Its friday january 16th. Welcome to morning joe. We have donny deutsch. Donny, big news. We can say it right . Yes. Its out. You have a new show. A new show. On what network . Usa network. Picked it up. Its a comedy that i star in and wrote. Its kind of like a curb your enthusiasm. Its like a fictional of myself. You saw the pilot. You are in the pilot. Well get back to that. Were going to talk more about this coming up but thats big news. Former treasury official steph rattner is here to talk about everything. But we want to get to switzerland because moves by central bank there is rocking the markets. Well talk about that. In washington bbc correspondent kim gattis. Major breaking news over night. Tons of politics. The flu shot not working. Joe has the flu. It is so bad. He got a flu shot i didnt. Really . Hes been killing for two weeks now, struggling. Theres a big story around that. And this controversy brewing around the oscars in terms of diversity there. But first, breaking news overnight. As i said france is coming to grips with the paris terror
attacks and now police in neighboring belgium say a series of antiterror raids have detained more than a dozen people and thwarted a major terrorism plot that could have just been hours away. Two suspected extremists were killed on the spot 1 3 suspect who was injured is now facing terrorism charges. At this hour a manhunt is under way in belgium for additional suspects. The operation took place in verviers, a former Industrial Town about 80 miles away from brussels. Amateur video captures the intense shootout. Police say the heavily armed suspects opened fire as s. W. A. T. Teams closed in. One witness says the fighting was so intense that the smell of gunpowder remained long after the shooting ended. Another witness says she swore it was another attack happening. And there may actually be links to the paris attacks. Its pretty early, but an arms dealer from belgium reportedly
sold weapons to the paris gunmen. Belgiums Terror Threat system is now at its second highest level. U. S. Officials tell nbc news extra marines were put on duty at the u. S. Embassy there. The extremists were planning to target Police Officers on public roads or at Police Buildings. And the attack was imminent. In verviers we found several weapons. Among them were four ak47s, several small fire weapons, firearms ammunition and explosive explosives. Her more over, we found material for communication, walky talkietalkies and radios. An amount of money. This information coming in in the past 30 minutes. Overnight there were several arrests in france. Lets bring in nbcs ron allen live in paris. Ron, what do we know about the latest arrests there . Reporter well, at least 12 people rounded up last night in the outskirts of paris. We understand in connection with the attacks last week. They are suspected of providing Logistical Support or support to the kouachi brothers or amedi coubali who attacked and killed four jewish citizens at the grocery store. The police have been trying to tie up the loose ends of this operation. They suspect there are other people out there and this was an aggressive attempt to try and do that. We know there is some connection to belgium as well because we understand the suspects here the gunmen here last week are believed to have bought weaponry there. We know the kouachi brothers went to belgium a couple years ago and tried to buy weaponry there. Belgium is a nexus of terrorist
activity organized crime activity there. The idea that there would be this huge raid at this place last night is really not surprising to officials across europe. Nbcs ron allen, thank you very much. Willie, so many questions about what may still be out there. Kim, i wanted to ask you. There is a familiar refrain in this story weve been seeing in these lately. Police say these guys went to syria. Learned their trade. Came back trained to attack police to kill civilians inside of europe. What is going on inside syria right now . Weve been bombing for three months. Reports yesterday that its not doing much good. Isis is expanding in syria. What is it about syria and the return to europe that we cant stop or the authorities cant seem to stop . Well, there is a vacuum in syria. The Syrian Government is not in control of all of its territory, snooet there are the socalled moderate rebels. You have this group, socalled Islamic State, that is increasing its hold on territory and on the number of people that they have under their control as well. Its growing you know day by day. And so the military campaign that is being conducted by the u. S. And its allies isnt really stemming the advance that much. Its certainly not rolling back the control of isis. And you have therefore, an area where people like Hayat Boumeddiene can escape to, if shes trying to leave france, which i understand she has done and where people have operated in the past can leave through turkey into europe and conduct some of these operations. I think it all brings us back to a common that Francois Hollande the president of france made a few days ago on the Aircraft Carrier where were seeing im
paraphrasing loosely, what were seeing is a result of lack of leadership in 2013. He said i still regret dearly that we did not intervene to stop the massacres in syria. Now, its quite a big link to make between what happened in paris and what did not happen in 2013. But there is very clearly a moment there, there was a moment in 2013 where people in syria felt abandoned by the west and it is feeding some of those fanatics who just want any excuse to commit violent acts in europe. You know, were trying to put the pieces together here. Just jumping back to belgium and the breaking news overnight, steve. They found these weapons that you heard in the News Conference firearms explosive Police Uniforms. They clearly were planning an attack on police in some way. False document significant amounts of cash, communications equipment. Two people have been arrested in
france in connection with these operations in belgium. And again, the operation theyre saying was meant to dismantle a terrorist cell as well as the Logistics Network behind it. They think theres something bigger. If you could talk about the unrest in europe that weve really been focusing on more and more in the past few weeks amid this clear and unfolding Terror Threat that were watching now . Well, theres no question that you have an undercurrent in europe conducive to this kind of thing happening. You have terrible Economic Conditions. 11 unemployment in france. You have enormous amounts of youth ununemployment. A lack of job prospects and a lot of hope for europeans and particularly for those of the immigrant groups from those who have come there more recently. So you start from the backdrop of a lot of unrest which has brought out the extremes of both left and right in europe. Were proposing all kinds of crazy alternative solutions to try to address it because the problems are so deep. One thing i wonder about here
and others will have an opinion about this is it feels like the european authorities have been a bit behind the curve here. That it took this incident in paris to. Send them off looking for a lot of other stuff that was clearly going on. I dont doubt what kim said that what went on in syria drove a lot of in activity in europe but it sounds like theres a lot of reactive antiterrorism work going on. If this was hours from happening, that backs that up. Steve i know you come from an economic point of view and i believe it drives a lot. But i still believe unemployment was only 5 in france this would be happening. I dont know how much of this is driven by pure soft economic numbers. I just there seems to be obviously something very different from extremism. You see rebellion a lot of times out of a downtrodden society. Certainly you can have terrorism activities under weve had them in the u. S. Although weve had a lot fewer in part because of our antiterrorism efforts have been
better. Not because our economy is better. Our economy is a lot better. I think youre drawing a Straight Line there where i think at best theres a very dotted line there. Well, usually when people are in desperate situations arent they easier targets to to recruit . To recruit and it also brings out a lot of the kind of hate speech that the europeans are now trying to figure out what to do about and where to figure out where to draw the line of free speech but not having these things going on there that in incite more hate activity. Were monitoring belgium. Officials are still releasing on more information. Top republicans in san diego are on the heels of their historic midterm wins and are looking now ahead to 2016. Mitt romney is slated to speak tonight but some Top Party Leaders are not jumping at his possible reentrance into the fray. Politico reports nearly a dozen commit key members are deeply
skeptical and even a former rm campaign cochair expressed his doubts. Im not happy frankly with the way that hes chosen to reenter president ial politics. Hes a great man. Would be a great president. But theres not a lot of good press in him for somebody losing the election and coming back four years later and becoming the nominee. Meanwhile, Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker is making waves of his own. He panned another potential mitt romney run saying its time for fresh ideas. Telling the wisconsin state journl, quote, well, i think mitt is a good man and i think he would have been a good president but i think particularly when you look at where things shape up in two years, i think its pretty hard to make an argument about going forward. You know when youre arguing about people and ideas from the past. Last night he also took an opportunity to slam Hillary Clinton as too inside washington. Its almost overwhelmingly
likely that Hillary Clinton, former secretary of state, is going to be the nominee for the other party. And i think the other big loser on november 4th wasnt just washington and the president , it was Hillary Rodham clinton. She embodies washington. She lives in washington. She worked in washington. You look at everything that people dislike about washington she embodies it. What we need is a contrast to that that says we need a fresh new perspective that says the answers to the ailments of our nation do not come out of our nations capitol. Seriously, why bother even talking about running because then all of a sudden everyone hates you. Have you noticed that . Its his own party with mitt romney. But thats not a coincidence. I know. A lot of people have a vested people. Why bother, hold off, i think, on talking about it. Also reminder of how long this process is and is going to be. Were 22 months from election day. One day mitt romney is a toast of the town. Now theres gop backlash. Tomorrow is another piece will
come out. I think well catch our breath for a minute. Also a number of possible president ial candidates not just skipping their partys events but in some cases thumbing their noses at leadership. Speaks to new challenges on capitol hill as some 2016 contenders look for distance from the newly minted republican majority in congress. Jeremy peters reports in the new york times, senator rand paul skipped the annual retreat in hershey pennsylvania to instead meet with supporters in New Hampshire. There he took a swipe at a potential foe while ted cruz took aim at members of his own party. We talked about education. This is another area where i would be distinguished from a jeb bush should we compete. Jub bush believes in more control in the federal government in washington. I think education should be decentralized. Im sort of an old reagan republican in the fact that i think the department of education really hasnt made us any better and that really state governments ought to be involved in local school districts. Federal government really has
not made our kids smarter. I am hopeful we will see real bold leadership from republicans this year and next. But i got to say, the lame duck was aptly named. It was not encouraging to see the giant pile of corporate welfare being the first things republicans rushed to pass through. Ted cruz. Reminds my of gecko in the geico commercial. Ted cruz . Similar look and feel . Not necessarily. Let me ask you something. I dont even know what youre talking about. Whenever republicans talk about internal politics they turn to donny deutsch. They do. Donny. What do you make and why isnt it a good thing to have this nice big feel . Why isnt there mitt romney and jeb bush and Chris Christie and
marco rubio. Every insider wants a position as an outsider. Everybody is distancing themselves from the core. The big difference between rm and bush. Bush is an old name but a new voice, new face. We havent seen him in the public spectrum in ten years. The irony of romney is a lot of what he ran on the last time around he would have been right about. But, but i think that the republicans clearly see that i think romney versus Hillary Clinton, you lose the new versus old, future versus past inside versus outside. The same with hillary versus jeb. A little bit of difference with jeb. When you see jeb think about right now romney comes on the screen. Ive seen that joe. Hillary comes on the screen. Ive seen that joe. Jeb has the same last name i havent seen that show really. In a strange way you have a foothold in the past but you do have the potential for new and fresh even though the name is old. There is a big distinction
there. Wow. I think the cerebral approach to it is you have a few guys fighting for one or two chairs. Christie romney and bush now in a food fight and each one trying to elbow the other one out using their various imperfections. Am i the only one that does not see a possibility for Chris Christie working on the National Stage . We have never in the history of politics lets go back to giuliani. This country does not go for the growling, the antagonistic works in new york it works in new jersey. We have never effected ever a president whose demeanor is like christies. I think christie will implode. I cant wait. I think the guy wears a lot of the emperors clothes. I think it will be interesting to see. I want to tune in to that but i want to wait for the first time he yells at a teacher and says, dont ask me a question. I tend to agree with you and especially with bush and romney in the mix its going to be hard
for christie. New poll numbers show what new yorkers think about the on going rift between mayor bill de blasio and the nypd. Overwhelming majority 67 , disapprove of officers turning their backs on the mayor at the funerals for their slain comrades. But a majority of new yorkers are also displeased with how the mayor has handled the department. When asked whether the mayor supports police, 47 say yes but there were big divisions among blacks and whites. Theres also a Racial Disparity when it comes to the mayors handling of police protests. 76 of blacks approved while 58 of whites disapproved. Commissioner brattons Approval Rating now standing at 56 , up 12 points from last month. I find it what exactly did de blasio do that was incredibly insulting to police was it the discussion about his son . Its several things in a continuum. First, he ran during the campaign against stop and frisk,
which most people in new york probably dont support. He was on the right side of that issue with the public. He just wasnt necessarily on the right side of the issue with the police. The second thing that happened were these protest, perceived to be very antipolice which de blasio was perceived to be supportive of. And the third thing was this comment about his son whichfrankly didnt seem to me to be consistent with things like obama and other black heard ares s leaders have said a black parent has to deal with a black teenager in the real world. But put together its seen that the mayor is hostile to them. There needs to be a summit and open discussion sdm theyve had a couple. Theyve had a couple. Its not working . Nobody is in the mood for love. Nobody is in the mood for love. Okay. Were going to keep trying. Weve had these statements made i dont think and you see in these poll numbers represent the point of view of most cops. Theres blood on the steps of city hall. The union. They may be right on their
point but some of the ways its been articulated havent been great. Police unit has favorable rating of 18 . I do think we talked about on this show the first time the cops turn their back at the first funeral, they made their point. I think everyone understood that. And the second time they said wait a minute now youre taking away from the officer and this is becoming more about you. I think that probably turned the tide and you saw 67 in new york disapprove of the action you are seeing right there. Absolutely. All right. One more story before we go to break. If you got the flu shot this year, were you a good boy, steve, donny . Yes. It didnt work. No. Worked for me. Apparently youre not alone if you got the flu after you got the flu shot. This is the one year i didnt get it. Joe got it. And he has been theres a difference. He drinks scotch every morning. No. Kind of negates it. He got the flu, i believe, on new years eve and he still has it. Health officials said thursday the vaccines are only 23 effective this season. It is not the worst year in
history for the shot but it normally prevents around 60 of the infections. The reason this years formula didnt account for the strain of the virus that ended up causing about twothirds of the illnesses this winter. So it didnt work. He may have had a doctor who didnt agree of what he says most on the show and gave him the wrong strain. I know his doctor. The full flu. Okay. Heres the flu shot. Talk to the doctor theres like 77 strains of the flu virus and the flu shot only gets a handful of them. So even if you get the flu shot youre going to get the flu. Say it again. You know when you drink a pint of scotch every morning before you come on the air like joe does, thats not going to help with the flu. Thats what he says but its not working. We have a doctor coming up later on morni