>> i love how much he loves you. he is so fixated on you. he goes on to say lawrence is very lonely and there is no ratings and my show is going on the canceled any minute now. that was 2011. it's a lot of ratings ago. >> wow. >> jon huntsman, as you might have heard is no longer being insulted by donald trump on twitter. he is actually chosen him to be ambassador to, of all places russia. >> russia. and if his twitter insults are kind of precede how he treats people in the future, him insulting like that on twitter means you're probably up for an ambassadorship some time soon. >> who knows. that's right. the part where he says lawrence is very lonely. rachel, he used to care about how i felt. and, you know, that was kind of touching. >> i am sorry to have to say this, but i'm so glad he is obsessed with you and not me. i'm happy with this. >> it's my luck. thank you, rachel. >> well done. >> well, sometimes it only takes one. and lindsey graham might turn out to be the one republican senator who does the most damage to donald trump. >> reported details released by wikileaks of how 2 cia is able to turn and home devices into potent eavesdropping tools. >> is the cia listening to me through my microwave oven? >> no. >> if they were, would you say yes? >> yes. >> the president has accused the u.s. government under his predecessor of tapping his phones. well. >> trump said it was particularly upsetting becse he is a private man who likes to keep his thoughts to himself. >> it would be great if there was a -- if there was any evidence presented. >> you can't fact check crazy. >> is the president the target of a counterintelligence investigation? >> i think that's what we need to find out. >> the president said he was tapped. he is stating that as fact. >> i understand that. >> at real donald trump. >> russia attacked the united states of america. >> russia is a ruse. >> they interfered with our internal affairs. they tried to influence our election. >> i love wikileaks. >> we got a chance to look at some of the raw intel product and we've got even more questions now. >> this is a major deal for the country. i want to get to the bottom of it. >> the worst day of the presidential campaign for donald trump was the day he got caught admitting to crimes on tape. >> i better use some tick tax just in case i start kissing her. i'm automatically attracted to beautiful women. i just start kissing them. it's like a magnet. you just kiss. and when you're a star, they let you do it. you can do anything. >> whatever you want. >> grab them by the [ bleep ]. you can do anything. >> no republicans were more offended by that video than utah republicans. in hours of breaking news coverage of that situation, when it broke that night, utah congressman jason chaffetz got on the phone with me that very night to give us his reaction. >> my wife and i, we have a 15-year-old daughter. how in the world could i look my 15-year-old daughter in the eye and say, honey, you know what? your dad endorses donald trump for president. i can't do that. >> utah senator mike lee posted a video on facebook saying this. >> mr. trump, that i respectfully ask you with all due respect to step aside. step down. >> and former utah governor jon huntsman who is also a former ambassador to china for president obama and a former presidential candidate, retracted his endorsement of donald trump, and he told "the salt lake tribune" in a campaign cycle that has been nothing but a race to the bottom, at such a critical moment for our nation and with so many who have tried to be respectful of a record primary vote, the time has come for governor pence to lead the ticket. jason chaffetz got over that whole thing pretty quickly and reendorsed trump. we invited him back on this program to tell us how he explained that to his daughter, and we're still waiting. tonight there is news that president trump will nominate jon huntsman as ambassador to the most important country in the world. well, i should say the most important country in trump world. the most important country in the world by most measures is of course the united states. the most important country in trump world is russia. and jon huntsman, if he is confirmeby theenate, will therefore have the strangest j in the world. communicating often directly with vladimir putin on behalf of a government that unbeknownst to jon huntsman, vladimir putin may very well to some extent control. that is the question. how much of the trump government does vladimir putin control, if any? by all appearance, vladimir putin is in complete control of what donald trump actually says about him. >> putin is a nicer person than i am. >> well, he certainly has better manners than donald trump. but then who doesn't? donald trump, whose most recent violation of his oath of office was to accuse president barack obama of a crime has never accused or even publicly suspected vladimir putin of committing a crime. how much influence does vladimir putin have over donald trump? if the answer is none, then so be it. let's move on to one of the many other trump scandals. but if vladimir putin does have some influence over donald trump, how did he get it? is the answer in donald trump's never to be released tax returns, which will soon be in the custody of a director of the irs actually appointed by donald trump? congressman jason chaffetz, who could never get enough of investigating hillary clinton has no curiosity at all about any of the questions at the center of the trump-putin relationship. he has no curiosity about the nature of the trump campaign's communications with russians, including russian government officials. jason chaffetz doesn't want to know the answers to what did president trump know about that communication and when did he know it. there is hope tonight for lindsey graham's soul, because he is one of the very few republicans in washington who has not yet sold his soul in its entirety to donald trump. >> president trump claims that president obama administration targeted his campaign, trump tower in the tweet. i have no knowledge of that. but he has challenged the congress to help him. so let's help. >> lindsey graham wants to use congressional power to get to the bottom of a tweet. he wants congress to investigate a donald trump tweet. because donald trump's staff challenged him to do that. donald trump's white house staff, which is the worst staff in washington history, and i don't just mean the worst white house staff, the worst staff in washington history, including all congressional staff in history, all department staff, all agency staff in the history of washington staffs. we have never seen a more breathtakingly incompetent clubhouse than the trump staff. they actually asked for a congressional investigation of the president. there are many more things i could say to prove that this is the most incompetent staff in history. but in this case, that one sentence will do. and now, lindsey graham has gone around the chairman of the senate judiciary committee chuck grassley who doesn't want to investigate anything. and lindsey graham has written a letter directly to the justice department and the head of the fbi cosigned by democratic senator sheldon whitehouse. they are demanding to know everything the justice department and the fbi knows about donald trump's tweet. their letter says we would take any abuse of wiretapping authorities for political purposes very seriously. we would equally -- we would be equally alarmed to learn that a court found enough evidence of criminal activity or contact with a foreign power to legally authorize a wiretap of president trump. lindsey graham signed this letter in his capacity as chairman of a subcommittee, a subcommittee of the judiciary committee. senator whitehouse signed in his capacity as the senior democrat on that same subcommittee. now footnote here about the united states senate. subcommittees in the senate have no power, and they do next to nothing. the senate has subcommittees mostly so that the title of chairman can be spread around to people who would like to be able to mention it back home on the campaign trail. the chairman of the judiciary committee who does have power, chuck grassley never would have written that letter because chuck grassley knows what donald trump's staff doesn't, that investigating any one thing in the matrix of trump scandal could easily unearth something else. something worse. something much worse. or even many, many things much worse. no one trying to protect donald trump, like jason chaffetz or chuck grassley wants an investigation of anything. throughout his life, it has been patently obvious that donald trump's worst enemy is donald trump. and now it is very clear that there is a tie for donald trump's second worst enemy among sean spicer, steve bannon, kellyanne conway, reince priebus, steven miller, and every other ranked incompetent working in donald trump's white house. joining us now, navid jamali, former fbi intelligence officer and author of "how to catch a russian spy." he worked as a double spy against russian intelligence. he is also a msnbc contributor. and eli stoeckel, white house correspondent for politico. navid, to the point of lindsey graham and sheldon whitehouse letter, they're asking directly to the people who would know, was there ever an authorization of any kind resembling what some people would call wiretapping in relation to donald trump or trump tower? what do you expect is the next move in that exchange? >> look, i don't know how many more times we can go through this, lawrence. it's very clear. either there was a wiretap because there was evidence of a crime, or this is just fiction that has been created from the nethers of the president's mind. and i don't know where we go from this. it doesn't seem like this there is a doctor there is a very clear-cut answer. the answer is going to be either there is a crime and someone is investigating or this is just vapor wear. and this needs to be a clear answer. and i think we'll get it. that's the short of it. >> it seems everyone involved, if they have to bet, betting everything they have on this is just a figment of donald trump's imagination. but to go with lindsey graham's construction in the letter, which is how shocked they would be to discover that donald trump d actually done something worthy of getting this kind of surveillance on him, let's just go with that for a second. and that is the first time i've done it. because i think it's all come from donald trump's dream in the middle of the night. but if you go with that for a second, then would donald trump be in a position to say to the director of the fbi, give me everything you have on this. tell me everything about how this came about. >> well, okay. we have to just separate there is two silos here. one is foreign intelligence collections. as we saw with the russian ambassador, the intelligence community routinely taps the phones of foreign targets, right? so it is very possible that there could be intelligence, a wiretap if you will that comes from a foreign non-u.s. person which relates to the president or someone else. just hypothetically. now, that you don't need a fisa warrant for that. that just happens routinely. the second silo is a law enforcement activity where there is evidence of a crime, where someone has gotten a warrant so they can surveil a u.s. person. i mean, that's really it. so the only place where this could happen where the president could declassify this is the first one, which is foreign intelligence collection, title 10 and title 50 that has nothing to do with fisa warrants. it's very possible that russians were speaking about donald trump. and there could be intelligence relating to that. he has the rights to classify that. >> listen to the new interview out of mike pence being asked about this. let's listen to this. i guess we don't have the video. an interviewer says to mike pence the president has alleged that the former president committed a felony in wiretapping trump tower. yes or no, do you believe that president obama did that? well, says pence, i can say -- what i can say is that the president and our administration are very confident that the congressional committees in the house and senate are that are examining issues surrounding the last election, the run-up to the last election will do that in a thorough and equitable way. and so, eli, yes or no, the words yes or no don't appear in mike pence's answer. but here is -- here is someone saying do you believe donald trump? now the way it's phrased do you believe president obama did that? it's donald trump, mike pence's boss who said he did it. do you believe donald trump is the question mike pence cannot say yes. >> right. it's a nonanswer. but if he believed it, he would have said yes. i think that's pretty clear. i think it's the same thing we've heard from sean spicer and every surrogate the white house has trotted out when asked about this. they have no facts to back this up with. they just have to say the president said it. he is confident in it and we stand behind the president. i think you can tell from polling and just the sense the president's approval rating that the american public isn't buying it, and that you have to consider this in the context. this is a president who waynes up in the morning and tweets back and forth with fox and friends. and so on saturday morning, he wakes up and sees this on breitbart that they have written about a conservative radio host diatribe about this, and that's where this came from. if they had evidence of this, they would have rolled it out by now. they don't. and i think what lindsey graham is doing something we tend to do most of the time with presidents before donald trump. we take them at their word. we take them literally. so he wants to get to the bottom of this. but i think most people understand there is no bottom. there is nothing here but figments of an active imagination. >> it seems like the american public want to get to the bottom of the essential question, which is what about the trump world ties to russia. new quinnipiac poll shows 66% support for an independent commission investigating possible trump camp-russia ties. now eli, i know that white house staff spends their day trying to tell the news media how smart they are off the record. but it seems that their position has not yet outsmarted the american public. 2/3 of which want what the white house doesn't want. >> right. and remember back to last friday, donald trump was livid and yelled at his senior staffers after jeff sessions recused himself. well, polling today showed that americans wanted jeff sessions to recuse himself. they don't trust the trump administration's justice department, and they don't trust these very partisan republicans on the intelligence committees on capitol hill to carry out an independent investigation. and that's partly the fault of this white house that thought it was a good idea to employ devon nunes as sort of a surrogate when fbi director comey couldn come to thr defense and speak publicly, they trottedutunes saying this is a good idea. he can speak to this. he has been briefed. and it shows the degree to which this has all been politicized. given how many questions there are, i think it's understandable that americans want an investigation out of that is sort of out of the hands of republicans on the hill that. >> quinnipiac poll also shows bad news for jeff session. did sessions lie under oath? 52% say yes. 40% say. no and should sessions resign, 51 say yes, 42% say. no we're going have to leave there it for the moment. naveed jamali, eli stokols, thanks for joining us. >> thank you. we'll soon find out if the greatest deal maker in the world can convince conservative republicans to vote for donald trump's version of socialism. george will will join us to discuss that. also, president obama responds to donald trump's tweet accusation about having him, donald trump, wiretapped. there's so much goodness found in light. it illuminates our world and connects us. adaptive lenses® with transitions® you'll live the good light. they block uv rays. plus they help protect from harmful blue light. both indoors... and out. enjoy light more comfortably. enjoy life more richly. live the good light. visit transitions.com visit your local visionworks an start to live the good light with transitions brand lenses. to f...nerve pain shoots and burns its way into your day... visit your local visionworks an start to live the good light ...i hear you. when that pain makes simple errands simply unbearable... ...i hear you. i hear you because my dad struggled with this pain. make sure your doctor hears you too. so folks, don't wait. step on up. and talk to your doctor. because you have places to go... ...and people who can't wait for you to get there. if you have diabetes and burning, shooting pain in your feet or hands... step on up and talk to your doctor today. you know, i tweeted today@realdonaldtrump. i tweet. don't worry, i'll give it up after i'm president. we won't tweet anymore, i don't think. not presidential. >> nothing, nothing he doesn't lie about. i'll give it up after i'm president. well, we are now watching the republicans try to deliver to donald trump a they'll be will rewrite the affordable care act. they're discovering just how hard it is to do that as the effort becomes kind of chaotic on capitol hill for the republicans. george will, who has been watching this, will join us next. americans - 83% try to eat healthy. yet up 90% fall short in getting key nutrients from food alone. let's do more. add one a day men's complete with key nutrients we may need. plus heart-health support with b vitamins. one a day men's in gummies and tablets. socialism is hard. that's what i said on this network seven years ago when the democrats without a single republican vote were struggling to get the affordable care act through congress using a combination of legislative procedures that had never been used in combination before. and it's not just the legislative process that is hard, but socialism is ambitious. socialism is an attempt to change a condition for the better. sometimes it works. sometimes it disappoints. medicare and social security are our most popular forms of socialism in the united states. but given economic literacy, most people don't have any idea that there is anything even slightly socialistic about those programs because in america socialism is a bad word. always has been, always will be. unless, of course, bernie sanders wins the presidency some day. that is why politicians must always deny that what they are proposing is socialism or socialistic in every way. the actual difference between democrats and republicans on health care policy has for the last several decades not been a difference between socialists and anti-socialists. the difference between the two parties has only been the degree to which they support socialist interventions in the health care system, and how much money they're willing to spend on them. the democrats have always supported more than the republicans have. and so in general, health care legislation over the years has always been a matter of democrats proposing something that republicans would try to reduce in scope and cost or to defeat outright as they did with president clinton and hillary clinton's health care reform bill. what we see are republicans actively trying to write their own socialistic intervention in the health care system, which is what they have now done. that means republicans have gone from criticizing legislation proposed by democrats to something infin notally more difficult, trying to defend their own legislation on health care. so the republicans have now discovered that socialism is hard. even watered down socialism. it is so hard that the republican party is coming apart over their attempt to rewrite obamacare. >> if you just look at the bill text, the very first paragraph says it amends the affordable care act. it doesn't repeal it. and so the american people want us to repeal it and replace it with snag is different. >> it seems like the only constituency for it is the political class in washington, and maybe some of the insurance companies. so i don't see how this bill goes anywhere. it certainly doesn't have 217 votes. i think they're taking the obamacare framework and trying to call it a republican piece of legislation. >> congressional republicans always promised to repeal obamacare as soon as they got a republican president. and now they have a republican president inattentive to detail who will sign anything put in front of him, including executive orders drawn up in a flash by people who have never done it before. so their only excuse now is that socialism is hard. joining us now prize winning syndicated columnist george will. george, welcome back. and you saw this coming. we're watching people trying to do something that historically they have never had their hearts in, this kind of intervention in the marketplace. the fact that they're trying to do it on a less grand scale than the obama plan doesn't seem to have made it any more republican-looking to some of the members. >> here's where we begin. before the affordable care act was passed, 50 cents of every health care dollar in the country was a government 50 cents. we're talking about regulating 1/6 of the american economy. the american health care sector is larger than a but five national economies in the rld. so it's a big problem, which is why it is, as you say, hard. now look, if you begin as the republicans do accepting as the country does the barack obama premise that the chief metric for measuring the worthiness of a health care reform is universal access, and then if you add to that that you're going to have a system in which preexisting health problems will not preclude someone purchasing insurance. and then if you add to that that you're going to build this around a system that exists in which 147 million americans get their health care from their employers with special tax preferences for that, if you start like that, you are bound to create a system of regulations and subsidies that is very complicated. different regulations than mr. obama had, and different subsidies, but the same basic kind of architecture. you notice now that some of the republicans are saying, well, the congressional budget office, which may not score this in a way that is congenial to them, it has a history of being inaccurate. yes, it does. but that's not because the cbo is staffed by people who are incompetent or unintelligent. they're neither. they're superb professionals. the problem is that it's complicated. and it illustrates the law of unintended consequences, which is of course that the unintended consequences of a government some are larger than the intended consequences. fiddling with health care is like touching a calder mobile. you touch it here and it jiggles way over there. they're up against the problem that i would rephrase from your intro. you said socialism is hard. i would say socialism is self-defeating. it is so hard that it should not be tried. >> and there is the difference between the two of us on socialism. i'm willing to go with the experiment. but george, in your -- if your view, you've watched the clinton crusade. you watched the obama crusade. you've watched over the decades, all of these crusades that have moved in this legislative arena. one thing i noticed about the clinton crusade was there was some dissent that would come out here and there among democrats. and that ultimately was part of what doomed it. last time with the obama effort they seemed to contain dissent, whatever dissent there was. they seemed to contain it so we weren't able to do shows like this saying here are the five democrats who have come out and attacked it today. when you see republicans out there on day one attacking this legislative vehicle, based on the models we've seen in the past, it's hard to see how it proceeds. >> the freedom caucus is composed of about 40 guys and gals who know why they're here. these are conviction politicians. and they did not come here to have a banquet, a feast, eating words they've spoken for 30 years or so. the head of the freedom caucus, that you just had on in a sound bite is mark meadows. the time he first came to the attention of a nation is when he, using a not very well-known legislative procedure called a motion to vacate started the process that led to the resignation of john boehner, which is to say these are serious people. and they will -- i don't think they will roll over quite as fast as mr. trump may expect them to. >> well, about the rolling over. the presidential roll this that is to be a combination of intimidating and then somehow rewarding in the sense that if you vote with this president, it will do you some good, somehow. in your reelection campaign or something else you want. it's hard to see in that calculus what donald trump has to offer that bill clinton didn't have to offer to get it passed, or what donald trump has to offer in comparison to what barack obama had to offer in terms of his personal support for that going forward. >> that's correct. and we're just talking about dissent within the republican congressional delegation. >> yes. >> 31 states, lawrence, expanded medicaid. 16 of those states have republican governors who are facing a huge budget hole if the medicaid expansion is not respected. so they're also going to be the receiving pressures from state houses in columbus and east lansing, michigan, and elsewhere. >> george f. will, thank you very much for joining us tonight. really appreciate it. >> glad to be with you. coming up, the best-selling author, the book to movie guy, michael lewis, moneyball, the big short, the best book to movie guide has been observing donald trump. he has also been oak executive decision making and leadership long before donald trump became president. he has much to say. he will join us. this is the silverado special edition. this is one gorgeous truck. oh, did i say there's only one special edition? because, actually there's five. ooohh!! aaaahh!! uh! hooooly mackerel. wow. nice. strength and style. it's truck month. get 0% financing for 60 months plus find your tag and get $5500 on select chevy silverado pick-ups when you finance with gm financial. find new roads at your local chevy dealer. find fast relief behind the counter allergies with nasal congestion? with claritin-d. 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better than i think almost anybody. >> better than almost anybody. our next guest michael lewis has studied executive judgment in business. he is the author of "moneyball," the big shore and the undoing project. he offers this take on donald trump. trump has proved no more accountable for the words he speaks than for the money he borrows. he lies in the moment in the most sensational ways without the usual concern of what might happen to him when his lie is exposed. his life strategy has always been to maximize the returns for himself in the moment while assigning zero value to future consequences of his actions. joining us now, michael lewis. michael, thank you very much for joining us tonight. really appreciate it. >> pleasure to be here. >> there is something about assigning zero value to the future of your actions. michael, it's a little scary in the presidency. >> you think? >> so give us your analysis. you've studied some of the best executives in their various judgment capacities and thou they do it, how much is instinct, how much is learning, how much is stuff they've studied. give us your read of what you're seeing with donald trump. >> well, the natural contrast is with obama, who i spent quite a bit of time with and wrote about. and this is a man who -- the contrast is very revealing. obama, when he got to the job, he came to appreciate pretty quickly that the job is basically a decision making job, and the decisions you get, that arrive on your desk are horrible decisions to make. that's why they're there. and these are probabilistic people are advising you. you have to take that into account. you have to watch your own bias when you're making decisions. you have predilections that you need to guard against. and you're prone to mental error. and all of this, this kind of ability to watch himself that i think served obama and other presidents well trump just doesn't have. he has just given himself -- he scores himself. he grades himself. and he doesn't have -- and he's got -- you know, he's got the -- it's a delusional quality, right? what he will do is no matter how whatever he decides turns out, he'll tell himself a story that it was all a great success. so he is really not accountable to anything but his own feelings about himself. it's a very strange thing to watch. >> does he resemble anyone else you have ever studied in a real decision making capacity? >> well, look, he is similar in some ways to what "moneyball" replaced in baseball, the kind of trust your gut instinct. >> the old idea. >> even though it was possible to dig out data that told you exactly why a baseball player was valuable or if he was valuable, instead you deferred to some guy staring at a baseball player and saying i like that guy. we should get that guy. and it was quickly proven when people started to use data better that that was an inferior way to make decisions. and at the very least, you wanted information as a check on your judgment. so he does remind me a bit of the people that billy beane and the oakland a's general manager who is at the heart of "moneyball" ran circles around. he is a guy who made stupid without any kind of reason for it. it's hard to -- you know -- but that doesn't -- it's to compare donald trump to old baseball scouts is really not fair to old baseball scouts. >> ah, okay. >> because i think at some level, there was -- there was a -- they always had a sense that, you know, this was a matter -- they knew they had been wrong enough to be guarded when they made their assessments. and they needed a kind of deniability at the end of it. and trump doesn't seem to have any sense of that. so we're in a very peculiar situation where the person who is the decider really doesn't have the equipment to make intelligent decisions. >> and in defense of the old baseball scouts, they brought as much fact-based analysis to it as they could. they didn't realize there was this whole other mountain of it that massive statistical analysis could help with. michael, we have to squeeze in a quick break here and we'll be right back. donald trump as an old baseball scout is the best model we've seen yet on how he is working the white house. we'll be right back. this this this this is my body of proof. proof of less joint pain and clearer skin. this is my body of proof that i can take on psoriatic arthritis with humira. humira works by targeting and helping to block a specific source of inflammation that contributes to both joint and skin symptoms. it's proven to help relieve pain, stop further joint damage, and clear skin in many adults. humira is the #1 prescribed biologic for psoriatic arthritis. humira can lower your ability to fight infections, including tuberculosis. serious, sometimes fatal infections and cancers, including lymphoma, have happened; as have blood, liver, and nervous system problems, serious allergic reactions, and new or worsening heart failure. before treatment, get tested for tb. tell your doctor if you've been to areas where certain fungal infections are common, and if you've had tb, hepatitis b, are prone to infections, or have flu-like symptoms or sores. don't start humira if you have an infection. want more proof? ask your rheumatologist about humira. what's your body of proof? you foundi'm a robot! cars.com rawr yeti and found a place to service it, too. ♪ jingle bells now when you're ready, you can sell your old car and find your new one all on cars.com you know us for shopping, and now we're there for every turn. cars.com th...oh, baked-on alfredo?e. ...gotta rinse that. nope. no way. nada. really? dish issues? throw it all in. cascade platinum powers through... your toughest stuck-on food. nice. cascade. at least we're going see someone go to jail. right? we're going to have to break up the banks and the party is over. >> i don't know. i don't know. i have a feeling that in a few years, people are going to be doing what they always do when the economy tanks. they will be blaming immigrants and poor people. >> that's adam mckay's brilliant movie "the big short" based on michael lewis' brilliant book "the big short." michael, you know wall street. you've studied the swamp aspects of wall street that donald trump talked about during the campaign. he told his voters he was going to drain the swamp, get rid of all that kind of influence in government. how is he doing? do you think he has enough goldman sachs guys in the administration to know how to drain the swamp? [ laughter ] >> you want to answer that question? so, you know, he doesn't know what he is doing, right? i mean, he said he is going to get rid of dodd/frank. and what does that mean? it's unclear -- what's unclear to me is if the people who he has brought in, the goldman sachs people, have any ability to talk to him about the details of the subject at hand. i mean, i don't even know what they want to do. it's not clear that they want to get rid of dodd/frank. there are probably some regulations that could be fine-tuned. but trump, the noise they've made about, like letting the banks loose is insane. i don't think anybody is ever actually going to do that. i think we're going to get to a moment with financial regulation essentially what he has done with health care where he says oh, i didn't realize it was so complicated. and maybe not much will happen. but it is -- it's breath taking that we're not -- the financial crisis is a living memory. and it was a story of really horrible incentives that were baked into the system that led the big banks to do things they really shouldn't have done and brought us all to our niece. and we're now talking about trying to let them loose seems to me insane. but who knows what they're going to do. >> what would you say, michael, is the single biggest thing at risk in some of the proposals you've heard what republicans want to do to dodd/frank? >> you know, there have been so many things said. if i was monitoring it from afar, not wanting to read the dodd/frank regulation and i just as a concerned citizen, i would watch first, they don't change the leverage requirements on banks. they should be -- the equity requirement should be greater than they are. but at the very least, they should not be reduced. the volcker rule, some republicans say the volcker rule had nothing whatsoever to do with the financial crisis. the huge banks loaded up on subprime mortgage risk. much of it disguised. it was hard to know who had what. that was the heart of the crisis. the rule that prevents them turning themselves into hedge funds using taxpayer money, that's a very important thing to keep in place. the consumer financial protection bureau. that makes imminent sense to have a place that serves as a watchdog. i would keep an eye on those things and make sure they don't fiddle with them. >> michael lewis, thank you so much for joining us tonight, and giving us finally the key to the mystery of donald trump. anyone who really wants to understand donald trump had better go back and read "monba." and if you're lazy, watch the movie. michael, make a penny or two ther way. and the new book, the undoing project by michael lewis. thank you very much for joining us tonight. really appreciate it. >> thanks for having me, lawrence. coming up, president obama responds to donald trump accusing him of committing a crime. there's nothing more important to me than my vacation. so when i need to book a hotel room, i want someone that makes it easy to find what i want. booking.com gets it. they offer free cancellation, in case i decide to go from kid-friendly to kid-free. now i can start relaxing even before the vacation begins. your vacation is very important. that's why booking.com makes finding the right hotel for the right price easy. visit booking.com now to find out why we're booking.yeah if you have moderate to severe ulcerative colitis or crohn's, and your symptoms have left you with the same view, it may be time for a different perspective. if other treatments haven't worked well enough, ask your doctor about entyvio, the only biologic developed and approved just for uc and crohn's. entyvio works by focusing right in the gi-tract to help control damaging inflammation and is clinically proven to begin helping many patients achieve both symptom relief as well as remission. infusion and serious allergic reactions can happen during or after treatment. entyvio may increase risk of infection, which can be serious. while not reported with entyvio, pml, a rare, serious brain infection caused by a virus may be possible. tell your doctor if you have an infection, experience frequent infections, or have flu-like symptoms, or sores. liver problems can occur with entyvio. if your uc or crohn's medication isn't working for you, ask your gastroenterologist about entyvio. entyvio. relief and remission within reach. announcer: get on your feet for the nastiest bull in the state of texas. ♪ ♪ hello, barack. >> what do you want? >> we got to write a movie or something. >> what the hell are you talking about? >> the birth certificate thing, i'm accusing you of tapping my phones. we're like rivals. >> no we're not. i'm an ex-president and you're insane. >> that was how conan o'brien reenacted president obama reacting to donald trump's accusation. news is president obama actually rolled his eyes. and there is more on that report coming up next. 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( ♪ ) it's off to work we go! woman: on the gulf coast, new exxonmobil projects are expected to create over 45,000 jobs. and each job created by the energy industry supports two others in the community. altogether, the industry supports over 9 million jobs nationwide. these are jobs that natural gas is helping make happen, all while reducing america's emissions. energy lives here. i like him. he likes me. i think he likes me. i mean, you're going to have to ask him. but i think he likes me. >> that's how president trump described his relationship with president obama. a week after the inauguration. let's see what jonathan alter, msnbc political analyst from the daily beast. so there has probably been some adjustments since saturday morning anyway in the relationship. >> with sean hannity and bill o'reilly before that, he was sally field at the oscars. you like me. you really like me. >> it's what he desperately wants to believe. >> and there is a neediness there. >> yes. >> which is such a contrast to obama. because obama, this hurt obama a little bit. he didn't understand the basic insecurities of most politicians because he is not insecure himself. so their neediness was an abstraction to him. >> yeah. >> and trump is the most profoundly insecure person who has held this office compared to nixon who was deeply insecure, lbj was insecure. and that's what's scary about it. most bullies are insecure. >> both lyndon johnson and nixon's case, their insecurities built as the job was crushing them. >> right. >> it wasn't a first month of insecurity. let's look at what "the wall street journal" reported. nbc literally had the detail that president obama rolled his eyes, which we have a visual for. okay, that's good. "the wall street journal" reports that president obama was livid over the accusation that he bugged the republican campaign office, believing that mr. trump was questioning both the integrity of the office of the president and mr. obama himself. people familiar with his thinking said, and this would not be the first time since with donald trump since he started with the birth certificate. >> right. so, you know, people have known for a long time since the takedown at the white house correspondence dinner that barack obama loathes trump. but at the beginning of trump's presidency, or in the interregnum, obama was trying to do something very clever, which was to not insult trump on the theory that if he didn't attack him, trump wouldn't attack obama. why did obama want to do that? for a crisis. he wanted to make sure that for the good of the country, if we had a crisis, he had a relationship with trump where trump could maybe bring him over in the middle of the night and he could give him advice on how to be president. >> or trump would take the phone call. at the crucial moment. >> so this was important for all of our safety. and what's alarming about this is that that might no longer be possible, which would really be a problem for our whole country should there be a foreign policy crisis. >> do you think president obama will try to hold on to this relationship? for the same reasons that you're stating? >> i think he will. his -- because he has his own ego in check, i think he will let this bounce off him if there is a crisis and the president needs his advice. >> john alter, thank you very much for joining us tonight. >> excellent. >> the last word is next. where's frank? it's league night! 'saved money on motorcycle insurance with geico! goin' up the country. bowl without me. frank.' i'm going to get nachos. snack bar's closed. gah! ah, ah ah. ♪ ♪ i'm goin' up the country, baby don't you wanna go? ♪ ♪ i'm goin' up the country, baby don't you wanna go? ♪ geico motorcycle, great rates for great rides. > wall street took a good idea. the mortgage bond and turned it into an atomic bond of fraud and stupidity that is on its way to decimating the world economy. i just know that at the end of the day, average people are going to be the ones that are going to have to pay for all of this. because they always, always do. >> another scene from adam mckay's brilliant movie "the mov great to have michael lewis join us tonight. because they always do. average people will pay for the whole thing. that's what it's going to look like, apparently, with the trump budget. average people paying for it. tax cuts for the rich. the 11th hour with brian williams starts right now. still no evidence about the wiretap claims. powerful member is taking up the president's challenge to investigate. also this meerng, with friends like these, the open revolt on capitol hill. republicans push back against their own party's plan to replace obamacare. can the president close the deal? and who's ready for dessert. formal rival and family get the white house treatment after incredibly rough treatment on the campaign trail. the 11th hour begins now. well, good evening once again from our headquarters here in new york. 12 days until the march 20th house intelligence committee hearings on russia. it's now been four days since