Derail your nomination. To the business of regulating political speech. Im going to go ahead and thank the senate now for what im sure will be a speedy confirmation process. This new paradigm has been bet attested. One of the oldest definitions of insanity is continuing to do the same thing over and over again. Continuing to do the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. A little dejavu. Thats shocking. Time to turn things around. Dejavu all over again. Guess whose back good to have you with us tonight, folks. Thanks for watching. There he is. Canadian senator ted cruz of texas. Now there seems to be a great deal of angst within the liberal Community Across america that were just giving this guy too much publicity. Were talking about him too much. Folks, i offer to you tonight, if youre a good lefty out there, we cant talk about this guy enough. Hes the gift that keeps on giving. He is americas biggest heckler from the stands. Which is perfect. And, of course, over the weekend, it was the love fest in iowa. The speech he gave on friday night. The media love fest is on. Did you know that he didnt even use a teleprompter . Did you know that he went back and forth across the stage for 20 minutes, without any notes to say what he was thinking . This is what is impressing the media. Its not solutionbased. Hes not that good. But he is a good strategist. You see, because he is going after the conviction crowd. Thats who he has to win over to keep this cruz machine rolling along. Heres ted cruzs base. First of all, lets start with the people that hate obama care. Well, hes got them down pretty good. How about those 144 members in congress that voted to default. Well, theyre all with ted cruz too. And then, of course, theres the basic tea Party Supporter out there. I think hes got rand paul beat. I think he, out of the box, if you had a choice, the tea partiers would take this guy. The conservative media, right wing talkers. They cant get enough of this guy. They want him because they love his conviction. They love the fact that he wont back down. That he cant stand obama. And, of course, obama haters a big part of this at the top. But then there is the religious right. You see, republicans love cruz so much, he was actually compared to jesus during a prayer in iowa on friday night. Lord, we also thank you for senator ted cruz here tonight. It just seems like that were lacking, especially on the conservative right, those leaders willing to take a stand and are willing to let the arrows come in the back of their head. And basically be crucified for their belief system. Arrows in the back of the head . Cruise filed . Who on the left is doing that . All were doing is talking about is policy, how screwed up they are. How he cares about profit and not people. Now, a short time later, cruz came out and said that the shutdown, which, of course, behind closed doors, hes taking credit for, you know, orchestrating. He says it elevated the national debate. Ill tell you what it did. It shook the hell out of a lot of people internationally about just who america is. And there is no doubt that the fringe celebrity of ted cruz, its on a roll, its on the rise. In iowa over the weekend, laying down the foundation for 2016, he did what all these guys have got to do. They have got to go hunting. The harvard snob joined steve king, congressman from iowa, for his annual pheasant hunt. On saturday the two got dressed up in their finest hunting gear and proceeded to hunt with a gaggle of reporters. Of course, they were following every move. What is this . I dont care if its a side by side, or an over and under. You dont hold the gun over your shoulder, okay . You hold it down and break it down. Thats just hunting etiquette for people around you so you dont shoot anybody. Thats just kind of how it is. But look at this entourage. Youve got walkers out there trying to get the birds up. Is that a hunt . No, thats just cornering the birds, is what it is. Its called harvest time. Its not really hunting. Not as i see it. And ive been doing it for 35 years. It looked more like a photo op than a pheasant hunt. Then something very unusual happened. The subject of dick cheneys hunting accident came up. Heres ted cruz, and congressman steve king. Early morning conversation. Over coffee. Making excuses for dick cheney shooting his friend in the face. According to them, it happens. Yeah, look, it happens. Its just part of it, and risk is a factor. Now, if cruz and king are really good friends, why in the world would they be talking about dick cheneys hunting accident . Ted cruz can go to iowa, pose for the cameras all he wants, with a shotgun, hold it wrong, pretend hes a regular guy, normal guy. But you know what, dont let him fool you. Hes not the normal dude that he wants you to believe he is. He doesnt care about average americans. And the fallacy in his whole push to win over the conviction crowd, anybody else who pays attention to this, knows that all along hes been going after president obama, and obama care. Not once has he stepped up and given a solution to the 50 million americans who dont have health care. Another thing that catches my attention is that over 10 of americas Largest Companies pay zero percent tax rate. I would like to know where the big target shooter stands on that. Does he think thats fair for average americans . That 10 percent of meramericas Largest Companies pay zero percent . Never answers those kinds of questions because the conservative media protects those folks. Cruz cares about protecting his big money corporate interests, and hes always at work. He wants those folks to put him in office. And you know what, as of late, there is no better example than his most recent stunt. Pay attention, folks. Ted cruz is blocking president obamas nominee for chairman of the federal communications commission. Now, the president has nominated ex tell com industry lobbyist tom wheeler. Good guy. Wants him to head up the fcc. Now, of course, there are five seats on the federal communications commission, and three of them are vacant. And, of course, theyre looking for some good democrats, because thats how it works when you have a democratic president. Wheeler is a democrat, and republicans are worried that he might, wait a minute, enforce provisions of the disclose act . Well, we cant have that. The disclose act is a failed bill that would require independent groups to disclose names of contributors who give more than 10,000 to independent groups for use and Political Campaigns. If those provisions are enforced, the secrecy behind Citizens United would be very much out in the open. The federal Elections Commission would have records of how much money super pacs and corporations spend on Political Campaigns. The bigmoney corporate interests, ooh, we dont want anything to do with this. Hell no. Democrats support the bill. Theyre in support of the bill. As a way to bring transparency to the political funding for republicans, this is all about keeping Citizens United alive, and, of course, the money in the dark, in the closet, nobody knows where its dom p coming from and well trash anybody we want. They want to keep the unlimited funds going to attack obama care. And wants them, of course, hidden out of the public eye. Cruz is blocking the fcc chairman. This is all about republicans controlling the airwaves in the message. And senator cruz wants tom wheeler to give guarantees that nothing is going to change. And he is a senator with a power that will block this guy, and, of course, were going to go into 2014 without the fcc, no deals are going to get approved. Ironically, its going hurt a lot of right wing companies, but, of course, ted cruz doesnt care. He is trying to prove that he is the man of conviction. And part of being the man of conviction is to stopping someone who might stand in the way of free speech, and we certainly cant have that. Now, he may be pheasant hunting down in iowa. And not doing it the correct way. But the fact of the matter is, youve got to give him credit. He is always working around the edges to make sure that his pace is going to be protected. Get your cell phones out, i want to know what you think. Tonights question. What does ted cruz care more about, money or people . Text a for money. Text b for people. To 67622. Leave a comment on our blog at ed. Msnbc. Com. Results coming up later on in the program. For more, let me bring in senator Bernie Sanders of vermont, who has been very critical of dart money advocating, of course, for workers all of the time. But also very concerned about communications in this country. Senator, why is ted cruz blocking the nomination of tom wheeler . How do you see this as part of his plan, and just gumming this all up . What does it mean . Ed, you know, what senator cruz is talking about is an issue of huge, huge consequence. At the end of the day, these guys have gotten Citizens United, and that means that the Koch Brothers and sheldon althsson and all of these guys can spend hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars on Political Campaigns without any disclosure. They want to go further. What they want to do is to make sure that individuals will be able to spend as much money as they want on campaigns, giving money to individuals, without any disclosure whatsoever. So ultimately, what they are about is creating a Campaign Finance system where billionaires can spend unlimited sums of money on campaigns and candidates electing the people they want. That is not, in my view, a democracy. That is called oligarchy where a nation is run by a handful of billionair billionaires. Now what senator cruz is here talking about, he is really outraged by the fact that the fcc is supporting a rule where it says that if you are putting ads on television in the 50 largest media markets in this country, that theyre going to put that information on their website, so that the American People will know who is, in fact, funding these ads. In my view, we should see that not only in the 50 largest markets, but all over this country. Not only on television, but on radio. But bottom line here, is what senator cruz and his friends want is a Campaign System where a few billionaires can spend unlimited sums of money without any disclosure at all. That is what they want. And we have got not only to defeat that. We need the alternative, which is overturning Citizens United, and which is moving forward toward public funding of elections. Senator, there is a domino effect to all of this. And i think the protection of the big three, medicare, medicaid and social security, plays right into this. Cruz wants to give these guys a super highway, a pathway to vilifying everything that we have when it comes to earned benefit programs. This, of course, is going to enam enamor him even further with the conviction crowd. And ill tell you, it really is a brilliant strategy, because nobody else who would think the chairman of the fcc would play right into somebodys Political Campaign . You but its very clear what cruz is doing. Are you concerned on the Budget Committee this is what youre going to be running into . Look, absolutely. These very same people who are making huge contributions. And were talking about hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars. These are exactly the same people that are leading the effort to cut social security, cut medicare, cut medicaid, to give huge tax breaks to the wealthiest people in this country. All of that stuff is related. That is the right wing extremist agenda. And campaign financing, the ability of billionaires to buy elections, is at the very top of their list. In terms of what they want to accomplish. Yeah. Senator, on the other hand, with cruz gaining in notoriety, popularity and with the fringe right, does it make the democrats job a little bit easier making the case to america about what are our priorities . Well, the answer is yes and no, ed. In one sense, obviously, he is such an extremist that once you talk about his agenda, it becomes easy to defeat him. But on the other, what he and others have managed to do is move the Democratic Party further to the right. You and i have talked about this a million times. You have a number democrats now talking about lets cut social security. The president of the United States is now talking about that. So its a mixed bag. Yes, he can be defeated. But on the other, he is helping to move the country to the right. We need a strong, progressive agenda, which talks about the america that we want, which is a very different one than senator cruz is talking about. Senator Bernie Sanders, good to have you with us tonight on the ed show. Appreciate your time so much. Thank you, sir. Thank you. Remember to answer tonights question there at the bottom of the screen. Share your thoughts with us on twitter. And give us a comment on twitter about what is the republican solution for health care . Has does anybody know it . I mean, do you know what theyre going to do with the uninsured in america . Where is their plan . They dont have one. All they have is negativity towards obama care and pinning all their hopes on this website that has some challenges. We want to know what you think. Coming up, bill clinton hits the campaign trail in virginia and hits republicans for putting ideology ahead of governing. And karl rove leads the glitch mob. Going after hhs secretary Kathleen Sebelius. Stay with us. Were right back. vo you are a business pro. Maestro of project management. Baron of the buildout. You need a permit. To be this awesome. And you. Rent from national. Because only national lets you choose any car in the aisle. And go. You can even take a fullsize or above, and still pay the midsize price. aaron purrrfect. vo meeeow, business pro. Meeeow. Go national. Go like a pro. Why would i take one pepcid® when i could take tums® throughout the day when my heartburn comes back . cause you only have to take one. [ male announcer ] dont be like the burns. Just one pepcid® complete works fast and lasts. [ male announcer ] dont be like the burns. I started parttime, now im a manager. N. My employer matches my charitable giving. Really. I get bonuses even working parttime. Where i work, over 400 people are promoted every day. Healthcare starting under 40 a month. I got education benefits. I work at walmart. Im a pharmacist. Sales associate. I manage produce. I work in logistics. Theres more to walmart than you think. Vo opportunity. Thats the real walmart. Help the gulf when we made recover and learn the gulf, bp from what happened so we could be a better, safer energy company. I can tell you safety is at the heart of everything we do. Weve added cuttingedge technology, like a new deepwater well cap and a stateoftheart monitoring center, where experts watch over all drilling activity twentyfourseven. And were sharing what weve learned, so we can all produce energy more safely. Our commitment has never been stronger. Time now for the trenders, social media, this is where you can find us, facebook, twitter and msnbc. Com. Leave a comment there. This is where you can find me on the radio, monday through friday, noon to 3 00 on channel 127, sirius xm. Ed show social media. Here are tonights top trenders, voted on by you. God bless america the number three trender. Big hit. Land that i love a former navy officer knocked it out of the park with his rendition of god bless america. God bless america my Home Sweet Home the number two trender. Clintons callout. When president george w. Bush, a republican, put that Medicare Part d drug program in, they had terrible problems with the computers. Must be an on button somewhere. Instead of bashing and screaming about how incompetent they were. Lets not lose our cool. Tried to help people understand the law and make it work. The former president blasts republican i had log. Putting people first, as opposed to some abstract philosophy. And todays top trender. Glitch mob. Millions of americans are visiting healthcare. Gov. Unfortunately, the site was only designed to handle six users at a time. Its very frustrating. It is certainly not what we wanted to be. When you become a parody on saturday night live, its awful hard to recover. I. T. , can we get someone from i. T. In here . Rightys target Kathleen Sebelius for healthcare. Govs poor health. The website was supposed to be the easy part. She has lost considerable credibility. Absolutely, she should resign. This is a woman that has to be fired. Youre fired. And at the end of the day, somebody has to be held responsible. And the secretary, who is in charge of this implementation, is that person. How we gonna fix it joining me tonight is congressman javier bess sarra of california. Congressman, good to have you with us tonight. I guess the witch hunt continues this week against the secretary. But, of course, you said last week that someone should be held accountable for these website issues. Should it be Kathleen Sebelius . El with, ed, i think we have a long ways to go before we can say it goes to the top. We certainly want to get the website fixed, but we shouldnt fix ate on the website and thats unfortunately what i think my republican colleagues have begun to do is fix ate on the website. We have to Work Together to make it work well. We want americans to get covered. The most important thing about the Affordable Care act isnt a website. Its that millions of americans will finally have an opportunity to get Quality Health care. And thats what we should really focus on. So absolutely, we should hold people accountable. But right now were trying to determine who should be accountable. Any time you take taxpayer money and taxpayers have paid for this, you should be held accountable. So those private contractors who took taxpayer money to do the work, those Health Personnel who are working on this for the different government agencies, we have to figure out who should be held accountable. And by the way, congress, supposed to d