Transcripts For MSNBC The Rachel Maddow Show 20131008

The way the redskins were going to turn their frown upside down. Heath shuler not enough to overcome the curse they put on themselves when they decided to dig in their heels and not change their racist name. Not actually a curse. How would i know. Seriously. Though the redskins signed up heath shuler for a long contract. Signing him up to pay him Something Like 20 million. He really never did anything for them of note. Except that one time he threw five interceptions in one game. So never really did anything for the redskins. Left the redskins. Went to the new orleans saints. Never did anything for them either. Then he went to the Oakland Raiders where he did nothing for them. Then heath shuler finally just decided to stuff all his remaining money into a duffel bag and washed out of the league. When he washed out of the nfl he made his way to Western North carolina. And within about 30 seconds of moving there, heath shuler announce heed was going to run for congress as a democrat. Interesting. His district in North Carolina, was pretty centrist district. Not impossible for a democrat to get elected there. More than 40 democrats in the district he got elected. Including asheville, North Carolina. All and all, the west, this Western North carolina district. 11th district. Big district. Relatively rural south. For heath shuler to run there and win there, he had to run as a conservative. He ran as a democrat but as a conservative democrat. Antigay rights, pro gun rights, antiabortion. Highest level member of the conservative blue dog democratic caucus. At one point, heath shuler refused to say he would vote for nancy pelosi as leader of the democrats in the house. Asked who might be a better alternative he suggested himself. So heath shuler got elected in 2006. Reelected in 2008. Reelected in 2010. In 2010 that was a big year. A census year and the year of the big republican takeover coast to coast. And what republicans did with the census data and control of State Government in North Carolina was that they redrew Heath Shulers congressional district. So that no democrat, no matter how conservative could ever get elected in that district again. That little liberal college town, asheville, North Carolina, they just carved much of it out of the district. The proportion of democratic voters dropped by 7 points in the district. They created the most republican district in the entire state. So tough guy that he is, heath shuler quit. Rather than defend the seat he had been holding for six years he dropped out. Gave it up. The new deep red guaranteed seat he used to represent went instead to this guy. You know it is interesting when the more we find out the more we realize how wrong the direction we are going. So what we are going to do is take back our country, 2012, is the time that we are going to send mr. Obama home to kenya or wherever it is. We are going to do it. Send him home to kenya or wherever it is. That is now congressman mark meadows of North Carolina campaigning there in Western North carolina in summer 2012. In the district that used to be Heath Shulers district. Now the most republican district in the whole state. And now belongs to mark meadows. Mark meadows elected past november. Sworn in in january. By this summer, as a freshman congressman who never Held Public Office before. Benefiting from a right red district drawn for him. Nubie congressman, mark meadows who thinks president obama is from kenya started circulating this letter demanding Republican House Speaker John Boehner shut down the government. Mark meadows strategy in the document is the strategy that republicans followed that indeed got us the Government Shutdown we have which is in its seventh day. The mark meadows letter had a demand in it. And it was, demand that was not addressed to democrats in the house or democrats in the senate or president obama or anybody else who you think would be on the opposite side of a mark meadows demand letter. No the demand was actually made to Republican House Speaker John Boehner. The letter essentially said, i mark meadows and republican members of congress who signed on to the letter with me demand that you, john boehner shut down the government. Make the funding of the federal government contingent on getting Health Reform. Getting rid of Health Reform. And if president obama does not agree to get rid of Health Reform. If he does not agree to that. Shut down the government. We demand that you follow this strategy. It is amazing to think that a brand new freshman member of congress with no national profile. Know additional position of power, no influence beyond his seat could get 80 members of congress to sign on to a letter look that. What is more amazing conservative groups started running targeted advertisements against 100 other republicans who did not sign on to the mark meadows letter. Impressive, right . This guy who nobody had ever heard of last year is punching really, really far above his weight. You know it is interesting. The more we find out, the more we realize how wrong the direction were going. So what we are going to do is take back our country 2012, is the time that we are going to send mr. Obama home, to kenya or wherever it is. We are going to do it. Send him home to kenya. Turns out that relatively random congressman, that send obama back to kenya guy, who nobody had ever heard of, is now, an out of nowhere force in congress who is apparently leading the shutdown strategy in the house. Turns out that has the less to do with him being an unusually Effective Member of congress than it does with the company that he has been keeping on the right. Because congressman, mark meadows, may be the visible head of this effort to get the government shut down on the house side. But he is not alone. He is just the most visible part of a plan that has been in the works for a long time. With a lot of people who you will have heard of if you never heard of him. Remember last spring, the Robert Draper book that came out about republicans in the obama era. The book made waves. Led with the bombshell opening scene of what, republicans in washington did on inauguration night when president obama was first sworn in. The very first day that he was president of the United States, on the day president obama was sworn in 2009, republicans held a meeting at a restaurant in washington, d. C. , that night, where they made their plans to block every single thing he wanted to accomplish as president. Before he had done anything except become president. Republicans had already started an overt strategy of opposition no matter what he opposed. After president obama was inaugurated second type. There was a similar meeting in washington for republicans to plan their second term antiobama strategy. And the second term antiobama strategy meeting right after the president was sworn in, was for a Government Shutdown. The meeting convened at an undisclosed location some where on capitol hill. And it was led by the radical reagan era attorney general, ed meese. And their demand. Plan from the beginning. Buzz the government should be shut down. No funding of the federal government. Unless president obama agreed. The New York Times reported this, this weekend. How more than three dozen conservative Groups Joined forces on the shutdown strategy at the very start of the second term. Although that initial meeting was convened. Much of the money in the end goes back to these conservative activist brothers billionaires because they inherited a company from their dad. Will they be heading into the shutdown, the 200 million, the group spent, building and conservative organizations demanding a shutdown . Would the civil war inside the Republican Party have petered out by now in a way less harmful to the country if Koch Brothers funding were not propping up all these conservative organizations that are rung the ads and demanding the ideological purity and telling republican members of congress they cannot bend, cannot woos out, they cannot compromise or else there will be hell to pay. Who knows what mess the Republican Party would have gotten itself into by now if it were not for the well funded conservative infrastructure fueling the fight that has ensnared the country. But that is where we are right now. With the even worse shutdown prospect of the debt ceiling looming in the next ten days. The boston globe on friday, the middle of all this, publish aid nice little puff piece on david koch. The occasion was the opening of a new Child Care Center for people who work at mit, at the Massachusetts Institute of technology, in cambridge, massachusetts. With the Child Care Center, mit doubles the total number of day care slots that are available for mit employees on campus. Now the reason mit got this Child Care Center and all the new slots for child care on campus is because david koch, personally was moved by the plight of these young parents. 2 1 2 years ago biology researchers were discussing their work. What could help you in your job they were asked . One simple answer from the women in the room. Child care. David koch, billionaire philanthropist and mit graduate known for activism and generosity attended dozens of meetings but never before had been so moved. David koch said i got a tear in my eye. David koch decided then and there he would spend 20 million on a Child Care Center for mit. I have never seen a group of people speak with such passion and such disappointment that a problem existed and it wasnt being fixed mr. Koch said. We wouldnt miss out on some outstanding researchers if they didnt have proper facilities for their children. So because those particular people who needed proper facilities for their children were lucky enough to have a personal audience with david koch able to explain the need face to face in a way that made david koch cry. He opened checkbook, swiveled wrist and took care if their problem and put his name on the mit Child Care Center in so doing. At the same time. David koch and brother and affiliates are spending ten times that amount to fund a nationwide network of organizations that has now forcing the closing nationwide of thousands of kids preschool programs which are in fact also child care programs for those kids parents because those kids parents also need proper facilities for their children just like the mit employees who made david koch cry. This is not to take away from the great news, for the parents of the 126 infants and toddlers and preschoolers whose parents who work at mit and will matter to david koch when me meets them. If your parents dont work at mit. David koch and his brother have a different message. Fund it at ten times the amount. On saturday the day after the david koch puff piece in the boston globe, North Carolina congressman, mark meadows talked to his hometown press. They started asking him about a starring role. Congressman meadows acknowledged demanding the shutdown. Push for the defending of obama care or shut you in the government if it didnt happen. Then he said do i ever want to be blamed for a shutdown . The answer is no. For me i picture every Single Person that could potentially be affected. He said it just breaks my heart. Every story i get of adverse impact from the shutdown just tears at my heart. But do i want to be blamed for a shutdown president . Answer is no. So david koch has the ate tear in his eye for families without child care, specific families without child care. Mark meadows, the congressman who demanded the shutdown from john boehner said the is pact breaks his hard. Breaks his hard. But he does not want to be blamed. You go ahead and ask santa for that and see what you get under the tree. I am not so sure that works everywhere in the country. Make it works for us at home. Joining us the Washington Bureau chief for the Huffington Post. Thank you for being here. Thank you for having me. Let me put the same question to you. Is the strategy not mark meadows strategy, the strategy more broadly to try to escape blame for the shutdown, while continuing to, to ensure that it keeps going on . Well, i think you have to be careful using the word strategy in relation to what republicans are doing right here. I think meadows and a lot of the tea partiers and ted cruz, they have had a strategy. And their strategy led them to this point. They, they didnt have any strategy going forward. You know, repeal obama care is not an actual strategy. Thats not going to happen. Republican leadership never wanted to get to this point. So, this isnt their strategy either. That is kind of what is upsetting the political balance here. The people who now have the responsibility for getting out of this jam, didnt want to be in it in the first place. So, you know its at this, at this point its, really difficult to see exactly where this goes. Because of that. Ryan, if they did want to end the shutdown. If somebody, some magic shift in the political wind made them decide that, it would be a good idea to end the shutdown. Some external event or something. Do you have the sense that they would know how to do it . That they would be able to put one foot in front of the other to keep the lights on or turn them back on . Its not obvious at this point. That they would, that they would know how to do it. Theyre really spitballing right now. I mean, theyre, theyre flying totally blind. The hope that, the boehner camp has at this point is that, maybe if they could do something short term. That would bring, bring the white house off to the negotiating table. Because they really think that the position that the white house has, that theyre refuse to negotiate is ultimately. Untenable. We only have two weeks left until we hit the debt ceiling. So, it is really hard to figure out how you go in practice from where we are here out of this. We heard president obama today not just repeating his call for for the house stew vote on on a on a clean budget agreement to reopen the government without having attached policy riders and things on it. He has been saying that all along. Today it got more pointed with him essentially saying, listen, you said you dont have the votes. I will prove to you that you do. If you put that, if you put that clean funding bill on the floor it will pass. It was, it was interesting to see the white house get so overt and have the president himself say that directly today. Any reaction to that on the hill you can discern. So the reaction from Republican Leadership is why are you trying to put us in this corn . Boehner could put a clean cr on the floor and ask everybody to vote against it and a lot of them would. And then he could go back to the white house and say, look you asked me to put it on the floor. They voted against it. Now there are two dozen, probably, actually, 25 now, republicans who have, either told reporters in the capitol or told their local papers that they would support a clean cr. But, when it actually comes to it, they, they might actually not. So, so, boehner is, is thinking then, okay, why are you trying to jam me into this corner here. You know, i didnt want to be here in the first place. And i am not, i am not going to cave to you. I want you to, i want you to come to the negotiating table. And, and, work this out. So, you know, they, they feel like theyre not being treated fairly. They feel like obama is partly to blame for the tea party because he is the one that passed obama care, obama care was, was according to them, an overreach. Because it was an overreach. That created the tea party. Therefore he needs to deal with the situation that he helped create. This is, i mean this is actually. The kind of place that, that that we are at in terms of the way that, that theyre interacting with each other a awe how dare you obama, create my hatred of you so much. Wow, amazing. Asking people to account for their own enemies. Ryan grimm, washington chief of the Huffington Post. Weird, weird stuff you are covering. Getting weirder. Every day. Long proposed House Speaker john boehner is just bad at his job. Doesnt mean he is a bad guy. Just means he is not up to the job he has got to do. That hypothesis was fully developed on the show before he displayed problem with counting. The counting problem is next. And a visit with the person who is involved in implementing Health Reform. [ lane ] do you ever feel like youre growing old waiting for your wrinkle cream to work . Clinically proven neutrogena® rapid wrinkle repair. It targets fine lines and wrinkles with the fastest retinol formula available. Youll see younger looking skin in just one week. One week . Thats just my speed. Rapid wrinkle repair. And for dark spots rapid tone repair. From neutrogena®. And for dark spots rapid tone repair. To find you a great deal, even if its not with us. [ ding ] oh, thats helpful well, our company does that, too. Actually, we invented that. Its like a sauna in here. Helping you save, even if its not with us now, thats progressive call or click today. No mas pantalones there are enough republicans and democrats in the house of representatives today that if the speaker of the house, john boehner let the bill get on the floor, for an up or down vote, every congressman could vote their conscience. The shut down could end today. Call a vote. Call a vote. Put it on the floor. And let every individual member of Congress Make up their own minds. Ever since the country entered shutdown mode, president obama has been pushing that message. Take a vote. He has been calling on House Speaker john boehner to bring up for a vote what everybody is calling a clean cr money to fund the government without Strings Attached to other policy things like getting rid of Health Reform or whatever. On the first day of the shut down. The president spoke in the rose garden and called for the house to hold an up or down vote on a clean budget. Saw him there in maryland late last week calling, calling on House Speaker john boehner, calling him out by name, calling again for an up or down vote on a clean budget. Today, speaker at the headquarters of fema, the president challenged Speaker Boehner again to hold a vote vote on it. Straight up budget bill to end the Government Shutdown. Truth of the matter is there are enough republican and democratic votes in the house of representatives right now to end the shutdown. Immediately with no partisan Strings Attached. The house should hold the vote today. If republicans and Speaker Boehner are saying there are not enough votes. Then they should prove it. Let the bill go to the floor. Lets see what happens. Just vote just vote. Prove it. The reason the president keeps asking republicans to just hold a vote on the budget, a budget that aims to just be a budget and not legislation defunding Health Reform or something, the reason the president wants the house to vote on a clean budget is math. Very easy math. There are 232 republicans in the house. They are the majority. There are 200 democrats. There are three vacant house seats. Altogether we have 432 representatives in the house. So, the math. 432 divided by 2, carry the 1, 216. In order for something to pass the house it need one more than 216 votes. It need 216 plus 1 which is 217. It need 217 votes. 217 a majority in the house. What you need to reopen the government. President obama says the clean version of the budget has that majority. He is arguing that all the democrats would vote for it and republicans get it passed to reopen the government. John boehner said that is not true. He said the math doesnt work. He said he doesnt have enough votes. I take it from your answer you are not prepared to schedule a clean vote on government funding right now . There are not the votes in the house to pass a clean cr. What he is saying there are not 217 members of the house who will vote for a budget. Who will vote for a budget without trying to get rid of obamacare or something. He says he cannot get to 217. Lets help him count. Over the weekend. 195 democrats signed a letter asking john boehner to schedule a vote. We know. They would sign their names. 195 votes to start with, crumb democrats for a clean budget. Need 217. Start at 195. So, were going to count this up for the speaker in case it is helpful. Start with 195. We have 195 democratic votes. A bunch of republicans in the past few days would vote with the democrats to end the shutdown and pass a clean budget. Starting with 195. Lets add representative pat meehan. A statement said it was time for the house to vote for a clean, short term funding bill. That gets us to 196. Very civil congressman, scott rigell tweeted. Time for a clean cr. Thats 197. New jersey, john runyan supports that as well. Congressman, mike fitzpatrick. Said i was sent to washington to solve problems. Not shut it down. Up to 199. Remember these are all republicans in the house who would vote with democrats to pass a clean budget. Lou barletta of pennsylvania told his local paper he would support a clean bill. 200 already. Peter king told National Review he would not vote for anything but a clean budget bill. 201. Congressman charlie dent told the Huffington Post he was prepared to vote for of a clean cr. One more on the list. Congressman, frank wolf of virginia said, its time to govern. That brings us to 203. And congressman, Michael Grimm confirmed he supports a clean budget vote. That is 204. Eric paulton said he would vote for a clean budget. And Frank Lobiondo supporting a clean budget. That brings us to 207. Randy forbes of virginia said he would vote for a clean bill. Jim gerlach, a statement said the same. And, he told the Huffington Post he was not oppose to voting for a clean budget. Saying he would vote for a clean budged. Leonard lance. Florida congressman bill young told a reporter that he support aid clean budget. Congressman, mario diaz barlart told the miami herald he would happily vote for a clean bill. 217. Richard hanna is for it. 214. Tim griffin of arkansas 215. Representative don young from alaska said he would vote for a clean budget. That means 216. And floridas own representative. Who wrote an oped in the Tampa Bay Times why he supports funding the government without trying to end health care. Congressman ross brings us to dont want to put too fine a point on it. But the votes are there. I mean unless the members of congress are telling their local press, telling their constituents, and tweeting and putting out press releases saying theyre going to do something that theyre not actually going to do, the votes are there. And we know who they are. Its not a mysterious esoteric ascribing votes to people who we think might be there. Its members of congress, by name, committing to do it. It is called arithmetic. The votes are there. Math will not lead you astray. It works every time. Thats a good thing, but it doesnt cover everything. Only about 80 of your part b medical expenses. The rest is up to you. So consider an aarp Medicare Supplement insurance plan, insured by unitedhealthcare insurance company. Like all standardized Medicare Supplement insurance plans, they pick up some of what medicare doesnt pay and could save you in outofpocket medical costs. 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And there are virtually no referrals needed. So dont wait. With all the good years ahead, look for the experience and commitment to go the distance with you. Call now to request your free decision guide. This easytounderstand guide will answer some of your questions and help you find the aarp Medicare Supplement plan or you. Breaking news on the impact of the shutdown. Not very much clarity how specifically members of the military, military families and veterans would be affected. A lot of worry, but so many moves by the congress around the issue it hasnt been clear. Well we have news tonight from the spokeswoman from the Veterans Affairs department. It is bad news. The va announcing tonight that veterans regional offices will be closed starting tomorrow morning and nobody will answer the phones at veterans regional offices across the country as of tomorrow. This is due to new furloughs of 7,000 employees of the Veterans Benefits administration. There were an additional nearly 3,000 furlough tuesday at the va office of information technology. The va is also warning that if the Government Shutdown doesnt end through the last two weeks of october that could result in delays of the next round of benefits payments including disability compensation, gi bill living stipends and survivors and veterans and families starting with the november 1 payments. So we have not had clarity on veterans, active duty, veterans, families this from Veterans Affairs spokeswoman, torrie dylan is bad news. Well keep you posted. Im pregnant. Really . Two weeks. You already went to the doctor . Not yet. But i took this new clearblue test. Its like two tests in one. Oh, my god. I think im gonna cry. [ female announcer ] the new clearblue pregnancy test also estimates how many weeks. Weeks estimator. Only from clearblue. Funny thing happened last week when they rolled out the website. The web exchange got more traffic than they expected on their first day. But in new york specifically the website got so much more traffic than they expected that state officials started to worry that maybe they had been hacked. The traffic flow was so high at new york States Health exchange the state said it would investigate the abnormally high traffic to see if they were maybe being attacked by hackers. Turns out they were not being attacked by hackers. Look, problems at Health Care Website not from online attack, experts say. They really were just get sowing much legitimate traffic that it looked like somebody was hacking them. Nobody was hacking them. By the end of the week, conservative republican texas congressman decided yes maybe there were traffic on the Different Exchange web sites, but he, congressman Michael Burgess had figured out the reason why. Im convinced the Affordable Health care law is a bad thing, and if so, why are so many people jamming the web sites to get more information to find out if they qualify for this care . I think if you subtract out members of congress and their staff and reporters who called in those first 4 hours the numbers will be considerably lower. Ah, see if it wasnt hackers it was members of congress and reporters. Thats what explains all the traffic. Millions of people went to the Health Exchange web sites on the first day they were open Something Like nine Million People by friday. By this weekend the main federal state covers 36 states and others had been taken down for maintenance in the offpeak hours, adding additional capacity to deal with unexpectedly high volume and also fixing some design issues that made the site glitchier than it need to be. This week, Health Secretary Kathleen Sebelius promotes the rollout, to encourage people to sign up for Insurance Coverage or learn what their options are under new law. The rollout this week will include an event at heinz field in pittsburgh with the steelers owner and some retired players, and other steely mcbeam, theyre doing enrollment fair at heinz field people can learn about their options and sign up for Health Insurance. This thing echoes the rollout effort in massachusetts from five years ago when the Boston Red Sox and fenway park were a big part of the publicity effort in that state to get massachusetts residents to seen up. Under romney care. Nobody calls it romney care. But in massachusetts it is basically, a single states version of obama care. And its working very well, thank you very much. Republicans are doing everything they can to make this current effort at national Health Reform not work. Republicans in the senate even wrote to all the National Sports leagues trying to tell them to not do what the red sox did in massachusetts five years ago. Senate republicans threatened all the sports leagues that they had better not get caught trying to make this Health Insurance thing work. They better not get caught encouraging people to get Health Insurance. The republicans would hold it against the teams and the leagues. But the rollout is happening. The law is in effect. The exchanges are open. Opening. And every glitch, every delay, delights the republicans. But it is happening. Joining us now from the interview, Kathleen Sebelius, secretary of health and human services, implementing the Affordable Care act, thank you for being here. Nice to be here with you, rachel. In your own terms, from your own perspective. How would you assess the rollout of the exchanges . Well i think the exciting thing is that we are having a rollout of the Affordable Care act. The final piece of implementation is here. What we are seeing is unprecedented interest across the country. People calling on, the toll free hot line which is open 24 7. We have had over 600,000 calls. We have had, over 10 million hits to the website. We have thousand of people setting up accounts and, shopping, simultaneously, so, there is clearly a lot of pent up desire for the website. You are right, we have had some issues about volume, driving a difficulty of people getting in. So we are taking it seriously. The wait time is down today over where it was yesterday. And the day before. We wanted to be as easy to use as possible. As seamless as possible. And we are confident that every day is getting a lot better. But the interest is there. The product is there. We have companies for the First Time Ever in the history of the United States, competing for the business of individual policy holders. They cant block them. Because of the preexisting condition. They cant medically underwrite their condition. Cant put a lifetime limit on their benefits. They have to play by a new set of rules. That its a brand nigh brand new day for millions of americans. Seems the volume issues are heartening. It means there are pent up demand and people want this. It also seems to me like it should have been expected you. Guys did actually do a pretty good job of publicizing, what day one was going to be and what to do on day one. And so that initial flood, i feel like if you want to try to get over peoples suspicions that government cant administer anything right and thats why theyre suspicious of Health Reform because it has something to do with the government administering the exchanges, having the exchanges be glitchy day one, not just growing pains, not just a problem of volume, but a messaging problem for the law overall. Would i have liked a much smoother rollout, you bet. I think the great news is we have 26 weeks of open enrollment. And this is in some ways like the kayak of health plans which has never been together before. Unlike kayak, we wont sell out of the product. And the price doesnt change. So, day one, the prices are the same. As the end of the rollout. March 31st. We are eager to have people come take a look. Lots of folks have never had insurance. They need to see what is a available for themselves and their families. Six out of 10 eligible folks are going to find a plan for under 100 a month. Very affordable coverage. And for the first time have the kind of Health Security that many of us take for granted. In terms of the way this is rolling out, and obviously, every state is different. There is, three dozen states that have the federal government either running their exchanges or running some part of their exchanges. Like 14 states. D. C. Are doing their own. 17. 17. Okay. Is there are there additional challenges for you, in trying to make sure this this new law works for the country. To be having to simultaneously deal with states embracing it. States that are rejecting it and fighting every step of the way. What are the challenges in the state like texas for example. Again, a lot of the states. Were running federal marketplace. Some of the less enthusiastic states at the governors level. Havent embraced it. Given a lot of misinformation. People get up every morning not sure the law applies to them. One of the reasons we have been heartened by the flood of people to the website. Because somehow that information is getting through in spite of the best best, you know, efforts of the opposition to stop it. I think what we have seen though is incredible support on the ground. Mayors in cities across this country are wildly enthusiastic, are mobilizing outreach enrollment effort. We have faith leaders. We have health care providers, disease groups, parents, health care advocates. So there is a mobilization on the ground. And thats another point that, yes, people can go off to the website. Health care. Gov. Again, it is getting faster. We are done to very low wait times. We are building capacity each of the nights. More hardware. More engineers. But there is also a tollfree callin come number. Open 24 7. Answering in languages. Enroll on the phone. There are people in neighborhood, around the country. Every federal Health Center has outreach and enrollment people. There are Trained Community volunteers who are able, oneonone, to walk folks through an application. So we anticipated that people would need help on the phone, on line, in person, and and are building that into the process. To get coverage by january 1, the deadline is november, december 15th. By which you have to be signed up. Government coverage. The soonest, is january 1st. That requires a december signup. Kathleen sebelius, our nations secretary of health and human services. Good luck with this, it, it, it, for the task that you have at hand the faster this works the better off the country is going to be. I agree with you. Thanks very much. Well be right back. On may 1, 2003, the president of the United States put on a flight suit and got into a navy set. They had him sitting there in the plane as the jet did a tailhook landing on to the deck of an Aircraft Carrier sitting offshore off the coast of san diego. They painted the president s name on the side of the plane. Showing where he was sitting when they did that landing. And they let him play land the jet on board that carrier. Then the president hopped off the plane and he walked around the place for a while. Showing off the flight suit with his helmet under his arm. He took a lot of pictures and stuff. Before he went to change into a regular president ial suit and tie. So he could deliver a speech standing under a banner that said mission accomplished. My fellow americans, major combat operations in iraq have ended. That was six weeks into the iraq war. When thenpresident george w. Bush declared victory and said the war in iraq was over. That was may 2003. Just over a year later, president bush again declared victory in afghanistan. This time they had the president do it himself. Coalition forces including many brave afghans have brought america, afghanistan and the free world its first ricketry. Victory declared by the president. That declaration of victory was june 2004. Now were still there. The longest war in u. S. History is still going on. It was 12 years ago today that the first u. S. Forces launched the initial invasion of afghanistan. Today is day one of year 13 of the longest war in american history. Day one of year 13 of a war that politicians first declared to be over more than a decade ago. More than 50,000 americans are still serving in afghanistan right now tonight. The worst recent attack on american troops in terms of loss of life was this weekend when four american soldiers were killed by an ied. Chuck hagle called many back to work. He called them back to work. We have never ever ever had a government shut down at a time of war. Yes george w. Bush and Donald Rumsfeld declared the war was over. But the war is not over. It is 12 years old today and counting. Thanks to the shut down, the soldiers who are fighting are being rewarded by having to wary about their kids being kicked out of on base child care while they are fighting that war. Support the troops looks awesome on a Bumper Sticker but as policy takes more commitment than that. You know whos having a really bad political time right now . The Republican Attorney general of the great state of virginia, republican candidate for governor. Hard School Old School social conservatives. Stops thinking of him as the antiabortion, anticontraception social conservative activist. He is the guy who has been fighting all this time to try to save virginias sodomy law. Thus earning a whole new round of virginia headlines. This is just not good for him a month out from the election. Ken used to love ted cruise. Having ted cruise come to an event right before the election used to sound like a great idea, im sure. Think that would be so cool. Until he became the guy with a 21 hour fake filibuster. If you think your state doesnt like the shut down, consider that virginia has 170,000 civilian federal employees. The new politico poll shows that percentage of virginias is 62 . 62 opposed to the shut down in virginia. Who do they blame . They blame Congressional Republicans by a 15 point margin. Perhaps not surprisingly they do not like the instigator of the shut down, who is ted krus. Are you sure you still want to do your event with ted kruz this weekend . Apparently not. He even left before the texas senator rose to speak. Would you . For his part, ted cruise went on to speak for almost an hour. That brings us to the last terrible horrible no good very bad political development. Particularly does not like this ted cruise shut down guy, the same new pole shows him now losing the governors race by ten points