All In With Chris Hayes, Thursday, November 6th, 2014

Show: ALL IN with CHRIS HAYES
Date: November 6, 2014

Guest: Chris Van Hollen, Ben Domenech, Dean Baker, Mitch Stewart, Erica
Sagrans, Charlie Pierce


(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CHRIS HAYES, MSNBC HOST (voice-over): Tonight on ALL IN --

REP. JOHN BOEHNER (R-OH), SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE: When you play with
matches, you take the risk of burning yourself. And he`s going to burn
himself if he continues to go down this path.

HAYES: Hot takes from the House speaker after the president promises
executive action on immigration.

And on Obamacare, John Boehner claims a mandate from voters.

BOEHNER: They don`t like Obamacare, I don`t like it, it`s hurting our
economy.

HAYES: We`ll ask why the law remains unpopular.

Then, meet the next head of the Senate Environment Committee.

SEN. JAMES INHOFE (R), OKLAHOMA: First of all, global warming is not
taking place. It`s kind of laughable right now with all the records that
have being sent.

HAYES: The president pushes back against criticism from Michael
Jordan on his golf game.

BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: There is no doubt that
Michael is a better golfer than I am. Of course, if I was playing twice a
day for the last 15 years, then that might not be the case.

HAYES: ALL IN starts right now.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HAYES: Good evening from New York. I`m Chris Hayes.

Today, Speaker of the House John Boehner emerged to make his first
public remarks since Tuesday night`s Republican wave victory. And if you
were expecting more platitudes about working together and finding common
ground with President Obama -- well, you came to the wrong press
conference.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BOEHNER: I`ve made clear to the president, that if he acts
unilaterally on his own, outside of his authority, he will poison the well
and there will be no chance for immigration reform moving in this Congress.
It`s as simple as that.

When you play with matches, you take the risk of burning yourself.
And he`s going to burn himself if he continues to go down this path. The
American people made it clear on Election Day, they want to get things
done, and they don`t want the president acting on a unilateral basis.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HAYES: That in reference to the president`s promise, which he
reiterated yesterday, several times, that he would, indeed, take executive
action on immigration reform, before the end of this year. Boehner, who
will now lead the largest Republican House majority since 1928, playing the
part of the bull in soon-to-be Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell`s
warning to the president yesterday.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. MITCH MCCONNELL (R-KY), MINORITY LEADER: I think the president
choosing to do a lot of things unilaterally on immigration would be a big
mistake. It`s an issue that most of my members want to address,
legislatively. And it`s like waving a red flag in front of a bull to say,
if you guys don`t do what I want, I`m going to do it on my own.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HAYES: Speaker Boehner today, self-satisfied, triumphant, defiant
throughout his press conference, made it clear that despite having already
held more than 50 votes, 50 votes in the House on Obamacare, he would not
be giving up the effort to repeal it anytime soon.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BOEHNER: The House, I`m sure, at some point next year, we`ll move to
repeal Obamacare, because it should be repealed, it should be replaced with
common sense reforms that respect the doctor/patient relationship. Now,
whether that can pass the Senate, I don`t know. But I know in the House,
it will pass.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HAYES: While Senator Mitch McConnell yesterday seemed to stress a
conditional willingness to work with President Obama, Speaker Boehner today
seemed all too happy to play the role of bad cop.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BOEHNER: Now, finding common grounds can be hard work. But it will
be even harder if the president isn`t willing to work with us. Yesterday,
we heard him say that he may double down on his go-it-alone approach. So,
my job is not to get along with the president just to get along with him,
although we actually have a nice relationship. The fact is, my job is to
listen to my members and listen to the American people and make their
priorities our priorities.

I tell my colleagues all the time, if you`re doing the right things
for the right reasons, you don`t have to worry about anything. The right
things will happen. Thanks.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HAYES: In an op-ed in the "Wall Street Journal" today, Boehner and
McConnell signaled their legislative properties next Congress. Such things
as, quote, "the insanely complex tax code, a savage global terrorist
threat, and excessive regulations and frivolous lawsuits, and, of course,
authorization of the Keystone XL pipeline.

Joining me now is Congressman Chris Van Hollen, Democrat from
Maryland.

All right. Congressman, there`s some interesting line in the Boehner
thing. Boehner seemed pretty defiant, he was basically kind of bring-it-on
sort of moment. He did say this about acting unilaterally, and then he has
this clause, "outside of his authority".

Which I thought maybe gave him a little bit of wiggle room, right?
That if he acts outside of his authority, then they`re going to do
something. But perhaps if he acts alone inside his authority, they`ll be
OK with it?

REP. CHRIS VAN HOLLEN (D), MARYLAND: Chris, I wish that were the
case. I think that may be wishful thinking. I think no matter what the
president does through executive action, Speaker Boehner and the
Republicans will claim he`s acting outside his authority.

Look, you had it exactly right. What we saw today from Speaker
Boehner was less than 48 hours after the election, the nice talk was over,
and what Speaker Boehner is doing is really responding to his Tea Party
caucus.

HAYES: Well, with all due respect, Congressman, if I had 250 votes in
my caucus, I would be kind of smarmy myself. I mean, the guy`s got -- the
guy has a huge majority in the House. He can do whatever the heck he wants
in there.

VAN HOLLEN: Sure. Look, look, what happened, though, there`s all
this focus in how the change in the Senate will affect the dynamics with
the president. But the one thing that`s stayed the same, obviously, is the
House -- in fact, as you indicate, they`ve actually grown their majority.
They have even more Tea Party members.

So, all this talk about how Speaker Boehner is interested in maybe
negotiating with the president was kind of dispelled today, because the
interpretation that his members have put on this election is not that we`ve
got to work together to end the dysfunction in Washington, but that they`ve
got to stop President Obama at all costs. And so, that means they`ve
doubled down on it`s their way or the highway. That`s what I heard from
Speaker Boehner.

HAYES: Let me ask you a personal question, Congressman. I was
looking at your election results. I think you were with around 56 percent
of the vote, which is low for you. You usually cruise to re-election by a
lot more. You`re from a state in Maryland that`s a deep blue state, that
saw the Republican gubernatorial candidate really romp to a surprising
victory.

How do you understand, from where you sit, in a state that had a sort
of surprising red surge, in a district where your victory was more narrow
than possibly expected, how do you understand what happened Tuesday night?

VAN HOLLEN: So, first of all, Chris, just an update from my race.
I`m pleased to report that I ended the night a little over 60 percent,
which was very close, actually, to my election results two years ago in the
new district I represent. But there`s no doubt that in Maryland overall,
the Democrats took a whooping, especially, of course, in the governor`s
race.

And it`s very clear what happened. First of all, Democrats did not
turn out. The Democratic turnout was way down, over 2010, compared to
2010. And the other thing is, you know, when you ask people what the
argument was in favor of electing Anthony Brown to governor, there was not
really a strong argument put forward in the race.

And a lot of people were taking us for granted and you got the results
that you had. I mean, just as you did in Massachusetts, which is also a
state that obviously, normally, elects Democratic governors.

HAYES: So what do you see your role in the minority in, without
having a Senate majority with which to work, where they`re just going to
pass a bunch of bills over your objections, what do you see your role over
the next two years as being?

VAN HOLLEN: Well, our role is to continue to do our very best to
reflect what we think are the values and priorities of the American public.
And I think our focus, Chris, has got to be like a laser beam on the
economic issues. So, that`s jobs, but it`s also addressing this chronic
problem we have in this country, of declining or static real wages.

HAYES: Yes.

VAN HOLLEN: And it`s not an easy thing to tackle, but I think the
party that puts forward the best case, the best solution, to begin to
address that issue, will be the party that succeeds.

HAYES: It`s funny you say that, Congressman, because I think that is
the single biggest issue, the fact that the recovery has not helped the
majority of people in terms of their incomes, that they haven`t seen a
raise. And if that was the singular focus of a Democratic midterm election
campaign, that might have been more successful.

Congressman Chris Van Hollen, it`s always a pleasure.

VAN HOLLEN: I agree with that.

HAYES: Thank you very much.

VAN HOLLEN: Thank you.

HAYES: All right. Throughout the current Congress, Speaker Boehner
has often appeared to be as much a follower of his caucus as its leader.
Today, he was pressed about what the current members and the new additions
of the ranks.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REPORTER: You have a new crop of conservatives coming into the House
who have suggested that women need to submit to the authority of their
husbands, that Hillary Clinton is the antichrist, and that the families of
Sandy Hook victims should just get over it. So, the "Hell No" caucuses, as
you put it, is getting bigger.

BOEHNER: No, no, no. No, no, no, now, listen.

REPORTER: How do you deal with them differently than you did the last
Congress?

BOEHNER: I think the premise of your question, I would take exception
to. Yes, we have some new members who have made some statements. I`ll
give you that. But when you look at the vast majority of the new members
that are coming in here, they`re really solid members.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HAYES: Yes, we`ve had some members that have made some statements,
I`ll give you that.

By the way, it was Congressman Steve Pierce who wrote in his memoir,
quote, "the wife is to voluntarily submit." It was Ryan Zinke, just
elected to Congress from Montana, who reportedly referred to Secretary
Clinton as the antichrist.

And it`s unclear who the reporter was referring to regarding the
statement, Sandy Hook victims should get over it.

In any event, the real question is whether Republican majority that
NBC News is currently predicting will wind up being nearly 250 will move
the House further right, if that`s even possible. It might instinctively
seem like the answer is, of course, the house would be far more
conservative with more Republicans in it.

There is this contrarian argument. The sheer size of the incoming
majority means that when the 114th Congress convenes in January of next
year, Speaker Boehner would be able to lose the votes of about 30 hard-
right Republicans and still reach the 218 votes needed to pass legislation,
which will make it interesting to see what will this caucus allow
particularly on the subject of immigration.

Joining me now, Ben Domenech, publisher of "The Federalist," senior
fellow at the Heartland Institute.

So, Ben, what do you think about that? I mean, the instinct is this
is going to be a more Tea Party-dominated caucus. At the same time, you
could give up a lot more votes and still get a win, which might give him a
margin to operate and to compromise that he didn`t have in the previous
Congress.

BEN DOMENECH, HEARTLAND INSTITUTE: I think your rationale on this is
really correct, Chris, in the sense that it`s better for the Boehner in the
sense that he has more flexibility to lose the far-right edge of his
coalition.

But I kind of want to go back to the question that you were posing to
the congressman because I think that there`s something that`s being missed
here in terms of the experience that I believe the Democratic Party is
going through right now. We`ve seen this before, we saw this in 2006, with
a regime that essentially, you know, had been in charge for six years, that
had, you know, lost the upper crust of their leadership, had gone down to
that sort of second tier that you see in second terms, has more difficulty
dealing with crisis, is dealing with all sorts of threats from the Middle
East and from elsewhere. You know, is really not giving the American
people confidence, and is doubling down on culture war arguments.

We saw this time around with the war on women. We saw that with the
arguments over immigration. And in 2006, if you remember, ancient history,
they were warning against the threat of -- the oncoming threat of gay
marriage at the time, was the Karl Rove approach to winning in that year.
I think we`re just seeing kind of a repeat of that, again, under this
regime. And it`s really kind of a question now of, maybe this is just the
second term curse in the modern era that everybody has to go through.

HAYES: That is an interesting question. I`m glad you brought that
up. I`ve been thinking a lot about that 2006 election, because here`s
what`s happened -- that election was I think pretty clearly a pretty frank
referendum on Iraq. I mean, that was the dominant theme. Democrats won
massively, and they won on that issue. They ran on that issue, they ran
ads on that issue. It was pretty clear that forefront in the exit polling.

The president`s response to that was to then say, oh, that war that
you hate, that you just repudiated, we`re going to escalate it.

DOMENECH: Yes.

HAYES: I`m going to send in tens of thousands of more troops and
screw you, and you`re going to like it, and he got the Democrats to vote to
fund that, and now Republicans say, well, the surge was a success. And it
seems to me the lesson is, Barack Obama shouldn`t listen at all to this as
some sort of repudiation.

DOMENECH: He should be Yul Brynner in the "Ten Commandments". So let
it be written, so let it be done.

That`s exactly the kind of lesson you can take it. I would say the
one difference there is that the president did work very hard to convince
Democrats to go along with that on Capitol Hill. And I don`t think that
the president in this instance is really showing any interest in doing
that, when it comes to immigration issue. And I --

HAYES: Let me just say this real quickly. There`s also the
difference in the politics in national security.

DOMENECH: Of course, of course.

HAYES: We`re going to see an authorization of military force, it
looks like in the lame duck, even though you saw these ads run on ISIS, in
the run to midterms, there wasn`t a huge substantive policy objection. And
in fact, what we`re going to see is Congress come together, I think, in the
lame duck, and ratify, what is, to my mind, at least, a sort of weird, not
fully baked policy around is, that both members, of both houses and both
parties are going to come and vote for in the lame duck.

DOMENECH: I think you`re completely right on that front. I would
say, though, on the immigration front, I do think this is an example where
the president may be sort of throwing a bon at the ability to have a
bipartisan discussion on this. The party elites still very much want of
this issue resolved before 2016. It`s the more conservative members who
essentially want to kick the can down and they want to save it for the next
election, have everybody run on saying, we`ll fix this problem that the
president made you promises about and never delivered on.

So, executive action on that course, I actually think that that may be
something that in the short-term, may help the president, but in the long-
term, you know, eliminates the ability to maybe solve this problem.

HAYES: And that`s interesting, because my read in the politics, I
think that there`s this tremendous moral urgency around it, substantively,
right? But my read on politics is exactly the opposite. I think it will
hurt in the short-term and help in the long-term, because I think it
creates this clarifying kind of generational battle. But, you know, I
could be wrong.

Ben Domenech, always a pleasure. Thank you very much.

DOMENECH: Good to be with you.

HAYES: All right. The most important thing Obamacare has done
besides giving health insurance to millions, ahead.

Plus, tonight, we will have live on this program, for the first time
ever, head-to-head, Hillary Clinton and Elizabeth Warren`s biggest fans,
for the first debate of 2016. Stick with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HAYES: Breaking news tonight: for the first time, since the Supreme
Court struck down the Defense of Marriage Act last year, a federal appeals
court, that`s a circuit court, has upheld state gay marriage bans in Ohio,
Kentucky, Michigan, and Tennessee. The court finding in a two to one
opinion, quote, "when the courts do not let people resolve new social
issues like this one, they perpetuate that the idea that the heroes in
these change events are judges and lawyers. Better in this instance, we
think to allow change through the customary political processes."

This now means the different appeals courts have reached different
conclusions about the constitutionality of marriage bans, which all but
assures the Supreme Court, which passed on weighing in on the last term
will now have to.

We`ll be following that as it develops.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HAYES: Republicans have a rule about elections and Obamacare. Here
it is -- if they win an election, that election is a referendum on
Obamacare. Today, in their "Wall Street Journal" op-ed, John Boehner and
Mitch McConnell wrote that they will, quote, "honor the voter`s trust by
renewing our commitment to repeal Obamacare, which is hurting the job
market along with Americans` health care."

That last part about hurting the job market isn`t actually true, by
the way.

Meanwhile, Ted Cruz speaking at a Republican Party Tuesday night
renewed his own calls to repeal the law.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. TED CRUZ (R), TEXAS: Now is the time to go after and do
everything humanly possible to repeal Obamacare.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HAYES: It`s a shame they couldn`t find a big flag for the event.

The two midterm elections in which they`ve done well since the health
care law passed in 2012 and 2013, the GOP has seen those elections as
incontrovertible proof that Obamacare should be killed and the people
support that.

But there was another election in the middle of those two, you might
recall, it was about two years ago, and the guy whose name comes before
"care" in Obamacare, that very guy, Barack Obama, he was actually on the
ballot and he won. Yet for some reason, Republicans didn`t seem to see
that election as a referendum on the health care law.

Now, here`s the thing. The politics of Obamacare are admittedly
pretty weird. Despite the fact that the law is by all unbiased accounts
working even better than expected, having contributed significantly, it
appears, to slowed health care inflation, and dramatically reducing the
national uninsurance rates, recent polling finds that only 36 percent of
Americans approve of Obamacare, while 55 percent disapprove -- although
some of those people presumably disapprove because they think the law
didn`t go far enough.

And there are indications that Obamacare may have helped Republicans
in what for them was definitely a very good election. Kantar Media group
found that GOP ran nearly 12,000 anti-Obamacare ads in Senate races in one
week in October, almost twice as many ads they ran that week on jobs and
unemployment.

Perhaps the most amazing fact was this -- in many of the states where
Obamacare has helped the most people, we`re talking Kentucky, West
Virginia, and Arkansas in particular, Democrats got absolutely crushed in
midterms, in races where they were supposed to be competitive, particularly
in Arkansas and Kentucky.

And that does lead this political paradox as we enter the last two
years of the Obama presidency, with Republicans still banging the drums for
repeal. The law remains unpopular, even as it succeeds.

A big part of this has to do with the central core fact of Obamacare,
that it was designed and conceived of to disturb as little of the existing
insurance market as possible. That was how they got it passed. But the
flip side of that is, for now, that it`s actually only helping a relatively
small percentage of the population, even as the entire population has to
endure an unending barrage of Republican rhetoric, demonizing the law.

Over time, as more and more people cycle through the exchanges, we`ll
start to see Obamacare cement itself in American life. Already, it`s seen
as a major driver of the so-called sharing economy, companies like Uber,
Lyft, Tax Rabbit and has spurred entrepreneurs, because it made far easier
to have health care without going through an employer.

But for now, it remains this bizarre political object, hated by right,
working better than expected, with almost no one defending it politically.
The good news is that eventually, it`s going to touch almost all of us.

Joining me now is Dean Baker, co-director of the Center for Economic
Policy Research and co-author of "Getting Back to Full Employment."

Dean, here`s one scenario of Obamacare I thought about. The law is,
to my progressive heart`s delight, a redistributive law. I mean, it`s got
a tax on high earners, sort of a Medicare surcharge tax. It expands
Medicaid for the working poor. Most of the benefits flow to the bottom of
the income distribution.

And maybe it`s just not ever going to be popular, because
redistribution is not popular.

DEAN BAKER, CENTER FOR ECONOMIC POLICY RESEARCH: Chris, I don`t
really think that`s the case. I think, basically, it`s not popular,
because for the most part, people have no clue what it is. Even you, sorry
to beat up on you here, a lot of what you just said was mistaken. It`s
already helped a very large number of people and they don`t know it,
because there are a lot of things, people go to see their doctor, they`re
getting preventative tests and they don`t even pay a co-pay on that. They
don`t know that. No one told them, guess what, you walk on here, no co-pay
because of Obamacare.

HAYES: Right, that`s an important point. I should be more precise
here, right? The people who are covered, who are gaining coverage under
the Affordable Care Act, whether through the Medicaid expansion or on the
exchanges is a relatively small percentage of the overall insurance market.

The people who are deriving benefits from the Affordable Care Act is
much, much more widespread. But that is less known. If you know, well,
I`m now on this new coverage because of the Affordable Act, it`s easier to
make that connection than all the benefits that come in patient protections
and co-pays and birth control, et cetera.

BAKER: Exactly. But even there, there`s an incredible amount of
confusion. Here, you know, the Democrats deserve it, because they weren`t
out here talking about this. You know, you`re mentioning Kentucky and
Mitch McConnell. He had the opportunity. He was nit several times. You
want to repeal Obamacare, so you want to get rid of Kentucky Kynect, the
local exchanges that have been very effective in signing up people.

And McConnell insisted, that has nothing to do with Obamacare. He
said that because he knew Kentucky Kynect is very popular and he also knew
a lot of people don`t understand. Just as you have a lot of Tea Party
people who famously said, I want the government to keep its hands off my
Medicare.

HAYES: Well, and you have the situation in these three states, that`s
so fascinating to me. There are these three states that are all very
conservative, relatively poor, and have gotten the Medicaid expansion.
That`s West Virginia, Kentucky, and Arkansas. And you would think in all
these states, the law is working as it`s intended to. It`s getting lots of
people health insurance. It`s reducing the uninsured rate, and it produced
no tangible political benefits to the Democratic Party it seems.

BAKER: Well, I think the problem is the Democrats haven`t tried to
claim it. You know, I did some clicking around and certainly it`s not my
area and I don`t follow politics that closely, but if you look at Alison
Grimes, the Democratic candidate for the Senate`s Web site in Kentucky, you
wouldn`t find anything about Obamacare. However put.

I mean, she wasn`t willing to say, look, you know, we, you know, the
Democrats over the complete opposition of the Republican Party, they put
through a program that`s giving hundreds of thousands of people in the
state of Kentucky insurance and also providing these other benefits,
including -- if you lose your job now in Kentucky and you had health
insurance through your job, now you can get it through Kentucky Kynect.
You weren`t able to do that before Obamacare. You wouldn`t know that
through her.

HAYES: Yes. And I think the question is, in the long range, because
the policy out. Which is to say, if these benefits are durable enough, if
people interface with them enough, do they come to associate that with
Obamacare or does it sort of seep into the background and there is never a
political benefit realized, because it just become the thing that you do.
You get off and you go to the exchange, which would be ironic if it ends up
being safest as it passes from something controversial to unpopular to not
even noted.

Dean Baker, always a pleasure. Thank you.

BAKER: Thanks for having me on.

HAYES: Michael Jordan trash talks the president and the president
trash talks back. Deeply enjoyable and it`s next.

Plus, your guide to the man named James "Mountain" Inhofe. The
Republican who will probably end up being the new head of the Senate
Environment and Public Works Committee. He has the kinds of ideas about
the environment and climate that I think you`re supposed to call eccentric
when discussing a U.S. senator, but you would call paranoid and daft if it
were anyone else. That`s all coming up.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MITT ROMNEY (R), THEN-PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: You said in the Rose
Garden, the day after the attack, it was an act of terror. It was not a
spontaneous demonstration. Is that what you`re saying?

OBAMA: Please proceed, governor.

ROMNEY: I want to make sure we get that for the record, because it
took the president 14 days before he called the attack in Benghazi an act
of terror.

OBAMA: Get the transcript.

CANDY CROWLEY, CNN ANCHOR: He did, in fact, sir. So let me call it
an act of terror.

OBAMA: Can you say that a little louder, Candy?

CROWLEY: He did call it an act of terror.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HAYES: All the talk about Barack Obama`s quiet discipline. It is an
under acknowledged fact he is both good at and seems to enjoy quite a bit
talking a little trash.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ROMNEY: Mr. President, have you looked at your pension? Have you
looked at your pension? Have you looked at your pension?

OBAMA: I`ve got to say.

ROMNEY: Mr. President, have you looked at your pension?

OBAMA: You know, I don`t look at my pension. It`s not as big as
yours, so it doesn`t take as long.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HAYES: Now, there are a lot of people, at least outside of the
Beltway, who
have both the stature and the gall to trash talk the president back with
the
notable exception being Michael Jordan. Last week, Jordan was talking to
his friend Ahmad Rashad about golf when sports caster asked Jordan if he
had a chance to play a round of golf with four people, who would it be?

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MICHAEL JORDAN, NBA LEGEND: I never played with Obama, but I would.
but, no, that`s okay. I`ll take him out. He`s a hack. I wouldn`t enjoy
playing all day with him.

AHMAD RASHAD, SPORTSCASTER: Do you really want to say that to the
president of the United States.

JORDAN: I never said he wasn`t a great politician. I`m just saying
he`s a
(EXPLETIVE DELETED) golfer.

RASHAD: No, he`s not a bad golfer.

JORDAN: OK.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HAYES: OK, so Jordan went there, but during a radio interview earlier
this week the president fired back.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OBAMA: Mike and I we know each other, but I`ve never played golf with
him. I`ve played with Ahmad.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK. OK.

OBAMA: Ahmad has been my partner. The last time we played I think it
was against Alonso Morning and other friend. And we won both times.

So Michael wasn`t very well informed about this. I think he might
have just been trying to give Ahmad an extra ratings boost off his show.

But there is no doubt that Michael is a better golfer than I am. Of
course, if I was playing twice a day for the last 15 years then that might
not be the case. And, you know, he might want to spend more time thinking
about the Bobcats, or maybe the Hornets, but that`s a whole other issue.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HAYES: OK, so that stings.

The NBA team Michael Jordan owns, the Charlotte Hornets, who used to
be known as the Bobcats until they changed their name this year, is a team
distinctly unJordanesque. MJ took over majority control of the team in
2010. In the first three seasons under Jordan`s control, the Bobcats had a
combined record of 62 to 168, this includes the lockout shortened 2011-2012
season when the team went 7-59 for the worst winning percentage in the
history of the NBA.

The team did make the playoffs last season. So there`s always that.
The start of this season, Jordan`s team has two wins in five tries. So
please proceed Michael Jordan.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

STEPHEN COLBERT, COLBERT REPORT: You`re on an interesting committee,
you`re on the environment and public works committee. And now you`re going
to have a
new chairman, James Inhofe. OK, you and he differs slightly on global
warming. He`s got some interesting ideas. He believes it is not happening
and that it is a hoax, OK. So where`s the middle ground for the two of
you?

Are you going to come over to his side? Are you going to compromise
on that one? And just say it`s not happening and I`m sure he`ll agree with
you.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HAYES: The first time Oklahoma senator James Inhofe chaired the
Senate`s committee on environmental and public works from 2003 to 2007, he
and his staff would post on the official Senate committee page the kinds of
things you`d expect to see on Drudge about the liberal global warming hoax,
articles headline, quote, "Climate fears reduced to children`s games," and,
quote "UK officially admits global warming has stopped!"

In fact, the Inhofe staffer who wrote many of those posts actually
went on to work at a mini-Drudge for climate denialists Climate Depot.com.
If you head over there today, you`ll see a champagne toast with the
headline "cheers warmists in a funk," followed by the New Republic
headlines, quote, "Congratulations, voters, you
just made this climate denier the most powerful senator on the
environment."

Inhofe called Climate Depot a place for, quote, "one stop-shopping of
the best headlines of the day." And now it appears he will once again be
running the most powerful environmental committee in the Senate.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. JAMES INHOFE, (R) OKLAHOMA: My point is, God`s still up there.
And this is the arrogance of people to think that we, human beings, would
be able to change what he is doing in the climate is to me outrageous."

Science is now showing that there`s not a relationship between man-
made gases or CO2 and climate change.

When you look back in history, you look at these cycles and you have
to come to the conclusion that God is still up there.

No one has seriously demonstrated any scientific proof that increased
global temperatures would lead to the catastrophic predictions by
alarmists.

You`ve got to understand we have people with their lives tied up in
trying to make this hoax a reality.

In fact, it appears just the opposite is true, that increases in
global temperatures have a beneficial effect in how we live our lives.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HAYES: Hm, Inhofe has made climate change denialism his number one
cause. He`s even compared the EPA to the Gestapo. again, denial is his
number In 2012, he authored a book called "The Greatest Hoax: How the
Global warming Conspiracy
Threatens Your Future".

The Senator from Oklahoma is perhaps the most committed denialist in
the Senate. But in his new role, he will have the entire weight of the
fossil fuels industry, Republican Party and conservative movement behind
him, a movement that has already made stopping the EPA regulation of coal-
fired power plants and getting the Keystone XL pipeline built its top
priorities.

So, James Inhofe may seem like an eccentric uncle you can politely nod
at an change topics on at a family dinner, but he`s about to try to destroy
what little we`re doing right to avoid climate catastrophe.

Joining me now, Charlie Pierce, writer at-large for Esquire.com and
political blogger for Esquire.com and a long-time Inhofe chronicler.

Charlie, your reaction to the once and future king James Inhofe
reclaiming the gavel in that committee?

CHARLIE PIERCE, ESQUIRE.COM: Well, I don`t know if it`s a gavel so
much as a whoopie cushion at this point.

But as you said, Chris, this is now the position of the Republican
Party. It is now an untenable position in the Republican Party to be -- to
accept the fact of anthroprogenic climate change. You can`t do it.

In fact, to me, on Tuesday night, when it comes to issues and leaving
the minimum wage referenda aside, the big winner was unquestionably voter
suppression. Scott Walker got elected, John Houston got reelected
secretary of state in Ohio over Nina Tailor who ran specifically on that
and Chris Kovach got reelected in Kansas.

The big loser among the issues was climate change.

HAYES: Yeah, and the thing that I find frightening about Inhofe in
that committee chairmanship is that they actually have their -- the entire
sort of fossil fuels and the right and conservatives actually had their
sights set on two real concrete targets.

I mean, they want the Keystone Pipeline built. They`re already
talking about that as the first big bipartisan compromise. And they want
to go after these EPA regulations and they are going to have the ability to
do that through appropriation bills with Inhofe there who seems like a
ridiculous character, but who is kind of go going to be the point -- the
tip of the spear for this whole assault.

PIERCE: Yeah, there -- and they`re going to get help, too. I read in
The Hill yesterday that McConnell is wooing Angus King and Joe Manchin.
And I guarantee you the way he`s wooing them is to be nice to the coal
companies.

Manchin came on TV just about when Alison Lundergan Grimes was
declaring her campaign over to say the president had pretty much demolished
her campaign because
of these EPA regulations. Manchin is a lot of things, but he`s not a
reliable vote on the issue of climate change. And he`s a Democrat.

So, yeah, I mean, I think that this is -- I think there`s an enormous
amount of power. And as much as I hate to say it, and as happy as I was to
see congressman Lee Terry out in Nebraska, who is probably the pipeline`s
best friend, lose his seat in congress to a Democrat. This -- I`m starting
to hear too much about this being the easiest bargaining chip.

HAYES: The Keystone XL pipeline.

PIERCE: Right. I mean, it -- the Keystone XL Pipeline is a fetish
object on the right now.

HAYES: It really is.

And Mitt Romney said that he would build it with his bare hands in
2012.

PIERCE: And I would buy a ticket to that, Chris.

(LAUGHTER)

HAYES: The other thing that`s interesting about Inhofe to me is he`s
actually in a weird way sort of out-of-step with the kind of front line,
avant-garde of climate change denialism, which I the new Republican spiel
of saying I`m not a scientist, so the sort of -- the slightly less cringe
inducing, slightly hipper, slightly less ridiculous seeming way of holding
James Inhofe`s views in politics if you`re Marco Rubio, if you`re Rick
Scott is basically say I`m not a scientist.

And he`s at least forthright enough to claim that the whole thing is a
massive global conspiracy foisted on the American people.

PIERCE: Yeah, he -- you know, I mean I told some people the other
night that what this election was, basically, was the Republican Party
taking the Tea party to finishing school and Tuesday night was a debutante
ball. Yeah, they haven`t gotten Inhofe yet. Inhofe, is still the wild
child on this. God will protect us even if this is happening, God will
protect us but don`t worry, because it`s not really happening.

HAYES: That`s the other thing about the Inhofe line, which is the
thing you see coming from conservatives is it`s like arguing the
alternative in law school, right. I mean, they will say, the planet is not
warming. It is warming, but It is warming, but it`s not a man-made -- if
it is warming and it is man-made, it will all be better off anyway and we
can`t do anything about it.

PIERCE: Right. And God will protect us. That`s the one step Inhofe
takes
and a lot of them don`t.

HAYES: God is still up there. Charlie Pierce, God is still up there.

Nice Gadston Flag (ph) lapel pin there.

PIERCE: We`re taking it back, Chris. What can I tell you?

HAYES: Charlie Pierce beginning the don`t tread on me re-
appropriation for liberals tonight. Thank you very much.

PIERCE: Night, Chris.

HAYES: All right. It`s a big night here at "All In" as we bring you
the first major moment of 2016 Democratic primary. It involves Hillary
Clinton and
Elizabeth Warren. You don`t want to miss it. Stay tuned right here.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Are you thinking about running for president?

RICK PERRY, GOVERNOR OF TEXAS: Keeping the option open.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You are?

PERRY: Absolutely.

BOB SCHIEFFER, HOST, FACE THE NATION: Well, are you going to run?

SEN. RAND PAUL, (R) KENTUCKY: Maybe. I don`t know.

DANA BASH, CNN CORRESPONDENT:

CHRIS CHRISTIE, GOVERNOR OF NEW JERSEY: I really haven`t decided.

DIANE SAWYER, ABC NEWS ANCHOR: When are you going to decide whether
you`re running for president?

HILLARY CLINTON, FRM. SECRETARY OF STATE: Well, you know, I`m going
to decide when it feels right for me to decide.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Are you going to run for president?

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN, (D) MASSACHUSETTS: I`m not running for
president.

UNIDETNIFIED MALE: What`s going on here? Are you running for
president?

SEN. TED CRUZ, (R) TEXAS: John, we are having a national debate.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Are you going to run in 2016?

JEB BUSH, FRM. GOVERNOR OF FLORIDA: That`s way off into the future

MITT ROMNEY, 2012 REPUBLIACN PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: What I`m saying
is I`m not running. I`m not planning on running.

PERRY: I`m sorry to say, I told you I gave up on running. I`m riding
a bike now.

BASH: How about you?

CHRISTIE: We`ll see.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HAYES: Two of people you saw there, Hillary Clinton and Elizabeth
Warren`s supporters will be here next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HAYES: Yesterday marked the official start of the 2016 presidential
campaign with Democrats around the country still absorbing their midterm
defeat. Pro-Hillary Clinton`s super PAC priorities USA action started
calling donors first thing yesterday morning to get the ball rolling. And
even before that, while the returns were still coming in on election night,
Rand Paul signaled just how thirsty he is to kick off his White House bid
when he took the stage at fellow Kentucky Senator Mitch McConnell`s victory
party. According to a reporter on the scene, the crowd went wild with
cheers for him to run for president.

Senator Paul`s official Twitter account promptly retweeted that report
of
the crowd`s encouragement only to delete it three seconds later.

While the GOP tried to make this year`s midterms all about President
Obama, Paul also tied the Democrats` losses to a different member of the
party.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PAUL: On Kentucky in particular I think this election was basically a
repudiation of the president. But, also, of Hillary Clinton. The Democrat
here ran. She wouldn`t admit that she voted for President Obama. She was
very specific, I`m a Clinton Democrat.

The Clintons, both of them came often to Kentucky, really, the cachet
of the
Clintons isn`t what people think it is.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HAYES: He later started a Facebook album dedicated to Hillary`s
losers: Democratic Senate candidates she campaigned with who lost their
races.

Now Rand Paul is just one of a large slate of likely GOP candidates
who were destined to make the Republican primary one for the books.

The first debate has already been scheduled, September 16, 2015 in
between Chris Christie, Scott Walker, Ted Cruz and all the other possible
2016 hopefuls it will be definitely be interesting to watch.

On the Democratic side, however, it`s not even clear there will be a
real strenuous primary. Just about everyone I`ve spoken to says Hillary
Clinton is all but certain to run. And the super PAC Ready for Hillary is
gearing up for a big strategy meeting with top donors in just a couple of
weeks.

The question is, will there be anyone for her to debate? A few people
seem to be clambering for Joe Biden to throw his hat in the ring. Though
he has certainly not ruled it out, conventional wisdom says outgoing
Maryland governor Martin O`Malley was weakened this week by the defeat of
his own lieutenant governor in the race to succeed him. And Elizabeth
Warren, the other potential candidate with an unaffiliated group Ready for
Warren prepping for a run has said she`s staying out of it, although she
did recently soften her resistance telling People Magazine last month,
quote, "if there`s any lesson I`ve learned in the last five years, it`s
don`t be so sure about what lies ahead. There are amazing doors that can
open."

So will she run? Or will the primary be a little more than a
coronation of Hillary Clinton? That`s next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HAYES: All right, joining me now, Erica Sagrans, campaign manager for
Ready for Warren and Mitch Stewart, founding partner with 270 Strategies,
consulting firm that has partnered with Ready for Hillary. They are both
Obama
campaign alums.

All right, the first question I want to -- is the interpretation of
the mid-terms and how they apply to 2016.

Erica, I`ll start with you. You think there are big takeaways from
the midterms in thinking about the Democratic presidential primary field?

ERICA SAGRANS, CAMPAIGN MANAGER READY FOR WARREN: Yeah, I think
there`s a few key takeaways. The first is that Democrats really need to be
able to articulate a strong, coherent economic vision for voters, one that
resonates with middle class voters. And there was a real lack of doing
that on Tuesday.

I think the second is people are just angry and frustrated with
Washington and with Wall Street. We saw exit polls show that about two-
thirds of voters said like Warren is saying, they feel the game is rigged
in favor of the wealthy, of the powerful, and only 1 percent said that they
thought the economy was excellent.

And I think other one is just that Democrats can`t continue to play it
safe. We need to think bigger. We can`t just think we can do the same
thing and try and run the same kind of candidates who seem like they`re the
most electable. Voters see through that. And we need someone with a
really strong vision, which we think is Elizabeth Warren in 2016.

HAYES: Mitch, what is -- what was your takeaway from the midterms?

MITCH STEWART, 270 STRATEGIES: Well, I think, number one, Chris, is
we got slaughtered. And I think it`s important for Democrats to
recognize...

HAYES: Well said.

STEWART: Yeah, I think it`s important for Democrats to recognize
that.

But from there I think -- I took four takeaways, two going into the
elections and two coming out.

The first is, there is an avalanche of outside money right now that
floods in
in midterms. In presidential years, candidates, certainly the presidential
candidate can kind of sort of bully up other ticket Democrats to that
avalanche. But in midterms, there`s a structural deficiency that we are
going to have to address as a party.

I think, second, we take a lot of pride in evaluating what works and
what doesn`t work from cycle to cycle. And I agree with Erica, I think the
biggest takeaway going into this election is that message, Democrat`s
message to middle class voters on the economy has not worked. And we need
to figure out from President Obama to Vice President Biden all the way down
to the ticket how do we in particular a message that frankly it has the
highest stock market in history, has 6 percent -- lower than 6 percent
unemployment, growing GDP. How do we articulate that to people so that it
resonates?

I think, third, is that while the Republicans certainly had a wave,
this is not a mandate. In a lot of red states, my home state of South
Dakota, a minimum
wage increase passed, in a lot of other Red States it did, too.

So while it was a Republican wave, it`s not a mandate to inherit or to
enact Republican policies.

And finally the last thing that I think is really important for
Democrats to -- and progressive to take heart at, is that this is not
determinative the 2014 to 2016. We went through this before: 2010 was the
worst election in a hundred years, unfortunately 2014 might be the second
worse.

But it had no real impact on the election of 2012. And I think it`s
important for people to recognize that.

HAYES: Let me ask you this. So, I sort of agree with all of those
takeaways. Those all seem broadly correct to me from both of you.

Mitch, let me ask you this question, this is a process question. It
seems to me my -- and I have a rooting interest, because I`m a journalist
who is going to cover this, so that`s on the table. But it seems to me the
best thing for the Democratic Party, for democracy is a big, wide open
primary where people make their
their cases, they run attack ads at each other, they do oppo dumps on each
other, that you have to -- candidates have to work those muscles, they have
to go press the flesh. They have to make their case. They have to hone
their message, they have to defend against allegations of scandal.

But they do all of that in the primary before you get to a nomination
process rather than a process of essentially acclimation, which is what it
looks like we`re going towards with Hillary Clinton. Do you agree with
that?

STEWART: Well, I will say two points to your point.

The first is, we had probably the longest and most competitive primary
in a generation, if not longer in 2007 and `08. And, you know, to think
that both candidates weren`t fully vetted and tested, I think, is
inaccurate.

Second, though, is that -- as part of the exit polling that a lot of
organizations did, they asked Democrats who is your presidential
preference? And 83 percent said Hillary Clinton.

And so in order to have a contested primary, I think it`s important
there to be a diversity of opinions about who should be the presidential
nominee. And right now, Democrats, whether you`re a liberal or a moderate
or whoever, are lined up now behind Hillary Clinton.

HAYES: But that`s a self-fulfilling prophesy, isn`t it, Erica? I
mean, that`s part of the issue here.

SAGRANS: Yeah, I mean, absolutely we need a Democratic primary and a
competitive primary to really have that conversation about what we want the
future of the party and the country to look like. I mean, do we want a
candidate who is close to Wall Street, who is close to the banks that
brought down the economy, or is someone who has really spent their lives
fighting for working families? And that`s definitely a debate worth
having.

Voters want a choice. They don`t want to be told this is who your
nominee is. They want to have a choice, have that conversation and debate.
And we absolutely need to have it.

HAYES: Mitch, do you think that`s a problem for Hillary Clinton, what
Erica just said about being perceived as close to the banks or close to the
titans of finance or close to the 1 percent?

STEWART: No, I think Secretary Clinton has a strong record of
fighting for minimum wage increases, advocating for women and children. I
think she`s got a record that`s very proud in which to run on, that, you
know, advocates for the middle class.

The one thing that I would add to that, though, Chris, is that as
Democrats, I think we pride ourselves on being a big tent party. And I
think there`s a lot of
really qualified people that are going to look hard at 2016. And as
Democratic activists, I hope they do. I hope we do have a lot of diversity
looking at running in 2016, because I think it`ll make our party stronger.

HAYES: But the problem is that the structural conditions are not
facilitated that way. It`s all the money lines up is ready for Hillary and
Priorities USA declare -- who are you kidding? Who is going to like walk
into the mouth of the lion?

STEWART: But when you say structural deficiencies, you`re talking 83
percent of Democrats right now who are already in support of Secretary
Clinton`s potential candidacy.

I don`t know what could change that.

HAYES: Well, what can change it is perhaps a contested primary.

So that`s the question. Erica Sagrans, you are not officially
affiliated with Elizabeth Warren. I just want to make that clear, right.
This is a sort of side project goading her to run. And Mitch Stewart of
270 Strategies, thank you both.

STEWART: Thank you, Chris.

SAGRANS: Thank you.

HAYES: All right, that is "All In" for this evening. The Rachel
Maddow Show starts now. Good evening, Rachel.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY
BE UPDATED.
END

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