keep repeating. too often we've seen a political culture of some officers who believe they are above the law, they can do whatever they want to do, that's wrong. whether someone wearing a blue uniform or blue jeans, everyone must be under the law, and all must respect that. thanks for watching. i'm al sharpton, hardball starts right now. a kinder, gentler gop? let's play hardball. good evening, i'm steve kor kornacki in for chris matthews. senator rand paul talked about poverty during his speech to the national urban league this morning. >> the poverty problem it's not new, and it's not going away easily, black unemployment still twice, white unemployment. i don't accuse the president of not caring, i think he does care, that's why we have to talk about policies, it's just about caring, there are people in both parties who care, we have to come up with a policy that does better. >> he's certainly not alone. the washington post reporting today, the last time republicans began running for president, there was a race to be the most confrontational, the most unbending. mitt romney said he was severely conservative, he got caught mocking the 47%. perry called the federal reserve treasonous. what a difference a disastrous election. two years and terrible polling make. 2012 was a contest to be the toughe toughest. it's likely to include a competition to appear the most compassionate. jeb bush talked about the need for compassion. dealing with the unaccompanied children at the border. marco rubio talked about single parents. and paul ryan unveiled an anti-poverty plan that maybe surprisingly didn't call for gutting anti-poverty programs. the plan would consolidate funds for those programs at the federal level and give grants to states. low income individuals would work with case managers to design programs to get them out of poverty. ryan talked about the need for judges to have more discretion and sentencing nonviolent offenders. >> the problem is, chuck, our safety net isn't working the way it ought to be, we have all these government programs with all these rules and regulations that are stove pipes. that don't make a lot of sense. if the status quo would be working, i would be supporting it, it's not. >> is this the return of compassionate conservatism, or is it an elaborate bait and switch as many progressives suspect. robert costa is a national political reporter for the washington post. i'll start with flattering you. i admit we are the reason we talk about the 47% right now. you guys put that tape behind the 2012 election, are you in their heads? is it right now republicans looking ahead to 2016 and saying, i don't want to be the guy caught on tape saying anything like that? >> i don't think anyone wants to be caught on tape like that ever again. i'm not buying this as a trend story. >> i think overall the tea party base is going to be the main force driving the gop nomination, in 2016, they're not looking for kinder, gentler poverty programs. they started breaking this stuff down. rand paul and paul ryan both come from this libertarian perspective, where they've been critical of social programs, and believe there's a libertarian way of dealing this, a way that hasn't worked in real life, and they haven't put their real policies behind that. paul ryan came out yesterday talking about caseworkers for everybody who's in the social safety net. well, you know what, if you did that, you would have to spend $30 billion. and so this is the arthur of the austerity budget. >> that's just to pay the caseworkers. paul ryan pushes congress and his republican comrades to expand government. >> what is it -- >> yeah, but what is the appetite? you say compassionate conservatism, you think back to the 1990s, to republicans who lost a bill, who cares more about the middle class, who cares more about health care like that. that's where george w. bush and compassion and conservatism came from. is there a disconnect where the paul ryans see this and see the general election, but the base isn't there? >> i think the base ahead of the midterm elections is certainly not there. they're not clamoring for some kind of poverty agenda on the republican side. even when you have ryan out there, and marco rubio and rand paul giving these speeches in urban airs. rah are they on the minimum wage. they're not talking about indexing minimum wage on inflation. when it comes to policy, they know they can only go so far with this conservative base. >> they want to repeal obama care, which is giving insurance to 20 more americans, most of them on the low end of the scale. they're not doing anything on immigration. marco rubio is running from immigration. it's a limited, we're not talking bobby kennedy here, it's a limited way of trying to change their -- >> that's one of the differences too. republicans killed health care reform -- we're going to do something better with george w. bush. paul ryan cuts food stamps by $137 billion. he doesn't cut food stamps at all. chuck todd asked him about that this morning. >> your poverty plan numberswise conflicts with your budget plan. you call for some cuts and cernanty pov irt programs. you're not calling for that here, you're calling for the expansion of the earned income tax credit. which proposal is the one -- does this mean you would change your budget proposal to reflect your new poverty plan? >> i didn't want to get into a debate over the funding levels of the status quo. we could keep doing that over and over again, i want to talk about how to reform the status quo. this program could occur under any funding level. >> he was talking about this a minute ago, i mean, this is a departure from the paul ryan we know who is sort of -- nothing is more important to him than budget deficits, austerity, bringing down the budget deficit as quickly as possible. >> paul ryan is a complicated spokesman, giving these upbeat speeches about giving an agenda. he was on the romney ticket, on that 47% campaign. is he the perfect spokesman for this new movement? i'm not so sure. ryan told it to chuck todd. he's not attacking his poverty recommendations to his own budget. he knows house republicans don't want to back him. >> the numbers don't add up. he was trying to cut food stamps, now he's talking about, not changing laws, but changing the way the program works. to do a lot of the things he says needs to be done on the poverty programs would cost more money, not less. >> it is messaging, he wants -- he obviouslien watts toen sad out somewhat different from the tea party republicans, while still having this hawkish budget reputation. at some point the rubber hits the road, he's caught between the two. >> where did this appetite in the republican party for being budget hawks, come from. the sort of appetite for austerity. it occurred to me it as a response. the tea party came up in response to barack obama, that's true. but it also came up in response to george w. bush. he grew the government too much, the deficit got out of control, we as republicans need to purify ourselves. you're basically telling the tea party, that's right, that's the reason you exist. >> i was the athe capitol today. they told me that it was not just about having some kind of contract with the austerity message. they see elizabeth warren on the left. and they're scared, not really ahead of 2014, but ahead of 2016, can they combat that populous rise on the left. can they have some kind of response? >> jeb bush said unaccompanied children coming across the border over the last several months should be sent home. the former governor emphasized the need for dealing with them compassionately. there is a reason and a need for compassion. these children are trying to escape horrific danger in their countries, but the ease with which so many of them are entering our country is a crisis. the tone was is somewhat different from congressman mo brooks of alabama. >> this president has caused the problem by enticing children into america by waiving in front of them the prospect of amnesty. this president has promised them all sorts of free goddys like free clothes, food, health care, transportation, entertainment. until that stops, you can't anticipate people won't try to break into america because america is going to be their sugar daddy. >> david, it seems that's the problem, from the standpoint of a republican who wants to bring compassion back, what mo brooks did there is so easy, and it speaks right to the base. what jeb bush has to do is couch everything. >> nothing concentrates the mind like a hanging. in politics, nothing concentrates the mind like a presidential primary. all this prepositioning that's going on right now, jeb bush trying to look tough but sound compassionate, all that stuff is going to get filtered and vetted and really ground down when you get to the presidential primary. if he tries to be compassionate about immigration, ted cruz or somebody else running. >> we saw that with rick perry? >> we'll make these either or issues, you won't be able to strat el the line. paul ryan will not be able to strat el the line between someone who wants to improve resources and someone who wants to cut the budget. all this stuff is going to push to one side. >> we're seeing -- is this what we are seeing here, the republican establishment is waking up thinking ahead to 2016 and saying, i don't want our nominee dragged to the right on that. it's going to come back to haunt us in the fall. like it did with romney, maybe even worse. >> you asked the great question, who is paul ryan speaking to when he speaks about move ert? i think they're speaking to the political class, the republican financial establishment, the people who fund presidential campaigns, they want to hear a new message on poverty and income inequality, not necessarily the conservative base. ahead of the race, as they position themselves, this appeals to those kind of donors who want to hear a fresh message. >> if the base is in revolt, all the money in the world -- >> it won't matter, eventually they will have to play to the base, and the base doesn't move, it doesn't change, theyen cat grow the base as we like to say in politics. >> it could be a populous type candidat candidate. >> someone's going to take that. >> he's getting off the message -- >> there's always a chance in the republican side, no one ever really grabs for it. >> thank you. david korn. coming up no border crossing needed. there are strong feelings on both sides of this issue, we'll hear from them in a moment. impeachment fever, 57% of republicans say it's time to kick the president out of office. the only thing they're missing is a reason. too bad, but i don't like this guy, it's probably not an impeachable offense. a new survey finds that the majority of americans no longer see health care as extremely important issues. could that be because president obama's policies have achieved improvement in all three areas? 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>> it's illegal immigration is what we're seeing here, parents, family members in the united states paying smugglers to bring their kids here, that's what it is. this is not a refugee flow, it's a regular immigration flow. >> the most striking thing about these kids crossing the border, they are turning themselves in right away. >> they know they're going to be allowed to stay. the government gives them a paper and delivers them free of charge to their relatives. this would be the government taking over the smuggling process. instead of the smugglers getting them to the rio grande, the federal government would take over the whole smuggling process straight from honduras to the front doorstep. >> kevin, you respond to what you just heard. >> that's a little silly. the plan will take the smugglers out of the process. if you go to the source and give these kids their chance to express their fear, and bring them to the u.s., you can take them to other countries. you take away that market from the smugglers, they won't have kids to take up to the north. it's an innovative idea. in vietnam it was done successfully, it was done in cuba. it's a humanitarian way to do it. >> what about the ones that get turned down. >> they're going to do it anyway. >> this will have no effect on the flow of the people coming into the united states. the ones that were turned down will just come anyway. they'll be entered into the system, they'll be appealing for ever and also stay here. >> the children who are here right now, we're talking about potentially putting a pilot program in place that would take place over a two-year period. it does raise the question of what happens with them. >> i think we should honor the law that's in place, the domestic law, the house unanimously voted for in 2009 and we should honor their due process, we can do it within the system. we have to resource the system, court cases take years for the kids to get to the court. not all of them will get to stay. 40% at most will get to stay and the others are going to be sent back. at least we honor the law and international obligations by doing that. the president made clear there were a few cases where refugee status would be granted by the u.s. >> under u.s. law, we admit a certain number of refugees all around the world, based on fairly narrow criteria. and typically refugee status is not granted just based on economic need or because a family lives in a bad neighborhood or poverty, it's typically defined fairly narrowly, we have a state, for example, that was targeting a political activist, and they need to get out of the country for fear of prosecution, or even death. >> in the united states, in order to be considered a refugee legally, the person must demonstrate that they were persecuted or fear persecution due to race, nationality or membership in a political social group. some experts say it's that last category, social groups might apply here. they say potentially, the children could count as a social group. other experts disagree. so mark, that gets to the idea here that this is fairly stringent. i guess we can talk about the interpretation. fairly stringent criteria, a lot of these kids won't qualify. why wouldn't you think they would be sent home when they go through the process. >> two thirds of the supposedly unaccompanied minors have been okayed right away. and more of them will be okay later. the majority of them who are coming illegally across the border are already getting political asylum, which is the same type of thing as a refugee status. this is not a narrowly defined stringent program, the final category you describe, membership in a particular social group is one of these loopholes that judges have used and lawyers have used to define expansively almost anybody they want. i'll tell you right now, and i'm willing to take a lunch bet right now, if they do this a very large, shockingly large share of the people applying for refugee status, if they do it in honduras, if they get it will be brought to the united states. >> it's a slippery slope here? >> i don't have a problem with someone getting refugee status if they make the law. >> 58% of these kids have an international protection claim. they should get due process. >> i guess part of the question is. we were talking in terms of a lot of people won't qualify this, you were thinking. what is your sense of who would and who wouldn't qualify. plagued with began violence or something. how do you come up with what the definition is for who applies for asylum. this is a refugee? >> detroit would want to escape gang violence. >> that's a slur against detroit. if a failed government cannot protect their citizens, they have a right to international protection, that's what's going on here. they are failed governments in both honduras and el salvador, theyen cat protect these kids. they can't be protected, that's where the international law comes in and protects these kids. as i said, not all of them are going to get it. they may be eligible for other forms of relief as well, under the special juvenile immigrant visa as well. all we're saying is, they should be able to articulate their fear and present their case. some of them might not meet it. >> there's outlines of a proposaler we'll see if the government puts this together in the future. up next, you may have seen that poll showing darth vader leading some presidential candidates. last night he got a pretty big endorsement. kid: hey dad, who was that man? 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good question. because a cut-rate price could mean cut-rate protection. you should listen to this guy. with allstate you get great protection, a great price, plus an agent! and safe drivers can save up to 45%. call now and see how much you can save. just a few more ways, allstate is changing car insurance for good. call an allstate agent and get a quote now. i'm milissa rehberger, here's what's happening. the 18-day conflict has left more than 820 palestinians and 38 people in israel dead. a third child has died in philadelphia after two carjackers lost control of a vehicle and plowed into a mother and her children on a straight corner. a waging wildfire has burned about 300 homes. back to hardball. welcome back to hardball. whether it's benghazi or his birth certificate, we'll see the right call for any reason for the president's impeachment, say he's usurping power the constitution does not authorize. a new cnn orc poll announced this morning reveals a lot about american attitudes toward impeachment. finding a wide majority of americans do not believe president obama should be impeached. that is unless they're republicans. 65% of two thirds of all americans, do not feel that president obama should be impeached. 33% think he should. if you look inside the numbers, you'll see how they skew along party lines. take a look at this breakdown, a majority of republicans favor impeaching the president, 57% of them. compared with only 13% of democrats. joining me now is jonathan capar. jonathan, that number, two thirds of the people say they don't want this to happen. the public says no, the republican party says yes, the public shuts down. do you think they would go forward with this? >> what's been happening since last summer is, you've had republican members of congress actively and publicly saying they would want to impeach the president. the one thing they would always follow that up with is because the democrats control the senate, we probably wouldn't be able to convict. my contention is, if the republicans take the senate in the midterm elections, there will be such pressure on speaker boehner to bring up articles of impeachment. >> they wouldn't have the two thirds needed to convict? >> right, impeachment is a two step process, you only need a simple majority of the members of the house to impeach. you need then to go to the senate where you need two thirds of the senate or 67 votes to convict. for a lot of these people who want to impeach the president, the first step is enough. they don't need a conviction, they're so desperate to put an asterisk next to the name of the president to successfully impeach the guy, no matter what the articles of impeachment are, that's good enough for them. the psychological barrier of democrats controlling the senate is what's keeping it at bay. >> this raises a number of questions for me, but one of them is this? what would they impeach him on? >> i don't see anything the president's done that's worthy of impeachment. to bring the president up on impeachment, it's happened three times. andrew johnson was impeached by congress, acquitted by the senate in 1868. he resigned before he could be impeached and president bill clinton was impeached by congress in 1998-'99 but acquitted as well by the senate. >> what do you hear from republicans? you don't believe this. plenty of people are saying it, what do you hear in terms of why they would want to do this? >> i don't hear anything with any gravity or specificity, because again for somebody -- for a president to be impeached, the president would have to commit treason or some heinous crime. some terrible crime that's worthy of impeachment, the president hasn't done that. certainly not to my knowledge, and not to the knowledge of the people with whom i talk. there's no sense of will for it, especially when you talk to speaker john boehner or others in the leadership positions in the house. certainly not today, there's no will to impeach the president. but sadly, over the last couple decades, given the strong partisanship and the divide in the country that exists, this idea, this notion of impeaching our president, when bill clinton was president, republicans gave him a hard time, he was impeached acquitted by the senate. in 2005, president bush had articles brought up against him. in 2006 -- >> the push against bush was quickly shut down. to the extent there was a push, it was quickly shut down by nancy pelosi. >> dennis kucinich and others brought articles against him. >> back in 2006 on the subject, nancy pelosi was unequivocal on her position to impeach when the subject was raised. i've said it before and i will say it again, impeachment is off the table. she shut it down right there. has john boehner shut it down with that same bainer? >> john boehner shut it down. their voices are saying -- >> speaker boehner answered a question from luke russert. he said, i disagree. that's not unequivocal. and again -- >> he's scared of the base. >> and he's been scared since 2010 when they came to washington. this is a guy that's many times done things that people view as something to throw a bone to the tea party base. and then he ends up being devoured by that same base. that's why i'm of this belief that the lawsuit that speaker boehner has now, suing the president is going to eventually lead to the impeachment of the president -- >> they don't get their way in the lawsuit. >> exactly. >> that's the question. i hear what you're saying here, this is a huge political mistake for republicans. what happens, sort of to jonathan's point here, they keep speaking out. impeach, impeach, impeach, impeach. let's say they do well in the midterms this year, they build their majority in the house. these tea party voices screaming impeachment now say see, the country wants it too. >> it's a huge mistake if anyone pushes to impeach the president in an election year. it's a huge distraction and there's going to be backlash, just as there was when bill clinton was impeached. the same thing becomes true if you look at the 2016 presidential election. why would republicans want to embark on a witch hunt to impeach the president without any reasonable charges. >> i know, but it's the same question of why would you want to shut the government down. >> exactly, it was a huge mistake with the debt ceiling fight in 2011. it was a big mistake to shut down the government on the fool's errand that they would overturn the affordable care act and it didn't happen. i firmly believe they will once again go down this road of doing something that makes absolutely no political sense to the rest of us but for some reason makes sense to the tea party base of the republican party. >> joe has a level headed approach. it's clear john boehner doesn't want to go down this road. but it feels like he's going to reach a point where he feels he has to, and he's going to -- this one i think he's going to hold at bay as long as he can. thank you. up next, people aren't as worried these days about the economy, the deficit, about health care as they were a few years ago. could that be because president obama's policies actually help on all three fronts. vital nutrients as you age? 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[ female announcer ] everyone has a moment when tomorrow becomes real. transamerica. transform tomorrow. we are back, three years ago, americans told pollsters they were concerned with the economy, the deficit and health care. cnn opinion research poll from 2011 found majorities viewed those three issues as extremely important, and now, well, not so much, according to the latest cnn poll, none of those three issues is any longer considered extremely important by a mablg or the of americans. what's changed? could it be that president obama's policies are actually working and people no longer see the mess as important because things have gotten better? the metrics on all three are pretty clear. why hasn't president obama received more credit? i'll start with you, on the question of the economy, i could see, this has been a slow and unusually slow recovery, this has not been one of those robust -- you know, the next thing you know, we're all back on the recovery. the deficit con the be clearer. this is the president who extended the social safety net of health care. >> if you're going to wait for republicans to give him credit, you're waiting for a long time. if the economy's going well, then the president doesn't get as much heat as he or she will when the economy is not doing well, there's a little question as much as president obama's policies have been working they've had a positive effect. people on the left say, if he had to have done more spending, the economy would be even more robust. there are others who say, he didn't go far enough in cutting the deficit. >> do you think he should be out there -- you don't want to take a victory lap or anything out there. we're out there -- it's in the right direction. i don't hear anyone talking about the deficit at all any more. should he be out there saying, you guys wanted this addressed and we addressed it. >> deficit halls are the core of the tea party, the core of supply side conservatives and it's something that notices. notice that? they will notice when government spending is spending money, but when government is not spending money you don't notice it unless you happen to be on the end of folks' benefits run out or whose food subsidies are not enough. then you're going to feel it. they don't have a big enough voice in our society. >> beth, is there a longer-term thing? president obama is probably not going to be running for anything ever again. in 2016, his legacy is something that's going to be on the ballot no matter who the democratic nominee is. are democrats looking at this, saying this is the seeds of something a few years from now is going to sprout into something electorally? >> absolutely. steve, everybody has to get through 2014, of course, and the thinking is that republicans will do very well, but it's not because of issues. it's because of the specific races and because in the midterms, almost every presidential second term, the president's party does not do very well, so in this case, the republicans do have a very good chance of getting a lot of new senate seats, potentially taking the senate, but we don't feel like it's a big wave election that we did in 2010 when people were very upset about the stimulus spending, very upset about the financial bailout and upset about obamacare which hadn't come into effect yet but had been very much poisoned in the world of public opinion by republicans. this time doesn't feel like that. i think it's because for the very reasons you say, there aren't any big compelling issues out there to motivate people one way or the other. so republicans at this point are just kind of playing trench warfare, hoping they can drag their candidates over the finish line in november 2014 because a more republican contingent of voters is going to come out. that older, whiter base that tends to vote republican rather than the younger, browner group that is the president's coalition. >> right. the presidential versus the midterm -- here's why americans might no longer be as concerned about the economy, deficit, and health care. since president obama came to office, we have seen the number of jobs lost taper off over time to a steady increase in job gains. in fact, recovery has now made back all of the jobs that were lost during the recession. what about the deficit? issue of deep concern to tea party activists. the deficit has actually been cut more than in half. from $1.4 trillion in 2009 to $649 billion in 2014. we now 13 million people have signed up for health coverage including medicaid under obamacare. the deficit jumps out at me, too. take a step back here and look at history, you remember ronald reagan getting punished early in his presidency because the testify sit deficits were exploding. 1982 midterms. by 1984, he won 49 states, the deficit had gotten much worse. because the economy was strong, people sort of stopped caring. i remember -- right, i remember president clinton in the '90s, too, i always wondered did he really get credit for reducing the deficits or just for the economy being strong? >> al gore should have given him more credit, been willing to run with him in 2000, he probably would have won. like jims carville says, what part of the years didn't you like, the peace or the prosperity? you know, when we don't have a prosperity, then we really notice it. i think right now, the economy is starting to recover. happy days aren't here again, but they aren't as sad as they were four, five years ago. so we're seeing a lot of apathy, ironically. this is an off-year election which is really important right now, is what issues do fire people up? well, they're base issues. on the left and the right. if voter i.d. becomes a big issue now, you would see more black voters turning out like you did in 2012 or immigration may yet turn out a lot of hispanic voters. >> thank you, clarence page, beth fouhy, appreciate it. when we return, let me finish with the long game for president obama and the democrats. you're watching "hardball." the place for politics. aud prot. if there are unauthorized purchases on your discover card, you're never held responsible. you are saying "frog protection"? fraud. fro-g. frau-d. i think we're on the same page. at discover, we treat you like you'd treat you. fraud protection. get it at discover.com and cialis for daily use helps you be ready anytime the moment is right. cialis is also the only daily ed tablet approved to treat symptoms of bph, like needing to go frequently. tell your doctor about all your medical conditions and medicines, and ask if your heart is healthy enough for sex. do not take cialis if you take nitrates for chest pain, as it may cause an unsafe drop in blood pressure. do not drink alcohol in excess. side effects may include headache, upset stomach, delayed backache or muscle ache. to avoid long term injury, get medical help right away for an erection lasting more than four hours. if you have any sudden decrease or loss in hearing or vision, or any allergic reactions like rash, hives, swelling of the lips, tongue or throat, or difficulty breathing or swallowing, stop taking cialis and get medical help right away. ask your doctor about cialis for daily use and a free 30-tablet trial. let me finish tonight with the long game for democrats. we just talked about some of the very big areas where the current president and his party can claim real successes. the deficit is down. the affordable care act is working. mostly. the economy is finally showing some real signs of life. we also talked about that always looming possibility of republican overreach. if the right's absolute determination to fight and oppose president obama on everything will ultimately lead republicans down the politically suicidal path of impeachment. so there are reasons for democrats to feel optimistic that they'll get a payoff for the ballot box for all of this, but remember, president obama's approval rating is still in the low 40s. that's not a good place to be heading into the fall's midterm elections. the playing field is stacked against democrats this year. their magic number is 17, the number of seats they need to gain if they're going to win back control of the this fall, if they're going to start moving on an agenda of their own again and not responding to the tea party's agenda. it's almost unheard of for a president's party to gain any seats in a midterm election. just think back to 1998 when republicans were trying to impeach bill clinton and the country revolted in that year's midterm elections. it was a huge, stunning victory for democrats. it was one so shocking that it forced newt gingrich to step down as house speaker. and how many seats did they gain that year? well, the answer is five. in what was one of the best midterm elections ever for a white house party. they managed to pick up just five seats. that's less than 1/3 of the 17 they need this year. that's why there's a longer game at work here for democrats. 2014 is part of it. they have to avoid getting wiped out this fall. they have to keep the 17-seat gap in the house from getting much worse. that's the food news for them, that right now at least it doesn't look like a big republican wave is building and it does look like democrats can at least hold their own this fall, and if they can do that, then it sets up the real battle in 2016. maybe the economy will be a little stronger then. maybe health care will be more popular. more established part of the safety net. in 2016, republicans won't just get to take shots at the white house, they'll have to put up a candidate of their own. they'll have to write a platform of their own. run on an agenda that may not sit that well with most americans. there could be a huge opportunity for democrats, in other words. run a strong candidate at the top of their ticket, like, say, hillary clinton, they could capitalize on all of this. that's when they could take back the house, keep the senate and the white house, too, and that's when after finally four years of gridlock, they could put themselves back in position to do what they did in the first