'The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell' for Tuesday, April 1st, 2014

THE LAST WORD WITH LAWRENCE O`DONNELL>
April 1, 2014

Guest: Howard Dean

LAWRENCE O`DONNELL, MSNBC HOST: The White House says they hit their
magic number for enrollments in Obamacare today, and Republicans are no
longer so sure that repealing it is such a great idea.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Sick months ago today,
a big part of the Affordable Care Act kicked in.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Now to the massive surge in health care
enrollment.

OBAMA: Last night, the first open enrollment period under this law
came to an end.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The Affordable Care Act is on track.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Obamacare enrollment topped 7 million.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: To hit or surpass 7 million people.

OBAMA: Seven-point-one million Americans have now signed up.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Is it time for a victory lap?

OBAMA: I want to make sure everybody understands, there will be
additional challenges to implementing this law.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is a major comeback story. A lot of people
obviously had written this off.

REP. PAUL RYAN (R), WISCONSIN: Elections do have consequences. That
means we surrender our principles?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Ryanomics.

RYAN: This is putting up yet again the path to prosperity. The path
to prosperity. A path to prosperity, a responsible balanced budget.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The 2015 edition of Paul Ryan budget will be
released.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Democrats are ready to pounce.

RYAN: By repealing Obamacare, we are basically preventing the
explosion of a program that`s already failing.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The healthcare remains the most divisive issue in
politics today.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You saw kind of a referendum on this in 2012.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Are you saying as part of your budget, you assume
the repeal of Obamacare?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It`s the centerpiece, again, of this budget.

RYAN: Yes.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, that`s not going to happen.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

O`DONNELL: The Affordable Care Act marketplace enrollments surpassed
the 7 million mark today, according to the White House, with "The L.A.
Times" reporting an estimated 9.5 million previously uninsured Americans
now have health insurance through the Affordable Care Act, either from the
exchanges or from the Medicaid expansion or actually from private insurance
purchased outside the exchanges.

The White House released this picture of President Obama as he
received the news that his signature piece of legislation hit its initial
targets ahead of his Rose Garden address today where he questioned the
continued Republican political agenda focused on repealing the Affordable
Care Act.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OBAMA: Why are folks working so hard for people not to have health
insurance? Why are they so mad about the idea of folks having health
insurance?

Many of the tall tales that have been told about this law have been
debunked. There are still no death panels.

(LAUGHTER)

Armageddon has not arrived.

(LAUGHTER)

Instead, this law is helping millions of Americans. The Affordable
Care Act is here to stay.

(APPLAUSE)

And those who have based their entire political agenda on repealing it
have to explain to the country why Jeanie (ph) should go back to being
uninsured.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

O`DONNELL: And President Obama is not the only person today to
question the Republican agenda. Conservative commentators are beginning to
urge their party to move away from the repeal rhetoric with headlines like,
stop waiting for Obamacare to implode.

Conservative Matt Drudge weighed in with this tweet, warning -- if the
Republicans are dumb enough to think they can win on Obamacare alone -- two
words, Terry McAuliffe.

Even FOX News is beginning to lose hope for repealing the Affordable
Care Act.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. TED CRUZ (R), TEXAS: I think it is the essence of pragmatism to
recognize this thing isn`t working, let`s start over, let`s repeal every
word of it.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, you know, you`re kind of in a minority when
it comes to that. I know the Democrats are saying, mend it, don`t
necessarily defend it.

But, you know, you look at the polling, senator, and a lot of
Americans like parts of it, would like to see parts of it continue. So to
blow the whole thing up, I don`t know if people are behind that.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If you look at Obamacare and say, OK, out of the 2
million pages, I like page 1,109, are you going to go through elements of
that and form a new plan to replace it? And where is the Cruz plan?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

O`DONNELL: No, there is no page 1,109.

And in Kentucky, "The Louisville Courier-Journal" reports the
Affordable Care Act has cut that state`s population by more than 40
percent. But still, the senior senator from Kentucky insists that the
Affordable Care Act is bad for Kentucky and bad for America.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. MITCH MCCONNELL (R), KENTUCKY: What we do know is that all
across the country our constituents are having an unpleasant interaction
with Obamacare, whether they can sign up for a policy or not, what they`re
discovering is, of course, higher premiums, higher deductibles. Many of
them are losing their jobs. And so, it is really a catastrophe for the
country.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

O`DONNELL: Joining me now, Dr. Howard Dean, former head of the
Democratic National Committee and former governor of Vermont, and Dr. Zeke
Emanuel, an MSNBC contributor, served as a special adviser for health
policy in the Obama administration.

Howard Dean, there is a new "Washington Post"/ABC News poll showing
support for the Affordable Care Act, finally in a positive zone. Just
barely, do you support or oppose the Affordable Care Act, support, 49
percent, oppose 48 percent.

And so, my guess is, Dr. Dean, it can only go up from there in term of
support, because now, it`s going to have that thing that every big hit
really needs, which is word of mouth. Forget what politicians are telling
you about it. What does your brother tell you about it, what does your
neighbor tell you about it?

HOWARD DEAN, FORMER DNC CHAIRMAN: That`s exactly right. And I think
-- I actually predicted this would happen, and by June, this will be a
positive for Democrats, not a negative.

I think if Mitch McConnell loses, it will be traced back to today,
which ironically is April Fool`s Day. He is basically trashing a program
that has helped literally hundreds of thousands of Kentuckians, and that
piece you just had on, that appears in an Alison Grimes TV ad sometimes
around October 15th.

This thing is going to be a positive for Democrats starting right
today.

O`DONNELL: Zeke Emanuel, there is that problem, though, that not all
of the beneficiaries, not all of those millions of people we just talked
about actually know that they are beneficiaries of the Affordable Care Act,
plenty of these 24-year-olds, for example, who are on their parents` health
insurance policies because the Affordable Care Act don`t know who gets
political credit for that. Many people enrolled in the Medicaid section
under the Affordable Care Act aren`t sure who gets credit for that.

ZEKE EMANUEL, MSNBC CONTRIBUTOR: But that`s an age-old problem about
American government which is we do give these very important benefits to
people and make them think that it`s not the government coming there to
help them.

And I would emphasize one other point, Lawrence, I might take a slight
issue which, at the end of April, early May, we`re going to get rates from
the insurance companies about what the premiums are going to be for the
next open enrollment period, and that is going to be a very crucial time.
They`ve been having some words that there are going to be high rate
increases.

I actually don`t believe them, but it is important to recognize that
that could be a somewhat treacherous thing. I myself have been pretty
optimistic the whole way. I did make a bet in December when it looked very
bleak that we would cross the 7 million threshold. So, I`ll have a very
nice dinner in New York.

But I do think there are potential other pitfalls as the president
recognized.

O`DONNELL: Well, yes, Howard Dean, that this is one of the problems,
is that having legislated in this arena, the Democrats politically now own
everything that happens in healthcare, including those trends that pre-
existed this law, like increasing insurance premiums.

DEAN: Well, Lawrence, they own everything except one pretty big
thing. There are a great many red states where the governor refused to
expand Medicare and Medicaid.

O`DONNELL: Right. Yes.

DEAN: So that means that everybody running in one of those states,
I`d like to see Scott Walker explain, if he wants to run for president, how
he can keep hundreds of thousands of Wisconsinans from getting health
insurance for free. That`s going to be a tough sell.

Rick Perry, running for president, kept millions of Texans, they
already have the highest rate of uninsured people in the whole country --
he kept millions of Texans from getting health insurance, simply out of
spite against the president of the United States. That is going -- we need
to be on offense here, 7.1 million subscribers sounds like a great time to
start offense.

O`DONNELL: Zeke Emanuel, let`s get to some of the basic numbers. The
-- one of the most important is how many of the uninsured are now getting
coverage, because that`s what this legislative endeavor was all about. It
was about bringing coverage to the uninsured. And what does the number
look like there? And how many uninsured have been left behind?

EMANUEL: Well, we have -- if you exclude the undocumented, we have
about 38 million Americans who need insurance, and according to the Rand
Study, around 9.5 million or 10 million people who were previously
uninsured have gotten insurance through staying on their parents` plan,
Medicaid or private insurance in the exchange.

Now, no one expected you would have all 38 million people in the first
year. It takes time for people to understand the system, to understand
that they need health care, to understand how to go about getting it. And
the Congressional Budget Office had the numbers ramping up over three or
four years, reaching steady state in about 2016, 2017.

And I think that`s really where we have to aim it towards, recognizing
that this is going to be a step wise process. It`s not going to happen all
at once. And we do have to prepare for the next enrollment period, which
is November 15. And it`s never too early to prepare. We`re going to have
to upgrade the Web site to make it easier, and probably build some brick
and mortar shops. I mean, those seem to have actually made a big
difference in many places, having a store where people could go in and talk
to someone.

O`DONNELL: But even with full implementation and full funding, the
Affordable Care Act never gets to universal coverage.

EMANUEL: Well, first of all, we don`t know whether it`s going to get
past 96 percent, 97 percent or not. We have projections.

I think what`s surprising is how big a surge there was at the end
here. And remember, we had two months of basically no enrollment at the
start here and yet we crossed the threshold the Congressional Budget Office
projected. It suggests to me that the demand for insurance is a lot
higher, more pent up than most people realized.

And so, I would not be surprised if we surpassed the Congressional
Budget Office suggestion that we`re going to get 4 percent of the
population insured. After all in Massachusetts, they`re beyond 97 percent
and their subsidies aren`t as good as the federal government`s subsidies.

O`DONNELL: Howard Dean, with all your campaign experience and your
authority in this area, what`s your sense of what people are likely to see
in TV ads and congressional campaign, Senate campaigns once we get into the
fall, into the real --

DEAN: This is something Democrats have missed the boat on. There are
an awful lot of Democrats, particularly in red states who are running away
from Obamacare. You can`t run away from a vote that you made. You`re
opponents certainly are not going to let you get away with it and you`re
going to look weak. And one thing people cannot stand in politicians is
weakness.

So, my advice is go out and campaign like crazy on the fact that you
managed to get a whole lot of people health care and beat the daylights out
of the Republicans over the fact that they actually stood in the way and
prevented millions of Americans getting health care, which would have
caused them nothing when they refused to expand Medicaid. I would hit
these guys over the head so hard they`re going to be sorry they ever
brought up Obamacare.

O`DONNELL: Howard Dean and Zeke Emanuel, the doctors, thank you both
for joining me tonight.

DEAN: Thank you.

EMANUEL: Thank you.

O`DONNELL: Coming up, Paul Ryan introduces a new budget plan, and it
is immediately ridiculed. Not by Democrats.

And yesterday, some Republican women celebrated women`s history month
by urging women to get married. Not just because they will be happier when
they get married, but because they`ll vote Republican. Karen Finney has
something to say about that, along with Nicolle Wallace.

And when he`s right, he`s right. And in "The Rewrite" tonight,
another episode of I agree with Bill O`Reilly.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

O`DONNELL: We have breaking news tonight. An enormous earthquake
struck off the coast of northern Chile this evening. Authorities in Peru
and Chile have been evacuating people from coastal areas after an 8.2
magnitude earthquake struck off the coast. The reports are of landslides
and Chile that are blocking some roads. The Chilean navy said an eight-
foot tsunami, eight-foot tsunami wave hit the coast within 45 minutes of
the quake. For context, the tsunami that hit Japan was 130 feet.

A tsunami warning is effect for Chile, Peru, Ecuador, Colombia, and
Panama. There is a tsunami watch for Costa Rica, Nicaragua, El Salvador,
Guatemala, Mexico and Honduras.

Coming up, why are Republicans attacking Paul Ryan`s new budget plan?
Jared Bernstein will join me.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

O`DONNELL: OK, class, who said this about Paul Ryan`s budget? "On
this day, when we celebrate fools, we are once again presented with a
budget by Republicans and asked to believe it is something more than a
political document." Hint: it was not a Democrat.

And who said this? "Ryan`s budget is should be found in the bookstore
in the fiction department." That wasn`t a Democrat either.

That is how Tea Party Republicans reacted to Paul Ryan`s budget today,
which he introduced and which immediately became a campaign document.
Democrats will run against it, Tea Party Republicans will run against it,
and probably no one, including Paul Ryan, will run in favor of it. It is a
budget that eliminates the Affordable Care Act, but still doesn`t cut
spending enough for the Tea Party, even though it ends Medicare as we know
it.

Just when Republicans are realizing that running against the
Affordable Care Act might not get them as far as they want to go, Democrats
now have Paul Ryan`s attack on Medicare to run against, which has instantly
given contracts new hope in the congressional elections.

The editor of the right wing "Breitbart News" was not happy that Paul
Ryan decided to introduce a new budget. He tweeted, "So Paul Ryan plays
Charlie Brown to the media`s Lucy by providing yet another comprehensive
budget for Dems to savage."

Joining me now, Jared Bernstein, a senior fellow at the Center on
Budget and Policy Priorities and an MSNBC analyst.

Jared, here you have Republicans no longer so sure that they should be
running on a repeal Obamacare platform and now the Democrats suddenly have
a document they do want to use in their campaigns, and that is the Paul
Ryan budget.

JARED BERNSTEIN, MSNBC ANALYST: Exactly. You had a good discussion
earlier about the sign-ups. Well, it is ironic that on the day that we got
good news about the Affordable Care Act gaining some momentum in terms of
folks signing up, getting coverage, we have this budget that repeals the
whole thing, and this is not just the exchanges and the subsidies, but this
is the 25, 27 states that have taken the Medicaid expansion as well.

Now, by the way, as if getting rid of the Medicaid expansion isn`t
enough by itself, the budget turns snap or food stamps, as well as the
Medicaid program, the existing Medicare program, into a block grant, which
means you give a fixed sum, a fixed sum of resources to the states and tell
them good luck, deal with this, even if there`s a recession, sorry, can`t
help you. So you`re completing taking the counter-cyclically, the anti-
recessionary component out of those programs.

O`DONNELL: And, Jared, you know, it used to be that politically,
certainly, in election years, members of Congress didn`t put out
politically difficult plan, especially if there was absolutely no chance of
them becoming law and absolutely no chance of getting any kind of
bipartisan support for such a plan. And yet, here, we see Ryan who is now
introducing plans getting trashed by his own right wing.

BERNSTEIN: Right. I mean, it`s kind of curious. And I wrote a piece
about this today, and I quoted Paul Ryan saying something, around his last
where he said, look, it`s really -- I`m paraphrasing. It`s not really a
budget that`s going to get legislated.

O`DONNELL: Yes.

BERNSTEIN: It`s a vision. I`m not paraphrasing that much. It`s a
pretty much what he said. It`s a visionary document.

Now, it happens to be a vision that I think is pretty horrific and in
many ways a very pessimistic vision. A vision of an America that`s
unwilling to meet challenges it faces, whether it`s health care coverage or
recessions or lifting folks out of poverty. But it`s not the kind of
budget that folks like myself -- kind of grew up at least in my
professional life is taking seriously.

And I do think it`s kind of a symbol of not only how dysfunctional
things are at the level of actually budgeting for our priorities, but just
how deeply ideological some of these players are in this game.

O`DONNELL: And, of course, it has that Republican trademark in it,
which is the dramatic cut in taxes and taking the top tax rate down to 25
percent so that you then, you know, got to do all these spending cuts,
cutting Medicare, all this stuff.

You know, so when you`re out there on the campaign trail, so why are
you cutting Medicare like this? Well, it`s because, you know, those rich
people -- they can`t be paying more than 25 percent in taxes.

BERNSTEIN: Right. And, by the way, just to be clear, all the
spending cuts, they feed into the deficit reduction. They don`t pay for
the big tax cut.

What pays for the big tax cut is about the largest giant asterisk
you`ve ever seen in any budget which really says -- I`m paraphrasing, but
I`m taking budget language and telling you what it says. Assume we can
close enough budget loopholes, of which we will not name one, not one --

O`DONNELL: Right.

BERNSTEIN: Assume, to pay for $5 trillion tax cut. So, this isn`t
even serious budgeting if you wanted to pretend for a moment that`s where
they`re going for this. When I said this is an ideological document when
he`s talking about his vision, there`s really no "there" there.

O`DONNELL: Well, Ryan definitely cheered up some congressional
Democrats today. Jared Bernstein, thank you for joining me tonight. My
pleasure.

BERNSTEIN: Coming up, the head of the city council in Albuquerque
will join me to talk about what that city is now doing in the aftermath of
police use of deadly force to kill a homeless man.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

HOLLIE HEMINGWAY, SR. EDITOR, "THE FEDERALIST": Very poorly, and that
can cause just as many problems in terms of the government needing to come
in and take care of a weak population, but we`re sot of unnecessarily
delaying it. So, everybody go out right now, go get married if you`re not
married and we should be able to solve all these problems.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

O`DONNELL: In the spotlight tonight, conservatives` message for women
voters. A "Washington Post" headline today summarized it as conservatives
to women -- lean back. The Heritage Foundation marked the end of women`s
history month Monday with a panel discussion Monday entitled evaluating
feminism, its failures and its future.

No one on the panel had any ideas about how Republican presidential
candidates can win larger shares of the women`s vote, except, of course,
urging all women to get married.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

HEMINGWAY: You see it in just election after election, though, that
women are voting for the more liberal or statist party. We do not have a
sex gap here in voting. We have a marriage gap, and it`s -- it`s just
easily the biggest story in politics.

MONA CHAREN, SYNDICATED COLUMNIST: Married women are happier,
healthier and more productive than single women. If we truly want women to
thrive, we have to revive the marriage norm. We haven`t yet achieved,
though, a cultural consensus that all unwed child-bearing, even among women
who are older in their 20s, 30s even 40s is a mistake.

That`s where we need to focus our energy. And if you care about
people in the middle class and the lower classes who are really struggling,
then you have to address the marriage issue, because that is the best --
that`s the first step on the ladder to a more secure and happy life.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

O`DONNELL: How about more Republican women candidates? Would that
help?

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHAREN: It doesn`t interest me whether a person who happens to share
my chromosomes sits in the Oval Office. It doesn`t interest me how many
women members of the Senate there are. None of that is that important to
me, and I recognize that by saying this out loud, this makes me a bad
woman, I know.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

O`DONNELL: Joining me now, Nicolle Wallace, former senior adviser to
the McCain-Palin campaign and an MSNBC political analyst. And Karen
Finney, host of MSNBC`s "DISRUPT WITH KAREN FINNEY."

Karen, do you have any reaction to anything you just heard there? I
can`t even form a question for you. I just want you to go.

KAREN FINNEY, HOST, "DISRUPT": There`s so many things we can say.
Number one, what an absolutely ridiculous portrayal of what it is to a
feminist and what it is to be a woman in 2014 in America. I mean, that was
just shameful. Let`s just start there obviously.

And, you know, as I was listening to that, if the Republican Party and
conservatives are going to be so pro-marriage, how about pro-marriage
equality for everyone? It`s not just that they`re about marriage. It`s
about women marrying men, right? It is very specific kind of marriage.
Not the least of which, how about supporting, I don`t know, policies like
equal pay or paid medical leave, you know, family leave policies that would
actually help keep families strong and help women be good moms and be
partners in their families?

O`DONNELL: Nicole, you actually worked on Republican campaigns trying to
appeal to all voters, including women. Someone who else has done that,
Katie Packer Gauge gave us this statement where she said, the words that
she had heard, the word seem to convey an antiquated view that does not
represent the realities that many women in America face today. As a
conservative Republican woman, I am disappointed when I see other
conservative women showing a lack of sensitivity to that fact. And I
believe our party`s future success depends on communicating a message that
acknowledges the daily struggles of many women which are not going to be
resolved simply by getting married. We must also recognize and celebrate
the dreams and aspirations of women, whether or not marriage is part of
that dream.

NICOLE WALLACE, ADVISOR, MCCAIN-PALIN CAMPAIGN: I mean, my first question
when I saw this today was, you know, are any of these women married? And
the notion that it`s on end --

O`DONNELL: Hey, the report from the marriage front, it`s --

WALLACE: I am a proud advocate for marriage equality. I signed on to the
brief to the court. And I think there are a lot of Republicans who are
advocates for same-sex marriage for this very reason. We`ve made a
conservative case for marriage that Karen just very eloquently made.

So I think the better place to start, as a proud Republican woman, is to
say that in if our party, we have a long way to go in preaching exactly
what we wish from the other side. So we wish for the other side -- you
know, we make a lot of accusations on a war on women being waged by the
Democrats.

These women inadvertently, because I believe their motives were pure, they
launched some pretty weighted grenades against women who may not feel the
way they feel about marriage, and there are plenty of Republican women that
none of these women are office holders, none of these women are running for
office. None of these women work for Republicans being talked about as
candidates in 2016. So I think that they did a lot of harm if their goal
is to help elect Republicans in the future.

O`DONNELL: Karen, go ahead.

FINNEY: Yes. Well, part of the problem, Nicole, is that that
conversation, I`m not even going to try to paint or broad brush on the
Republican party with that conversation, but the problem with that
conversation is it is too familiar with the conversation the Democrats --
we talk about the war on women, where we`re having conversation, we are
seeing policies being passed that essentially treat women like children who
are too stupid to make their own decisions, to choose their own medicines.

So part of what happened here is it is a broad brush that women are being
painted with across a lot of the conservative ideology and policies that
make it seem like we want to go back to the 1850s. And I think that`s the
problem. It`s the tone of the conversation. And it is, you know, the lack
of putting forward any positive ideas about women and the kinds of things
that could really support women and support families.

You know, if people want to be married, fantastic. But then let`s look at
ways we can really help keep marriages strong, particularly low income
people. That means let`s not cut SNAP. That means, you know, let`s not
cut the things that help people be better parents if they`re low income.
And I think that`s the problem. The rhetoric doesn`t match the policies
that we`re hearing from conservatives.

O`DONNELL: Let`s listen to one more piece from the panel discussion which
I remind you was about the history of feminisms and its failures. Nothing
about success in there, OK? And one of the failures, of course, is that
feminism invented date rape. Let`s listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MONA CHAREN, SYNDICATED COLUMNIST: Supposing that one of the pro-typical
woman`s daughters succeeds well enough to attend college, is she content to
send her daughter off to a campus where hooking up is considered normal and
date rape is difficult to prevent? If so, she can thank feminism for that,
too.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

O`DONNELL: See Nicole, I thought rape was the rapist`s fault, not the
woman`s fault and not feminism`s fault.

WALLACE: And hooking up to happen in mad man at Miss Porter (ph). So that
has been going on for very long time, too. Listen, again, I understand
these women are in the spotlight and understand why that`s the case today.
But I think if you want to have a serious conversation about women and what
women want, the whole premise is ludicrous, right? I mean, women are more
than half of the country.

So I think the feeling in the Republican party when we get into political
conversation about women, and it`s being going on now for two presidential
cycles and the fact that Republicans have come up short is enough evidence
in my mind to make clear that we have to do different things.

But I spend my days writing fictional accounts of a female president, and I
really believe that women, not just Republicans but all women have to
decide it matters more than not at all that a candidate is a woman before
we actually see a woman president or in my party a woman nominee for our
party.

So I think we have so far to go, not just in my party, but as a country, I
mean, issue and it`s not just three conservative women who I never heard of
before today saying things that seem not just antiquated but absolutely
inaccurate about feminism. Feminism is the reason I`m here. I don`t know
if Karen feels that way. But it is a ridiculous thought. And I`m going to
guess they were meant to provoke the kind of conversation we`re having.

O`DONNELL: Well, yes.

And Karen, I have to give you a last word on this because what we just
heard Mona Charen say was not something off the cuff. She was reading
carefully considered prepared remarks. And in her carefully, considered
view of the situation, it is feminism to blame for date rape.

FINNEY: Well, we have heard previously feminism is the evil for a lot of
different things. I mean, date rape, that`s a part of slut shaming, I
mean, that is a part of blaming the woman. We heard time and again, a
conservative mean that really blames women for actually working outside the
home.

So one thing I will say, Lawrence, none of this matters if women don`t get
out and vote in 2014 and 2016.

O`DONNELL: Nicole Wallace and Karen Finney, thank you both for joining me
tonight.

Coming up, tonight`s episode of "I agree with Bill O`Reilly" in which
O`Reilly actually agrees with me, since I got there first several months
ago. That`s in tonight`s "rewrite."

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The new survey found that 30 percent of Americans admit
to getting most of their news from facebook. Of course, when facebook
heard about this, they actually decided to experiment with printing a
newspaper. We got a copy over here. Let`s take a look at some of the
headlines here.

The top story, super excited for the weekend claims woman you don`t
remember from high school.

The big story, another headline. Everybody in existence may be attending
party. Nobody ever clicks yes.

And the last headline, mediocre sunrise captured on film. There you go.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

O`DONNELL: Bill O`Reilly is next in "the rewrite" and this time he`s
right.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

O`DONNELL: Last night, Bill O`Reilly opened his show, as usual, with what
he calls the talking points memo. It`s that section of the show in which
inexplicably they put almost every word that is on O`Reilly`s teleprompter
on the screen beside his talking head. So you have the choice of listening
to Bill or reading what he`s saying or both. There is no other show on
television that does this because no television professional has been able
to figure out why O`Reilly does it.

Last night`s talking points memo included typical FOX News doubts on global
warming and attacks on Brian Williams for reporting on the United Nations
report on climate change, and then something truly extraordinary happened.
That once in a lifetime thing. I guess it`s more like once a year thing
where Bill O`Reilly actually said something that I agree with completely.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BILL O`REILLY, FOX NEWS ANCHOR: I`ll give you one concrete thing that all
responsible people should be rooting for. On "60 Minutes" last night, they
reported on the Tesla electric car which is a game changer. The car runs
extremely well, looks good, doesn`t use gas, no gas at all.

Now, that car in the next few years could be available to millions at a
decent price. So everybody on the planet should be rooting for Tesla. I
mean, everybody. Even the traditional car companies that will have to
compete.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

O`DONNELL: Viewers on this program know the traditional car companies and
their dealers are fighting Tesla everywhere they can to make it illegal for
Tesla to sell cars at Tesla stores the way apple sells computers and
phones. Republicans in Texas who pretend to champion free market champion
have made it illegal for Tesla to sell cars? The company`s show rooms.
But now that Bill O`Reilly is on the case, maybe he can help loosen the car
dealership`s grip on state governments from New Jersey to Texas and strike
a blow for the free market. And when I say Bill O`Reilly is on the case, I
mean, Bill O`Reilly is on the damn case.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

O`REILLY: If Tesla can make a clean car, the entire automotive industry
can, therefore the air would be cleaner everywhere. And our wallets
thicker. So let`s get on it, people. But there will be resistance. Many
conservatives don`t believe in global warming and oppose alternative
energy.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

O`DONNELL: OK, make no mistake about it. Bill O`Reilly does not believe
in global warming. But he does think pursuing alternative energy sources
is a good idea.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

O`REILLY: Many conservatives don`t believe in global warming and oppose
alternative energy. I hope you rethink the energy part. I completely
understand that many in the green lobby are self-righteous, arrogant and
dumb, but we would all be better off if clean, cheap energy becomes the
norm and that`s the truth. And that`s the Memo.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

O`DONNELL: And now I`m trying to think of something self-righteous,
arrogant and dumb to say. But I shouldn`t try to compete with the master.
No one does self-righteous, arrogant and dumb better than Bill.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

O`DONNELL: In the aftermath of a police shoot of a homeless man in
Albuquerque, the mayor of Albuquerque asked the city council for an
additional $1 million to fund police training. The video we are about to
show you demonstrates the desperate need for that police training.

The mayor wants the additional training money to go specifically to, quote,
"evaluation training and execution of policies and reforms relating to
police interaction with people living with mental illness, with a focus on
de-escalation and other crisis intervention strategies." You are about to
see a video of heavily armed Albuquerque police shooting and killing a
homeless man who didn`t have a gun, who was in no position to harm the
heavily armed officers, and actually turned away from them when he was
shot.

You will see him being shot in the back by police in violation of the
Albuquerque police department`s rule on the use of deadly force. This is a
deeply disturbing video. I have just described it to you ahead of time so
you don`t have to watch it to know what it shows. We will be joined by the
president of the Albuquerque city council for discussion of this situation
after this video, which was recorded by the police on the scene.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Get on the ground! Get on the ground now! Get on the
ground! Keep your hands up!

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He has a knife in his hands.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Is he moving?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Get your hands out.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Put your hands out to your side and drop the knife.
Hands out to your side and drop the knife.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Drop the knife!

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All right, he`s good. Somebody step on that right hand
real hard.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Knife in his hand.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Knife in his hand.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I`m going to switch you.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You got this right there?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I didn`t see where it went. Where did the first knife
go? Cuffs?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

O`DONNELL: Joining me now is the president of the Albuquerque city council
Ken Sanchez and Eugene O`Donnell, former New York city police officer and a
professor of law and police study at John Jay College of criminal justice.

Mr. Sanchez, your police chief in Albuquerque first said that the shooting
was completely justified. Three days later, he said he regrets saying that
the shooting was justified. He had access to that video all along showing
that man being shot in the back and came out and said, first of all, his
first reaction was, it was completely justified.

KEN SANCHEZ, PRESIDENT, ALBUQUERQUE CITY COUNCIL: I was totally shocked
and alarmed by these statements that the chief made when he made the
statements when he said the shooting was justified. The people across the
country and in Albuquerque have looked at what occurred on the foot hills
of Albuquerque. And it was extremely disturbing to see what occurred.

And for the chief to make those comments, and he`s a new chief to the
Albuquerque police department, he just recently got appointed to the
position, I was alarmed by his statements. I think it`s unfortunate that
you don`t review the evidence that occurred.

And in looking at the tape, you know, I think we`ve got a horrific scene
here in Albuquerque that needs to be investigated very thoroughly. I came
out and made statements immediately along with other members of council,
(INAUDIBLE), making the statements that the department of justice needs to
come in and also review this particular case. The mayor also came out
after the fact and did make the same statements that we needed to review --
the FBI or the department of justice needed to come in and investigate this
case.

O`DONNELL: And Eugene, this is the department, this police department has
already been under inspection by the justice department because they have a
shooting history there that is statistically completely out of whack with
the rest of the country and departments of that size.

But let`s get to -- I want to use your police training and expertise on
what you see in that video. What goes wrong in that video?

EUGENE O`DONNELL, FORMER NEW YORK POLICE DEPARTMENT OFFICER: I think the
whole issue could the police have found a better way to slow things down,
buy time, protect themselves, possibly disengage together. Just because a
citizen says you must do something, it`s not how high you have to jump. It
may very well be to leave this guy and come back. (INAUDIBLE).

But the whole idea of how that diagnose it and how it`s allowed to slip out
of their control, those things need to be looked at. And obviously the
protocols for mentally ill people, for isolating and containing people, and
then further back, how you can get non-police people intervening in this
man`s life and get armed police officers out of this picture altogether.

You need leadership, it`s political and police leadership you need beyond
the issue of the split second of the last few moments of this man`s life.

O`DONNELL: What would be your reaction if you were in the department
investigating this shooting and you found he`s shoot in the back?

EUGENE O`DONNELL: Well, it`s certainly an issue. A department that values
human life, they shoot because they must, not because they`re choosing to.
So there is really not any alternative to do that. So that would be
something you`re looking at. Does this department properly emphasize
shooting as an absolute last resort, the preservation of human life as the
top priority.

And this couple, with some of the ore incidents raises serious questions
about whether Albuquerque puts the proper emphasis on shooting as an
absolute last resort, shooting because absolutely your back is against the
wall and you have no choice to do that. That`s the proper balance in this
equation.

O`DONNELL: Mr. Sanchez, I think we can all see a range of choices that
were available to those police officers there. They are there responding
to the crime of illegal camping, which does not carry the death penalty in
your state. And it seems to me as you look at that tape and other city
council look at that tape, you must have many notions about what their
options are.

What are you going to be able to do with that police department in order to
get them the kind of training or the kind of corrections that they need.

SANCHEZ: Well, right now, the mayor has proposed in the budget an
additional $1 million for training. I do not think that is going to be
enough money. It`s going to take a lot more than that. We also need to
address the issue of mental illness. That has been a very serious problem
throughout the country and right here in Albuquerque.

Two years ago, the Albuquerque city council, when we were looking at the
police shootings, we`ve had approximately 37 shootings since 2010, 24 of
those shootings have been fatal. And we asked Mayor Barry two years ago to
bring in the department of justice. That bill passed the Albuquerque city
of council. Mayor Barry vetoed that legislation. Council came back with a
floor substitute to bring back the department of justice, but that language
was toned down. But fortunately the department of justice is looking at
practices with the Albuquerque police department and hopefully we can get
results as quickly as possible.

O`DONNELL: Ken Sanchez, thank you very much for joining us tonight. And
Eugene O`Donnell, thank you for joining us again tonight.

EUGENE O`DONNELL: Thanks.

O`DONNELL: Chris Hayes is up next.

END

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