Transcripts For MSNBCW Morning Joe 20171009

Nuclear weapons . And we reported it here first. And the three were iran, as we said at the time. The second issue just generally, why cant we just generally . A desire to go to war. And the third was north korea. If weve got Nuclear Weapons, why cant we use them against north korea . You gave a very impassioned plea. Republicans, americans, think about what youre doing. Youre electing somebody who has a desire to use Nuclear Weapons and has talked to one of the most important people in u. S. Foreign policy and has asked them three times in an hour briefing why we cant use Nuclear Weapons. Its frightening. Thats where we are. Its frightening. And corker is now highlighting this concern with real insight from his position in washington. Meanwhile, Vice President mike pence makes a public show of turning his back on the nfl in a preplanned protest to players taking a knee during the national anthem. And, of course, it costs taxpayers a lot of money to fly there, secure a stadium only to walk out for what looked to be a pr stunt. Can you imagine how much how badly thought out that was. Fans in indianapolis were inconvenienced, how youre always inconvenienced if a president or Vice President comes to a game . How much secret Service Personnel were wrapped up at that time, if something serious had happened elsewhere, how much money that costs the american taxpayers just just to deflect away from what had happened with bob corker, just to deflect from Everything Else. This was a stunt. You call a stunt something that you know is going to happen and you go and you play it out. So he went there, knowing the 49ers were going to kneel. Everybody in the nfl knew it. Yeah. He actually left his Pool Reporter outside and said i dont think im going to be here very long. Warned him. They flew in all the secret service, did all the stuff, secured the stadium. On top of that, he came from las vegas to indianapolis and went back to california. How much money did that cost . A lot of money. A lot of money. Well get to that. And inconvenienced a lot of the good people that went to the game there. Thats right. A lot of people from indiana inconvenienced because of a short stunt. Also this morning nothing conservative about that. Nothing at all. Trump told him to do that. You know, mr. President , i think ill just put out a statement. Thats going to cost the taxpayers millions of dollars. Thats going to tie up secret service. Thats going to require we use jets as recklessly as everybody else in this administration. Were going to have to fly back and forth. Mr. President , that would be a very reckless thing to do. But he didnt do that. Harvey weinstein is fired from his company over rampant allegations of Sexual Harassment, well have more including the silence from hollywood and washington on this story. What the heck. You guys broke this on friday. It is the only thing i talked to some of the most powerful people in hollywood over the weekend. It is the only thing hollywood is talking about right now. They are transfixed. And they are all saying behind the scenes this guy is a sleazebag. He deserves it. He had it coming. And yet nobody will say in fact, almost didnt step down. Rose mcgowan said something. Lena dunham said something. Who else . Ashley judd. Of course ashley judd. But nobody else. Nobody. The silence is deafening. The president s, who hes personal friends with, said nothing. Im not comparing this guy to trump. Any time i said the silence is deafening this week, people said hes not president. Well, i didnt say hes president. People who took mon fri him. Whose children worked for him. Partied out in the hamptons, the clinton. Supported his lifestyle. Not a word. Not a word from the actresses who made millions. Not a word from the directors. Not a word from anybody out there. You know, its amazing. It takes two things for these stories to come to light. The first is the most important, which is people who are victims who are willing to step up and speak publicly, whose stories allow journalists to tell these stories and second is journalist willing to find the stories and tell them and print them. Were beginning a sea change of culture in our business. People are coming back, not standing back, allowing it to happen. Until now its true, Harvey Weinstein acres lot of people saw a value of staying in business with him for years and years and years and thought it was better to go along and tolerate this kind of behavior that they had heard about. But, you know, it takes people who are willing to come forward and talk about their experiences. Thats the first critical ingredient. Second one, though, is to have powerful people support them at whatever cost. Right. If they dont get that support like where is Hillary Clinton . Where are the democrats who took money from him . Theyre just returning it and giving it to the dnc . Where are the powerful people in hollywood who should be supporting can you imagine the women we havent heard about . Given what weve heard so far . Thats the only thing i heard. Everything youve heard good lord. Thats scratching the surface. Is the tip of the iceberg. Again, the guy at the center of hollywood said it is so much worse on so many levels. Its astounding. And yet, steve, what is it . Why wont people in new york that have known this was going on with Harvey Weinstein for such a long time, why wont the obamas, why wont the clintons and, most importantly, why wont be the people in hollywood stand up and speak out for the actresses who were abused in the past and who will be abused in the future . Well, i agree with that. Im in a slightly awkward position here. While i dont disagree with anything youre saying about harvey, he has been a friend of mine for more than 20 years, an incredibly loyal friend and has never done anything at all untoward me. I dont mean sexually but generally. He has been a loyal friend. Icon dem what he has done. You find it appalling. It is appalling. In fact, harvey has said its appalling. So why cant hollywood say that . This is not any left right thing. How about going out and making sure that ashley judd and rose mcgowan and, you know, these few women that have had the guts to step forward, how about not making them feel so alone in this . Pull your business from him . I agree with you about that and some of the democratic politicians. Some have been fine. I think they said immediately theyll return it, give it to womens groups and so on. Some of the people you alluded to need to be heard on this. As i said, you can have been a friend of harveys but still say this is appalling, unacceptable, disgusting behavior. I never met him. I had a book deal through his publisher and pulled it over the weekend. I feel he even pushed the story out there when i signed the deal. Mika brzezinski signs threebook deal, womens empowerment. I feel he was using it. You met him before. Once or twice. You mean socially . Socially. I never worked with him, never been in an office with him. I did not know about this. But i do now and theres no way it could move forward. And it felt like he was using the book series know your value, about womens empowerment, as a cover. And i wasnt going to be part of that. And more people need to step up who have done business with him or taken money from him. Im sorry. You cant do it now, you have some issues. So long with you just said no. Im also going to write about it in my book so the Company Better be ready about that. He leaked it. He leaked it. Against your will that he had signed you to a threebook deal. Yeah. The books not done and now Harvey Weinstein is going to be a big part of it. Steve ratner and nick contosorri, we have David Ignatius. That was just the tease. What a huge story this bob corker story is. The chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee unloaded in a no holds barred interview telling the new york time thats president s reckless threat koss set the nation, quote, on the path to world war iii. Member of the senators staff confirmed his comments to nbc news. Corker said he was alarmed about a president who acts, quote, like hes doing the apprentice or something. And, quote, i know for a fact that every single day at the white house its a situation of trying to contain him. Corker referenced tweets that trump made on twitter about secretary of state Rex Tillersons diplomatic efforts with north korea in which the president undercut tillerson, telling him save your energy, rex. Corker said a lot of people think there is some kind of good cop, bad cop act under way but thats just not true. I know he has hurt, in several instances, hes hurt us as it relates to negotiations that were underway by tweeting things out. Look, except for a few people, the vast majority of our caucus understands what were dealing with here, he said, adding that, of course, they understand the volatility that were dealing with and the tremendous amount of work that it takes by people around him to keep him in the middle of the road. According to the times, corker would not directly answer when asked whether he thought trump was fit for the presidency, but he did say trump was not fully aware of the power of his office. Quote, i dont think he appreciates that when the president of the United States speaks and says the things that he does the impact that it has around the world, especially in the region that hes addressing, he said and so, yeah, its concerning to me. David ignatius, there is a parallel here with the weinstein story. Powerful people in washington wont speak up about something that theyre all talking about. And they know is happening. Off the record and they all knew was happening. They wont speak out about it. By the way, corker was talking about this before, asking whether he was fit for office, making that suggestion long before he decided not to run for office, even after donald trump begged him to run for reelection and said it would support him. Theres a parallel here. Republicans know whats going on in this white house and they know this president is not fit for office. They have known it for a very long time. As bob corker said all except for a handful are very, very concerned about this president being in the middle of a Nuclear Showdown and not understanding the stakes. Joe, i think you said it exactly right. This is one of those rare moments that we always talk about, celebrate but happen too infrequently, where somebody speaks truth to power. Bob corker has said flat out the things that people whisper about, worry about, the sort of inner concerns of washington that go to the president , the way he operates. These lines, Adult Daycare Center could have been written by the great tweeter himself. They have an edge. Theyre funny. But hes really getting at the question of the underlying stability of conduct of policy in washington under this president. And, david, when he talks about Adult Daycare Center and then talks about somebody, obviously, wasnt making their rounds, there is a suggestion there. It seems thats not just a joke. This is a suggestion this man may not be fit for office. At least thats how i read it. You know, i think until he comes forward, or someone does, with Additional Details you have to be careful in parsing just what that means. Over the weekend, joe and mika, i asked people at the pentagon how much of this luster weve been seeing since last friday, the calm before the storm, the sort of, whoa, that the president has been doing. How much of that is real. And i was told i dont think this will surprise anyone, that in terms of actual movements of military assets of anything communicated to our allies, anything specific, my contact said were not aware of anything. They said that when theyre asked by foreign ministries of defense whats going on, whats this about, they basically reply this is messaging. You understand this president. So we have this weird situation in which we have red hot comments from the president but so far as i can tell underneath not yet plans for any specific military action. Yeah. Well, the fighting between President Trump and senator corker kicked off on twitter sunday morning. President trump began tweeting about the senator, who recently announced he would not seek a third term in 2018. Quote, senator bob corker begged me to endorse him for reelection in tennessee. Wait. Just stop. That was false. The president lies repeatedly. We are desensitized to it. Invitation to you to have dinner with him. First sentence say lie. Corker did not ask for his endorsement. Then i said no and he dropped out. Also a lie, according to multiple sources. Said he could not win without my endorsement. That also is a lie. He also wanted to be secretary of state. I know for a fact that was a lie because i was calling bob corker and begging him to be secretary of state. To be secretary of state and corker said that it was a possibility but he met with him and he said it was so awkward there was no way, bob corker said theres no way i could have worked with him, joe. I would have been glad to serve my country. It just wouldnt work out. Told me that in real time. Remember that awkward moment on the stage . He said i was backstage and, you know, i just had to tell him no thanks, it will never work out. Said no to the president. Someone should have told the president corker is not a stooge. Hes not going to back down to your tweets. Your going to shoot yourself in the foot time and time again as you did all day yesterday. Katty, this is the thing he doesnt understand. I mean this. The president is so out of it, he doesnt understand Adult Daycare Center. That if you attack bob corker, a guy who started a business on his own, became unbelievably successful in his 30s, has always been a success, a mayor, twoterm senator. You attack this guy, hes not scared of the president. And hes got nothing to lose. The damage that donald trump did additionally to his presidency yesterday is unspeakable. He also guess what, he has lost a vote on tax reform. He has lost a vote on just about anything. If impeachment does come up, i wouldnt be surprised if bob corker seeing the 25th amendment now. If Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski and jeff flake and all these republicans that hes going after, if hes, again, not sealing his own fate and, hopefully, theres one or two republicans out there that i havent mentioned who said, you know what, this is just too dangerous for our country. I really dont think this man is stable and i do not think hes fit. And i think we need to Start Talking about other alternatives. All that unleashed by donald trump. Since donald trump repeatedly seems to see the administration as just donald trump, he doesnt understand this concept of the idea that his success depends on more than just himself, whether its rex tillerson, john mccain, bob corker, that he has to keep whether its even the mayor of san juan, doing her job down in puerto rico. He sees it very much as himself and a reflection of himself. That is why he gets into this position of alienating other people and thinking there arent going to be consequences. I dont know whether bob corker was saying donald trump was fit mentally or not to be president of the United States. World war iii, the fact that he lies on twitter, that he runs the presidency like a television show. Thats an image of somebody he thinks isnt fit to be running the white house. It certainly calls into question his fitness. Katty, he also suggests that donald trump does not understand the reality that spins out of control after some of his tweets. And, nick, republicans have been warned so many times. We warned republicans about donald trump asking one of the top Foreign Policy advisers three times if he could use Nuclear Weapons. Weve got Nuclear Weapons. Why dont we use them . He said basically the same thing with Chris Matthews on hardball before that. We warned them outright. There are dire consequences for and these republican senators, bob corker said they know. They see it behind the scenes. Hes not fit to be president. Were in the middle of a Nuclear Showdown. After 3 Million People die in seattle thats too late for the republicans to say, you know, maybe hes not fit to be president. Right. Look, just compare pence and corker in this last couple of days. If you want to understand the bargain that the Republican Party has backed itself into with this president. You have the Vice President participating in what we all recognize as theater, the culture theater he wants to wage instead of passing bills and then senator corker coming out saying no, this is lunacy. Its not the way you conduct business. It will be interesting if well see more or fewer corkers in the months ahead but its clear hes channeling what people in washington are saying privately. First a lot of us i was very sorry when corker beat our friend harold ford. That said, corker has been a terrific senator. I worked closely with him on the auto rescue. He has a lot of friends on the democratic side of the aisle. Hes highly respected, not some flake out of left field. When he says this stuff people take it seriously. To reinforce the point you made this has serious policy implications. Hes leader of the senate and people respect him. David ignatius, the most powerful republican voice on Foreign Policy. The chairman of senate committee, crucial in bargaining over the Iran Nuclear Deal tochlt start this twitter war literal eye n the eve of launching your iran policy suggests a president who is so reactive and focused on these vengeance wars of people who criticize him. Not thinking about what he needs to roll out his iran policy. He needs people in congress to say we support you, mr. President. He needs people who will communicate with other capitals where theres deep consternation about these policies. Those people are getting blown off right now. Nick, you know, a couple of New York Times stories yesterday were fascinating regarding republicans. One of them was frank bruni. Saying all republicans know that bannon trump are coming after them. Theyre going to find anybody they can to go after established senators. And so donald trump at some point is going to turn more than four, five or six republican senators against him. He is turning this into an allout war with the Republican Party. I dont know what it means. Maybe it means he just decided he doesnt want to pass legislation. He just wants to do pr stunts to gin up his 32 . Sflt forces behind bannon and forces behind the president trying to reshape the party in his image. They want it to be more like President Trump not less. Thats a legitimate struggle over what it means to be a republican. It will be a pitched battle. Its going to cost them support, distract them from what the president says he wants to do. Tax reform is one of the hardest things to do in washington. It just got harder. You need everybody pulling in the same direction for a year to get that done. You cant also carry on a guerrilla war against your own party. Its just not going to happen. Shows hes not fit. He doesnt even know how to do the math. Its just not going to happen right now. Will corker support that tax reform . No. He was saying before all this that its impossible to do. Is he going to give him benefit of the doubt on really bad elements in this tax policy . No. Its not going to happen. Also theres a lot of pushback on the state and local Tax Deduction elimination, principle source of revenue for the tax bill. Its got policy problems as well as political problems. Still ahead on morning joe with a wink and a nod, President Trump plays with the prospect of nuclear war. Well show you what he said and didnt say about north korea. Plus, the president defends his outreach to puerto rico. My god. Why hes blaming the media for not giving proper due to the, quote, beautiful, soft and very good towels he tossed out to hurricane victims. Well speak live to puerto ricos governor. More on the fallout surrounding Harvey Weinstein and the radio silence from certain corners of hollywood and washington. Whats going on there . Have you noticed the media world, too . The silence from the media world . I dont get it. Theres some corners of that media world that have been strangely silent. Strangely silent. I totally agree. Youre watching morning joe. Including a certain entertainment show held here every saturday night. Youre watching morning joe. A dairy cow that talks to farmers . What kind of sorcery is that . Its not the magicwand kind. Its the rfidcollarand internet of thingskind we created with chitale dairy. So every cow can let farmers know how she feels and what she needs to be healthier phone vibrates all with a simple text. Tahdah. Magic cant make Digital Transformation happen. But we can. Thats the power of vmware, part of dell technologies. Start here. At fidelity, we let you know where you stand, so when it comes to your Retirement Plan, youll always be absolutely. Clear. Its your retirement. Know where you stand. You know win control . Be absolutely. Clear. This guy. Check it out selfappendectomy oh, thats really attached. Thats why i rent from national. Where i get the control to choose any car in the aisle i want, not some car they choose for me. Which makes me one smooth operator. Ah still a little tender. vo go national. Go like a pro. Dad molly, can you please take out the trash . sigh dad molly trash whoo mom hey, molly . Its time to go bell ringing class, lets turn to page 136, recessive traits skip generations. Who would like to read . molly i reprogrammed the robots to do the inspection. Its running much faster now. See . Its amazing, molly. Thank you. its a warm blanket. Its a bottle of clean water. Its a roof and a bed. Its knowing someone cares. Its feeling safe. Its a today thats better than yesterday. Every dollar you can spare helps so much more than you can imagine. Please donate now to help people affected by hurricane harvey. Your help is urgently needed. Revealing that he had engaged in decades of rampant Sexual Harassment. He announced friday he would take a leave of absence while an outside lawyer investigated the allegations. His lawyer threatened to sue the newspaper, claiming it was false and defamat rochlt. Y. Allmale board resigned the same day and lisa bloom, who previously said harvey was just a dinosaur and was raised in the 60s and 70s. Usually represents women in these situations. For some weird reason was defending harvey. I guess the pressure got too hot and she got out. And Brooks Barnes reports from thursday to saturday he called more than 40 Entertainment Industry players. Wow and almost all refused to speak for the record on the matter. Barnes said some of them was because the publicist need to approve anything they say while others gave reasons that painted a picture of a community hobbled by fear, self interest and hypocrisy. Democratic lawmakers are ridding themselves of the contributions from the mogul. Chuck schumer and several colleagues announced they would give the money donated by Harvey Weinstein to womens groups and Democratic Women win elections and condemned all forms of Sexual Harassment and assault. President ial nominee Hillary Clinton is being criticized for not publicly condemning weinstein n a series of tweets over the weekend, whose side is Hillary Clinton on, Harvey Weinstein or his victims . She continued, where is Hillary Clintons condemnation of weinstein . Even the New York Times is criticizing her. His daughter even worked for Harvey Weinstein. Mika, you made a decision, obviously. Lets talk about it really briefly here. You had a threebook deal with the publication owned by Harvey Weinstein in which he leaked to the New York Post a big book deal. But you said no. You walk add way from it. Why . Its not worth it. Whats the point . Especially these books, educating women on how to understand their value and communicate it effectively. These are really good books and they cant be funded by or cant be out of the company run by a guy who is alleged perverted activity, abused women over the course of years. Its just impossible. Its also a way of stepping up. I think more people should. Katty kay, im surprised were seeing such a lack of response. I mean, this is the age of trump. This is the age in which women who have any power, whether its inconvenient or not, should be stepping up and pushing back to this behavior. Im totally at a loss. Yeah. You and i have been tweeting about this and texting each other about this all weekend, mika. Im stunned at the silence. Both from political types but also from men and women in hollywood. It shouldnt just be the women in hollywood. Youre right. Men should be speaking up about this, too. You asked me if i would retweet. Saturday morning you asked me to retweet the story that im pulling out of the deal. It took you less than a day to make that decision. Were now three days later and still getting silence out of hollywo hollywood. We havent had a chance to talk about it directly. When you were making that deal did you hear anything about Harvey Weinstein . Was there anything that people said . Did you hear rumors going round . No. I worked publishers there, fantastic women who do great work and weve done great work, the first knowing your value that were releasing in the spring. Ive worked with these very women and weve had an inkr incredible time working together. I would have been sad to move way from the company but would have done it, absolutely. I never heard anything from inside the company. I dont hear much. He has invited us to many event s. Weve never gone. We really never traveled in his circles. Having said that, after everything that i read and that he has even admitted to, this was a no brainer on so many levels. I also am stunned to hear that in this heated Board Meeting over the weekend that he thought this would blow over. Like that is huberis, arrogance, someone who has been abusing for so many years that he has absolutely no sense of self awareness. Joining us now, editor for the daily beast, sam stein. Sam, youve done some reporting on this story as it concerns the rncs response. Tell us about that. First off, i applaud your decision, mika. And i find the Weinstein Companys reason for firing Harvey Weinstein a little dubious. They say new information just surfaced. If i read the first report correctly he had eight settlements. Were those secret . Did they not know about the settlements . I guess the publishing of those settlements is what did it, not new information. Past information. Anyways, putting that aside, over the week there was a lot of pressure put on democratic politicians, obviously, to return these donations that weinstein gave. And i think the dnc fed the story instead of putting it away by only giving a portion of their donations from weinstein and giving them to political groups not charities. So they took the donations they had received in the past year from weinstein and gave them to groups that help women run for elected office. It was sort of a half measure. They got a lot of criticism for it and rightly so. It struck me as odd that people doing the criticism, primarily folks associated with the Republican National committee. The Republican National committee is there to promote, fund raise and take money from, in some cases, donald trump, who, as everyone knows, has multiple women having accused him of sexual advances, Sexual Harassment and so on. The rnc has allowed itself to be turned into an arm of donald trump, which usually happens. Thats what happens, yes. But more so in this case. They fund raised with him this weekend in north carolina. No credibility. If this comes from the rnc, if this comes from a republican who supports donald trump, theres absolutely no credibility whatsoever in that criticism. Thats the pot calling the kettle black. Ive been asking the rnc repeatedly, do you feel youre compromised in making this case . They just wont respond. They dont have to respond but it struck me as hypocritical. If youre a decent, normal human being and you feel intellectually consistent you should be able to say what Harvey Weinstein did is deplorable. The money he gave should be returned and people should condemn him publicly and quickly. And you should be able to say what donald trump did is deplorable and you shouldnt be associated with him if you feel like democrats shouldnt be associated with Harvey Weinstein. Those are the consistencies here. Thats fair. And i donjust think there is none. Dont you think that women would feel comfortable speaking out in a situation that is similar if people step up and speak out publicly . One of the reasons women dont speak out about abuse, theyre accused of lying and they get no support. It was their fault in some way, what happened to them. This kind of silence were hearing from hollywood, lack of support for ashley judd and rose mcgowan will not be very comforting to them and to other women looking at this story thinking, god, the titans of hollywood, Meryl Streeps and Jennifer Lawrences have not stood up publicly and spoken out in support of me. It makes it that much harder. If you are a young woman, so often young, Vulnerable Women who dont have much power, in their 20s, who cant speak out, like you can, mika. Thats why we need to speak out. We need to give them voice as well. And it should be a lot easier. Theyre afraid they may lose money. Yeah. I guess, katty. How much do they need . Mika lost, you know, a lot of money doing this. But it was an easy decision to make. What does Gwyneth Paltrow has to i dont even think its money. What does meryl streep have to lose . Nothing. Kate winslet. All these people who have worked with Harvey Weinstein have to lose that they wont go out and Say Something in support of rose mcgowan, ashley judd and these women who have had the courage to speak out. By the way, the men, too, right, joe . The men. Where are the men . It should be up to the male stars, too, equally coming out and saying this is not acceptable. Now that he has been fired i suspect we might have more of them. But the time to do it was before he was fired. By the way, dont put your little ribbons on at the next oscar ceremony and dont nick these people are willing to get up on stage at the globes, oscars and attack President Trump for this kind of thing. Where were they over the weekend . Where are they now . This was pretty easy. This was ease. I this one wasnt hard. No money is worth it. Again, youve been a friend of his. You were in his wedding, right . Yes. You condemned his actions. Mika, you had a big financial deal, a book deal. But you walked away from it immediately. Two people right here at the table, hollywood. This is not difficult. Step out and just say whats right, whats not right. And speak for the victims of Sexual Harassment across the board and make a more comfortable environment for more women to come forward so we can change the way society functions here. Or start in your corner in hollywood. Do what you can do. President trump attacks the top senator after undercutting his own secretary of state. Natos former commander is here to talk about how thats going over on the world stage. Knowing where you stand has never been easier. Except when it comes to retirement. At fidelity, you get a retirement score in just 60 seconds. And well help you make decisions for your plan. To keep you on track. Its your retirement. Know where you stand. To keep you on track. This this this is my body of proof. Proof of less joint pain and clearer skin. This is my body of proof that i can take on Psoriatic Arthritis with humira. Humira works by targeting and helping to block a specific source of inflammation that contributes to both joint and skin symptoms. Its proven to help relieve pain, stop further joint damage, and clear skin in many adults. Humira is the 1 prescribed biologic for Psoriatic Arthritis. Humira can lower your ability to fight infections, including tuberculosis. Serious, sometimes fatal infections and cancers, including lymphoma, have happened; as have blood, liver, and nervous system problems, serious allergic reactions, and new or worsening heart failure. Before treatment, get tested for tb. Tell your doctor if youve been to areas where certain fungal infections are common, and if youve had tb, hepatitis b, are prone to infections, or have flulike symptoms or sores. Dont start humira if you have an infection. Want more proof . Ask your rheumatologist about humira. Whats your body of proof . When i was too busy with the kids to get a repair estimate. I just snapped a photo and got an estimate in 24 hours. My Insurance Company definitely doesnt have that. You can leave worry behind when liberty stands with you™ Liberty Mutual insurance. Its not just a car, its your daily treat. Go ahead, spoil yourself. The es and es hybrid. Experience amazing. A Nations Technology will determine its power. In its economy, in medicine, in science and in national security. One company designs and builds more supercomputers than any other. An american company. Hewlett packard enterprise. Leading the way to discover. To innovate. And to protect. Hewlett packard enterprise. A National Asset in supercomputing. Start here. At fidelity, we let you know where you stand, so when it comes to your Retirement Plan, youll always be absolutely. Clear. Its your retirement. Know where you stand. Was he referring to military action when he said calm before the storm . As we said many times before, i know the president has, as i have from this podium on quite a few occasions, were never going to say in advance what the president is going to do. As he said last night in addition to those comments youll have to wait and see. Calm before the storm comment . Nothing to clarify. [ inaudible ] youll figure that out pretty soo soon. Continued to saber rattle with north korea over the weekend. President s and their administrations have been talking to north korea for 25 years. Agreements made and massive amounts of money paid hasnt worked. Agreements violated before the ink was try, making fools of u. S. Negotiators. Sorry but only one thing will work. Whats that, stupid tweets or oh, my god. Jangled Foreign Policy . Corker is 1,000 right. You have reason to be concerned. Well bring in admiral james tsavrides next on morning joe. Woman every year we take a girls trip. Remember nashville . Both kimchi bbq amazing honkytonk i cant believe you got us tickets i did. I didnt pay for anything. sigh you never do. Send me what i owe. Ive got it. I mean, you did find money to buy those boots. alert beep are you serious . Is that why you dont like them . Those boots could make a unicorn cry. Yeah tears of joy. groan settle up with your friends on october 17th with the bank of america mobile banking app. Settle up with your friends on october 17th and when youod sugar is a replace one meal. Choices. Or snack a day with glucerna. Made with carbsteady. To help minimize blood sugar spikes. You can really feel it. Now with 30 less carbs and sugars. Glucerna. Giveyoure finished curse you, heman, you interfering imbecile give us one good reason we shouldnt vanquish you to another dimension ok, guys, hear me out. Switching to geico could save you. Hundreds on Car Insurance. Huh, he does make a point. I do like to save money. Catch you on the flip, suckas geico. Because saving fifteen percent or more on Car Insurance is always a great answer. Start here. At fidelity, we let you know where you stand, so when it comes to your Retirement Plan, youll always be absolutely. Clear. Its your retirement. Know where you stand. You like secretary tillerson. So do i. We have a very good relationship. We disagree on a couple of things. Sometimes i would like him to be atougher, but other than that, we have a very good relationship. Sometimes you would like him to be a little tougher. Sometimes he would like you to be a little less crazy. Dean of the Fletcher School of diplomacy. Retired four star navy admiral. He is chief International Analyst for msnbc, nothing i say during his introduction is a reflection of his personal views or opinions. First question to david in washington. I want to ask the admiral the thing i think were all wondering. When the president of the United States, the commander in chief makes comments like these, were calling them saber rattling, talks about the calm before the storm, what are his commanders, the people like you when you served as nato commander, what do you think . What do you say . What do you tell your allies when you go back to your commands . I looked at the photograph of all of those military four star officers as david says, the Combatant Commanders at a dinner in the white house. I attended seven of those dinners over the years as a Combatant Commander both with president bush and obama. I cant imagine a moment where either of those president s or any president would make kind of a leering comment like this is the calm before the storm and sort of make those military officers a prop in his own little theater. And then to follow it up with this whole idea of oh, youll see whats going oh happen. This is absolutely not the way to conduct diplomacy and no way to run the presidency of the United States. It demeaned those officers, putting them in that position. Admiral, if i could ask you one quick followup. I just want to ask what kinds of checks there are built in to our system so that the American People can be comfortable, if thats the right word, that there wont be accidents or miscalculations driven by those seeming off the cuff comments from the president. Well, good news and bad news. The good news is weve got fairly sensible people in the immediate environment of the president. And that would be general mattis and general kelly and general mcmaster. Thats the good news. The bad news is our command and control system is built for speed. It is built to deliver lethal effect very rapidly. So i would be hoping that general kelly in particular, but also general mattis are being very close to the president these days so we dont end up in a situation where we stumble into an exchange of ordnance which can escalate very quickly into a full blown war, for example, on the korean peninsula. Admiral, its sam stain here. It appears per reports that the Trump Administration is going to declare that iran has broken the Nuclear Agreement with the hopes that congress doesnt reimpose sanctions. A bit of a middle ground threading of the needle, if you will. Is there any actual diplomatic geo political up side to doing Something Like that when our own military Personnel Say iran has livered up to the accord . I dont see any up side to that action. What we ought to be focusing on is keeping the deal that we have in place. We had a big debate about good deal, bad deal. Its a done deal. If we walk away from it, the europeans will walk away from us. What we ought to do instead is think about how we can meet the challenge of iran which is pushing hard in a variety of venues including Ballistic Missiles, enforcing terrorism, trying to take over other nations like yemen and syria. So weve got work to do against iran. But this kind of dance with the diplomacy and the congress is not going to have much effect at all on iran. President trump just tweeted moments ago. It says this. Our country has been unsuccessfully dealing with north korea for 25 years, giving billions of dollars and getting nothing. Policy didnt work. Katty kay, to you. Admiral, when you read that tweet, saying only one possible thing will work with his comments, are you aware of moves within the pentagon, changes in war planning that might make you think that this is more than just tone and bluster, this is actually we are inching toward as the North Koreans seem to think, we are inching toward some kind of military conflict with north korea . Katty, i dont see military operations beginning to unfold in a way that would lead me to believe we are setting the table for an actual full blown military strike. The thing to watch are the aircraft carriers. Youll read reports that an care craft carrier deployed this morning and it did. Roosevelt deployed today on schedule. Longplanned, a year planned. When you see two or three carriers moving toward the korean peninsula, thats setting the table. Thats getting ready for the strike zone. Im not seeing that, but these kind of tweets do more than inch us. We are starting to really sleepwalk toward a conflict on the korean peninsula. A Million People are going to die, and we can still avoid that if we can hold ourselves back from this kind of impetuous behavior. Admiral, thank you very much. And sam stain, thank you as well. Coming up, bob corker hits back after President Trump trashes him on twitter. Comparing the white house to an adult day care center. We are joined at the table about what corkers republican colleagues should do. Senator Richard Blumenthal joins us after his visit to puerto rico. Why he says the u. S. Is on the verge of failing the island. And Melania Trump reportedly compares life in the white house to living in a venezuelan jail. Morning joe is coming right back. When this bell rings. It starts a chain reaction. Thats heard throughout the connected business world. At t Network Security helps protect business, from the largest Financial Markets to the smallest transactions, by sensing cyberattacks in near real time and automatically deploying countermeasures. Keeping the world of business connected and protected. Thats the power of and. Are made with smarttrack®igners material to precisely move your teeth to your best smile. See how invisalign® treatment can shape your smile up to 50 faster today at invisalign. Com start here. At fidelity, we let you know where you stand, so when it comes to your Retirement Plan, youll always be absolutely. Clear. Its your retirement. Know where you stand. Youll always be absolutely. Clear. Hes a nascar champion whos shes a worldclass swimmer whos stared down the best in her sport. But for both of them, the most challenging opponent was. Pe blood clots in my lung. It was really scary. A dvt in my leg. I had to learn all i could to help protect myself. My doctor and i choose xarelto® xarelto®. To help keep me protected. Xarelto® is a latestgeneration blood thinner. Thats proven to treat and reduce the risk of dvt and pe blood clots from happening again. In clinical studies, almost 98 of patients on xarelto® did not experience another dvt or pe. Heres how xarelto works. Xarelto® works differently. Warfarin interferes with at least six bloodclotting factors. Xarelto® is selective. Targeting just one critical factor, interacting with less of your bodys natural bloodclotting function. Dont stop taking xarelto® without talking to your doctor as this may increase risk of blood clots. While taking, you may bruise more easily, or take longer for bleeding to stop. It may increase your risk of bleeding if you take certain medicines. Xarelto® can cause serious, and in rare cases, fatal bleeding. Get help right away for unexpected bleeding, unusual bruising, or tingling. If youve had spinal anesthesia, watch for back pain or any nerve or musclerelated signs or symptoms. Do not take xarelto® if you have an artificial heart valve or abnormal bleeding. Tell your doctor before all planned medical or dental procedures and before starting xarelto® about any conditions, such as kidney, liver, or bleeding problems. Youve got to learn all you can. To help protect yourself from dvt and pe blood clots. Talk to your doctor about xarelto®. Theres more to know. Welcome back to morning joe. Its monday, october 9th. Steve rattner, New York Times nick confisori. Katty kay and David Ignatius back with us. With us, we have elise jordan and former senior strategist for john mccains 2008 president ial campaign, Steve Schmidt, and chief White House Correspondent for the new york typeimes, pete baker. Want to begin with corker . I do. John lennon would have been 77 today. Wow. Is that right . I think a little younger. 77 . Born in 1940. Thats 77. I went to alabama. He has lots of money. All right. The chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee unloaded on President Trump in a no holds bar interview on sunday night. The interview is 25 minutes long, but wow. Bob corker of tennessee telling the New York Times that the president s reckless threats could set the nation, quote, on the path to world war iii. A member of the senator staff confirmed his comments to nbc news. Corker said he was alarmed about a president who acts, quote, like hes doing the apprentice or something. I know for a fact every single day at the white house its a situation of trying to contain him. This is something, David Ignatius, thats being said of our commander in chief by the most powerful republican on capitol hill. Who has access to secrets and says everything on the committee is saying the same thing. We move around in the community in washington d. C. , and weve talked to military people. I wont speak for you, but i can say what corker is saying on the record is what people have been saying off the record to me for a long time. Where do republicans on the hill go from here . Joe, i think that there has been deep anxiety about the erratic moves of the president. Its been something people have talked about behind the scenes. Been concerned about. What are the checks on it . I think washington feels that you have a bunch of people who are responsible. Secretary of defense mattis, secretary of state tillerson, and hr mcmaster, and john kelly. And the hopes for containing the behavior lies with those people. I want to add one thing this morning. Countries around the world watch this inflammatory debate between our president and the chairman of the Foreign Relations committee and just wonder what to do. They want to interact with the United States. These are crucial alliances. They want to understand where our iran policy is going. Whats going to happen in north korea. I think its our allies, a particularly difficult time trying to figure out where policy is between this white house, this pentagon, this state department. What is happening to our strategic alliances . Steve schmidt, in the times interview corker referenced tweets that trump made on twitter about secretary of state Rex Tillersons diplomatic efforts with north korea in which the president undercut tillerson telling him save your energy, rex. Corker said a lot of people think there was a Good Cop Bad Cop act underway, but thats just not true. I know he has hurt us in several instances as it relates to negotiations that were underway by tweeting things out. Look, except for a few people, the vast majority of our caucus understands what were dealing with here. Adding that, of course, they understand the volatility were dealing with and the tremendous amount of work that it takes by people around him to keep him in the middle of the road. And according to the times, corker would not directly answer when asked whether he thought trump was fit for the presidency, but he did say trump was not fully aware of the power of his office. Quote, i dont think he appreciates that when the president of the United States speaks and says the things that he does, the impact that it has around the world, especially in the region that hes addressing. He said, and so yeah, its concerning to me. Steve schmidt, lets im going to ask you to go there. He is questioning his fitness. Of course he is. This is the senate of the chairman of Foreign Relations committee. He knows whats going on in the white house and around the world, and he is deeply concerned. Fair . Whether he said it or not, the entire interview he demonstrates he questions his fitness as commander in chief. And manifestly so. When we consider the president s loose talk about Nuclear Weapons, about war on the korean peninsula, we should stop for a second and think about this. We have 40,000 troops in japan, roughly. 28,000 in korea. There are 12,000 ar titillery pieces that are ranged on the city of seoul. They believe they can deliver 500,000 of artillery and mortars in the first hour of the war. There are 230,000 u. S. Military dependents in south korea. When you look at the response in puerto rico, i think theres very serious reason to be concerned about our countrys capacity to safely air lift the americans out of harms way. When you look at the behavior across this administration, the lack of competence, the dishonesty, the lying, the indifference to american citizens, what we find through history is that leaders believe that they control events as opposed to being driven by events. We have a president who is clearly out of his depth. The chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee has acknowledged it. Foreign heads of state and heads of government understand it as well. Were at a dangerous hour in the world. I do think there is a real lack of imagination in this country for the magnitude of the type of tragedy we could have with this reckless and irresponsible president. And it is past time for members of the United States senate, particularly in the Republican Party who know whats going onto speak out directly about it. To communicate truthfully to the American People. They didnt take an oath to the Republican Party. They didnt take an oath to donald trump. They took an oath to the constitution of the United States. And joe, isnt there a false sense of security that they have this team of mcmaster and mattis and kelly, that can somehow contain him. Hasnt it been proven time and time again that thats impossible . He will do whatever he wants and if he wants to be a little crazy, hell be that too. Corker has made that very clear that this guy cannot be contained. If you bgo back and look at the warning of the Republican Party and the American People in early august of 2016 when we got word from a top Foreign Policy adviser that donald trump asked three times about the ability to use Nuclear Weapons against places like and he named north korea. We have Nuclear Weapons. Why cant we use them . We asked general hayden. The process. About the clear and present danger of donald trump. If we were president , and he had Nuclear Weapons or he was in the Nuclear Showdown, were there any checks . And general hayden chillingly said, well, unfortunately, that process is built for speed, not for checks and balances. And so as i said earlier today, all the warning signs are there. A lot of people have been warning about this for some time. Specifically to Nuclear Weapons. And elise, as i said earlier this morning, here we are, three, well, former republican. Are you a former republican . Not yet. Im trying to hang on. Its a struggle. This is a republican side by the way, im more conservative than 90 of the jack people on capitol hill any way. As i said earlier today, when theres a Nuclear Incident and the Million People in seattle or los angeles or San Francisco die, 100,000 americans are slaughtered in days worth of fight. At that point its too late for republicans to say i get it. Maybe i should have said this in front of the camera. Were talking about hollywood has a responsibility to talk about Harvey Weinstein. Hey, republicans really have a responsibility to talk about the imminent threat they know because theyve seen behind the scenes this man poses to the safety and the security to the United States of america. And by the way, its october 9th, 2017. Im holding it up. All right . Im not saying this because i feel like saying it. Im not saying this im saying this because im going to show you this. When something really bad happens. And im going to ask you where you were, because you know, republicans on the senate, you know republicans in the house. Because youve told me. This man is not fit to be president of the United States. So elise, too late for them. Too late after 100,000 americans die. After a Nuclear Holocaust. Or after a million die in seattle. Thats where we are. This is not an exaggeration. Ive worried about how donald trump would behave when given the power of Nuclear Weapons, and a nuclear arsenal. He has been fascinated for decades with Nuclear Weapons, and he has thinks he could be the great negotiator about Nuclear Weapons, and though we had all this noninterventionist talk during the republican primary, weve seen that its basically hallow and shallow and meaningless. I think he would have no compunction about going to war if it served a political purpose. Hes known himself to be craven when it comes to using the oval office for his own political means. But to joes point, we have a senator we all respect who spoke out strongly. But lets be honest. Hes not running for reelection. Heres the evidence, though, steve, that he wasnt just saying this because hes not running for reelection, even though donald trump begged him to run for reelection and said he would support him. Senator corker said about the same thing a month or two ago questioning his stability. Questioning his fitness for office. But hes gotten more outspoken. The point is weve all said people in hollywood should be speaking out about Harvey Weinstein. Its a serious matter. This is the future of the world. Where are the republican senators and leaders of the party . Were not saying that you cant do both things at once. That women being harassed in hollywood is not important just because a Nuclear Holocaust affects so many other people. But peter baker, its an interesting position republicans find themselves in. Youve heard a lot of the same things off the record. Im tired of hearing things off the record that people wont put on the record when it has to do with the stability of the commander in chief. Theres no question what senator corker said basically vented what many republicans in the senate think and have said privately. Whats interesting here is if the president now is at war with the chairman of his own partys foreign relation committee, majority, for the next 18 months. Thats going to be a very interesting position. This is a person who is in charge of a lot of things that matter to President Trump. If iran sanctions are to be put back on, senator corker has a voice in that. If President Trump were, in fact, to get rid of rex tillerson, the next person who would go up would go through senator corkers committee. Theres a lot of business to be done here. For the next 18 months senator corker is liberated. He no longer feels any compunction about saying what he thinks about this president. If he feels like hes going to take a different course, he has every freedom to do it. Hes not running for reelection. I think President Trump has earned himself an enemy in the last couple of days thats probably unhelpful to him. Steve, corker clearly feels liberated. That might mean he acts in certain ways on tax reform, for example, maybe even on the iran deal thats not helpful to the president. How many people do you think are there who are not saying anything but would be prepared to vote in ways that would be a problem for this president on key elements of his agenda on the republican side . I think if you look at the Republican Party, generally, as a general proposition, i think you see members that are terrified. Theyre terrified of being primaried. Theyre pterrified of the Republican Base which they dont understand at this moment where the coalition seems to be realigning. Theres a lack of political courage where everything is subordinated to the prospects of reelection including the dangerous behavior of the president , and admirals are talking about the four star officers, the Combatant Commanders standing there being used as political props with all of this loose talk. The overwhelming majority members of congress on both sides know this is wrong. But there has been an absence of real arguments explaining to the American People why this is dangerous. How its dangerous. How a tragedy unfolds. How a miscalculation happening on the korean peninsula. You look across not with this story, but look at puerto rico this morning. The relief efforts are disastrous. Weve seen Donald Trumps behavior and its disgusted people. But now when you look at the incompetence of the administration, its causing loss of life in places like puerto rico, and when you add on top of it the loose talk and war talk were seeing from this administration, we could be on the edge of something much, much worse. And peter baker, also were talking about how the senators and members of congress are concerned about whats going on in Donald Trumps head. They see the tweets yesterday, for instance, and these are the sort of things that we just forget about. Right . After a while youre like okay, wait a second. Yes, he lied 12 times in 140 characters talking about bob corker. He lied about bob corker begging him for an endorsement and when he said bob corker begged to be secretary of state. Corker said in realtime he couldnt do it. Even when you talked about the iran deal, he said the only thing bob corker gave us was the iran deal. Bob corker voted against the iran deal. If youre a senator and you see misinformation go out constantly, again, at what point do you say enough is enough . This man is not connected with reality . Well, it is interesting. Does there become a cascade effect where others feel liberated to speak the way senator corker has . We said repeatedly again, senator corker is not running for reelection. This is 52 republican senators. You lose one, two, and sudden lu youre no longer the governing party. This is a dangerous situation for the president , because you cant afford to lose bob corker. Katty mentioned corker is an important player even on tax reform. Hes troubled by the idea of adding hundreds of billions of dollars to the budget. Even tax reform, it comes outside of this president s reach. And so this is a big situation. Thats why i think a lot of attention is being paid on this. Its not just john mccain putting his thumb down on health care and its not just Lisa Murkowski or Susan Collins bolting from the party. Bob corker is in the center of the moderate conservative side of the party, and where he is at this moment is where many of them are. And heres when you have the president blowing up bridges to tax reform, being sel selfdestructive, suddenly, again, tax reform doesnt look like thats possible. Health care reform isnt possible. So he forces his Vice President to go to indianapolis to do a stunt that costs hundreds of thousands of dollars, ties up the secret service. Inconveniences the good people of indiana, and were left with the president who is nothing more than a reality tv guy doubling as a talk radio show host. And heres the real problem. 75 of your former and Current Party support President Trump. Theyre with him. And the reason that bob corker can speak more freely right now is hes not running for election. The reason the other guys cant, is theyre being primaried. A bigger problem is why has the way he does business found so much popularity among his party. Its three quarters of his party. Thats a crisis. Heres an Associated Press things going in the right direction among republicans. In june it was 60 . Today its 44 . Not create numbers. Theres a clear reason why donald trump wanted that stunt to happen yesterday at the football field. It really resonates with his base of supporters. He can have that one cultural issue, and he can hope that Everything Else is going to be ignored. But what cant be ignored right now is that republicans are having a tough time containing donald trump. And containing its one thing when its domestic policy. The Foreign Policy is out of control right now with north korea, and thats what we see with bob corker. The behavior. Mental. They cant contain donald trump. Thats obvious at the moment. I take nicks point about them being fearful about the reelection. Were talking about potentially nuclear war of some sort of another. You need people willing to stand up and say okay, there may be political consequences, but this cant go on like this. If this guy were running a company, he would be asked to leave and get help. A week after he got in. Imagine if this was the commander of a Ballistic Missile submarine and he comported himself. They would take him off that sub in a straight jacket in about 2. 2 seconds let alone a Public Company ceo or a superintendent of schools or really any person in a position of leadership and responsibility. And i would just say to one thing that peter said. He referenced the Republican Party as the governing party. Republican party may be the majority party. Theyre certainly not the governing party in this country. I dont think thats particularly lost on the American People as we see congressional approvals in the low teens. We see president ial approval in the low 30s. And we should not mistake intensity of support in a Republican Party that is shrinking as being the same thing as majority support for this president who continues to lose altitude week after week, month after month. And David Ignatius, again, just to show how significant these tweets are, this past weekend i was talking to a military person who had been around decades. And he said something i think that youve said on this show. You cant insult the leader of north korea. A man who is viewed as a god, and expect them to let that pass. They will not let that pass. Donald trump, an insulting, the person he calls rocket man time after time after time is inviting a response. This isnt like the tenant that youre trying to drive out of your decaying hotel because you want to tear it down and build a skyscraper there. This is a guy who was born believing he was a god. His countryman believe hes a god, and if you insult that god, then they have to respond. And they have to respond in a way that is going to be damaging, and provides a sort of retribution they believe is required in that setting. Thats a final grim element of our discussion this morning, joe. What effect do the tweets have on north korea, our potential adversary. My best korea watcher sources say that the North Koreans believe they need to do two more things to have their deterrent. They need to launch an icbm with flat trajectly across the pacific and need to test a Hydrogen Bomb in a way thats visible. Either of the moves could trigger a sudden u. S. Reaction, and then were really in the actual latter of escalation. I dont mean words. I mean military moves. So people need to understand. This is a moving target. Each word by the president may be heard and acted upon in north korea. Peter baker, what are you working on today . You know, its so early, we dont even know. It changes by the hour. There will be something huge in an hour. Exactly. Every morning i get up thinking i know what the story is going to be, but almost every morning its wrong. David ignatius, what about you . Im going to try to followup some of the things we talked about this morning. I want to know for sure we said we dont think there are moouchts of military assets in response to the calm before the storm. I want to make sure thats true today. And katty kay . I have the task of trying to explain this to the rest of the world. You give that a go, joe. Thank you to you all for being on the show this morning. Still ahead on morning joe, it looked like President Trump cut a deal with chuck and nancy on immigration. Now a new list of demands from the white house is calling that into question. Big surprise. New details on that next on morning joe. Woman for the holidays, we get a gift for mom and dad. And every year, we split it equally. Except for one of us. I write them a poem instead. And one for each of you too. Woman cool. That actually yours. That one. Yeah. Regardless, were stuck with the bill. To many, words are the most valuable currency. Last i checked, stores dont take words. Man some do. Oh. alert beeps not everyone can be the poetic voice of a generation. I know, right . Such a burden. Settle up with your friends on october 17th with the bank of america mobile banking app. Were on a mission to show drip coffee drinkers, its time to wake up to keurig. Wakey wakey rise and shine oh my gosh how are you . Well watch this. I pop that in there. Press brew. Thats it. So rich. I love it. Thats why you should be a keurig man fullbodied. Are you sure youre describing the coffee and not me . Fullbodied. Eight hundred dollars when wet switched our auto and home insurance. With liberty, we could afford a real babysitter instead of your brother. Hey. Oh. Thats my robe. Is it . You could save seven hundred eighty two dollars when liberty stands with you. Liberty mutual insurance. You know win control . Be this guy. Check it out selfappendectomy oh, thats really attached. Thats why i rent from national. Where i get the control to choose any car in the aisle i want, not some car they choose for me. Which makes me one smooth operator. Ah still a little tender. vo go national. Go like a pro. Knowing where you stand. Its never been easier. Except when it comes to your Retirement Plan. But at fidelity, were making Retirement Planning clearer. And it all starts with getting your Fidelity Retirement score. In 60 seconds, youll know where you stand. And together, well help you make decisions for your plan. To keep you on track. Time to think of your future its your retirement. Know where you stand. Its pretty incredible. Were talking about mike pence. Think about him going and angering the people of indianapolis. And indiana. Its amazing. He took air force 2. Full package of secret service from las vegas to indianapolis for a stunt, inconvenienced tens of thousands of colts fans to, again, use the flag and the anthem as a prop. And the greatest desecration of that flag is the assault on its foundational values which occurs every day with this administration with their attacks on the spirit of the First Amendment, freedom of the press, freedom of expression. Appalling, wasteful, disgusting behavior from the Vice President. He ought to be ashamed of himself. And people of indiana were welcoming pence back. Its sad. A native son who has made it big time going home and the whole state, im sure, wants to celebrate, and welcome him, and then theyre just part of being a political prop. Its sick and sad and a waste of taxpayer dollars. And not for nothing. He then flies back to california for a fundraiser for someone who literally in the congress is Vladimir Putins number one useful idiot. Okay. Shocking. This is wonderful. Joe, by the way, on sunday as the Vice President was flying home for this stunt, there were white nationalists marching in charlottesville. If youre going to fly somewhere to show your respect for the values of the flag and for american democracy, perhaps a better use of that time and money would be spent flying to charlottesville. The white house is out with a list of demands for any deal to protect socalled dreamers including proposals that are drawing rebuke from some democrats. Joining us now from the white house, kristen welker. I thought they had a deal with chuck and nancy. It was all going so well. Reporter thats right. It started off on strong footing, but the white house is saying this represents a compromise. Democrats are saying this is a nonstarter. Heres what were talking act. The white house putting forth what theyre calling a compromise package that would protect dreamers, the daca program, those who came here undocumented as children who are working, going to school, in exchange for a number of key policy proposals. Let me just list the most controversial, funding for the border wall. This is a Key Campaign Promise by President Trump. Something he has yet to fulfill. This is a nod to the base. The proepposals call for toughe actions on undocumented minors, beefed up Border Security. And also a controversial proposal that democrats are pushing back strongly against. Ive been talking to democrats and republicans on the hill about this immigration proposal. Even republicans say the white house is asking for too much now. Could this be a negotiating tactic . Is it possible the white house is putting all the asks on the table and then theyre willing to scale back . Well have to wait and see. You even have republicans saying its not realistic. Put that against the backdrop of the faceoff with bob corker and the odds get even steeper this type of package is going to get through. Kristen welker, thank you. What do you think . I think its negotiations. Chuck and nancy arent going to get everything they want, and republicans arent going to get everything they want. Youre not going to get money for the wall. Youre not going to get some of the other provisions, but you may see some increased Border Security which hes talked about all along. I think a lot of democrats would go along with that. One thing, meritbased immigration. It makes a lot of sense to a lot of americans. Those are two things that may be part of a deal that the democrats may not like. It could protect dreamers to not be kicked out of the country. And this piece in Washington Post describes how President Trump up ended years of policy with venezuela. It came after the wife of prison came to the white house where the president praised her past appearances on reality television. After hearing her story, the president called for her husbands release going further than some diplomats hoped for. According to post the first lady who was also in the room said she sympathized with the conditions her husband faced in jail because the white house often felt as confining as a prison. Its a point on which the president reportedly agreed. Steve, im going to let you take this one. Theres no words. You think about the white house. And the office of president of the United States, and the profound honor that holding that office must be. The understanding of the power and responsibility thats bestowed upon you by the American People to walk in a place where giants served. When i was in the west wing of the white house to understand that this is where fdr and churchill collaborated together to save the world, this is where Ronald Reagan conducted himself with dignity and decency, that this is a hallowed place, and to see the serial disrespect by word and deed literally on a quarter hour basis is tragic and heart breaking and for every kid and weve talked about this. When i was a kid, rond reagan was the president. A 14yearold, 11yearold, 4 1 2yearold and this is what they get to see. This is their model for the president of the United States . Beyond awful. The white house is a place the president reportedly called a dump. Even more than that, telling somebody that you can relate to their Family Member being jailed, being imprisoned by a regime in venezuela and that you can relate to that because the white house seems confining seems to be so disconnected. He is disconnected. Hes obviously completely insulated from the real world. He has no idea whats going on in any of these places. By the way, theres another piece of this which is hes making Foreign Policy on the fly with tweets. In other words, if you had because he likes a reality tv star. If you read something about something in venn lezuela and ha concern, you talk to people in the white house and he makes a tweet. Theres talk about regime change. I know senator marco rubio has been influential in the policy shift. Its so opposed to donald trump on the campaign trail, the noninterventionist which gives me more pause when it comes back to north korea. Coming up, President Trumps legal team is holding out hope that bob mueller with publicly clear the president of collusion. What started as a passion. Has grown into an enterprise. Thats why i switched to the spark cash card from capital one. Now, im earning unlimited 2 cash back on every purchase i make. Everything. Whats in your wallet . This is a story about mail and packages. And its also a story about people. People who rely on us every day to deliver their dreams theyre handing us more than mail theyre handing us their business and while we make more ecommerce deliveries to homes than anyone else in the country, we never forget. That your business is our business the United States postal service. Priority you a Nations Technology will determine its power. In its economy, in medicine, in science and in national security. One company designs and builds more supercomputers than any other. An american company. Hewlett packard enterprise. Leading the way to discover. To innovate. And to protect. Hewlett packard enterprise. A National Asset in supercomputing. I understood early that facebook was how donald trump was going to win. Twitter is how he talked to the people. Facebook was how he would win. And facebook is how he won . I think so. I mean, i think donald trump won, but i think facebook was the method. It was the highway on which his car drove on. We had their staff imbedded inside our offices. Facebook employees would show up for work everyday in our offices. Wait a minute. Facebook employees showed up at the trump Head Quarters . They were there three or four days a week, five days a week. What were they doing . Helping us get elected. I said i want to know every single secret, button, click, technology you have. I want to know everything you tell hillarys campaign plus some, and i want your people to teach me how to use it. I think its a joke when they involve myself. I know my own activities, and i know the activities of this campaign. I was there. Its a farce. Its a farce that you colluded with the russians . Yeah. Its just a joke. So 60 minutes sat down with the man behind President Trumps digital campaign. He says facebook was a key component to trumps win. The social media giant responded saying the Company Offered identical support to both campaigns. President trumps legal team is easing the resistance to Robert Mueller in the hopes hell declare in the coming months that trump is not under investigation. More trouble ahead for the trump team. What we do know, especially given what happened this summer with respect to the fbis intrusion into Paul Manaforts condominium, in light of the revelations that weve seen about general flynn, i have a sense that there will, in fact, be indictments. Joining us now member of the Armed Services and Judiciary Committees. Richard blumenthal of connecticut and staff writer at the atlantic, julia loffe. Good to have you both on senator. Senator, well start with russia as we were bumping in here with the facebook involvement. I do think that on lower levels of the campaign they were using facebook just like any other campaign would use facebook. At the high levels of the campaign, though, there are questions about the connection with russia. Where does the probe stand right now as far as you see it . We are looking at facebook adds. Ive seen them and review them and certainly they are extremely sophisticated. The russian ads are a tableau of very sinister as well as sophisticated use of social media. And the question is whether they were assisted, whether there was collusion with the Trump Campaign, and that is one of the focuses of our investigation. And weve reached no conclusion. The important point is the special counsel is reviewing that issue as well along with the obstruction of justice issue. And given that amidst of backdrop of this, is bob corkers comments in the past 24 hours about the president which gives you a sense not just of whether or not you think hes fit to lead, but what his moral code is in terms of the decisions he would make when hes running a campaign. The things he might do. Are you all taking that into consideration . The moral issues are profoundly important, but the focus really has to be for us on the legal issues. Whether there was obstruction of justice, our responsibility in the Judiciary Committee is oversight over the fbi, the firing of jim comey, whether that was obstruction of justice. The misuse of the department of justice itself, but the facebook ads, i think, indicate an attack on our democracy. And that attack, if it was aided or abetted by the Trump Campaign indicates not only a moral failure but a profound violation of the law. Because the russians are going to do it again if they dont pay a price this time, and anybody who colluded with them paying the price as well. Senator, what strikes me in my own reporting on facebook and the Trump Campaign is that the russian effort, as we currently understand it, consisted in large part of using tools freely available to any campaign to any company in america, to me, to you. And they use those against us in our own election. Is there a realistic possibility of any kind of regulation or intervention that would actually make a bit of difference on this if its so central to what these Big Companies do every day . Great question, and the answer, yes, there is. In the form of disclosure. Right now there is no transparency, no disclosure whatsoever. So i am helping to lead a measure that would require facebook to say in effect, the russians are paying for this message. Right. Coming to you straight from Vladimir Putin as part of a campaign to try to sew discord to undermine our democracy. It wouldnt say all that, but in effect, that would be what the message is to the American People, and it ought to be broader than just political campaigns. If Vladimir Putin is using facebook or google or twitter to in effect destroy our democracy, the American People should know about it. Julia, elise jordan here. Yesterday was putins birthday in russia, and protests all over the country, but in support of the opposition leader. How do you see this impacting the runup to the 2018 election . Russia, if at all . Well, if putin still announced if hes going to run. We dont know what hes going to do, but obviously hes going to run, and hes going to win. Hes still largely popular. The thing about the i want to refer to what the senator said about facebook. It is widely available, and as weve thing about things like microtargeting ads, its the wild wild west on these plat forms, and anybody who wants to misuse them can. Traveling around the country during the campaign, most voters told me that facebook was their main source of news. And if youre russia and youve honed these techniques at home, now is the perfect time or 2016 was the perfect time to export them, and it doesnt take a genius to figure out things like ferguson and racial tensions are going to be are going to be to your great benefit if you amplify them. Facebook is a news source, whether they like it or not, right . It is. It is. And, look, i think were on the front end of having a debate in this country about how big should these companies become . How powerful do we want to let them be . How much do we want them to effect economically the Competitive Landscape in the country . Are antitrust laws needing updating for the digital age in these companies . And i think that Vladimir Putin looked at us as a country, and he understood something about us, that we need to be honest with. He understood how easy it would be to get us at each others throats, and one of the things that is clear from this. This was not an attack on the democratic party. Well find out if theres been criminal wrong doing, but theres been collusion as evidenced by the meeting with donald trump junior, jared kushner, Paul Manafort with members of the russian intelligence committee, and its true in every single instance, 100 of the time, 100 of the people asked a question of this administration from the president , the Vice President and down have lied to the American People about it. 100 of the time. Well continue this conversation with julia next block. Senator, before you go, the president was tweeting videos about what a great job he has done in puerto rico. Somehow making that story about himself still. Can you update us on the efforts there and exactly how would you characterize what President Trump has done in puerto rico . I went to puerto rico with a bipartisan group. There were five of us senators, and a number of Congress People on the trip. We flew over the island, and it was a profoundly moving experience to look down on this beautiful island, part of america, with 3. 4 million americans, towns completely destroyed, flattened. Community centers gone. Thousands of homes decimated. And to hear that 90 of the transmission is down, half the island has no portable waters. A million meals a day have to be delivered, theres a humanitarian crisis, and america is on the verge of failing fellow americans, the great efforts and heroic work of fema and the military and our First Responders are continuing the triage, but essentially theres no plan, no strategy for longterm rebuilding which is so essential to the island, and where the president is lacking is in in leadership. Theres no marshall plan, which is what we need, for rebuilding and recovery on puerto rico. And the consequence is that there is a growing outflow of talent, skills, brains, from puerto rico theyre leaving. Theyre leaving. How could you stay . Im meeting with a number of the families later today who are coming to the United States. Theyre going to be here needing education and other services, and we need to welcome them. But the fact of the matter is that a bipartisan plan is necessary, and the leadership has to come from the white house. So far, it has not. All right, in our next hour, well talk to puerto ricos governor about that. Senator Richard Blumenthal, thank you so much. Its great to have you on the show. Thank you. Julia, stay with us. More morning joe after a quick break. If you have moderate to severe plaque psoriasis,. Isnt it time to let the real you shine through . Maybe its time for Otezla Apremilast . Otezla is not an injection or a cream. Its a pill that treats plaque psoriasis differently. With otezla, 75 clearer skin is achievable after just 4 months,. With reduced redness,. Thickness, and scaliness of plaques. And the otezla prescribing information has. No requirement for routine lab monitoring. Dont use if youre allergic to otezla. Otezla may cause severe diarrhea, nausea, or vomiting. Tell your doctor if these occur. Otezla is associated with an increased. Risk of depression. Tell your doctor if you have. A history of depression. Or suicidal thoughts,. Or if these feelings develop. Some people taking otezla. Reported weight loss. Your doctor should monitor your weight and may stop treatment. Other side effects include upper. Respiratory tract infection and headache. Tell your doctor about all the medicines you take. And if youre pregnant or planning to be. Ask your dermatologist about otezla today. Otezla. Show more of you. Our guests can earn a free night when they book at choicehotels. Com and stay with us just two times . Fall time. Badda book. Badda boom. Pumpkin spice cookie . Im good. Book now at choicehotels. Com its a warm blanket. Its a bottle of clean water. Its a roof and a bed. Its knowing someone cares. Its feeling safe. Its a today thats better than yesterday. Every dollar you can spare helps so much more than you can imagine. Please donate now to help people affected by hurricane harvey. Your help is urgently needed. So, julia, weve heard that moscow may actually limit access to u. S. Media. Is that correct . Yeah. Well, the thing is that this is all part of this wider tit for tat, and this is their tit for our tat with threatening to label russia today and sputnik foreign agents, right . Right. So, this is the danger when you get into that. And you know, its a great talking point for them that, look, this is american hypocrisy on full display. They talk about freedom of the press and their precious First Amendment, and yet, any media they dont agree with they shut down or they force to, you know, label themselves as a foreign agent. Of course, russia does this to all kinds of organizations at home, but this is a great play on their part geopolitically. So, julia, are you saying morning joe may not be available for st. Petersburg viewers . This would be heartbreaking some of our biggest fans are from st. Petersburg. By the way, did you yeah, Vladimir Putin is from st. Petersburg. Right. How could he how could he hurt people from his own town . Its like pence in indianapolis it doesnt seem like maybe even worse. Maybe even worse. So, julia, did you hear last week im just curious, did you hear last week the biden Putin Exchange . Joe biden, when he got the brazinski award, he told an interact with Vladimir Putin where he said he met him, said im looking to your eyes and i just want you to know i see no soul. Vladimir putin says, so we understand each other, which is, i mean, it explains, obviously, what a tough character he obviously is, but also how this administration seems so overmatched against the leader of russia. Er b yes, but the russians ar handling this really well, either. Things havent gone great for them under this administration. They were hoping for so much and they got so little, and theyre really not happy with how this has turned out. This reminds me of what former nsa chief Michael Hayden once said to me, which was, you know, sometimes a covert influence operation is so successful, you wish it hadnt been successful, like we thought it was a great idea providing arms to some guys in afghanistan, and look how that turned out. So, this has really backfired for the russians, too. So, theyre overmatched, but it hasnt worked out well for them either. All right, thank you so much. Greatly appreciate you dealing here. Still ahead, he may not be running for reelection, but bob corker proved he is far from a lame duck senator. Well talk about the damage donald trump is doing to himself and his agenda by going after the head of the Foreign Relations committee and one of the most powerful republicans on capitol hill. Plus, new reaction from the president this morning after telling his Vice President to walk out of yesterdays colts game, and it cost him about 250,000. Peter alexander will be live from the white house with his latest reporting. Hold on, kids, morning joe coming right back. 9 out of 10 couples prefer a different mattress firmness, so we created the only bed that adjusts on both sides to your ideal comfort, your sleep number setting. You can even see how well youre sleeping and make adjustments. Does your bed do that . The most amazing part is they start at 699. Thats 200 off our queen c2 mattress. And free Home Delivery on select beds only during our fall sale. Ends monday. Visit sleepnumber. Com for a store near you. I enjoy working with senator corker. I think its going to be fun to work with him, especially now that he nuanced hes not running for reelection, because i think it unleashes him and lets him say whatever he wants to say. White house budget chief Mick Mulvaney all but predicted the unplugged version of bob corker and thats exactly what the president got. Well cover that this morning. Well show you the retiring senators stinging rebuke of the white house, which he compared to an Adult Daycare Center, careening toward world war ii. And you know, this is actually what bob corker was hinting before he decided not to run. Of course, its fascinating, the president calling him up last week, begging him to run. Mmhmm. And saying that hed support him, and then, of course, pulling out. And he is saying what a lot of republicans are saying and is not holding back. Meanwhile, Vice President mike pence makes a public show of turning his back on the nfl in a preplanned protest to players taking a knee during the national anthem. And of course, it cost taxpayers a lot of money to fly there and secure a stadium, only to walk out for what looked to be a pr stunt, if you can believe it, at this point. Can you imagine how much fans how badly thought out that was. In indianapolis were inconvenienced, how youre always inconvenienced if a president or a Vice President comes to a game, how much secret Service Personnel were wrapped up at that time if something serious had happened elsewhere, how much money that cost the american taxpayers, just to deflect away from what had happened with bob corker, just to deflect from Everything Else. This was a stunt. You call a stunt something that you know is going to happen, and you go and you play it out. So, he went there knowing the 49ers were going to kneel. Everybody in the nfl knew it. And he actually left his Pool Reporter outside, said i dont think im going to be here very long. So they secured the stadium, flew in the secret service, did all that stuff, and on top of all that, he came from las vegas, to indianapolis and back to california. How much money did that cost . A lot of money. A lot of money. Well get to that. And inconvenienced a lot of good people that went to the game there. Thats right. A lot of people from indiana inconvenienced because of a short stunt. Also this morning by the way, nothing conservative about that. Nothing at all. And trump nothing conservative. Told him to do that. Trump told him to do that. You could have said, mr. President , we should just put out a statement because thats going to cost taxpayers millions and millions of dollars, its going to tie up secret service, it will require us to use jets as recklessly as everybody else in the administration. That requires you to speak up. Were going to have to fly back and forth. Its just, mr. President , that would be a very reckless thing to do. He didnt do that. Also this morning, Harvey Weinstein is fired from his company over allegations of rampant Sexual Harassment. Well get to that story in just a few minutes. Joining us this morning, former treasury official steve rattner, Political Writer for the New York Times, nick convasori, washington anchor for bbc world news america, katty kay, and columnist and associate editor for the Washington Post, David Ignatius. And well start with the fallout on capitol hill after the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee unloaded on President Trump in a no holds barred interview on sunday night. Republican senator bob corker of tennessee telling the New York Times that the president s reckless threats could set the nation on the path to world war iii. A member of the senators staff confirmed his comments to nbc news. Corker said hes alarmed by a president who acts like hes doing the apprentice or something and i know that every single day at the white house its a situation of trying to contain him. Corker referenced tweets that trump made on twitter about secretary of state Rex Tillersons diplomatic efforts with north korea in which the president undercut him, saying save your energy, rex. Corker said a lot of people think there is a good copbad cop act under way, but that is not true. I know in several instances hes hurt us as it relates to negotiations that were under way by tweeting things out. Look, except for a few people, the vast majority of our caucus understands what were dealing with here, he said, adding that of course they understand the volatility that were dealing with and tremendous amount of work that it takes by people around him to keep him in the middle of the road. According to the times, corker would not directly answer when asked whether he thought trump was fit for the presidency, but he did say trump was not fully aware of the power of his office i dont think he appreciates that when the president of the United States speaks and says the things that he does, the impact that it has around the world, especially in the region that he is addressing. He said, and so, yeah, its concerning to me. David ignatius, there is a parallel here with the weinstein story. Powerful people in washington wont speak up about something that theyre all talking about off the record. That they know is happening. And they all knew was happening, but they wouldnt speak out about it. These republicans, as bob corker said by the way, corker was talking about this before, asking whether he was fit for office, making that suggestion long before he decided not to run for office, even after donald trump begged him to run for reelection, said hed support him. But there is a parallel here. Republicans know whats going on in this white house. They know this president is not fit for office. They have known it for a very long time. And as bob corker said, all except for a handful are very, very concerned about this president being in the middle of a Nuclear Showdown and not understanding the stakes. Joe, i think youve said it exactly right. This is one of those rare moments that we always talk about, celebrate, but happen too infrequently, where somebody speaks truth to power. Bob corker has said flat out the things that people whisper about, worry about, the sort of inner concerns of washington that go to the president , the way he operates. These lines, Adult Daycare Center could have been written by the great tweeter himself. They have an edge, theyre funny, but hes really getting at the question of the underlying stability of conduct of policy in washington under this president , and and david, when he talks about Adult Daycare Center and then talks about somebody obviously wasnt making their rounds, there is a suggestion there that it seems thats not just a joke. This is a suggestion this man may not be fit for office. At least thats how i read it. You know, i think until he comes forward, or someone does, with Additional Details, you have to be careful in parsing just what that means. What i did over the weekend, joe and mika, was to ask people at the pentagon how much of this bluster weve been seeing since last friday, the calm before the storm, the sort of, whoa, that the president s been doing, how much that was real. And i was told i dont think this will surprise anyone that in terms of actual movements of military assets, of anything communicated to our allies, anything specific, my contact said were not aware of anything. They said when theyre asked by foreign ministries of defense whats going on, whats this about, they basically reply this is messaging. You understand this president. So, we have this weird situation which we have the redhot comments from the president , but so far as i can tell, underneath, not yet plans for any specific military action. Yeah, well, the fighting between President Trump and senator corker kicked off on twitter sunday morning. President trump began tweeting about the senator who recently announced he would not seek a third term in 2018. Senator bob corker begged me to endorse him for reelection in tennessee would you stop . That was false. First thing was false. The president lies repeatedly, and we are desensitized to it. This is the invitation for you to have dinner with him when he lied about that. First is a lie. Corker did not ask for his endorsement. Then i said no and he dropped out, also a lie according to multiple sources. Said he could not win without my endorsement. That also is a lie. He also wanted to meet secretary of state. I know for a fact that was a lie because i was calling bob corker and begging him to be secretary of state. To be secretary of state. And corker said that it was a possibility, but he met with him and he said it was so awkward, there was no way bob corker said there is no way i could have worked with him, joe. I would have been glad to serve my country. It just wouldnt work out. Told me that in realtime. Remember that awkward moment on the stage . And he said, i was backstage, and you know, i just had to tell him, no, thanks, it will never work out. No to the president. Someone should have told the president , corkers not a stooge. Hes not going to back down to your tweets. Youre actually going to just shoot yourself in the foot time and time again, just as you did all day yesterday. And katty, this is the thing he doesnt understand, and i mean this. The president , hes just so out of it. He does not understand Adult Daycare Center. That if you attack bob corker, a guy who started a business on his own, became unbelievably successful in his 30s, has always been a success, a mayor, you know, a twoterm senator. You attack this guy, hes not scared of the president. And hes got nothing to lose. The damage that donald trump did additionally to his presidency yesterday is unspeakable. He also, guess what, hes lost a vote on tax reform. Hes lost a vote on just about anything. If impeachment does come up, i wouldnt be surprised if bob corker im seeing 25thamendment now. If bob corker and john mccain and Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski and jeff flake, and all of these republicans that hes going after, if hes, again, not sealing his own fate. And hopefully, theres one or two republicans out there that i havent mentioned who said, you know what, this is just too dangerous for our country, i really do not think this man is stable and i do not think he is fit, and i think we need to Start Talking about other alternatives, all that unleashed by donald trump. Yeah. And you know, its interesting, donald trump repeatedly seems to see the administration as just donald trump. He doesnt understand this concept of the idea that his success depends on more than just himself, whether its rex tillerson, whether its john mccain, whether its bob corker, that he has to keep whether its even the mayor of san juan, you know, doing her job down in puerto rico. He sees it very much as himself and a reflection of himself, and i think that is why he gets into this position of alienating other people and thinking there arent going to be consequences. Still ahead on morning joe, well go live to the white house on the heels of the Vice President s public protest of the nfl. What the administration is saying about securing a stadium only to have him walk out minutes later. Youre watching morning joe. Well be right back. In the future, a Nations Technology will determine its power. In its economy, in medicine, in science and in national security. One company designs and builds more supercomputers than any other. An american company. Hewlett packard enterprise. Leading the way to discover. To innovate. And to protect. Hewlett packard enterprise. A National Asset in supercomputing. You know win control . Be this guy. Check it out selfappendectomy oh, thats really attached. Thats why i rent from national. Where i get the control to choose any car in the aisle i want, not some car they choose for me. Which makes me one smooth operator. Ah still a little tender. vo go national. Go like a pro. honking beeping were on to you, diabetes. Times up, insufficient prenatal care. And administrative paperwork, your days of drowning people are numbered. Same goes for you, budget overruns. And rising costs, wipe that smile off your face. Were coming for you too. At optum, were partnering across the Health System to tackle its biggest challenges. Knowing where you stand. Its never been easier. Except when it comes to your Retirement Plan. But at fidelity, were making Retirement Planning clearer. And it all starts with getting your Fidelity Retirement score. In 60 seconds, youll know where you stand. And together, well help you make decisions for your plan. To keep you on track. Time to think of your future its your retirement. Know where you stand. Your bbut as you get older,ing. It naturally begins to change, causing a lack of sharpness, or even trouble with recall. Thankfully, the breakthrough in prevagen helps your brain and actually improves memory. The secret is an ingredient originally discovered. In jellyfish. In clinical trials, prevagen has been shown to improve shortterm memory. Prevagen. The name to remember. Throughout history, the one meal when we come together, break bread, share our day and connect as a family. [ bloop, clicking ] and connect, as a family. Just, uh one second voice guy. [ bloop ] huh . Hey . I paused it. Bam, family time. So how is everyone . Find your awesome with xfinity xfi and change the way you wifi. Executive Harvey Weinstein has been fired from the studio he cofounded following revelations of numerous Sexual Harassment allegations. The board of the Weinstein Company made the announcement in a Statement Released yesterday, citing new information about the misconduct by Harvey Weinstein. The move comes after the New York Times investigation published on thursday revealing allegations of weinstein engaged in decades worth of rampant Sexual Harassment. Following the times report, weinstein announced friday hed take a leave of absence while an outside lawyer investigated the allegations. He issued an apology, while the attorney threatened to sue the newspaper calling the reports inflammatory. Onethird of the boards male members resigned the same day. And lisa bloom who said he was a dinosaur. Usually represents women. But for some weird reason was defending harvey, but i guess the pressure got too hot and she got out. And Brooks Barnes reports that from thursday to saturday, he called more than 40 Entertainment Industry players and almost all refused to speak for the record on the matter. Barnes said that some of it was because the companies publicisted needed to prove everything while others painted a picture of a community hobbled by fear, selfinterest and hypocrisy. Amid the continued fallout of the bombshell report, democratic lawmakers are ridding themselves of contributions from the mogul and political donor. Chuck schumer and several colleagues announced on friday theyll give their money donated by weinstein to womens charities groups that combat sexual violence. And the democratic National Committee said it would give money to groups that help Democratic Women win elections and also condemned all forms of Sexual Harassment and assault. But the head of the Republican National committee is slamming former democratic president ial nominee Hillary Clinton for not publicly condemning weinstein. In a series of tweets over the weekend, Ronna Romney Mcdaniel wrote whose side is Hillary Clinton on, Harvey Weinsteins or his victims . She continued where is Hillary Clintons condemnation of weinstein . Even the New York Times is criticizing him with a link to a New York Times opinion piece. Former president obama also has yet to weigh in on the matter, despite the fact he and weinstein had a close relationship and his daughter even worked for Harvey Weinstein. Mika, let me ask you, you made a decision, obviously. Lets just talk about it really briefly here. You had a threebook deal with a Company Owned by Harvey Weinstein, which he leaked to the New York Post. It was a big, big book deal. Mmhmm. But you said no. You walked away from it. Why . Because its not worth it. Whats the point . And especially these books, theyre educating women on how to understand their value and communicate it effectively. These are really good books, and they cant be funded by or they cant be out of a company run by a guy who has alleged perverted activity, who has abused women over the course of years. Its just impossible. And its also a way of stepping up. I think more people should. Katty kay, im surprised that were seeing such a lack of response. I mean, this is the age of trump. This is the age in which women who have any power, whether its inconvenient or not, should be stepping up and pushing back to this behavior. Im totally at a loss. Yeah. You and i have been tweeting about this and texting each other about this all weekend, mika. Im stunned at the silence, you know, both from political types, but also from men and women in hollywood. It shouldnt just be the women in hollywood speaking up. Youre right. Men should be speaking up about this, too. You asked me if i would retweet i think it was saturday morning you texted me and said would you retweet the deal of im pulling out of the hashad deal . It took a day for you to make that decision and three days later were still getting silence out of hollywood. But i wanted to ask you, and we havent had a chance to talk about it directly, when you were making the deal, did you hear anything about Harvey Weinstein . Was this something you heard at hachette . No, i worked with publishers there, fantastic women who have done great work, and we have done great work. The first knowing your value that came out that were releasing in the spring, i worked with these women and weve had an incredible time working together. I would have been sad to move away from the company, but i would have done it, absolutely. I never heard anything from inside the company, and i didnt hear much because we dont really i mean, hes invited us to many events. Weve never gone. So, we really never traveled in his circles. Having said that, after everything that i read and that hes even admitted to, this was a nobrainer on so many levels. I also am stunned to hear that in this heated Board Meeting over the weekend that he thought this would blow over. Like, that is hubris. That is arrogance. That is someone who has been abusing for so many years that he has absolutely no sense of selfawareness. Joining us now, politics editor for the daily beast, sam stein. And youve done reporting on this story as concerns to the rncs response. Tell us about that. Well, first off, i applaud your decision, mika, and i find the Weinstein Companys reason for firing Harvey Weinstein a little dubious. They say new information just surfaced. If i read the first report correctly, he had eight settlements. Were those secret . Did they not know about the settlements . I guess the publishing of those settlements is what did it, not new information, past information. Anyway, putting that aside. Over the week, there was a lot of pressure put on politicians, obviously, to return the donations weinstein gave, and i think the dnc fed the story, instead of putting it away, by only giving a portion of their donations from weinstein and to political groups, not charities. So they took the donations they had received in the past year from weinstein and gave them to groups that help women run for elected office. And this is sort of a half measure and they got a lot of criticism for it, and rightfully so, but it just struck me as odd the people who were doing the criticism, which was primarily folks associated with the Republican National committee. The Republican National committee is there to promote, fund raise, and take money from in some cases donald trump, who as everyone knows has multiple women having accused him of sexual advances, Sexual Harassment and so on. But sam, the rnc has allowed itself to be turned into an arm of donald trump, which usually happens, but that happens, yeah. Its happened more so in this case, so they fund raised with him this weekend in north carolina, so you know right, so no credibility if this comes from the rnc, if this comes from a republican who supports donald trump, theres absolutely no credibility whatsoever in that criticism. Thats the pot calling the kettle black. Yeah, and so ive been asking the rnc repeatedly, do you feel like youre compromised in making this case, and they just wont they wont respond. And i mean, they dont have to respond, but it just struck me as hypocritical. Now, if youre a decent, normal human being and you feel intellectually consistent, then you should be able to say, what Harvey Weinstein did is deplorable, the money that he gave should be returned and people should condemn him publicly and quickly. And you should be able to say what donald trump did is deplorable. Right. And you shouldnt be associated with him if you feel like democrats shouldnt be associated with Harvey Weinstein. Those are the consistencies here, and i feel like there is none. Thats fair yeah. And katty, dont you feel more women would be comfortable speaking out in any situation which might be similar to this, which seems extreme, i hope, if people step up and support what has happened publicly . Yeah, absolutely. One of the reasons that women dont speak out about abuse, one of them is that theyre accused of lying when they do, and the second is that they get no support, that theyre somehow made to feel guilty about what happened to them. It was their fault in some way. Well, this kind of silence that were hearing from hollywood, lack of support for ashley judge and rose mcgowen, is not going to be very comforting to them and to other women who are looking at this story and thinking, god, the titans of hollywood, the Meryl Streeps and the Jennifer Lawrences have not stood up publicly and spoken out in support of me. That makes it that much harder. If you are a young woman, its so often young, Vulnerable Women who dont have much power, who are in their 20s, who cannot speak out like you can, mika. Thats why we need to speak out, because we need to give them voice as well. It should be a lot easier. Theyre afraid they may lose money, i guess, katty. How much do they need . Mika lost you know, mika lost a lot of money doing this. And again, though, but it was an easy decision to make. I mean, what does Gwyneth Paltrow have to lose . I dont think its even money. What does meryl streep have to lose . Nothing what does i mean, kate winslet. What do all of these people who have worked with Harvey Weinstein have to lose that they wont go out and Say Something in support of rose mcgowen, in support of ashley judd, in support of all these women who have finally had the courage to go out and Say Something that people in hollywood have known about for 20 years . And by the way, the men, too, right, joe . And the men it shouldnt just be up to the women. Where are the men . It should be up to the male stars, too, equally coming out and saying this is not acceptable. Now that hes been fired, i suspect we might have more of them, but the time to do it was before he get fired. By the way, dont put your little ribbons on at the next oscar ceremony and dont nick these people are willing to get up on stage so selfrighteous. At the globes and oscars and attack President Trump for this kind of thing. Where were they over the weekend . Where are they now . Nowhere. This was pretty easy. This is easy. This one is not hard. You dont have to think about it. No money is worth it. By the way, on the set, again, youve been a friend of his. You were in his wedding, right . Yes. You condemned his actions. Mika, you had a big financial deal, a book deal that you walked away from immediately. So we have two people here at the table, hollywood. This is not difficult. Step out and just say whats right, whats not right. And speak for the victims of Sexual Harassment across the board and make a more comfortable environment for more women to come forward so we can change the way society functions here because its really messed up. By the way, hes just starting, your corner in hollywood. Do what you can do. Coming up on morning joe, the governor of puerto rico joins us live as President Trump defends his response to hurricane manager maria. Are things getting any better . Bp uses flir cameras a new thermal imagining technology to inspect difficulttoreach pipelines, so we can detect leaks before humans can see them. Because safety is never being satisfied. And always working to be better. Upeace of mind. S we had a power outage for five days total. We lost a lot of food. We actually filed a claim with usaa to replace that spoiled food. And we really appreciated that were the webber family and we are usaa members for life. bell ringing so, i was at mom and dads and found this. Cds, baseball cards. Your old magic set . sigh and this wrestling ticket. Which you still owe me for. Seriously . 25 . I didnt even want to go. Ahh, your diary mom says it is totally natural. 25 is nothing. alert beep abracadabra, bro. Settle up with your friends on october 17th with the bank of america mobile banking app. Settle up with your friends on october 17th and i am a senior Public Safety my namspecialist for pg e. My job is to help educate our First Responders on how to deal with natural gas and electric emergencies. Everyday when we go to work we want everyone to work safely and come home safely. I live right here in auburn, i absolutely love this community. Once i moved here i didnt want to live anywhere else. I love that people in this community are willing to come together to make a difference for other peoples lives. Together, were building a better california. Welcome back to morning joe. Steve rattner, the New York Times, nick convasori, former aid to the george w. Bush white house and state departments elise jordan and republican strategist Steve Schmidt are all back with us. We just had that conversation about the Sexual Harassment allegations against hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein, and were talking about that muted reaction from said where are all the leading people in hollywood . Some corners of the media as well, and hollywood. Well, now, meryl streep is speaking out. Thats a big one. Reported in the huffington post. Her full Statement Reads the disgraceful news about Harvey Weinstein has appalled those of us whose work he championed and those whose good and worthy causes he supported. The intrepid women who raised their voices to expose this abuse are heroes. One thing can be clarified, not everybody knew. Harvey supported the work fiercely, was exasperatingly but respectful with me in our working relationship and with many others with whom he worked professionally. I didnt know about these other offenses. I did not know about his financial settlements with actresses and colleagues. I did not know about his having meetings in his hotel room, his bathroom, or other inappropriate coercive acts. And if anybody knew, i dont believe that all the investigative reporters in the entertainment and the hard news media would have neglected for decades to write about it. The behavior is inexcusable, but the abuse of power familiar. Each brave voice that is raised, heard, and credited by our watchdog media will ultimately change the game. So, mika, very good. Very important, too, for anybody that is afraid to speak out. You have, you know, perhaps the most celebrated, successful actress i love it. In hollywood. Good for her. Has come out and spoken strongly about her beliefs. Yeah, and this is at a time like this, we need to hear from powerful women who have aligned themselves, benefited from, gotten money from Harvey Weinstein any way, whether its political or hollywood related, because we then give voice to the women who dont have a voice. But we should also hear from men just as much, right . And men, and men, absolutely. Exactly. You know, youre absolutely right, and i keep making that mistake. We need to hear from women and men. This is unacceptable. And elise, how important, again, that it comes from meryl streep, who is, again, one of the most celebrated actresses of our time, one of the greatest actresses of our time probably good friends with him. And obviously owes a lot to him. He owes a lot to her. Thats exactly when you speak out, when its not an easy thing to do. Easy to do. But she just did. Well, and it gives space to women who are questioning should they come forward. Right. It gives them it helps give them the strength to know that theyre being backed up and supported by the community. And mika, i give you huge props. Threebook deal. You could take a financial hit. Youre choosing to do the right thing because you do not appreciate or respect the way that they, this company has treated women. No, well, not Harvey Weinstein. You came, you did it early. Lena dunham did it early. Her producer, jenny coner, did it early, which i really respect. Theyre putting their money where their mouth is. And women like meryl. And you look at someone like rose mcgowan, who had talked about for years an anonymous producer, a powerful mogul who had raped her, and she had had to endure this for years, and i think that women have a responsibility to come out and support other women. And i definitely you know, hes stepped down. I said i would not do the book deal unless he did. I have to say, though, i want more. I want to know that this company does not embrace sexual abusers, sexual harassers, and i want to have a conversation with them before i move forward, because this is step one. Step two is having a wider conversation about the culture within an organization that, of course, starts at the top. And again, you said, the people that youve worked with have been great. First of all, theyre all women. I work with an allfemale team, and theyre incredible. And i look forward to working with them more, so i hope this works out. But for their sake and, quite frankly, this doesnt end with Harvey Weinstein stepping down. No. This is just the beginning. Well, he didnt step down. He got pushed out, which says something about the company. And i think that we also need to just look at what Gretchen Carlson started by speaking out. And you know, Amanda Carpenter tweeted that it was the first time in her lifetime she can remember a woman speaking out about Sexual Harassment and not being judged for it, and i couldnt agree more with that. I cant think of a time before gretchen that a woman could come out and it wasnt somehow because of the way she dressed, the way she behaved, this and that. And gretchen kind of opened up a new era where more people are being open. It needs to happen in realtime, though. It needs to happen in realtime, and it needs to happen when it is at a cost to you even. And women need to have a space to do that so they dont pay the ultimate price. Were not there yet. Now to Nbc News National Correspondent Peter Alexander live at the white house. Peter, the president is mosqutwg this morning, pushing back at the criticism of Vice President pence, who walked out of that nfl game after some players knelt in protest of the national anthem. Whats the latest on what most see as a very costly stunt, costly to the american taxpayers . Reporter yeah, joe and mika, good morning to you. Its certainly the latest chapter in whats become a divisive national debate, but this certainly escalates things. As youve been talking about, the Vice President flying into his home state for this colts game, hosting the niners. Many of the niners players taking a knee during the starspangled banner. The Vice President then tweeting out a picture, hand over heart, writing President Trump and i will not dignify any event that disrespects our soldiers, our flag, or our national anthem. Trump later tweeted that he basically asked pence ahead of time to leave if anyone kneels, writing im proud of him. Of course, as you noted, critics have pounced. Democrat adam schiff calling this an expensive taxpayerfunded political stunt, making note of the questions now involving trump cabinet members expensive travel habits. The Vice President s team did not say how much the trip cost. I reached out last night, but the reimbursable rate and we checked on this for political travel aboard air force two would be just shy of 16,000 an hour to fly. So, take about six hours of flight from las vegas, where he was, to indianapolis, back to l. A. Where he was heading back ahead of a political fundraiser. The cost of that would be roughly 96,000. Of course, its not surprising that the 49ers would take a knee. Their former quarterback, colin kaepernick, he began the whole protest last season to bring attention to Police Brutality and injustice. At the stadium, reporters traveling with the Vice President were told to stay in the van because and this is a quote there may be an early departure from the game. Ahead of the game, the Vice President tweeted out a picture yesterday with the caption that read looking forward to cheering for the colts and honoring the great career of peyton manning, whose number was going to be retired at halftime. Thats just disingenuous. Peter, thats ingenuous. He knew he knew the 49ers were going to kneel. Reporter yeah before he went there. Reporter well, the bottom line was it would have been impossible not to know. The 49ers started this whole thing. The Vice President says this has been in the works for a long time, that it was a lastminute flight to go out to vegas ahead of time for this. Theyre pushing back, saying its the height of hypocrisy for liberal democrats basically to celebrate players who disrespect the flag and then to accuse the Vice President effectively of, you know, engaging in his own First Amendment rights of carrying out a political stunt. All right, thank you so much. Wow. Peter alexander. Ill tell you what the height of hypocrisy is how lame. The height of hypocrisy, steve, is tweeting out a Photo Looking forward to watching the colts play today, when youve told everybody thats following you, hey, i am not going to watch the colts today, where in fact, were going to have an early departure. This is embarrassing. They knew what was going to happen, and this isnt about First Amendment rights. This is about a political stunt thats going to end up costing taxpayers maybe 250,000, that tied up secret service members. This is revealing about mike pence. That required the seeblcret service to go in and sweep the stadium probably the night before, the day of, that inconvenienced the good people of indiana that wanted to go to a Football Game and didnt want to be tools used in his political pr stunt. But they were tools used in a political pr stunt. They were. Thats exactly what it was, but just have you ever sat in traffic outside of a stadium when there is a president or a Vice President there . Well, dont ask steve has not, but maybe elise has. Have you done that before . I know you helicoptered the 50 yard line, gave you gray pupon and you were ushered up to the box. If you can imagine. All of us have done it, where we have had to sit in our cars and wait for hours because of the inconvenience of a president or a Vice President at an event. Everybody has to be screened, everybody has to go through the process. Just one footnote on what peter was saying, though. The 96,000 for the air force two, if thats even the cost, is a fraction, a fraction of the cost. You have to send in advance people, you have to send in his car to get from the airport to the stadium. You have to pay for all the secret service. You have to get all those things back out again. The cost of moving the president or Vice President is hundreds and hundreds of thousands of dollars. And on a separate note, can we just talk about not the smoothest operators with the photo and twitter . No. Did they not think journalists were going to immediately google and find out it was an old image . Covering their tracks is not and i wonder in indianapolis yesterday if there was a mom who was in labor who needed to get to the hospital. Its like bridgegate. Because the roads were closed for the vps motorcade or if there was a Police Officer who couldnt respond to 9 11 as quickly or if there were ambulances tied up. When you step back from it, the abusiveness the abuse of power, yes. The abuse of power, thats what its about. Its not about the First Amendment. By the way, donald trump its a great story. In private and in public loved talking about Chris Christie and bridgegate, loved talking about it. This makes shutting down a lane at the George Washington bridge pale in comparison, because the secret service were involved, the hundreds and hundreds of thousands of dollars. This is so much worse than bridgegate and donald trump would talk to anybody about bridgegate that would listen. And not for nothing, you want to talk about disrespecting the flag . This is somebody who stood in silence when his running mate, donald trump, attacked a gold star father and mother. Yes. And attacked prisoners of war to include my former boss, captain john mccaptain, u. S. Navy retired, winner of the distinguished Service Cross and three awards of the bronze star and one of the silver star, and colonel bud day, recipient of the medal of honor, real heroes. Yeah. Doesnt say a word. So, he can spare us the sankt moany and the lectures and the hypocrisy here with his outrageous, profligated use of my tax dollars and all of yours. And again, the safety i think he thinks everyone is stupid. Of the people of indianapolis. Thats a very good question, who was delayed from getting to the hospital or who was delayed from doing their job, maybe just going to a shift responding to a 911 call. Who was late to maybe the first job that they had . A fire. They probably might have gotten fired because i mean, we dont know. Who missed a Job Interview . Exactly. Over the weekend, by the way, President Trump defended his tossing paper towels to hurricane victims last week during his visit to puerto rico. We did a great job, and we werent treated fairly by the media because we really did a good job. I mean, one example. They had these beautiful, soft towels. Very good towels. And i came in and there was a crout of a lot of people, and they were screaming and they were loving everything. And i was having fun. They were having fun. They said, throw them to me, throw them to me, mr. President so, im doing some of the so, the next day, they said, oh, it was so disrespectful to the people. It was just a madeup thing. And also, when they had when i walked in, the cheering was incredible. The cheering was incredible. Beautiful paper towels. Because it is all about you. And yesterday he tweeted nobody could have done what ive done for puerto rico with so little appreciation. Not true. So much work, along with a nearly nineminute video of Recovery Efforts which he actually wasnt a part of. It takes work to be that bad. Meanwhile, puerto rico suffered a setback in restoring power. According to nbc news, the substation failure dropped the share of san juan residents with power from the electrical grid from 12 to almost 7 . The mayor of san juan tweeted increasingly painful to understand the American People want to help. The u. S. Government does not want to help. Power collapses in San Juan Hospital with two patients being transferred out. We filtered out the mayor a long time ago. We dont have time for the political noise. The bottom line is, is that we are making progress every day in conjunction with the governor. And in regards to the power failure, were restringing a very fragile system every day. As we make progress, simple thunderstorms pass through, knock the progress out. Filtering out the mayor of one of the cities most hit. He also is the one who said this is the greatest, most difficult logistical operation the United States government has ever done. Of course, talk to ike about dday or macarthur. They didnt think back that far. Lets bring in the governor of puerto rico. Governor, listen, well just stick to the facts. Well handle the politics. We dont want to put you in a difficult position. Id say ive been in your position youre in a difficult position. Because four or five hurricanes went through my district. Ive never been in your position. This is grim. So, lets just get some facts right now for americans, because americans need to give. Americans need to give more to puerto rico in fact, than they gave to houston and florida, because you guys need it more right now. First of all, is that number accurate . Right now do you have 7 of residents with power . Its a little bit higher now, joe. And thank you for the opportunity. Its about 12 , but notwithstanding, it just shows how fragile our energy grid is, and we cant be talking about just putting back the old grid again. We need to be talking about how were going to innovate, how this destruction gives us now a platform to not just rebuild but to transform puerto rico. Right. Thats one of the things that were focusing on, how do we work with tesla, how do we work with other companies and innovate in puerto rico and make puerto rico stronger. So, governor, how about drinkable water . What percentage of the island, of people on your island have drinkable water . Its about 57 right now. The vast majority of the island has about 65 to 70 , but theres a corner in the northern part of the island where were at about 23 clip. So naturally, all of the logistics and all of the efforts to get a Potable Water to those areas is focused on. And today were powering one of the major outlets of water to the northern area, so hopefully, we can get that number up. So, what percentage of your hospitals are without power right now . What can you tell us about that . That seems to be such a critical concern. It is a critical concern, and i want to caveat this. We do have hospitals powered. We have about 60 that are powered by generators or by generation. About ten of them are powered by direct generation. But the reality is, joe, this is a fragile system right now. It is dependent on a power grid that goes up, that goes down, that we need generators, that we need a constant maintenance and repair loop of those generators. We need to fuel them all the time. So, even though its working right now and even though weve gotten assets such as the uss comfort, which has, you know, space for about 1,000 patients thats going around the island, the truth of the matter is, were going to need resources in the long run to make sure that we can reestablish normalcy in our health care system. So, our petition right now is to congress for us to take action right now in immediate relief. Were estimating in the immediate relief effort, 4. 6 billion so that we can push forward, you know, what we lose in the economy and the immediate relief process. And of course, later on have a recovery package thats consistent with the damage here in puerto rico. And as you stated, this is a very big storm, it was a very big disaster. Two category 4 and 5 hurricanes passing in the span of two weeks in one jurisdiction. Wow. And essentially devastating the whole of puerto rico and its energy grid. So, it is we need a lot of work. A lot of effort has been going on. There has been great clar collaboration with the dod, with the federal government, with the state governments, but we need to do more and focus on the midrun and the longrun so we dont just put puerto rico back together again, we build it transform it better than ever. Nick. Governor, speaking of the long term, as you know, as we all know, puerto rico is laboring under a huge amount of public debt. The president has talked about wiping it out entirely. Is it time for congress as part of an aid package to ask the control board to forgive the islands debt in large part or in whole . Well, right now what were focusing on is on the immediate liquidity needs. Were working those with treasury so that we can meet those. And then whatever strategy is pushed forward in terms of the debt, you know, right now theres a lot of comments and opinions. We in puerto rico are currently in a Legal Process called title three. Its sort of a restructuring process. So, really, i cant comment on what should be done in that process because right now im in the middle of that proceding. All right, thank you so much, governor. Governor of puerto rico, ricardo rossello. Thank you so much. Up next, trying to put this into perspective. Well get insight from a man whos served in the last three republican administrations. Keep it right here on morning joe. You nervous . Hi, im the internet you knoarmless bowling. Lt . Ahhhhhhhh you know whats easy . Building your website with godaddy. Get your domain today and get a free trial of gocentral. Build a better website in under an hour. A Nations Technology will determine its power. In its economy, in medicine, in science and in national security. One company designs and builds more supercomputers than any other. An american company. Hewlett packard enterprise. Leading the way to discover. To innovate. And to protect. Hewlett packard enterprise. A National Asset in supercomputing. Looking for clear answers for your Retirement Plan . Start here. Or here. Even here. And definitely here. At fidelity, were available 24 7 to make Retirement Planning simpler. We let you know where you stand, so when it comes to your Retirement Plan, youll always be absolutely. Clear. Time to think of your future its your retirement. Know where you stand. With us right now, worked for the reagans and both for the bushs administration. Seeing trump through a glass darkly. When i see so many republicans defend mr. Trump regardless of his action actions invoking defenses that i am certain would enrage them if champions of a president Hillary Clinton had said the same things. I am convinced we are seeing a severe case. We need to emphasize a greater epistemological modesty on our side and a greater appreciation on our side. Pete, you are sure to right. I dont know how all the words mean. If we talk about all the tribes that we dont understand. The people that get me elected. V evangelicals. I have no idea how they can support donald trump right now. Absolutely no idea. Your column was fascinating, stop, listen, talk, try to understand. You are not guilty of the very thing that you are accusing trumps supporters being guilty of. Thats right, it is easier to write than to do. I tried to do that. The most painful thing in this election during the trumps presidency has been absolutely rock solid support that christians given to donald trump. I think hes doing great damage and they have been quite hypocrite cal in their support because of the same standard they use to be critical of bill clinton, because of their support for donald trump. With that said, i have heard them and their arguments are that President Trump would be better than Hillary Clinton on the merits and policy grounds and gorsuch as Supreme Court nominee and abortion and everything. I get that argue, what i dont get is the enthusiastic support form and the unwillingness to challenge him. Thats whats necessary to keep people in power and it is not happening in my estimation. Trying to run out people in my old church that actually steve dare to question whether donald trump was the right choice for president , which was what the Southern Baptist tried to do. How concerned are you by what some call a creeping authoritarian not so much in function but in form that infected the conservative movement. The almost out of parody level, the Vice President s chief of staff and members of congress, talk about that a little bit. Yeah, really does worry me a lot. I dont consider conservative anymore. These are not conservative tendency. There is a kind of authoritarian straight there. I am happy of the institute of america and the press of Law Enforcement withstood of President Trump pretty well. Within the conservative movement and the Republican Party, tlher is a malady and deeper than anticipated. It is a danger and it is something that i am not familiar with in all of my life as a conservati conservative, i think it needs to be confronted. The people who have stood for conservative for the last few years are a different view of it needs to have the energy and fight and the breitbart people have. It seems to me that all the energy is on their side and if we care about these things, you have to have the energy to fight for that and articulate a vision of the moral goods that lifts peoples hearts and capture their moral imagination. It is not easy but have to be done. Pete, i am concerned of the erosions of norms that this has been ushered in of the era of President Trump. How do we return back to respecting norms and laws and service to your fellow americans that does not paula ebben you are entitled to a private jet. All these norms that are not law but it is going to make it so easy for both sides of the political spectrum to say well, they did it so we cannot now. How do we ever return to any kind of respect for these norms . Yes, it is well put, i think the collapse of the norms and the shattering of guard rails is a real cost of the trumps presidency. Look, i think and i hope that sometimes viruses are on anybody. Sometimes it is stripping away of virtues and values and norms of what people took for grant it. When it is taken away, you begin to cherish them again. Maybe there is an analogy of nixon and watergate and after that, there is a surge of politicapli political ethics. The American People by and large are not happy of whats happening. By the time we are done with donald trump however how long hes in office, this country is exhausted by the experience. Theyre long and thirsting for Something Better and higher and deeper and it is up to politicians to give it to them. I could not agree more. Pete, thank you very much. On that note, it ends for us, Chris Jansing picks it up right now. Bob corker aims at President Trump saying he treats the office like a reality show it is fun to work right now he announced hes not running for the election. Mike pence dunks out of a