Presidency. Lots happening inside the white house this afternoon. Nbcs Peter Alexander is there at the white house. Peter, what are you hearing at this hour . Krystal, good day to you. We hear from Senior Administration officials that president obama has not yet made up his mind whether or not to authorize air strikes inside syria. President obama will have a meeting about two hours from now. 4 50 p. M. Is the time on the schedule. Hell gather here at the white house with the secretary of state john kerry and his Vice President joe biden, where im told by officials here that the focus of the conversation will be on efforts to confront isis, on a formation of the iraqi government, and on the topic of gaza as well. Another piece of information making headlines today. On the topic of Bashar Al Assad and syria specifically, Administration Officials have made it very clear that they will not and have not coordinated with the assad regime. They have no intention to share intelligence with the regime there. Articulating once again that they do not still recognize Bashar Al Assad as a legitimate leader of that country. But at this point, it would appear that the administration is moving closer to air strikes in syria. Though again, we have to node that no decision has been formally made. Remember, it was a year ago this week that the president really appeared to be on the cusp of air strikes in syria, specifically in that case because of the chemical weapons that had been used, the u. S. Indicated, bit sooyrian regime. At the last minute, president obama insisted that would not happen. Krystal . Peter alexander at the white house. Thank you so much for that report. The president s speech today in front of the American Legion was no accident. Hes facing a legion of critics, you could say, on military and foreign affairs. Just over a third of americans at this point approve of the president s handling of iraq in a brand new poll. His critics continue to pile on him for having a strategy that they characterize as confusing. Politico today calling administrations Foreign Policy a, quote, blurry vision. But that attack line is getting some pushback, even from those who dont always agree with the president. No, hes not leading from behind there. Hes not leading from behind. Hes arming the kurds, something that of course republicans said they were for but now theyre not saying, thank you, mr. President , for doing what weve been asking you to do. Dont know exactly why. Oh, yeah. We aggressively worked to retake a dam from isis. Still all i heard this weekend was criticism of the commander in chief. Thats fine, i guess, if thats what you want to do, if that gets you off. Seriously . Were in the middle of a crisis and you want to talk about what happened in the rearview mirror. And leading us off at the table is blake zeff, politics editor for salon. Com. So lets start with mr. Scarboroughs rant there. Hes right. I think in a lot of ways, dont the opponents of the president lose credibility when they attack him and continue to criticize when hes doing the very things that they had previously instructed for him to do . Absolutely. You have so many members of the republican side of congress who are basically an antiobama team no matter what are he does. If it has his name on it, theyre against it. Then he starts to do things that are exactly what they were calling for, and theyre against it in this case. Whats going to be interesting here is youre going to test a lot of bedrock principles about u. S. Politics right now if we proceed with syria. Youve got a party that is almost always reflexively against whatever obama does. Thats the republicans. On the other hand, many of them are very hawkish. On the other hand, you then have democrats who, you know, dont actually want to be seen with the president very much right now because of his low popularity as we get into midterms. So they may be reluctant to get on board. You have a lot of interesting currents going on politically. In the president s first six years, he dealt with a lot of wars that we didnt want to be a part of. He was elected because he said, im going to get us out of afghanistan, im going to get us out of iraq. Folks have liked mostly him saying no more boots on the ground, were not going back into iraq the way we were before. With isis, we have something new, a potentially popular war for the president. Folks are going to debate tactics, you know, until we end this thing, but theres a lot of sense of, like, we want to take the fight to these guys. We understand theyre evil. Especially after the killing of james foley. People are like, lets go fight them. I think its important to distinguish between congress and then the American People. I think congress, you really are starting to see some bipartisanship. There are new reports that a lot of the republicans who were initially against this, when they saw james foley, they felt the threat is coming to the United States right now. So this feels a little different than the syria threat we had a year ago where there was no popularity. That being said, im going to push back a little bit because i think the American People remain very war weary. I think if you have some polls that show that people are for humanitarian aid or Something Like that, thats one thing. But once you get in there, its very we all know about mission creep. Its very hard to get out. I think a lot of American People are going to be very, very wary of our involvement each step of the way. Its very clear to americans why we have to deal with isis. Syria was like, well, what does this matter to the average american . I wonder what luke thinks about all this. With isis, its very clear why we have to stop them. Yeah, but i also say to you, toure, there might be some support for these types of limited air strikes, i dont think the United States has any appetite for another ground scale invasion like we saw in afghanistan or iraq. Talking about congress, blake, i want to pose to you a question. Seems that this issue is obviously getting some traction. We do know that the economy will be the number one issue heading into the midterms. Thats where america has been since the economic collapse of 2008. However, youre starting to see some on right play this up into this culture of incompetence they say present ed in the obam white house. Theyre trying to attach members to that incompetence. Look at this ad against senator udhall in new mexico, saying hes attaching himself to president obamas Foreign Policy, which is not seriously taking on isis when hes on vacation. I feel this diplomatic path that were on right now is a good one. Im giving myself to you and the American People should have no patience for whatevers going through your head because youve got a job to do. Do you think this could be an effective issue in the 2014 midterms, or is the gop trying to score points in the summer . Its the latter. I did a lot of campaigns in my youth, if you will. In my rowdy young days. Four years ago. Yes. And in my experience, if you want to be specific, if youre doing an ad like that, you are either very desperate in a campaign or you dont know what youre doing or possibly both. In this case, i think that the candidate doing that ad is down by 16 or 17 points in a blue state. I dont think that ad is going to be particularly effective at all. I think attack on obama for golfing, president s play golf. I dont golf myself. I dont love the sport. I think its a little bit of a silly ad and argument. Is there a way to message the lowering of expectations on Foreign Policy . I mean, the Obama Administration has basically been stepping away from various conflicts around the world, saying were going to pick our shots, involve ourselves when we can have positive effects. The flip side is sometimes bad things will happen around the world that the u. S. Government wont do anything about because the u. S. Government is not in a good position to do anything about them. Its similar to what president bush said when he came in. Is there a way to then people get mad when something goes wrong and its , well, if were not going to try to run the world, were not going to run world. Is there a way to message that balance and convince people to be okay with the idea that sometimes something bad happens, but its better than trying to make it better . Thats a great question. Its particularly relevant now. What were dealing with in syria is no good option. On one hand, youre dealing with isis. Thats a huge problem. On the other hand, you have assad, which is another huge problem. You get involved going after isis. Then assad wants to be your friend and theres all sorts of problems. I think there are certain times where you need to explain to the American People that, you know, sometimes its okay not to go after every enemy. The problem, i think, to get back to toures original point, when you start to have american lives at stake, it does get to be harder from a messaging point of view. I think americans see that. They get justifiably concerned by that. So far its one american life. You compare it to thousands of combat deaths in iraq and afghanistan and hundreds of thousands of deaths over there. Its, you know, when its all bad options, you have to come to terms with the fact youre going to settle on a bad option. We seem to feel as americans, part of being america is we can control the world and the things we want to happen should happen. But i think this idea of american exceptionalism is really sort of been relaxed a little in recent years. I think a lot of americans, to get back to what i was saying before, we are a war weary nation. We just got done with one crisis. Then were into another, into another. We dont invite every crisis that comes our way. Thats for sure. But we have some free will to decide what were going to get involved in, what were not going to get involved in. Its very right for the United States to say in certain cases this. What i heard from the president in his speech today was trying to say, were going to think things through fully before we do anything. He didnt say this part, but maybe unlike the past president s who have contributed to the current situation. Blake, thank you so much as always. Thanks. Up next, a former navy s. E. A. L. Commander weighs in on escalating military ops in syria and iraq and why the u. S. Needs to adopt a fight club mentality. Right now, cheers in the streets at word of a mideast ceasefire. But will this one last actually . The cycle rollins on for tuesday, august 26th. Great rates for great rides. Geico motorcycle, see how much you could save. Dont wait for awesome. Totinos pizza rolls. Gets you there in just 60 seconds. Tigers, both of you. Tigers . Dont be modest. I see how youve been investing. Setting long term goals. Diversifying. Dip you got our attention. We did . Of course. Youre type e well, i have been researching retirement strategies. Well thats what type e s do. Welcome home. Taking control of your retirement . E trade gives you the tools and resources to get it right. Are you type e . [music] jackies heart attack didnt come with a warning. Today her doctor has her on a bayer aspirin regimen to help reduce the risk of another one. If youve had a heart attack be sure to talk to your doctor before you begin an aspirin regimen. Were back with breaking news. These are live pictures from inside gaza after israel and hamas have agreed to a longterm ceasefire. The deal was reached following seven weeks of fighting that kill more than 2200 people, mostly palestinians. Under the agreement, which takes effect immediately, israel will ease its belolockade of gaza to allow humanitarian aid to enter. As the u. S. Launches surveillance migs over syria, theyre also likely looking for any sign of three americans being held hostage by isis. That includes american Steven Sotloff and two young Italian Women kidnapped last month while delivers medical supplies. An American Fighting alongside isis was killed over the weekend in syria by opposition forces. Nearly every town under isis control has a prison with its main complex believed to be in raqqa, located in northern syria. Isis is reportedly holding as many as 1,000 syrians as well. And with so many hostages still in isis hands, the pentagon is being criticized for speaking publicly about last months botched rescue attempt. Form eer navy s. E. A. L. Dan osh is an expert on kidnapping and ransom situations. Hes now the vp for kidnap and ransom at ground technologies. He says the real jv team is the president s advisers, not isis. Welcome to the show, dan. A man well versed in kidnapping and hostage situations. Dan, you had some pretty forceful language, essentially saying it was wrong of the pentagon to talk about their attempt to free mr. Foley back prior that any attempt to do this is showing our hand too early. Absolutely. Theres absolutely no tactical, operational, or Strategic Value by admitting to the world that we sent troops in to syria to even launch a hostage rescue attempt. I really am still at a loss for words why we felt compelled to reveal that. Now you have focused Media Attention, more information coming out that reveals tactics, techniques, procedures about how we execute these missions. More importantly, there are hostages still being held. If were going to launch another mission as the clock is ticking on journalists lives as we know, the enemy is going to be well tuned. Theyre going to be up on heightened sense of concern. So we just made any Hostage Rescue Mission that much more unlikely because the stakes have been raised so much by exposing it by having an official press conference. What the administration said is that there had been leaks to the press that the story was already going to be printed, so thats why they decided to go public with it. What do you say to that . Thats not an argument. Bottom line. When i was in iraq in over ten years of service, there were multiple operations we never publicly acknowledge, even though the news came out with headline stories on classified missions that were being conducted by special operations. For years we rely on a thing called plausible deniability. You dont need to acknowledge it just because its coming out in the New York Times. It just focuses more attention on it, and now youve taken one card out of the playbook that we can now not say that we havent had boots on the ground in syria. So that weakens our hand in the future. One thing weve been searing here is the u. S. And u. K. Have a policy of not paying ransoms for hostages. Is there anything the u. S. Can do to discourage that and create a more unified line against ransoms . Well, listen, its a very tough policy to stand by. I dealt with hundreds of cases, Many American cases where with all the capability of the planet in iraq at the time, there was very few missions where we had a successful hostage rescue. If you want your people back, generally you have to pay a ransom. But for the u. S. , they get in the same game as the european governments. Its a path down to hell for us. Its a hard policy, but its the right policy. It actually protects american citizens. Because of the europeans that have paid so much ransoms, theyve put a target on everyone traveling with a german, french, and italian passport. We havent done that until now. Theres pressure to do that. But the u. S. Has to stick by the policy that its had for decades. There should be no change in policy. Even releasing prisoners for bergdahl was a dangerous precedent and i believe stepped up the game, why isis thought to even raise it to the next level by putting airing james foleys execution. Its a card game here, and right now isis is winning. In terms of hostage negotiation policy, how do we talk to folks who we dont trust, who we consider terrorists, but who we need to talk to to try to get our folks rescued . How do we even deal with that sort of group . Well, you cant really deal with them directly. No one calls up the u. S. Embassy or government and says, hey, i have an american held hostage. Theres back door intermediaries. There are ways to resolve hostage scenario cases that dont involve publicly admitting you played in the game. Thats how unfortunately, this is a very dark business that needs to stay in the shadows, much like special Operations Missions. They need to stay in the shadows. Im all about having the press conference after the fact when the hostage is rescued. But the reality is negotiations need to be done in the back door channels and shouldnt be spread out in the news media. It just complicates the situation on many, many levels. And i want to go back to that point you brought up about plausible deniability, dan, because i find that fascinating. Do you think this administration has been too weak to succumb to outside media pressure and has felt that theyve lost control of the narrative since they exposed their hand too much . And how do you play through that as somebody whos on the ground, that idea of plausible deniability. Expound on that for our audience. Well, listen, im not a Strategic Communication adviser for the president. I think the folks that are doing that job are doing wrong job. Whoever advised him to do the press conference and then go out on the golf course within the hour, that was terrible. In fact, theres been more criticism. Even the New York Times on the president s response to the video than actually criticism on isis itself. So theyre winning that strategic battle, that perception battle. And again, getting back to the plausible deniability issue, special Operations Missions and classified planning goes on all the time. You dont need to acknowledge it. Yeah, in this world, social media and twitter, stuff gets revealed very quickly, but you dont need to go be part of it. We dont need to add to the cycle of that information. So you know, special operations cannot operate with the glare of the focus on them. They need to be able to operate in the shadows when the enemy doesnt expect us to be coming. Now with all this added attention, any Hostage Rescue Mission that was maybe in planning to rescue the current hostages likely its been squashed because the enemy knows the game. Theyre actually going to raise the stakes because they know this video had such an impacten us that the president had a press conference and the secretary of defense and the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff. Listen, this is what fuels terrorism. The Media Attention on this, it fuels terrorism. Guess what . It encourages more of it. Were likely to see this story continue to be played out in the coming days and weeks. What happened to james foley may not be the worst card these guys play because they saw how successful it was. Thats very scary to hear. Dan oshea, thank you so much for coming on the program. Up next, Michael Brown has been laid to rest, but the unrest over his death remains. New protests on the streets today. So where does ferguson and the country go from here . And later, a bit of comic relief. Long lost lovers reunited. Of course where . The emmys. If i can impart one lesson to a new business owner, it would be one thing ive learned is my philosophy is real simple American Express open forum is an online community, that helps our members connect and share ideas to make Smart Business decisions. If you mess up, fess up. Be your partners best partner. We built it for our members, but its open for everyone. Theres not one way to do something. No details too small. American express open forum. This is what membership is. This is what membership does. The summer that summers from here on will be compared to. So get out there, and get the best price guaranteed. Find it for less and well match it and give you 50 toward your next trip. Expedia. Find yours. You got a Little Something on the back of your shoe there. A price tag danger price tag alert oh. Hey, guys. Price tag alert is this normal . Well, progressive is a price tag free zone. We let you tell us what you want to pay, and we help you find options to fit your budget. Where are they taking him . I dont know. This seems excessive decontamination in progress. I dont want to tell you guys your job, but. Policies without the price tags. Now, thats progressive. In just a few hours, ferguson, missouri, was to hold the citys First Council meeting since the shooting death of Michael Brown two weeks ago. But citing safety concerns, that meeting has been postponed indefinitely. The city says theyre looking for a larger venue to accommodate the rush of people wanting to attend the meeting. Protesters still made their voices heard this afternoon, marching from city hall to the u. S. Attorneys office in downtown st. Louis. Another group plans to march through ferguson tonight. They say to spread a message of peace while not taking any sides. Wi the focus is now shifting away from the violence on the streets to the investigation itself. For all the latest, lets head to st. Louis. Alex, thanks for being with us. Thanks for having me. I wanted to get your take on this piece of polling data that has been floating around thats been irking me. Pew did a poll asking the question, how do blacks and whites feel about how they get along with one another . Majority said that they feel like they get along pretty well, which is great and encouraging. But thats been used by some to say, oh, so theres nothing to see here. Theres no problem. And i find that question very misleading and very missing of the point of what ferguson is actually about. Because you can get along pretty well and still have a structural problem that benefits one side over the other. And you can still have tensions that dont relate to whether or not you can get along with the white people on the other side of town. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, ive spent a lot of time talking to both white and black residents of ferguson. And the overwhelming message that i hear from the white residents is that they really had no idea that there were tensions. I went down to the farmers market. Of course, thats what everyone was talking about there, a predominantly white crowd, not surprisingly. Everyone said they were kind of shocked by this incident, that they didnt recognize the ferguson on their tv as the ferguson they live in. We choose to selfsegregate ourselves often. We live around people of our similar race and demographics. We hang out with people of similar race and demographics. So when Something Like this is forced into your consciousness, it totally can shock and surprise you. And that same poll found that 80 of whites have confidence in the police, confidence in the police investigation, whereas only 37 of africanamericans did. So a huge divide there. And i think that a legacy of the shooting of Michael Brown and these two weeks of violence is going to be to wake up a lot of these people. Well see if that turns into any kind of action or any change. But right now, its definitely something that both white and black are talking about. Alex, youve been writing about the cancellation of the city council meeting. Ive struck by this. They cite security concerns for the cancellation. Before they canceled it, theyve been planning to have metal detectors for the audience at the meeting. Instead of having the meeting, theyre going to send out comment cards to people in the town so they can send in their written comments. Basically, you have a legislative body that is literally afraid of violence if it faces its public. The way youve ended up with this divide is you have this majority blackto town. In municipal elections, you have almost no black turnout. What are you seeing about this on ground there . Is there a sense among the black residents of ferguson that theyre about to get involved in municipal politics and were going to see a change in which the city council is composed . Theres definitely a lot of talk about that. Theres organizing. Theres Voter Registration going on. There was a rally in st. Louis on sunday. Maxine waters said, if you dont register to vote, theres something wrong with you. Thats definitely the direction a lot of the sort of leadership is pushing people in. I dont really from the youth that are out on the streets see that being a satisfactory alternative for them. They want something to happen right now. Theyre not going to wait until november and then an election and maybe the election wont go their way. Itll be interesting to see if that actually changes. But yeah, you have a majority blacktown with a majority white representation. I think the confidence has just been completely lost in the Police Department and the mayor, which have been sidelined in this entire incident. One point on the security around the city council shooting. In 2008 in the south side of st. Louis, a city called kirkwood, there was a city council shooting there where a black man somewhat similar situation. He killed six people on the city council. So that memory is still fresh in peoples minds. Theyre very aware of the possibility for violence. Theres another movement, alex, around those parts. One that is supportive of darren wilson. About 60 or 70 folks met in a st. Louis bar on sunday to share their sentiments. They had a press conference afterward where they chanted, i am darren wilson. Have you seen much of those folks . Yeah, i was down there at that bar in the parking lot. They have a completely different response, completely different mood, as you can imagine. They think officer wilson did exactly what he was supposed to do. That he was provoked, that he was defending himself. A lot of these people are Law Enforcement themselves or relatives of Law Enforcement. They sort of see the attention and the por trarl of wilson as an attack on Law Enforcement in general and theyre closing ranks around, you know, the Police Department and Law Enforcement. Interesting about this, the organizers of this effort, which has raised almost 400,000 to support officer wilson, theyre not revealing their names. This woman is organizing this and not telling reporters what her name is. When i ask people for their own name, just people standing with signs, they would only give their name as officer wilson. Theyre afraid of retribution. But its an interesting thing. If youre going to get involved in political action, you sort of need to put your name behind your action, i think. As this moves on, the eyes of the world will eventually not be focused on ferguson. And the grand jury investigation, we understand, could possibly take all the way to the middle of october. How does that sit with the residents, and what do you think the plan will be on ground for action moving forward when the media frenzy is complete . Yeah, this is going to be a major potential flash point to watch when the grand jury comes out with a decision of either an indictment or nonindictment. People on the ground are already talking about it. Theres been a lot of organizing around getting the prosecutor, robert mcculloch, to recuse himself. He has family ties to Law Enforcement. His father was a Police Officer who was killed by a black man in the line of duty. And he said that he got into being a prosecutor because he couldnt be a Police Officer himself. So no matter what happens, theres already a lot of distrust with the prosecutor. And if the grand jury comes down with a nonindictment, they decide to let officer wilson walk, i think people are going to pour out in the streets again, or at least theres the potential to, and things could get potentially very disturbed again. Alex, thank you so much, as always. And cycling right now, new aftershocks in California Wine country this morning. The largest since that big 6. 0magnitude quake hit over the weekend. Cost to wineries in napa are expected to top 1 billion. The industry was already dealing with a weaker than usual crop due to that record drought. It remains to be seen whether those losses will translate into a higher price for that glass of pinot. No losses on wall street today. A half hour left of trading, and a half hour left of the cycle. The Little Things that you do for me [ male announcer ] the Little Things we do. Can make a big difference. Every time you use dawn, youre using a brand that supports Wildlife Rescue efforts. Experts trust dawn. Because its tough on grease yet gentle. You by my side makes the Little Things so good be a part of the bigger picture. And your kindness makes the Little Things that you do for me go to facebook. Com dawnsaveswildlife. Wouldnt it be great if hiring plumbers, shopping online is as easy as it gets. Carpenters and even piano tuners were just as simple . Thanks to angies list, now it is. Start shopping online from a list of toprated providers. Visit angieslist. Com today. So factors like diet can negatively impact good bacteria . Even if youre healthy and active. Phillips Digestive Health support is a duoprobiotic found in two parts of your digestive tract. Im doubly impressed phillips Digestive Health. A daily probiotic. Television, its always been the booty call friend of entertainment. Tv is always up. Shell happily entertain you while you cook, dinner or wrap your christmas presents. Shes not like that highmaintenance diva movies who expects you to put on pants, drive all the way over to her house, and buy 40 worth of soda. Yes, tv is like that friends who needs your companionship so badly hes willing to do anything to keep you watching. That was on full display last night at the emmys. Miss, youre a lesbian. Are you watching orange is the new black . I do, but im not a lesbian. Just put your name on imdb and ill back you up. Call yourself a creative consultant [ muted ]. Dont make me say that. Tim wattly. That was me. Yeah, he was on seinfeld. The big winners last night were modern family, tied for most trophies ever won by a series, and of course breaking bad, which dominated the night, the way walter white used to dominate the meth trade. I miss you, walt. Im happy that breaking bad went out with a big night. Because breaking bald is, of course, one of the greatest Television Shows in the history of television. Walt was this intellectual mcgooifr. I loved seeing him move into this drug lord. This was about a normal guy becoming an antihero. This was about a drug war, a modern family, and a morality play all wrapped in one. Modern family. I love it as part of a broader trend. Breaking bad dominated for good reason, but its about a trend of people being terrible. We saw house of cards, madmen, game of thrones, all of these shows is about fundm t fundmently bad people you used to have to go to the movies to see. Even colbert report. On the other hand, you have the last gasp of broadcast tv in the form of modern family, a show about how everybody is so lovely and nice. At least all my friends have been complaining about how either louis or veep was robbed in that comedy category. I like modern family. I think its better than veep. It keeps it going. On that point in terms of americas fascination with shows that have darker story lines, one show that i feel should have raked up a lot more was true detective. True detective was fabulous. Matthew mcconaughey, woody harrellson. Best story line of any new show. Its right up there with hbo. I would put it maybe 1a and 1b. The fact true detective only won one award is absurd. It should have been in the mini series category. But to give breaking bad all those awards and shut out true detective, what were they thinking . Matthew mcconaughey, woody harrellson, you guys got hosed. I cannot wait for season two. Toure, youll probably have a cameo on true detective season two. Im not interested in that cameo. I think they were thinking breaking bad did it incredibly well for multiple seasons, went out on a high. True detective dipped their toes in. They just hit it off like an annoying fly. Give them some credit. Not just one. At least three. I wasnt going to weigh in on breaking bad, by i just cant get through this segment without saying i just dont get what all the fuss is about. It gave me nightmares. It was a negative impact in my life. I watched two seasons because people kept telling me if i just kept going, i would like it. I know most of america disagrees with me. Since you spent so much time talking about it t i had to say something. But the one part of the emmys i did actually watch was probably the worst part of the emmys, which is where they called Sophia Vergara on stage just to place her on a rotating pedestal, to keep silent, and rotate her while the president of the academy talked. This was not a high point, i would say, for women. Didnt object ifify her at all though, luke. I totally agree with you on that because i know my mom is watching. Good call, luke. But i will say, theres nothing worse than these award shows when you hear from the oltd white guy babble on for 15 minutes about nothing. So theres a way to spice it up. Lets do it in a nonsexist manner. Be a little more creative next time. I think it was in on its own joke. Sophia vergara, in fact, has tremendous comic timing. Even though i find the show a little too upbeat for my taste, she okay, tremendous comic timing. They could have done Something Else perhaps more amusing. She does that. The whole thing about shes playing this woman from Central America who still does not understand american ways. I found that insensitive. Before we leave last nights emmys, a little bit of a Steve Friedman indulgence. He happens to run this show. While his wife beverly was absolutely killing him in their oneonone emmy pool, about 40 minutes into the show his mood did change for the better when this happened. The yoplay commercial featured their grandson shane. This is the first time theyve seen it. When your friends and family do a commercial, you never know when you will see it. But there he was. Shane has been doing this sort of thing for the last seven or eight years. While he is a veteran of commercials, seeing him is always special for the people he calls papa and nami. While breaking bad and modern family were the big winners last night, all eyes in the friedman household were on this yoplay commercial. Onomy, to quality, todays chevrolet has it all. And its a good time to see for yourself. This labor day, check out great lease offers on chevys awardwinning, fuel efficient lineup. Just announced, get additional 500 bonus to lease this 2014 chevy malibu lt for around 189 per month. Find new roads at your local chevy dealer. Thlook what i got. P. Oh my froot loops [sniffs] lets do this . Get up get up get up get up loop me bring back the awesome. Yeah yeah yeah with the great taste of Kelloggs Froot loops. Follow your nose trouble makers. Dreamer of dreamers. We are the yao chinese singing oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Been all fun and games, here at the harrison household. But one dark, stormy evening. She needed a good meal and a good family. So we gave her purina cat chow complete. Its great because it has the four cornerstones of nutrition. Everything a cat needs for the first step to a healthy, happy life. Purina cat chow complete. Share your rescue story and join us in building better lives. One rescue at a time. Relish. The sweet pleasure of delivered straight to your face in accomodation paradise. Booking. Com booking. Yeah frotheres no reasonn average 17 we cant manufacture in shuthe United States. Here at timbuk2, we make more than 70,000 custom bags a year, right here in san francisco. We knew we needed to grow internationally, we also knew that it was much more complicated to deal with. I cant imagine having executed what weve executed without having citi side by side with us. Their global expertise was critical to our International Expansion into asia, into europe and into canada. So today, a customer can walk into our store in singapore, will design a custom bag and that customer will have that American Made bag within a few days in singapore. Citi has helped us expand our manufacturing facility; the company has doubled in size since 2007. If it can be done here in san francisco, it can be done anywhere in america. Cycling right now, yes, folks, this actually happened. A United Airlines plane grounded over a seat dispute. It happened sunday on a night from newark to denver. The 737 was forced to divert to chicago when a passenger tried to stop a woman in front of him from reclining. He apparently did so using the knee defender, a device that attached to the tray table and locks the seat in place. As you might imagine, the woman was not too happy about that and she let him know about it rather loudly. You know who else wasnt happy . The pilot, who kicked them both off the flight. Why would you ever buy a knee defender . Thats so mean. Its very jerky. You can find just about anything on the internet these days, including that knee defender that were not endorsing the use of. Not at all. Im not anyway. You can also know all the emmy winners without having actually watched the emmys. You can get the latest on isis with a single search. You can catch the bullet points from the president s speech today without watching it by watching people live tweet it. In fact, ask google virtually anything, and boom, you have an answer. But is all this access to info helping us or hurting us. Ian leslie argues its making us lazier at a time when rewards of intellectual curiosity has never been higher. You say curiosity has never been more important but its in decline. Why . Hi. Yeah, i mean, we ought to be in the greatest age of curiosity ever known. The internet gives us access to the worlds information. At the click of a button, we can get our smartphone out, find out virtually anything. But when the answers are too easy to get, you forget how to ask questions. Because its so easy, thats making us a little bit lazy. We prefer to get a quick answer, just read the top line of a google search, than actually investigate, learn, and go off on a journey of intellectual exploration. While i think the internet has the potential to be the greatest tool for curiosity, for learning ever, i think the danger is that a lot of us are a little too lazy to exploit it. Were also, of course, just getting diverted by all the incredible entertainment out there. Were not necessarily finding out more about the world than we should be doing. But ian, how lazy are we as consumers . Because i would say this has a lot to do with the fact that Technology Makes us have scatter brain. In a sense, we really cant concentrate on a single article because theres a million Different Things blinking on the screen or were trying to scroll through it because our email button is going off. Theres a tv in the background or whatnot. Whenever theres something i really want to take a closer look at that i want to disseminate properly, like a josh barrow article, i print it out and find my brain able to comprehend it so much better and soak it up so much better. I still get a hard copy of the Washington Post every morning for that purpose. How much of this is because of the technology wiring our brains to act this way . Oh, i think a lot of it has to do with that. The internet, the Technology Makes everything easy, right . Thats the whole point of technology. It makes things easy. But the brain responds really well to difficulty. When we find this is proven by psychologists, by scientists. When we find things difficult to learn, when we have to make an effort, then actually we learn a lot better. So the new information goes in and it stays in. When we learn something very quickly with no effort, we tend to forget it quite quickly, right. So even if we learn something from the internet and its involved no effort whatsoever, like a lot of lot of the stuff, wikipedia page, youre probably not learning much at all. The second point to your point, its full of shiny objects and great post on red sdit, well known, if there was one thing you could tell somebody 100 years ago, one thing you could tell them about the future, that would really blow their minds, what would it be . The most clicked answer was, well, we invented a device that gives us access to the entire of the worlds information at the click of a button. For getting into arguments and looking at cats. One thing ive learned the whole way luke russert is a very old soul. Lets talk about children and curiosity. Anyone who has been around small kids, they are asking those explanatory questions, why is the sky blue and television turn on the way it does. What goes on in the refrigerator. And some parents have the patience to answer the questions and some have less than patience. Whats the difference between those who grew up in the environments that encourage that curiosity and those that say, please, enough with your questions . Yeah, i mean, between the ages of 3 and 5, they calculate children ask the average child asks 40,000 questions that begin how or why, right . Explanatory questions, 40,000. 100 questions. So, as any parent knows, it request get very wearing, why, why . And i totally understand the urge to say, you know, just leave it. And however, its really interesting, when you look at studies between the kids who grow up into curious kids that ask a lot of questions and engage and kids that dont so much, theres one difference in the way they were raised. Its not that the parents in the less curious, less curious were giving less answers, they were asking fewer questions back right . If you want to raise a curious question. Dont just answer it, answer as many as you can but also ask questions back. You say, i dont know why that is. But you tell me, why do you think that is . Just to come back to the internet, this is the problem with google, google never says, i dont know, what do you think . It gives us an answer and shuts the conversation down. Very Good Parenting tips there. Thank you so much. Up next, one of my favorite topics Corporate Tax incentives and scott walker hook. Happy National Dog Day from the canines of the cycle. [ male announcer ] its one of the most Amazing Things we build and it doesnt even fly. We build it in classrooms and exhibit halls, mentoring tomorrows innovators. We build it raising roofs, preserving habitats and serving americas veterans. Every day, thousands of boeing volunteers help make their communities the best they can be. Building Something Better for all of us. We are the solis family. And this is our chex commercial. Theres lots of choices. 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Theres something a bit odd going in wisconsin right now and it involves wisconsin Governor Scott walker. Governor walker is up for reelection in november and this had something of a ethical cloud hanging over them due to local allegations that he was involved in a quote criminal scheme to coordinate Campaign Fund raising. Heres the deal, back in january after a Party Line Vote of the Wisconsin Economic Development board, wisconsin based ashlee furniture was awarded a 6 million tax credit. Governor walker serves on chair of the board. It is the largest that ashley has ever received and given as an enterprise zone tax credit, one of the most highly coveted tax breaks. What has led even one of the Board Members who supported this deal to call it very unusual, was the fact that ashley was given this big juicy tax break not to create jobs but with an agreement that they could cut as much as half of their wisconsin workforce. In a memo that was obtained by the wisconsin state journal, they agreed to keep 70 of the workforce and 50 in 2016 to 2018. I guess after that they can either close up shoop all together or threaten to do so unless they are granted a new and even more exorbitant ransom from taxpayers. These corporate handouts are incredibly common place, they usually come with a big promise of job creation. One estimate suggests that corporate welfare costs state and local governments 80 billion per year and very little of that is a good deal for taxpayers. Survey of all Available Research concluded that after decades of policy experimentation and literally hundreds of scholarly studies, none of the claims of Development Incentives is clearly substantiated. Theres a good chance all of these claims are false. In other words, were spending billions to line corporate pockets and getting nothing in return. I guess at least we can credit Ashley Furniture for being a bit more honest about their intention to cut not create jobs. Theres no transparency around these programs. According to the pugh center, almost four states in the country actually compile comprehensive data to see whether or not the corporate welfare programs work. Yet all states have some sort of Economic Development program. So what gives . This era of budget cuts and aus teri, how have they survived . Mr. Walker may provide clues here. Two weeks after they agreed to give the 6 million to Ashley Furniture, walker got his own little subsidy, his came in the form of 20,000 in Campaign Contributions from ashley executives and their spouses. A spokeswoman for walker said political contributions are in no way tied to tax incentives provided by the Wisconsin Economic Development corporation. Nothing to see here, people, just sadly business as usual. Budget cuts and austerity for the masses, and if you follow my logic here, what really is galling is 20,000 gets you 6 million. That does it for the cycle. Now with alex wagner starts right now. President obama says that rooting out a cancer like isis will be easy or quick but will it bring u. S. Military into syria. It is tuesday, august 26th and this is now qult. Well continue to direct action where needed. Growing concern over isis militants. The u. S. Military is flying surveillance flights over northern syria. Authorized the flights for the purpose of selectsing potential targets for possible u. S. Air strikes against isis. The president preparing the American People for a longterm commitment. Rooting a cancer like isil wont be easy or quick. This is a serious threat from a Serious Group of terrorists. Its very important to push back aggressively. Not going