Which george h. W. Bush was. And by not going partisan, george w. Bush helped remind us just how starved we are for decency in American Public life. And im going to leave you with that picture, get ready to put to rest one of our points of light, one of my points of light, the 41st president. Thanks to nancy, brett, nick, elise. Thats it for this hour. Im any coko nicolle wallace. Mtp daily is next with chuck todd. Good evening, im chuck todd here in new york. And welcome to mtp daily. Moments ago, president george h. W. Bushs remains arrived by train in college station. Next is a Burial Ceremony at the george bush president ial library. We will be keeping an eye on these proceedings as the 41st president is officially laid to
rest in a few minutes. Well take you back there, but were going to begin tonight with yet another piece of reporting that raises questions if the trump administrations Foreign Policy is for sale. It raises other questions about whether bob mueller might be invest
sort of, enlarged the powers of the presidency, have grabbed power from a congress that became increasingly gridlocked and dysfunctional and unable to, you know, to do its job, basically. and some people would say that s the demise of the seniority system, which was, you know, had its problems, but did work. some people say, you know, bring back earmarks, that allowed things to happen. even though, you know, it wasn t necessarily the fairest system, but whatever you want to trace it to, congress isn t working, and because congress isn t working, it the power sort of devolves to presidents, and so the presidency becomes more important than the founders intended it to be, and probably more important than it should be. why don t we step aside here, just watch. there s, for some reason, it feels there s a finality of
that time. if you want the branches of government, we have three. we know how troubling it is for the legislative branch, which i am in and then you have the executive branch and judicial branch. if you want to judicial branch to work and the rule of law, which we ve been known for and admired worldwide, you ve got to have nine supreme court justices. well, at the same time, your message to senators wyden and merkley and others, what do you say to them? i think merrick garland should have had a vote. they had enough votes to turn him down. it could have just been a consideration of the process, voting. with that being said, whether you think you ve been robbed or not, this system basically has not been the fairest system that we work in and deal in.
investigation. it s the only way, the only fairway to give sergeant bergdahl just miss. exonerate him or condemn him. do it under oath and article 32 which is the military equivalent of a grand jury and it s the fairest system of justice around. that s why i asked for a court martial when i was going through my ordeal back in the 80s and of course why the special prosecutor wasn t about to give me one. wasn t the ransom the five taliban guys they wanted? that s ransom. no. you think they wanted money too. look it. that s all they wanted. i know a lot about hostage negotiation. we don t need to get into all of that tonight. it s not right to say we never negotiated with the enemy. george washington did so. in the aftermath of the barbary wars, thomas jefferson beating the pirates in 1805, paid
making more than $400,000 a year. to talk about this and his new book, senior writer of the wall street editorial page, stephen moore. he s out with a new book who s the fairest of them all. the truth about opportunity, taxes and wealth in america. first of all, fiscal cliff, are you hopeful and does it sound like what they re close to might be fair? it depends on this is such a moving target in terms of what the final negotiations will be. i always predicted near midnight december 24 or december 31 they will reach a deal. the question is whether it will be something good for the economy and something i had in my book, does it really make sense to be raising tax rates when we have a high unemployment rate. one of the point i make in the book the fairest system of them all would be a flat tax, something steve forbes talks about in the 1990s keeps rates low and broadens the base and