dominant variant in the u.s. the cdc is reporting it accounts now for almost three-quarters of new cases. a month ago i had never heard of omicron. the first detection here was september 1st. now here we are, 19 days later, it accounts for three out of four new cases. so with this new variant quickly taking hold, the white house says this biden speech is not going to be about locking the country down but rather about what to expect in these winter months, what steps we can all be taking now, and some dire warnings for the unvaxed in particular. will biden's new warnings resonate? remember, he campaigned on ending this pandemic. but nearly a year into his presidency, even with the miraculous vaccines, covid is still raging with a vengeance. we're hearing now some of his advisers are encouraging him to alter his messaging about ending the pandemic and instead steer public attention away from the total number of cases and focus on severity, how much more dangerous this virus is for the nonimunized. only 61% of the country is fully vaccinated at this moment, low in comparison to a lot of countries in europe like spain with 80% fully vaxed or denmark or ireland, also with more than three-quarters of their populations fully immunized. and only 18% in total have been boosted here so far, a number that sounds especially concerning with so many gathering for christmas as we speak. so could this potentially help president biden boost the booster effort? >> both the president and i are vaxed. did you get the booster? >> yes. >> i got it too. okay. so -- do >> don't, don't, don't. there's a very tiny group over there. >> not only donald trump reveal to his base yesterday that he was boosted, he quieted those in the crowd and pounced on him for it and tried to reverse their psychology on vaccines. >> take credit for it. take credit for it. what we've done is historic. don't let them take it away. don't take it away from ourselves. you play right into their hands when you're sort of, oh, the vaccine. >> interestingly, the fox corporation just tightened its vaccine rules, that includes fox news employees. as of next monday all working at fox in new york city will have to show proof of at least one dose of the covid shot, removing the option to get tested weekly instead, due to a strict new citywide mandate. new york city now asking for federal help to beat back omicron. dr. ashish jha, a great medical mind from brown university's school of public health, just wrote a column with some key perspective on what he thinks our way forward should be. he writes in "the atlantic," don't panic about omicron but don't be indifferent either. navigating the next wave will require charting a middle course between dismay and dismissal and our clear goals must be preventing deaths, preventing hospitals from having crushing caseloads and keeping schools and businesses open. who so you do we do that? we need more vaccinations, he says, a massive increase in the availability and use of rapid tests, a clear strategy for schools, and we can all make modest sacrifices in the coming weeks, like avoiding large holiday parties and other unmasked indoor gatherings. what says another pandemic preparedness md? joining me now is dr. zeke emanuel, a member of president biden's advisory board during the transition and former white house health policy adviser. dr. emanuel, thanks for coming back. do we yet know the omicron's severity of disease in comparison to prior strains? >> no. it's not clear whether it's less severe or more severe. but even if it's less sphevere,f it's less infectious, you'll have more people come down with serious illness and again have an increase in hospitalizations, an increase in icu use, and an increase in deaths. that's i think the big problem that we're facing. >> can we at least say it's having disparate impact on the vaccinated versus the unvaccinated? >> oh, yes. it definitely is worse for the unvaccinated. many times more likely to die from it. and it appears that the people who are vaccinated, who get a breakthrough infection, have mild symptoms. and that's good, but it's still worrisome. and it's spreading so rapidly with incubation times of two to four days, that you can see, as you pointed out, in three weeks, it's really exploded and come to dominate the country. >> so if president biden were to call you, and for all i know he has, and say, zeke, i need your advice again, as you provided during the transition, what do i tell the nation tomorrow? you would say what? >> there are four things that we can really do to fight this vaccine -- to fight this virus. number one are vaccinations. we have to get more of them. i do think we'll need more mandates. we've tried everything else. we've tried educating people. we've reduced the price to zero. we've tried incentives. we've made it readily available. we're going to need mandates. that's just -- we're not going to get past the 61 or 2 percent just by asking people. we've been stuck at that level for several months now. so we're definitely going to need to have more mandates. then we have testing. we have to flood the zone with tests. they are -- you know, that needs to be done. we need probably 2 to 3 billion tests a months, not hundreds of millions. billions of tests a month, if we want people in america to take, say, two tests a week before gatherings and other things. and then you have masking. we have to upgrade from sort of flimsy cotton masks to really serious k95, kn95 masks. wear them indoors. wear them outdoors if you're going to a crowded situation. then we have ventilation, which has not been well publicized here, getting hepa filters and making sure that the air is better and filtering out the virus particles. so those are the four things. and the fifth thing we're waiting on is, for the merck and pfizer drugs that really shorten the impact of getting an infection to be authorized by the fda. that should happen pretty soon. and then getting them out to people who are infected is going to be a very big and important task. >> should every american be provided with a rapid test? to be fair, what i'm about to show you is two weeks old, and this is moving at a fast clip, but this is white house press secretary jen psaki two weeks ago on that issue. roll it. >> why not just make them free and give them out and have them available everywhere? >> should we just send one to every american? >> maybe. >> then what happens if every american has one test? how much does that cost and then what happens after that? >> what's the answer to her question? should we just send one to every american, is that even practical? >> sending one is probably not adequate for omicron. you're going to have to send more. and the answer is yes, it's practical. not only has britain showed that you can do it, you call up the national health service and they will mail out to you tests. but colorado, new hampshire, have done similar things. i think the other alternative is just the federal government should buy them, drive the price as low as possible, get more tests authorized, and distribute them to pharmacies and grocery stores and doctors' offices, where for either nothing or a nominal amount, people can pick up tests. the situation now where you have to pay $25 for two tests and you can't find any because they're not available is unacceptable. i mean, we're asking people to test before holiday gatherings with their family. but if they can't get a test, what good is that advice? >> do you think that president biden has received that message? >> oh, yes. i'm sure they've received that message. i think that -- >> did you give them that message? >> that episode with jen psaki made it clear that her answer was not an acceptable answer for most americans. >> dr. emanuel, your prescription, your four steps, or five steps if we talk about the pill, sounds reasonable to me in philadelphia, sounded reasonable to me when i was in new york last week, i'm sure sounds reasonable in chicago. it's a big country where i hear from radio listeners every day who don't see people in masks. how do we reach the rest of the country? >> again, i think that one thing the government could do, and we recommended this a year ago, that we mail out good masks to people free of charge, to every household we send five masks, for example, n95 masks. that would be very, very useful. first of all, it would say, this is normalized, this is what people do. and the second, it would make it available so that there's no barrier, again, to them to get those kind of masks. >> stick with me for just a moment. i want to respond to some social media. my hunch is it will be more in your expertise than my own. what do we have, vaughn? put it up on the screen and let me just take a look. we have to learn to live with this virus and move on with life. we have vaccines and medications but we cannot shut down or lock down over this anymore, says emr. you would say what? >> i totally agree, we can't lock down, shut down. we'll have to learn to live with coronavirus. and part of living with it is taking precautions to reduce risk like wearing a mask going indoors, like improving the ventilation indoors, and like getting a vaccine. that's living with it. ignoring it is not living with it. that's just asking for trouble. >> right. you sound to me like this is a good thing, like dr. ashish jha from brown, in that there's a middle road somewhere in here that we should be traveling on. one more, if i've got time, for dr. emanuel. what do we have? yes, families need at-home, free, or inexpensive rapid tests that are bulk packs, no lines at clinics. that's one of the frustrating things. in new york city, to see people who are standing in line wrapped around a block, waiting for a test, you've made this very clear, you think americans need to get masks, need to get rapid tests, and that the government needs to be providing both. you can have the final word. >> i totally agree with you. i think that -- and i don't think it's an unreasonable request by people. you know, tens and hundreds of billions of dollars have been allocated to things like testing and getting the schools ready. and people should get it. that's the -- we've got to remove all the barriers and put the effort, the tools, to actually fight this pandemic in people's hands. we've done this, miraculously, with the vaccines. we have to do it with testing and masks. >> dr. emanuel, thank you as always. >> you're great, mike, thank you. we turn next to the "no" that has turned washington upside down. is joe manchin really a hard pass now on build back better? did the key democrat go back on his word to president biden, or did the white house push him, as he said, to, quote, unquote, wit's end? all kinds of accusations are flying around and there's a lot more high drama tonight. there's also a theory that the senator is actually doing biden a favor by torpedoing his agenda. we'll take that up with former republican congressman charlie dent. i use liberty mutual, they customize your car insurance, so you only pay for what you need. wooo, yeaa, woooooo and, by switching you could even save 665 dollars. hey tex, can someone else get a turn? yeah, hang on, i'm about to break my own record. yeah. only pay for what you need. ♪ liberty, liberty, liberty, liberty. ♪ feel stuck with student loan debt? move to sofi and feel what it's like to get your money right. ♪ ♪ move your student loan debt to sofi— you could save with low rates and no fees. earn a $1,000 bonus when you refi— and get your money right. ♪ we're carvana, the company who invented car vending machines and buying a car 100% online. now we've created a brand-new way for you to sell your car. whether it's a year old or a few years old. we wanna buy your car. so go to carvana and enter your license plate answer a few questions. and our techno wizardry calculates your car's value and gives you a real offer in seconds. when you're ready, we'll come to you, pay you on the spot and pick up your car, that's it. so ditch the old way of selling your car, and say hello to the new way at carvana. my hygienist cleans with a round head. so does my oral-b my hygienist personalizes my cleaning. so does my oral-b oral-b delivers the wow of a professional clean feel every day. joe manchin on radio back home in west virginia today defending his move to sink joe biden's build back better plan. >> i'm not blaming anybody. i knew where they were and i knew what they could and could not do. they just never realized it because they figured surely to god we can move one person, surely we can badger and beat one person up, surely we can get enough protesters to make that person uncomfortable enough, he'll say, okay, i'll vote for anything, just quit. guess what, i'm from west virginia. they think they can beat the crap out of someone and they'll be submissive. >> for democrats the operative question seems to be how to explain this to voters in their swing districts. and what this means for democrats in the midterms, given that the latest cnn poll shows covid and the economy far and away the top issues. did joe manchin just give them all a chance to shift their focus to what voters really want? my next guest knows what it's like to be a centrist out of step with his party these days. former congressman charlie dent joins me in and out of charlie, congressman, nice to see you again. you compared joe manchin to john mccain in an essay you just published at cnn.com and you said we ought to be pinning a medal on manchin's chest. how come? >> well, i think joe manchin has been very forthright and honest and open about where he stands. he's told everybody what his concerns and objections were. unfortunately many on the left chose not to hear them, they won't take no for an answer. he's been quite clear. and just like john mccain, he voted against the health care reform bill in 2017. he put his thumb down and that ended up killing it. but that bill was problematic. and, you know, john mccain i think, you know, it was a big moment for him, he showed some real guts and courage. i think that joe manchin is doing the same thing. he cannot be bullied. this is a man who knows what state he represents and he's listening to his constituents and he finds the size and scope of this bill is too much. and i think he's correct. and i think he's correct like the other ones you identified, michael, like inflation, the economy, covid, these are the issues that are front and center on the minds of many americans, particularly after $6 trillion has been spent on covid, and now we're talking about even more spending. >> you know that president biden said he had a commitment with senator manchin a couple of weeks ago. last week here with me, representative jayapal was my guest, we discussed that. here is what she said. >> most of build back better was prenegotiated, preconferenced with senator manchin and with the president. and i believe the president when he said he had a commit and that he had confidence that he would get the 50 votes needed in the senate. and i've spoken to the white house again recently. i believe that still to be true. >> charlie, so you've got the progressives who feel like they got snookered, right? in you've also got, among the democrats, moderates, i'm thinking of josh gottheimer, who voted for the house version of this bill and now is sort of exposed because in the end, they couldn't get it through the senate, so i'm sure he has to worry about drawing a republican opponent who says, hey, not even joe manchin would go along with what he was willing to support. talk to me about the dynamics of progressives and moderates within the democratic party. >> the moderates knew, i think they knew when they voted for the build back better version in the house, that it had almost no chance of passing the senate. you know, with the s.a.l.t. provisions, with the immigration provisions. they knew this bill was going to change substantially. i would argue that many house democrats were btu'd, that is they were forced to walk the plank for a bill that was not going to become law. that's a bad place to be. same thing happened to house republicans in 2017 on the obama repeal/replace legislation. i voted against it because it was bad policy but also i said that bill had no chance of becoming law ever through the senate, so why vote for it? same thing happened on the btu tax with bill clinton many years ago in the '90s when many democrats, again, walked the plank. if i'm a moderate, i'm upset. in fact i hear a lot of talk about people acting in good faith. well, the moderates in the house, gottheimer, they negotiated with the progressives on a budget resolution in august in exchange for a vote on the infrastructure bill, september 27th. well, the progressives and speaker pelosi reneged on that agreement, pushed it out to any of, then got the moderates to vote on build back better in order to vote on the infrastructure bill. i saw how they behaved, i think they did not operate in good faith towards the moderates and i would be very upset right now. and i just saw -- >> final question, if i may. >> sure. >> charlie, is this all just a negotiation? is this all just shtick and in the end they get together and pass something that's got a lot less of a price tag? quick answer from you. >> yes. they have to scale this thing down dramatically. maybe one of the major provisions. that would be it, as far as i'm concerned. they might be able to get away with that. but they all but called joe manchin a liar yesterday from the white house, that's not helping things. we'll see where this goes, but i think this is on life-support right now. >> thank you, charlie, as always. >> thank you, michael. build back better. the subject of tonight's survey question @smerconish.com. go to my website, vote yes or no. i'll give you the results at the end of this hour. more social media reaction that has come in thus far during the course of the program. they need to drop manchin from the democratic caucus. he is hurting biden and the democrats more than he is helping. michael wenning, you just heard charlie dent make the case that manchin is actually helping the democrats, that he didn't go this far, but if joe manchin didn't have -- that if joe biden didn't have joe manchin as a buffer, he would have to create him because it's actually man manchin, by this argued, that reins biden in by the most progressive elements of his party. one more if we have time for it. it's just another case of the democrats eating each other alive while the republicans sit by holding hands. sdm, yeah, it is like herding indicates. that's always been the case relative to the democratic caucus, whether it's the senate and the house, republicans much mormon owe e and the house, republicans much mormon me monolithic in their approach. when three retired generals say they're chilled to the bone about something. it gets your attention. it definitely got mine. these are three warriors who are definitely concerned about a repeat of january 6th and the possibility of a coup succeeding next time. they're warning our military must prepare now. and one of those generals, paul eaton, is here next. >> man: what's my safelite story? 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as in free? just like schwab. schwab! look forward to planning with schwab. the pentagon today tried to define a line that we have failed to mark as a society. where is the line between political passion and extremism? the top brass in the military issuing new rules which for the first time regulate troops' behavior on social media, down to the level of clicking "like" or using certain emojis. >> the physical liking is advocating, and advocating for extremist groups certainly, you know, groups that advocate violating the oath to the constitution, overthrow of the government, terrorist activities, liking is an advocation. that's laid out clear in the instruction. >> the change comes as more than 70 current or former members of the u.s. military face charges for storming the capitol on january 6th. but even as the pentagon updates its rules, a group of former generals say steps need to be taken to protect the chain of command in case another coup attempt takes place. that includes my next guest, retired major jean-pgeneral pau eaton. general, thank you for being here. first of all, what did you make of what admiral kirby said that now they'll be taking a look at who likes what in social media among military personnel? >> michael, first, thank you very much for having me on board. admiral kirby is a good man, and we have a lot of really good, competent men and women in the pentagon trying to figure this out. regulations and law lag behind technology. so we now, in the face of the abundant indicators and warning that we have a problem, we are going after the idea that social media can be a disruptive influence in the chain of command, in units. and we're beginning to get after it. there's plenty of work to be done. and there is this whole idea of, is it freedom of speech, is it freedom of association? and to your point earlier, where do you draw that line? and we'll figure it out. we've got the best and brightest in the pentagon to do that for us. >> your conditcern is a scenari where how one follows the chain of command depends on party affiliation. is that fantastical or is that a real issue? >> it's not fantastical. we've got a failure to imagine outcomes and failure to imagine what might precipitate outcomes. what we have to do is acknowledge that 39% of the republican party do not believe that president biden is the duly elected president of the united states. 17% in the same polling indicate that the use of violence to correct that outcome of the presidential election is okay. and you cannot have that level of negativity, of bad acting, in a major political party without infecting the rest of the united states. and sooner or later, we draw our men and women in the armed forces from society at large. you cannot avoid infecting some of our move impressionable young men and women. so that's ongoing. the pentagon sees it. they're working on it. >> 1% of us bear the burden of service, military service. i shouldn't say "us" because i've never worn the uniform of my country. but it's 1%, in round numbers. and yet among those charged for the events, storming the capitol on january 6th, we're looking at 10% who were either active duty or veterans. what accounts for that? >> again, i go back to the fact that a lot of americans, a lot of good americans, you and i know them, we've got friends, we may have family members, who believe in this whole stolen election. so we've got people who actually fervently believe that there was enough shenanigans in our electoral system based on the constant drumbeat that you get out of republican leadership, that we had a flawed election. no. the 2020 election was one of the best, one of the safest, one of the most well-monitored elections that we've ever had. but we still have some young men and women who have bought that stop the steal mantra that we get. so we've just got to -- we've just got to message better. we've got to fight the stop the steal messaging that is ongoing. and we can stop -- we can start it by stopping fox news on any military installation. that is -- that is anathema. the messaging tool these guys are using to get into the armed forces of the united states are guys like tucker carlson, sean hannity. these guys, these guys have got to be cut out of the information stream going into the men and women of the armed forces of the united states. >> my pitch is, people need to change the channel, whatever channel they're watching, you've got to mix it up and get out of your bubble, get out of your silo. general, thank you very much for being here, i really appreciate your insight. >> my pleasure, michael, thank you very much. from social media, what do we have? the guardrails held in 2020 but gop controlled legislatures are tearing them down and setting the stage for a successful coup next time. the republic was great while it lasted. i'm not ready to bury the idea of the republic, but i think you're correct in pointing out how close we came in 2020 and those guardrails needing to be reinforced. i've said over the last couple of months, watching the event unfold was that it was more organic and less planned than it turned out to be. we'll talk about that more in the next days as well. i'm going to lighten things up in the next segment by sharing an obituary. i promise it won't bum you out. you'll meet the author of the snarky and star-studded sendoff for a woman you probably never heard of but won't forget, and that's his mom. andy oren is here to tell us about the tribute that reads more like a celebrity roast, next. we envisioned at times that we would lose one of our facilities. breaking news. but we never envisioned even in a pandemic that we might lose them all. our engineers and operations team worked with cisco to do whatever's necessary and bring whatever tools we have to bring to tell the best story. between what's news and what's now, there's a bridge. cisco. the bridge to possible. your plain aspirin could be hurting your stomach. vazalore... is the first liquid-filled aspirin capsule clinically shown to cause fewer ulcers than plain aspirin. try new vazalore. aspirin made amazing! - [narrator] every three minutes, a child is born with a cleft condition. without surgery, some will die. those who do survive face extreme challenges. operation smile works to heal children born with cleft conditions. we need you. there are still millions in dire need of healing. go to operationsmile.org today and become a monthly supporter, or call. 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[echoing] get a quote today. ♪ we are farmers. bum-pa-dum, bum-bum-bum-bum ♪ ♪ i see trees of green ♪ ♪ red roses too ♪ ♪ i see them bloom for me and you ♪ (music) ♪ so i think to myself ♪ ♪ oh what a wonderful world ♪ earn about covid-19, the more questions we have. the biggest question now, what's next? what will covid bring in six months, a year? if you're feeling anxious about the future, you're not alone. calhope offers free covid-19 emotional support. call 833-317-4673, or live chat at calhope.org today. a stunning headline in "the new york post" caught my eye over the weekend. quote, son's brutal obit of his plus sized redneck mother goes viral. the idea that a son would trash his dead mom and go viral for it, you can imagine why i found that distressing. then i took time to read the actual obituary in "the fay fayetteville observer." it was nothing like what "the post" was describing. his mother was unapologetically a force. here is what he wrote. because she was my mother, the death of zaftig renee coren at the impossible old age of 84 is newsworthy to me and i treat it with the same respect and reverence she had for, well, nothing. a more disrespectful, trash-reading, talking and watching woman in north carolina, florida, or texas was not to be found. she played cards like a shark, bold and played cribbage like a pro, and laughed with the boys until the wee hours, long after the last pin dropped. she told me she came up with the name for sunoco. and i choose to believe this too. yes, renee lied a lot. she left me nothing but these lousy memories which i and my family of five brothers and my sister-in-laws, nephews, nieces, larry king's children who i guess i might be one of, the total strangers who all to a person loved and will cherish her forever. andy coren joins me now. andy, i love it. and my hunch is, she would have loved it, am i right? >> first of all, it's such an honor to be here, mr. king. and we've been waiting practically my whole life to meet my true father here in his time slot. so i hope you don't mind we brought a portable dna kit to make things official. >> yeah, i don't even have the suspenders. i may as well go there first. vaughn, put up the second of the passages that i want to read aloud. so you said this. covid couldn't kill renee, neither could pneumonia twice, infections, blood clots, bad feet, breast cancer twice, two mastectomies, two recessions, multiple bankruptsies, six kids, one cesarean, a few abortions in spring lake, north carolina, or an affair with larry king in the '60s. renee was preceded in death by her ex-boyfriend larry. what is the deal on larry king? >> listen, i'm here to find out. we've got time. this is your hour. let's get to the bottom of this. there are actually receipts in my family, which is a sprawling family, you know, five boys and a girl, and my mom ran around a lot in miami in the early '60s, late '50s and early '60s, and she ran around with, you know, with the bad boys, and guess what larry king was. he was kind of a, you know, a dirt bag. i think everybody knows his early days were not golden years. >> okay, in a good way. if there is such a thing. >> well -- well, maybe -- the story is he stole some money from my mom's parents and that that's -- >> oh, jesus. hang on a second. he's not here to defend himself. here's what your mom was great at. dyeing her red roots, weekly manicures, dirty jokes, pier fishing, rolling joints and buying dirty magazines. she said she read them for the articles but filthy free speech was really renee's thing, hers was a baudy, rowdy life lived large, broke, and out loud. i should tell people on her 85th birthday next spring, you're having a nondenominational memorial service. what's that going to look like? >> i hope it's gonzo, weird, loud, colorful, filled with pepsi and carbs and krispy kremes and we have a real celebration of what i've been calling the queen of the dirt bags because that's what my brothers and i kind of jokingly refer to each other as. but we have a lively memorial for a lively woman. it's the least we can do. in a place she truly was, which was b&b lanes in fayetteville. >> to go back where i started, mom would have loved the way that you've memorialized her, right? >> oh, my gosh. i mean, look, she was an atheist so she didn't believe in an afterlife so i can't comfort myself thinking of my mommy in some magical place, thinking and laughing about what's happening. but i can tell you that over the years of writing about her in various places, storytelling, plays, et cetera, she always took tremendous pride in being a source of inspiration for me, as any jewish mother would be. >> andy, we're going to send a film crew, may 10 of 2022, to watch all this happen, okay? >> oh, i think it's going to be really good material. i think it's going to be plenty gonzo. north carolina is rowdy and fayetteville is dirty, so it's a great combo. >> i'm laughing as i say sorry about your loss. thank you, andy. >> you know what, hey, smerconish, people needed a laugh and truly, i mean this, i'm so honored that my mommy could give people a moment to laugh in the face of death because she did for 84 years. >> that's a life well-lived. thank you, andy. >> thank you. >> i don't know what to say. are we doing social media? is there social media after that or am i just -- no. okay. good. the s.a.t. and act exams with facing their own test when it comes to the future. one of the nation's top universities says it won't require high school students to submit those test scores for the next few years. bob shaffer is an expert in the so-called testing optional movement and we'll look at what this movement means for the battle to end the standardized testing requirements with him, next. ♪ superpowers from a spider bite? i could use some help showing the world how liberty mutual customizes their car insurance so they only pay for what they need. 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ask your health care provider today about once-weekly ozempic®. oh, oh, oh, ozempic®! you may pay as little as $25 for a 3-month prescription. welcome news for some students aiming for an ivy league education. harvard university won't require s.a.t. or a.c.t. scores for entry through 2026. they first implemented the policy before the pandemic because students had a hard time accessing testing sites and still are and that's why other ivy leaguers like colombia and cornell are doing the same through 2024. it's unclear if the testing requirement will return but what is notable is the seat change in recent years. the university of chicago was the first top ten school to go test optional in 2018 prepan dem mi -- prepandemic. prepandemic 1,070 schools went test optional. that number jumped to over 1800 schools. the pandemic only expanded the movement more than 90% of school on the u.s. news and war report top 100 colleges and universities nationwide are no longer requiring the scores. so, should this be the new norm? and should we do away with the tests completely? bob shafer is the executive director of fair test, a testing reform organization. bob, welcome back. nice to see you. what would be the common denominator? how if i'm a university supposed to compare school districts? >> thanks, michael. the schools that have been test optional for years and boden was the first to go test optional 51 years ago know high school record grades are a better predictor of under graduate success than any test will be. you don't need test scores to make fair and accurate decisions and that's why there are over 1800 schools listed as test optional or test free on our website at fair tests.org. >> when you say optional, what does that really mean? is that a wink and a nod kind of thing like hey, you don't have to do it but the high achievers are still out there going to prep courses and taking it to give them an edge. >> quite the contrary. in the last year, nearly 600 college and university leaders signed a statement saying optional means optional. you will neither be advantaged nor disadvantaged in the admissions process by submitting test scores and i've been on a number of panels with admissions directors who talk about their numbers and that's what the data shows. you are not at an advantage when you submit test scores. what matters most is your high school record, the grades, the rigor of your curriculum, and leadership abilities, extra kir ribl d curricular activities that's more than filling in bubbles on a saturday morning. >> it was already headed in this direction but it appears the pandemic will be the death of the standardized test as we knew it. >> it certainly is true that test optional admissions is the new normal for the foreseeable future. a few schools will continue requiring the test. the u.s. service academies whose policies are made by congress, a couple conservative states where admission policies are determined by political appointees like georgia and florida are requiring the test and a number of small conservative religious colleges still have a testing requirement, but for the vast majority of students now in high school, there will be no requirement to take the a.c.t. or s.a.t. we're up well over 75% of all colleges and universities in the country do not require test scores for the next couple years. >> i am as a parent four time veteran of the process. now, i think, thankfully finished. i have lots of thoughts on this. next, the common app needs to go. too easy to apply to too many schools and if you require recommendations, there ought to be one that comes from a classmate. my two cents. bob shafer, thank you. >> thank you, michael. we'll be right back with more reaction to tonight's program and survey results. switching wireless carriers is easy with xfinity. just lean on our helpful switch squad to help you save with xfinity mobile. they can help break up with your current carrier for you and transfer your info to your new phone. giving you a fast and easy experience that can save you hundreds a year on your wireless bill. visit your nearest xfinity store and see how the switch squad can help you switch and save. get $200 off a new eligible 5g phone when you switch to xfinity mobile. talk with our helpful switch squad at your local xfinity store today. results of tonight's survey from my website at sm smerconish.com. do democrats continue to camouflage the real cause of the content behind this bill? 9,000 voted. 59% interestingly say no, they do not adpregree with senator mansion. 60-40, 59-41. more social media reaction. here is what we have. no one individual should have the power that mansion has right now, our two party system doesn't work anymore. michael, i guess i could respond and say joe mansion doesn't have the power, 51 senators do. i get your point, obviously, that one individual is holding it up but it kind of overlooks that we've got a body of 100 and 51 of them are saying no we don't want the largest expansion of the societals safety net since lbj. i mean, glass half empty, glass half full. think about it that way. one more, i think, i've got time for. people who aren't wearing masks isn't because they don't have masks, it's because they are being told not to wear them by republicans and fox news. yeah, i get your point, iowa to colorado. dr. zeke emanuel was here and frankly, i like what he said. he made some news when he as a former advisor to the president elect said the government auoug to be providing rapid testing kits to everybody and masks, an upgrade in the masks. whether people would use the kits and wear the masks, i get it. that's still an issue to be determined. thank you for watching. i'll be back here tomorrow night. "don lemon tonight" begins in a moment with laura coates sitting in. >> i love the survey. i was filling out mine. you didn't get to my question, smerconish. >> i would respond to your question at any time. so thank you very much. >> all right. 9:00 a.m. tomorrow, sirus xm. i'm calling in. >> i love it. please do. >> i'm the nasal voice one. thank you. this is "don lemon tonight." i'm laura coates in for don lemon. omicron is spreading so fast it's now the most dominant coronavirus varian

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