Guests: Richard Wolffe, Ezra Klein, Ari Berman, Nate Silver,Meghan McCain, Alex Wagner
LAWRENCE O‘DONNELL, HOST: Do you know where the nation‘s color-coded terror alert status is at the moment? Orange alert, yellow alert? No.
That‘s probably why the White House is going to announce tomorrow that they‘re getting rid of the code that was created by the Bush administration. It happens to be yellow right now, by the way. When there‘s danger, they say, they‘ll let us know.
But even as we‘re losing the Republican color-coded scare tactic on terrorism, Republicans are trying to replace it with an economic fear factor that is always stuck on code red when referring to Barack Obama.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
(MUSIC)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The substance, the fame, win the future. That‘s winning.
BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: What America does better than anyone else—
MIKA BRZEZINSKI, MSNBC ANCHOR: It was a very good speech.
JOE SCARBOROUGH, MSNBC ANCHOR: Come on.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was a tough crowd.
O‘DONNELL (voice-over): First reactions. Congressional prom night meant less applause and more listening.
SCARBOROUGH: I noticed that like 15 minutes had gone by, Pat Buchanan, without a standing ovation.
ANDREA MITCHELL, NBC NEWS: The president missed the cheering section.
SCARBOROUGH: It was one of the flattest speeches I‘ve seen. A lot of people last night, very angry the president didn‘t seize on this moment to talk about gun control.
O‘DONNELL: But the president didn‘t worry about the reviews.
THOMAS ROBERTS, MSNBC ANCHOR: President Obama is selling his mandate.
O‘DONNELL: His speech was aimed at the middle, the political middle, the middle of the country, and the middle class.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The president‘s State of the Union speech last night was directed at the center of the country.
TAMRON HALL, MSNBC ANCHOR: He‘s en route to Wisconsin promoting his economic agenda.
CHRIS JANSING, NBC NEWS: A state he won easily in 2008, but saw a turn sharply to the GOP in the midterms.
CHRIS TODD, NBC NEWS: It‘s called a swing state, Chris. It‘s pretty obvious there.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We first stopped by this, where we are now, Orion. It‘s a company that focuses on renewable energy.
O‘DONNELL: As the president pushes a plan of optimism and growth through innovation—
OBAMA: This is our generation‘s Sputnik moment.
O‘DONNELL: -- there‘s also reaction to the Republican plan—prosperity through budget cuts.
REP. PAUL RYAN ®, WISCONSIN: All this new government spending was sold as investment. Endless borrowing is not a strategy.
SCARBOROUGH: I think Paul did OK.
RYAN: They believe government needs to increase its size and its reach.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We may not like his solution, but at least he‘s led.
CHRIS MATTHEWS, “HARDBALL” HOST: The president and the loony tunes.
MITCHELL: Republicans delivered not one but two responses to the president‘s speech.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It‘s not Michele Bachmann‘s response to the State of the Union people are talking about, it‘s this.
O‘DONNELL: What was up with that?
JANSING: Where was her producer? Why was she looking off-camera?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Balloon head. Balloon head.
SCARBOROUGH: What was she doing looking at the wrong camera?
MATTHEWS: I call her a balloon head for a reason.
SCARBOROUGH: Who looks at the wrong camera? Who looks at the wrong camera?
(END VIDEOTAPE)
O‘DONNELL: Good evening from New York. I‘m Lawrence O‘Donnell.
Today, President Obama reiterated his State of the Union call for a new Sputnik moment in America by visiting Wisconsin where a piece of the Soviet satellite Sputnik crashed nearly 50 years ago. The visit to the 2012 battleground state included quick tours of renewable energy plants, part of the president‘s return to campaign-style events, emphasizing innovation and competitiveness.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
OBAMA: In this new and challenging time, when America is facing tougher competition from countries around the world than ever before, we‘ve got to up our game. We‘re going to need to go all in. We‘re going to need to get serious about winning the future.
Now, the words of the man that the Super Bowl trophy is named after has something to say about winning. He said, “There is no room for second place. There‘s only one place in my game and that‘s first place.”
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O‘DONNELL: “New York Times” blogger and polling analyst, Nate Silver, described Obama‘s new rhetorical battle plan as smart, safe, centrist, vague, and optimistic.
But at least one part of his message is getting panned by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, who took offense to the president‘s promise to veto any bill that includes any earmark.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. HARRY REID (D-NV), MAJORITY LEADER: This is a applause line, it‘s an effort of the White House to get more power. They‘ve got enough power as it is.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O‘DONNELL: The Obama administration is betting that their fiscally responsible pro-future message will play well in Middle America, in contrast to the Republicans‘ constant warnings of impending disaster.
Meanwhile, back at the White House, David Axelrod met with representatives of what Robert Gibbs has called the “Professional Left,” including bloggers from “The Huffington Post,” the Center for American Progress, and “Daily Kos,” presumably to reassure them that the president is not ignoring their issues as he tries to reach swing voters.
Joining me now are: Richard Wolffe, author of “Revival: The Struggle for the Survival Inside the Obama White House”; Ari Berman, author of “Herding Donkeys: The Fight to Rebuild the Democratic Party and Reshape American Politics”; and Nate Silver, columnist for FiveThirtyEight blog on “The New York Times.”
Ari, you were in that White House meeting today with the so-called “Professional Left.” What did David Axelrod have to say? A nation awaits.
ARI BERMAN, AUTHOR, “HERDING DONKEYS”: I was honored to be a member of that esteemed “Professional Left” club, Lawrence. Axelrod was very positive about the speech, as you would expect, and I think he felt like the progressives in the party would like the speech too. That there was something for everyone in terms of what Obama said. He gave the new Democrats technology, he gave labor and progressives infrastructure, he gave the education reformers and the conservatives a lot of on education.
But Axelrod felt like the message of pro-growth, the growth message of Obama, of investing in the future and investing in jobs was something that they could contrast very favorably with the Republican plan, which is all just cut, cut, cut. And there was a lot of worry among progressives going into the speech that Obama would embrace austerity politics head-on.
He didn‘t do that. He did a delicate dance where he said, I‘ll do some of that, but I‘m also going to fight for some forward-leaning policies on the economy that I can contrast with the GOP. So, far from being super conciliatory, I actually think we‘re headed towards a pretty interesting showdown on the budget in the few weeks from what David Axelrod told us.
O‘DONNELL: Ari, how‘d it go over in the room? How did this presentation get received by you and others there?
BERMAN: Well, the first question was from Bill Scher of the Campaign for America‘s Future, and he basically thanked David Axelrod for essentially the fact that the president did not put Social Security cuts on the table. They were happy with the fact that Social Security was something that Obama said he was going to strengthen, not undermine. And so, that was one of the major worries going into the speech.
Quite frankly, the expectations from the progressive community, from the so-called, quote-unquote, “Professional Left” was relatively low going into Obama‘s speech. So, when he talked about these investments, when he talked about spending money to create more jobs, when he talked about firming up Social Security and resisting the most draconian cuts, those were things that went over well with the people in this room today.
O‘DONNELL: Richard Wolffe, who tricked who here? Did Ari and what the White House thinks of as the “Professional Left” get faked out ahead of time by thinking that there was any chance at all that this would be the first president of the United States who stood up there at a State of the Union address and said, “I‘m going to cut Medicare and I‘m going to cut Social Security”?
I mean, here it sounds like, Ari—and we‘re going to come back to you, Ari, on this—it sounds like Ari and company are giving the White House credit for not doing something that I would bet they weren‘t going to do anyway.
RICHARD WOLFFE, MSNBC POLITICAL ANALYST: Right. Well, it‘s always been about expectations, isn‘t it? And expectations, I would say, of many progressives, including many people who blog, were maybe way too high in the first couple of years. On the other hand, they were maybe too low through the end of the Congress and maybe they‘re still too low now.
You know, this is clearly a president who has put a lot of points on the board for a lot of long-held Democratic dreams. And one thing that has motivated and energized the left broadly is the prospect of this fierce battle that is raging now and will for the next two years against Republicans. There is nothing that partisans like more than the two sides going up against each other.
So, having a confident, resurgent, revived president going ahead with these better poll numbers, better economic numbers and taking on some Republicans and offering a different agenda is a good thing.
But on the other hand, they aren‘t the audience here. The audience here was the center ground, the independents who have really come back to him strongly in the last couple of months. And most of this speech was an argument for bipartisanship. It was an economic argument for bipartisanship, just as Tucson was a moral argument for bipartisanship.
That‘s what independents want to hear, and those really are the target audience.
O‘DONNELL: Nate Silver, you said the president‘s speech was safe and vague. I said here last night that I thought it was vague. I was sitting here trying to underline specific policy proposals and there were a lot of blank pages in terms of my underlining.
Was it safe because it was vague?
NATE SILVER, FIVETHIRTYEIGHT BLOG: Yes, I think. I mean, if you look at specific items, like what the public this is about Obama against Republicans on the deficit, for example, his numbers aren‘t as good as they are when you just look at overall favorability and personality, that kind of thing.
So, you know, I think because he has now a 50-something percent approval rating and not a 40 percent, he can kind of be safe and maybe start to do a slow, slow walk until 2012 -- because he can‘t really pass any major Democratic initiatives, because Republicans don‘t want to pass very much themselves and couldn‘t anyway with the Democrats having the senate. I mean, his job in some ways is a lot easier now and he has nothing much to do politically apart from start to plan for 2012, no matter how much he‘ll deny that‘s what‘s taking place.
O‘DONNELL: Ari, the president said he wanted a strengthen Social Security. Now, that is a phrase that people use when they want to strengthen it by doing things like increasing the retirement age slightly, so that the fund will stay solvent for a longer period of time, or reducing the COLAs, the cost of living increases in the Social Security, or increasing the taxes that go into the Social Security fund. So, strengthen is a word that can be interpreted a lot of ways. He said he would not slash benefits, Social Security benefits.
But might he—and I asked this question last night—might that mean that he would trim them just a little bit?
BERMAN: That didn‘t come up over the course of the meeting with Axelrod. It wasn‘t like we were high-fiving him. I mean, the mood in the room was cautiously optimistic, but they made very clear in that meeting that when their new budget comes out as a result of this spending freeze, there are going to have to be a lot of significant cuts. And it could be a situation where in a few weeks, the so-called “Professional Left” will be howling because of these budget cuts.
I mean, there needs to be a lot more details. It was a vague speech. I think people liked the fact that there was a forward-looking narrative ton economy that has been somewhat missing in the past year, but nonetheless, there are a lot of specifics that we have not seen yet. And I think once we see that, people will start to react.
O‘DONNELL: Ari, on specifics, when they‘re talking about a spending freeze, did David Axelrod unravel the riddle of how you can have a spending freeze and increase all those spending items that the president said he wanted to increase spending on?
BERMAN: No, and the fact is, they didn‘t really make it clear. Axelrod really didn‘t make it clear how they‘re planning to get these spending increases through. Now, there‘s a Republican House. This is probably a nonstarter.
That‘s why I think there‘s an element of political positioning here, because the president wants to lay out these policies that he believes in. He wants the Republicans to lay out their own policies, and then he wants to have a debate on it. Axelrod said, well, the American people will then have a debate about this.
And they view this as a favorable debate. Maybe they can get some stuff through the Congress and work to their benefit in terms of legislation. But if they don‘t get it, though, it gives them a perfect platform to go around the country and make the case and start laying the groundwork for a strong message in a re-election campaign in 2012.
O‘DONNELL: Richard, jumping off what Ari just said, is that the next move? Does the White House think—look, our job is done now, we can go out and do these campaign-style tours, while we wait for the Republicans to come forward from the House of Representatives with their budget in which they will slash spending, as they have promise that had will do, and allow that budget to arrive with the unpopularity that the president believes it will arrive?
WOLFFE: They don‘t think their job is done. They think they‘ve laid a foundation and they‘re in a better position now than they‘ve been for a very long time, maybe since the first sort of quarter of the presidency.
But what they are looking forward to is seeing Republican specifics, because this is a staring game. You know, who blinks first here?
When the Republicans come up with specifics as opposed to the rhetoric, what are they going to cut? Everyone knows—you don‘t have to be a polling genius to know that the spending specifics, the cutting specifics are deeply unpopular.
And by the way, there is a model here for what the Republicans are trying to do, or are wanting to do, and that‘s the conservative government in London. The conservative-led government in London has come in with austerity package, pushed all the same scary buttons, and what‘s happened to economic growth there is that it‘s slowed sharply.
So, you can feel good and tough and macho about dealing with long-term deficits, but there is a short-term economic challenge that every voter in this country knows about and Republicans have got this difficult position now where they‘re going to have to move from the rhetoric to actual specifics. That‘s a political game that the White House is kind of relishing.
O‘DONNELL: Nate Silver, the very first stop the president makes after the State of the Union address is the state of Wisconsin.
SILVER: Sure.
O‘DONNELL: Was that a calculation made out of a policy notion that they want to advance, or was that a calculation made out of looking at the Electoral College map?
SILVER: Well, if you look at the states that he ticked up during the speech last night—I mean, all swing states, you know, Wisconsin, and Michigan, and North Carolina and so forth.
I mean, you know, that Upper Midwest region is so important. It‘s also where one of the biggest swings took place between 2008 and 2010, and that‘s where elections are won and lost. If Obama wins most of those states in the Upper Midwest, then Republicans definitely don‘t have a plausible map towards 270. And it‘s also where, you know, obviously, unemployment was quite profound, too.
So, he‘s going to be spending a lot of time there. You know, it‘s kind of his home region as well. So, it‘s not a coincidence at all—of course not.
O‘DONNELL: Richard Wolffe of MSNBC, Ari Berman, author of “Hurting Donkeys,” and Nate Silver with “The New York Times”—thank you all for joining me tonight.
SILVER: Thank you, Lawrence.
WOLFFE: Thanks, Lawrence.
O‘DONNELL: Paul Ryan‘s Republican plan to balance the budget doesn‘t actually balance the budget for nearly 50 years. Oh, yes, and it adds more than $60 trillion to the national debt. Why don‘t the message and the math add up? I‘m joined by Ezra Klein next.
And Meghan McCain gets tonight‘s “Spotlight.” She‘ll react to last night‘s State of the Union and the Republican Party‘s dueling responses.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
O‘DONNELL: Members of the Republican Party like to claim they‘re fiscally conservative. So, why are some ling up behind a budget plan that doesn‘t balance the budget for decades and adds trillions to the deficit? That‘s the roadmap for America‘s future laid out by Republican Paul Ryan last night.
And later, Mayor Michael Bloomberg announces a push to strengthen gun control laws and the NRA sharpens its attack on the mayor. That‘s in tonight‘s “Rewrite.”
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
O‘DONNELL: Last night, President Obama and Republican respondent Congressman Paul Ryan waged the debate on how to solve the debt crisis and the definition of “investment.”
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. PAUL RYAN ®, WISCONSIN: Whether sold as stimulus or repackaged as investment, their actions show they want a federal government that controls too much, taxes too much, and spends too much in order to do too much. And during the last two years, that is exactly what we have gotten, along with record deficits and debt, to the point where the president is now urging Congress to increase the debt limit.
Endless borrowing is not a strategy. Spending cuts have to come first.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O‘DONNELL: Ryan waxed philosophical about the role of government.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RYAN: We believe government‘s role is both vital and limited, to defend the nation from attack and provide for the common defense, to ensure domestic tranquility and equal opportunity. And to provide a safety net—to help provide a safety net for those who cannot provide for themselves.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O‘DONNELL: Congressman Ryan‘s budget plan is a 629-page bill that has won him praise from pundit who is appreciate Ryan‘s rare willingness to be specific about budget cuts, but has been condemned by most experts who have actually read it.
Nobel Prize-winning economist Paul Krugman calls it a fraud that makes no useful debate over America‘s fiscal future.
Joining me now, someone else who‘s read the Ryan plan, MSNBC contributor, Ezra Klein.
Ezra, thanks for joining us tonight.
EZRA KLEIN, MSNBC CONTRIBUTOR: Good evening, Lawrence.
O‘DONNELL: Ezra, I want to play you something else that Congressman Ryan said last night.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RYAN: Our forthcoming budget is our obligation to you, to show you how we would do things differently, how we will cut spending to get the down, help create jobs in prosperity, and reform government programs. If we act soon, and if we act responsibly, people in and near retirement will be protected.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O‘DONNELL: Ezra, protected from what?
KLEIN: It‘s a good question. So, the guide we have is Paul Ryan‘s roadmap. That‘s the long goal we were talking about a moment ago.
And the GOP has run from this. They love Paul Ryan because he‘s the guy with the plan. He‘s got great credibility from pundits for being willing to make at least some specific decisions about what he would like to do to Medicare and Social Security.
But for making those decisions, for saying that the way he will control cost is to not pay for the full amount seniors need to get Medicare, the GOP is terrified of his actual bill. So, they‘ve got him out there. He‘s not allowed to mention his bill in these events. He didn‘t mention Medicare, didn‘t mention Social Security, didn‘t mention the roadmap last night.
And we‘re sort of getting a lot of hinting about what it will look like when they actually have to sit down and write a budget. And nobody knows yet, they‘ve not said.
O‘DONNELL: Ad he has been given unique authority in the House of Representatives, something we‘ve never seen anybody else had. I mean, I don‘t know how to say this in a way that we‘ll be understood out there—but he seems to have individual authority to write what they call a budget resolution, which normally would take a few committees to get together to do and then the House would be bound by it.
So, he‘s going to be in a unique position. They‘re investing all this authority in someone who they don‘t trust, it sounds like. They don‘t trust him politically. They think he could scare off the entire state of Florida with a couple of well-placed sentences.
KLEIN: Well, he certainly—he certainly could, but this is where I would part with you. They do trust him.
The thing Paul Ryan is above all is a good soldier. And he‘s been playing a tough double game.
Number one, he‘s coming to pundits and saying, look, I‘m cutting Medicare here. I‘m doing something terrifying to seniors. I‘m cutting—
I‘m privatizing a lot of Social Security. And they sort of go, clap, clap, that‘s impressive you‘re saying that. But when the Republican Party trots him out and they tell him what to say, he says it every time.
So, you‘re completely right. Paul—the budget level, the amount the government can spend according to the House of Representatives, although the Senate won‘t agree and the president won‘t agree, is essentially what Paul Ryan says it is.
But Paul Ryan has proven to them that he will walk in lockstep with the House GOP. He will not run off on his own and say, you know what, we need to make tough choices and you guys aren‘t making them. If the Republicans decide not to make tough choices, Paul Ryan, I predict, will be right there not making them with him.
O‘DONNELL: Since Paul Ryan is not allowed to tell us what his Medicare plan is anymore—what is it, Ezra?
KLEIN: So, there‘s a shell game here. He says his Medicare plan is essentially voucherizing it. You get instead of a Medicare program a check and you go by a private insurance plan that will be called and certified by Medicare.
But that‘s not how controls cost. The way it controls cost is right now Medicare just pays for what you need covered. It pays for your health care.
Under his plan, you get a check and that check doesn‘t grow as quickly as the cost of health care does. So, soon enough, you‘re getting a check that covers 70 percent of the insurance plan you need, 60 percent of the insurance plan you need. That is one way to control cost. And so, it‘s a legitimate debate to have to just set a global budget and we pay for what‘s in the budget and seniors can figure out how to pay for the rest of it beyond that.
But it is not the magic solution. And it is the thing that
Republicans love to attack Democrats for. As Ryan has said in an interview with me, it is a form of rationing—in this case, rationing by income.
O‘DONNELL: And I think that‘s a very respectful description of it, Ezra, because I would add the point that one of the reasons we needed Medicare is that there really was no private insurance market for people 65 and older, because their insurance—their health costs are so high. You can‘t possibly write an insurance policy that a 92-year-old could purchase, at any cost. There would be no number at which an insurance company would be willing to sell it. And that‘s why we have Medicare.
Ryan is saying, I‘m going to give you a voucher to buy a product that the companies won‘t even be able to sell you.
KLEIN: You can if you‘re willing to pay enough. We got a Medicare right now, the Medicare Advantage program and it costs about 119 percent of what Medicare does. So, to get a private plan in Medicare right now, you have to pay, depending where you are, between 15 and 20 percent more than - - or the government pays on your behalf, 15 to 20 percent more than what Medicare does.
What Medicare does, it is about 20 percent to 30 percent usually cheaper than comparable private insurance, and the reason is because you can bargain down cost. Private insurance is not as able as you say to cover these people. And so, what‘s going to happen, if experience is any guide, is those plans will cost more. So, on the one hand, you‘ll be getting less to pay for them. On the other hand, they‘ll be more expensive because frankly, as we see in this country and as we see in other countries, a big government bargain is able to bring cost down more than private insurers are.
So, you can do it. It‘s just going to be more expensive. And when people begin facing up to the numbers in this plan, I think there‘s going to be some real concern about where grandmother‘s going to get her health care in 40 years.
O‘DONNELL: Next time, Ezra, we‘re going to get to his Social Security idea, which absolutely wipes out the program as we know it, which is why Senator Bernie Sanders wants to bring all of this to a vote in the Senate. He believes Republicans will run away from it.
Ezra Klein of “The Washington Post”—thank you very much for joining us tonight.
KLEIN: Thank you.
O‘DONNELL: Coming up: Meghan McCain on last night‘s State of the Union, which actually turned into prom night on Capitol Hill. Will the newfound civility last beyond the first date?
And later, THE LAST WORD on who or what was to blame for Michele Bachmann‘s weird camera problems during her Tea Party response last night.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
O‘DONNELL: Doctors continue to marvel at Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords‘ recovery. They say her neurological condition is improving at, quote, “lightning speed” for a brain injury. She‘s now at a Houston rehabilitation center where her treatment will continue.
The shooting happened in Arizona, home to Meghan McCain, who has been speaking out against nasty partisan rhetoric for months. Does she believe people will finally listen? Meghan McCain is in the Spotlight tonight.
And later, a LAST WORD investigation into exactly what went wrong with the cameras that caused Michele Bachmann‘s big moment to become a big joke.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
O‘DONNELL: In tonight‘s Spotlight, my guest Meghan McCain, who was calling for toning down the political rhetoric in this country months before the attack in Tucson. Back in November, Meghan McCain wrote, “as Republicans, we cannot risk heightening this cultural war to a higher level than it is already. It is not just the liberal elites versus the real American Republicans. It is now becoming a war within the Republican party itself about what kind of people we want leading the party. This type of rhetoric will continue to alienate and stereotype Republicans that don‘t pass cultural purity tests. We are watching the old-fashioned spirit of the Republican party that once served us so well abused for the purpose of clever talking points.”
Tonight, we welcome Meghan McCain back to THE LAST WORD. She‘s a columnist for “The Daily Beast” and is also the author of “Dirty, Sexy Politics.”
Meghan, thank you very much for joining me again.
MEGHAN MCCAIN, “THE DAILY BEAST”: Thank you so much for having me on, Lawrence.
O‘DONNELL: Meghan, what did you make of prom night? You‘ve watched an awful lot of State of the Union Addresses. I‘m sure your father has told you stories about what it‘s like being down there on the floor with his colleagues in that very partisan evening that it always used to be, with people clapping or not clapping at the right moment.
It was a really unusual sight, wasn‘t it?
MCCAIN: It was. It definitely toned down the clapping and the applause. I don‘t think that the State of the Union should necessarily be about who can get the most cheers.
So I thought it was nice. I enjoyed following on Twitter what the congressmen and the pundits were saying. And there were a lot of jokes about prom night that I enjoyed. I think it was good and definitely a very metaphorical thing to do.
O‘DONNELL: Now I just saw that shot of your father sitting beside John Kerry. Were they a date, those two Navy guys?
MCCAIN: Yeah, they both are Navy guys. I think he sat with him and Mr. Udall. So a little bipartisan grouping there.
O‘DONNELL: Meghan, to Arizona, to Tucson, what was it like for you to hear that news that Saturday that your home state had flared up in this awful way?
MCCAIN: I was actually in Arizona when it happened. And it was just scary and tragic and people didn‘t really know what was going on. And I think for all Americans, it was just shocking. And although it is a wake-up call for what‘s going on in this country, I don‘t think that the shootings were necessarily politically motivated.
O‘DONNELL: But when you thought about the things that you‘d said in the past about the heightening of political rhetoric, did you feel, certainly, that after the fact of this, this was a time for changing the political rhetoric, as most did, toning it down, and trying to go forward, rhetorically anyway, with a different style?
MCCAIN: Yeah, although I think it was a tragedy, I think it was a catalyst for this king of discussion. It is something that I‘ve been talking about for months and years. And obviously I‘m glad that people are finally coming to the forefront and really recognizing that this polarizing rhetoric is really damaging our country in many different ways.
O‘DONNELL: Now, Michele Bachmann gave this second response to the State of the Union Address last night. That seems to be what you were talking about months ago when you were saying in that thing that we quoted at the beginning about how there are these different people who are just using their platforms to their own personal advantage, rather than thinking about what it means for the party.
Wasn‘t that kind of exactly your worst dream come true, that someone like Michele Bachmann would stand up after the designated Republican giving the response to the State of the Union Address, and come up with her own response?
MCCAIN: Yes. I think it‘s important to note that Michele Bachmann is not a leader and she is not the leader of the Republican party. Michele Bachmann, in my opinion, is no better than a poor man‘s Sarah Palin. And I think the fact that MSNBC and Fox elected not to run this is admirable to the kind of journalism Fox and MSNBC is airing.
I think CNN should be ashamed of themselves for airing this. It is one rogue woman who couldn‘t even look into the camera directly. I take none of it seriously. And I think if the Tea Party wants to put a candidate up to give a response, why don‘t they have someone like Rand Paul, who was elected on the Tea Party platform, give that?
O‘DONNELL: Now with all this new talk about gun control, it‘s actually about ammunition control these days, and the size of those clips you can use in automatic handguns. I want to play for you what Dick Cheney said last week about this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DICK CHENEY, FMR. VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I would certainly be willing to listen to ideas. I‘ve always been a gun advocate. Obviously had a strong voting record on behalf of the Second Amendment.
That‘s just what I believe.
And whether or not there‘s some measure there of limiting the size of the magazine you can buy to go with a semiautomatic, we‘ve had that in place before.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O‘DONNELL: That struck me as a big moment, that Dick Cheney would say, it‘s time to reconsider whether we should limit those magazines. We had that restriction in place before. I think what he is, in effect, saying is it didn‘t exactly hurt the Second Amendment to have that in place for ten years.
Is that the kind of territory that reasonable Republicans should be moving to now?
MCCAIN: Yes. And I also am a gun advocate and an NRA member. But I think this discussion about magazines is a notable one, because really when you‘re talking about things like this, it really doesn‘t affect the Second Amendment rights. It‘s not talking about the way to bear arms. It‘s talking about how a gun is going to be used. And in this case, obviously, it was used to kill a little girl.
And anyone that knows anything about this, you can basically fire off I think it‘s 36 rounds in one gun. And I think that obviously it‘s a discussion that should be taking place. I think with gun rights, it often goes way far to the left and people get freaked out that we‘re trying to have our Second Amendment rights taken away. And I just don‘t think that‘s the case.
O‘DONNELL: I mean, you‘re I think much better connected to that kind of voter than I am. I‘m just wondering, what is your sense of how many—what proportion of Republican voters would be single issue voters on this, by which I mean if a Republican were to come out and say, I‘d like to limit those magazines so that you can only fire ten bullets, but I would also like to limit your tax bracket to 35 percent at the top or to 28 percent in the middle—
I mean, would a Republican voter look at that and go, oh, no, no, you can‘t—you have to go along with me on guns as well as taxes? You can‘t vary from my thinking at all?
MCCAIN: No, I think there are a lot of reasonable republicans out there that would necessarily vote—I certainly don‘t vote on one issue when I‘m deciding my elected leaders. I think what‘s important is that there‘s a lot of violence that‘s continuing to go on in this country, but it‘s not necessarily guns that are doing this. It‘s crazy people.
And we really need to analyze how someone who could go to college at University in Tucson and have teachers complain about what kind of student he was still fall through the cracks and still do this.
O‘DONNELL: Meghan, do you think there is a possibility now, with the Republicans in control of the House of Representatives in divided government, where they will be, in effect, forced at some point to move into some sort of real negotiating with Senate Democrats or the White House to try to get something done this year and next year, that it can‘t simply be because they have control of the House, a party of no as they have been in the past?
And by the way, politically very successful as a minority party of no.
That‘s worked for Democrats too when they‘ve been in the minority.
MCCAIN: Well, I certainly hope it won‘t be a lame-duck session. There‘s a lot to be done. There‘s a lot that‘s going on. We‘re in a fiscal crisis. So I certainly hope that we can all come together. There will always be a few senators that won‘t be able to meet in the middle on both sides. This isn‘t just a one-party issue.
And I really hope this theme of civility continues. You can only hope that the platform that we‘re going on will continue and that people in politics will see the kind of damage that‘s being done by partisan politics.
O‘DONNELL: Meghan McCain, thank you very much for returning to THE
LAST WORD.
MCCAIN: Thank you for having me, Lawrence.
O‘DONNELL: Coming up, who exactly was Michele Bachmann talking to last night during her State of the Union response? THE LAST WORD tech team has discovered what went wrong with the congresswoman‘s camera.
And the NRA political director compares Mayor Michael Bloomberg‘s push for stricter gun control laws to his management of New York City snow removal. That director gets tonight‘s Rewrite.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
O‘DONNELL: Time for tonight‘s Rewrite. While President Obama made no mention of gun or ammunition control in his State of the Union Address last night, a small but influential number of politicians, including Dick Cheney, are talking about common sense reform. One of them, as we showed you on Monday, New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg.
At a press conference in Manhattan, he called for Congress to tighten existing laws and require background checks for all guns sold in the United States. Along with the mayor, 34 victims of gun violence -- 34 because that‘s the number of American killed every day in the United States by a gun.
And of course, the most successful lobbying group in the history of lobbying, the National Rifle Association, was quick to respond. The group‘s political director, Chuck Cunningham, while repeatedly referring to Mayor Bloomberg as “Mayor Blame” said, “he likes to blame everyone else for violent crime in New York City. He‘s also blamed Mother Nature for his recent problems with snow removal. He‘s not after illegal guns. He‘s after your guns. And that‘s a real snow job.”
Funny guy, Chuck Cunningham. Here‘s what Chuck Cunningham‘s NRA propaganda machine doesn‘t want you to know. In the years since New York City officials started cracking down on illegal guns and violent crime, the murder rate in New York City has fallen drastically.
In 1990, 2,262 murders. A decade later, 629, down 73 percent in ten years. And last year, Mayor Bloomberg got the number down to 536. In the nine years that Michael Bloomberg has been mayor, nine New York City police officers have been killed in the line of duty by guns. Nine, which is still nine too many.
But compare that to 1980, when crime was rampant in New York City, and ten NYPD officers were killed by gunfire in just one year.
So here‘s what Chuck Cunningham should have said: “Mayor Michael Bloomberg has a proven track record of accomplishment in reducing gun violence in his city. We at the NRA are devoted to responsible use of firearms. And though we may not agree with him on every point, we appreciate the mayor‘s wisdom and experience in this area.”
Chuck Cunningham‘s choice to joke about Mayor Bloomberg and illegal guns in the aftermath of the Tucson massacre proves once again that Chuck Cunningham and his employer, the heartless, brainless National Rifle Association, have chosen as their mission not guaranteeing the right to bear arms, because the Constitution already guarantees that, but the right to bear sorrow.
Indeed, they guarantee us the need to bear sorrow so enormous after events like the Tucson massacre that the president of the United States must fly to the scene, take to the presidential pulpit, and lead the country in prayer for a safer future that the blood-drenched lobbyists of the NRA refuse to allow us.
Christina Taylor Green is not the last nine-year-old girl who will give her life thanks to the work of Chuck Cunningham and NRA lobbyists. Surely, some of them must have children, daughters. Chuck, do you have a nine-year-old daughter? The next massacre delivered by a high-capacity ammunition magazine filled with 22-cent bullets easily purchased by a madman, be it at a college like Virginia Tech or a Safeway parking lot like the one where Gabby Giffords last stood, will once again leave its victims in pools of blood.
And the stricken families and communities of this nation will continue to struggle to find a way to bear that sorrow.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
O‘DONNELL: If you did not see eye to eye with Congresswoman Michele Bachmann on her Tea Party rebuttal to the president‘s State of the Union Address last night, you were not alone.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. MICHELE BACHMANN ®, MINNESOTA: The Tea Party is a dynamic force for good in our national conversation. And it‘s an honor for me to speak with you.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O‘DONNELL: While it may have appeared that Congresswoman Bachmann was looking at the wrong camera, just slightly off, that wasn‘t exactly the case. She was looking into the camera of the Tea Party Express, the group that invited her to respond to the State of the Union. They were live streaming the response on their website.
We would now love to show you the shot of her looking into the correct camera, but the Tea Party Express won‘t release it. It was the image from a second camera, the pool camera for the National News Networks, that we showed you last night, which then provoked TV moments like this one.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
O‘DONNELL: We‘re not quite sure who to blame for this, but she did look at the wrong camera throughout her speech. Joining me now, President Obama‘s senior adviser, David Axelrod. David, thank you very much for making the time to join us tonight.
DAVID AXELROD, WHITE HOUSE SENIOR ADVISE: Am I looking at the right camera?
O‘DONNELL: You are. You‘re doing just fine. We only have one, so you can‘t get that wrong.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O‘DONNELL: Joining me now, White House correspondent for “Politics Daily,” Alex Wagner. Alex, the old two-camera trick.
ALEX WAGNER, “POLITICS DAILY”: The old two-camera trick.
O‘DONNELL: Who‘s been fired? Who pointed to the wrong camera for her last night?
WAGNER: Some poor intern, I hope. All I know, Lawrence, is that the whole time I was watching her, I was sort of sliding slowly to the left in the hopes that somehow we could make eye contact. No such luck.
O‘DONNELL: You know, I have a room full of cameras here. And I feel like this could happen to me at any moment. In fact, we‘re going to do a shot right now to show you just how easy it is. There are two cameras in this studio that are right beside each other.
Now, as long as I‘m talking into this one, it looks like I‘m doing the right thing, going right to the audience. But if my Tea Party staff told me to talk to this camera that is right here, and I went dutifully to that camera for my entire speech, I would be just that far off.
And there‘s about the maximum of a foot separating these two cameras that throw off the whole image. So it‘s—I want forgiveness now, Alex, for when it happens to me, because I know it‘s going to happen to me. But it seems like politically the worst decision of the night was Michele Bachmann doing this at all, wasn‘t it?
WAGNER: Absolutely. And when you talk about disconnect, it wasn‘t just visually. There are other things she was doing that undermined her position. There was this weird sort of QVC-ish vibe that she was giving off. There was a lot of this hand movement. You almost expected the limited edition Isaac Mizrahi bath mat to be on sale somewhere in the back.
And here she is talking about a really bleak economic picture and laying the lion‘s share of the blame on President Obama. And I think when you‘re talking about grave matters in that fashion, your body language and certainly your eye contact should be in lockstep with that.
O‘DONNELL: Now, Paul Ryan spent almost as much time or just about the same amount of time talking about Gabby Giffords as President Obama did. Paul Ryan was wearing one of those ribbons in memory, in honor of Gabby Giffords. Michele Bachmann didn‘t wear the ribbon and forgot to mention Gabby Giffords in her speech.
Was she about maybe the only member of Congress who could have done that?
WAGNER: Yeah. I was actually watching—I was in the gallery that night and I was watching Michele Bachmann. And it was like watching a honing pigeon sort of trying to figure out where the epicenter of power was. Even when Obama came into the room, you could almost see her leaping over aisles of chairs to get closer to him.
I think the Giffords thing is certainly one thing. But say what you will about Paul Ryan and his remarks; he was a bit more magnanimous in terms of where we are right now and the difficulties facing America. Michele Bachmann squarely laid the blame on President Obama. And even on points where she seemed to agree with him, which is the idea that America has to go back to a manufacturing economy and that we‘re an exceptional country and we need to reform our tax codes, you know, she didn‘t give him any credit. And those are points he brought up in his own State of the Union.
O‘DONNELL: Now, John Boehner said about Michele Bachmann, “I didn‘t see it” and just kind of walked away from giving any comment. Let‘s listen to what Meghan McCain just said on this program. I think it‘s representative of a very sharp Republican criticism of Michele Bachmann.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MCCAIN: I think it‘s important to note that Michele Bachmann is not a leader. And she‘s not the leader of the Republican party. Michele Bachmann, in my opinion, is no better than a poor man‘s Sarah Palin. And I think the fact that MSNBC and Fox elected not to run this is admiral to the kind of journalism Fox and MSNBC is airing. I think CNN should be ashamed of themselves for airing this.
It is one rogue woman who couldn‘t even look into the camera directly. And I take none of it seriously. And I think if the Tea Party wants to put a candidate up to give a response, why don‘t they have someone like Rand Paul, who was elected on the Tea Party platform, give that?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O‘DONNELL: I didn‘t roll that again, Alex, just to hear the MSNBC compliment. But she is leveling a pretty hard hit on Michele Bachmann. And I don‘t hear anyone defending Michele Bachmann, on the Republican side.
WAGNER: You hear crickets, is what you hear. And I think it‘s evidence of the fracture that we are seeing within the Republican party. Look, if you look down the barrel to what‘s happening with the budget, there‘s definitely a cleave between the establishment Republican party and the Tea Partiers, who are much more—they‘re much more firebrand. They‘re much more gung ho about being really aggressive with budgetary cuts.
And I think the other side of the Republican party understands that some parts of the budget, namely entitlement programs, are political Kryptonite and you cannot touch them. And I think the sort of behavior and the attitude towards Michele Bachmann is evidence of the frustration that those parts of the Republican party have with the Tea Party.
O‘DONNELL: Alex Wagner of “Politics Daily,” thank you for covering the poor man‘s Sarah Palin segment for us tonight.
WAGNER: Thanks, Lawrence.
O‘DONNELL: That‘s tonight‘s LAST WORD. You can have THE LAST WORD by going to our blog, TheLastWord.MSNBC.com.
“THE RACHEL MADDOW” show is up next. Hi Rachel.
RACHEL MADDOW, MSNBC ANCHOR: Hey, Lawrence. Thank you. And thanks to you at home for staying with us for the next hour. We begin with the president of the United States addressing the nation and calling for a massive investment in this country‘s infrastructure, rebuffing the idea of giant tax breaks for the richest Americans, and warning anyone who would dare touch Social Security to keep their hands off.
You want to talk about red meat for the base? Listen to some of the language the president used.
END
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