million members count on angies list. Angies list reviews you can trust. Let me finish tonight with this. What i like about elections is when they agree with me. I do believe, not in polls, but in real elections, when people get out there and get themselves into that booth and vote their minds and their guts and their hearts. Its really quite a combination when you put it all together. Our minds, our guts, our hearts. And when they voted for deblasio up in new york this week, i think they were voting with it all, especially their hearts. You know, i, like everywhere else in the world, we have battles among our people, our ethnic groups, and they are fought in so many different ways. But the fact of the matter is we want them over with, especially the fight between white and black. I really believe that the picture of bill deblasio and his wife and young son at the breakfast table won the hearts of new york. Why . Because that picture of a funloving family that is real, not some reality show, but truly get up in the morning, have breakfast together, argue about things, watch television together, live together, makes us happy. New yorkers want to be happy. Thats why they voted for deblasio. They dont want fights about stop and frisk and all the rest, they want peace. More than that, they want some love. I hope bill and his family go on showing new york and the country how to live together. Im for that picture. Im for what new york has set its heart on. And thats hardball r now
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