Show: ALL IN with CHRIS HAYES
Date: November 6, 2013
Guest: Andrea Kassimatis, Sam Seder, Erick Klinenberg; Sally Kohn, Heather
McGee
CHRIS HAYES, MSNBC HOST: Good evening from New York. I`m Chris
Hayes.
Chris Christie spent the day basking in the glow of his resounding
victory last night. But before we allow ourselves collectively to be swept
up in what he called "the spirit of Sandy", it`s worth actually taking a
look at the man`s record.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Big news, big election results across the country.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Big win for Chris Christie in New Jersey, a boost
for his presidential prospects.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Republicans are crowing about the big Chris
Christie landslide in New Jersey.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Governor Christie, wow --
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: -- as he prepares to become the national
frontrunner for the 2016 race.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Was that a campaign speech for running for
president in 2016?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That wasn`t an acceptance speech. That was an
announcing speech.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So Chris Christie is running for president on the
theme "I can do it".
HAYES (voice-over): Chris Christie emerged from last night`s election
as a frontrunner for the 2016 Republican nomination. And he got there,
thanks in no small part, to Hurricane Sandy. But don`t take our word for
it.
GOV. CHRIS CHRISTIE (R), NEW JERSEY: My pledge to you tonight is I
will govern with the spirit of Sandy.
HAYES: The spirit of Sandy that Christie evoked so many times last
night is one thing. But the facts of Sandy recovery are something else
entirely. New Jersey received billions of dollars in federal aid to
rebuild, and $1.8 billion of that came from the U.S. Department of Housing
and Urban Development to get people back in their homes. To get that
money, Christie promised that 60 percent of the funds would be reserved for
low to moderate income households.
Right now, it appears that Chris Christie is breaking that promise.
Of course, we don`t know for sure.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Fair Share Housing Center, an advocate group for
affordable housing, insists they`re just frustrated. The center sued the
sate for what they call the administration`s failure to provide the most
basic documents, on why thousands of families have been denied assistance
in rebuilding post-Sandy.
HAYES: Because the Christie administration has released almost no
information about how the federal money is being spent. What we do know
came out of a lawsuit that alleged that the Christie administration was
improperly holding data on the use of the funds.
In response to that, Christie`s government released information on
where just a fraction of it all went, of that money, only 36.9 went to the
people Christie promised he`d give it to.
The whereabouts of the rest of the billion dollars remains a total
mystery.
We do, however, know where an additional $25 million in Sandy aid
went, to a very well produced ad campaign -- in fact, a whopping $7.4
million federal dollars for this one commercial.
It turns out the firm hired to run the campaign had been chosen over
an advertising firm that had bid 40 percent less, but did not propose using
the governor`s family in the spot.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Jersey shore is open.
CHRISTIE: We`re standing because we`re stronger than the storm.
UNIDENTIFIED GIRL: You bet we are.
HAYES: Right now, there are thousands of people still out of their
homes one year after the storm hit.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Did you think when all this happened that a year
later you would be in this condition?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Never. We honestly figured maybe six months and
we`d have a home.
HAYES: Mortgage defaults are up over the past year in the Sandy-hit
areas. Seventy-five percent of New Jersey residents affected by the storm
say people like them have been largely forgotten in recovery efforts.
For many people in New Jersey, Sandy was the worst thing that ever
happened to them. For Chris Christie, it could have been the best.
CHRISTIE: You see a mission is different than a job. A mission is
something that is a sacred. It`s a sacred trust that was thrust upon me
and you.
HAYES: Chris Christie is not just benefiting politically from a
natural disaster, he is benefiting politically from a natural disaster made
more disastrous by his own administration`s failure to prepare. During his
first term, Christie de-funded the state`s Office of Climate Change and
Energy, after Sandy.
When reporters filed public records request to New York and New
Jersey, they found that New York City`s transit plans for severe storms is
detailed in five binders, each three inches thick. New Jersey`s plan?
Three and a half pages with everything blacked out.
CHRISTIE: My pledge to you tonight is I will govern with the spirit
of Sandy.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HAYES: Joining me now is Andrea Kassimatis, a Hurricane Sandy
survivor who lives in Union Beach, New Jersey. She appeared in a Barbara
Buono campaign ad, did not work for the campaign.
Andrea, thank you for joining us tonight.
Your home was destroyed by hurricane Sandy, right?
ANDREA KASSIMATIS, HURRICANE SANDY SURVIVOR: Yes.
HAYES: And it is a year later, what`s going on?
KASSIMATIS: Right now, myself and my two boys and fiancee and our dog
are living in the trailer in our driveway, staring at an empty vacant lot.
HAYES: Have you gotten help from the state? What is going on?
KASSIMATIS: We`re still waiting our RREM grants, we were one of the
preliminarily accepted for the grant, I filed for the grant an hour after
the grant had opened on line, went in for the filing of the paperwork, I
took three separate days off to go file the paperwork, sign the documents
they requested. Bring the same documents back a second, a third time, sign
them over and over, and just you know, haven`t had any movement since
beginning of August, end of September.
HAYES: The morning after Sandy, and you woke up. You said it was a
horrible night for you. You spent the night in your house in the beach.
When you accounted for your loved ones, was there any part of you that
thought a year later on the anniversary you would be in a trailer on that
lot with the house still destroyed?
KASSIMATIS: No, no, I truly believed that the policies that we had
paid for, that the government requires us to carry, I believe that they
were going to protect us, take care of us, and do exactly what we paid for
them to do. And I feel like, you know, the federal government and the
state government have fallen short of that.
HAYES: When Chris Christie gets up last night and he invokes the
spirit of Sandy and togetherness and people, political punts and political
observers from all over the country look at this guy, saying he is a star
on the rise. And he brought New Jersey back after Sandy, how do you feel
about that?
KASSIMATIS: It`s very frustrating to me. It almost disgusts me in a
sense, because of the fact that when he brags about all the people that are
back in their houses, he neglects that the people broke the bank. They
tapped into their 401(k)s, their retirement. They now have to work an
additional 10, 15, 20 years to pay off the loans that bring them back into
those houses.
HAYES: Did the people on your block, the people that were really
directly affected, do they feel the same way? Is this a common feeling?
KASSIMATIS: Yes, yes, my next door neighbors were weight lifted for
the grants. They were not own preliminarily accepted. And they have a
heartbreaking story just like myself and my family. And they have a young
daughter. And to be wait-listed for them, for what reason? You know, you
say there is 15 million left over Sandy funds that you can give rebuild the
seaside for the second time, and you have people that are wait-listed. So,
how is their funds that are left over for that?
HAYES: The governor rebuilt the in -- the famous boardwalk, the
Jersey Shore, I almost said infamous, which is also kind of true. The
famous boardwalk on Jersey Shore, Seaside and Seaside Heights. It burned
down famously, tragically, just a month after I think it was reopened and
rebuilt, Christie said he found another $15 million to build that again.
And your neighbor, wait-listed to get her home reconstructed a year after
Sandy hit.
KASSIMATIS: Correct.
HAYES: I want to bring in MSNBC contributor, Joy Reid, also managing
editor of TheGrio.com, and Sam Seder, host of the online daily political
show and podcast "Majority Report."
I have to say, it`s one thing if you say, look, Chris Christie ran on
capping property taxes, and he capped the property taxes, and you may not
like it but he did it, OK? And that`s fine. I mean, he`d go, my record
was on New Jersey capping taxes, we got that passed through, we capped
property taxes. I`m a low tax guy.
It`s another thing entirely for your entirely political persona to be
bound up in your heroic help that you give the people of New Jersey in an
hour of need, when I have to say, the more that you look at this record,
the less there is to it, the more angry I get, the more time I spend
reporting on this.
JOY REID, THE GRIO: As I was listening to Chris Christie`s acceptance
speech last night, I was kind of fuming, because he -- Chris Christie has
perfected this performance of being the sort of great man of the people,
that entrances the reporters, it then raptures and almost hypnotizes
reporters because it`s so gosh darn every man.
But his actual performance as governor doesn`t marry up with the
image. Last night, he talked about almost as if he was a marine, not
leaving people on the beaches of Normandy. He talked about his big
achievement. Well, darn it, he hugged people. People hugged him.
That is not -- I mean, it is a minimum standard for a governor to
accept federal aid. He did do that. And he didn`t hate Barack Obama in
the process, he gets credit for being able to do that --
HAYES: Yes.
REID: -- in a Republican Party that punishes for not hating Barack
Obama. He deserves credit for that.
HAYES: That`s low bar.
REID: It`s a low bar, he cleared it. But this is so important, this
is the first time I have actually heard broken down what did he actually do
to earn this rapturous response from the media?
SAM SEDER, MAJORITY REPORT: Yes, I thought it was incredibly craven.
I mean, he`s talking about this concept of the spirit of Sandy, which is
actually people coming together after a tragedy --
HAYES: Which again, I am not raining on. It is an amazing thing. I
have seen it firsthand.
SEDER: It had nothing to do with him.
HAYES: Right.
SEDER: And he put himself in the middle of that so-called coming
together, as if it was his alchemy of that brought people together after
suffering from this horrible tragedy, and yet, the one thing he could do,
above and beyond the idea of your neighbors coming together to help you is
to deliver the federal aid, to do so in a transparent and timely fashion,
and he failed at that.
HAYES: Is that how you feel, Andrea?
KASSIMATIS: Absolutely, absolutely. I can`t believe with the special
election that they had to come up with this year. You found the money to
fund that special election in a three-month time period and yet you still a
year later can`t find a way to funnel the funds to those who need it. .
It is absolutely frustrating to me. And my voice is one of thousands of
families. Don`t think that my story is unique. It is not.
HAYES: I was amazed by the polling, people affected, it is a huge
disconnect, it`s like if you held a Sandy survivor`s election, Chris
Christie might very well lose it. But the whole state of New Jersey is
going to reelect him to overwhelmingly based on the image of what he`s
done.
I also think, the other thing that I feel like hidden in this story
here is, you know what? It is not hard to be popular when you are handing
out billions of dollars in federal money. This is not to say he should not
be in a position, he should. Absolutely, the Sandy aid was justified. I`m
glad that Congress. There`s no one questioning that.
But it is not the hardest thing in the world, Joy Reid, to be a
popular politician when you are sitting on a huge federal budget piggy bank
that you didn`t have to raise, to dole out for political favors.
REID: Yes. I mean, the experience of having lived in Florid really
teaches that competency in the face of tragedy, of natural disaster can be
a huge political benefit, because as you said, the optics of being the
governor, when a huge hurricane hits, or something disastrous happens, for
which the federal government is footing the bill for the recovery, is that
you are the guy handing out the water, you are the guy writing the checks.
It appears from the outside looking in, you could have tremendous
benefit politically from it. Jeb Bush benefited politically from it.
Charlie Crist has benefited from that appearance of total competency.
But you`re right, that competency is bankrolled by the federal
government, which shovels in the money. You just have to figure out how to
allocate it.
So, all Chris Christie had to do --
HAYES: And of you, Andrea Kassimatis, you`re sitting here right now,
in a trailer next to your destroyed house a year after Sandy hit.
SEDER: Yes. I think, you know, it`s not just a question of optics.
I mean, that money went somewhere, only a quarter of it, a third of it is
accounted for. And you have the Democratic challenger saying you know,
these party bosses, essentially in the Democratic state politics, for some
reason, they decided not to pursue what the policies they have always
pursued.
HAYES: Right.
SEDER: And frankly, I don`t think it shocked anybody that the New
Jersey politics are transitional.
HAYES: Yes, I wanted to show a little bit of Christie, the Q&A today
talking about all the 2016 speculation, which didn`t even wait until he had
won last night. And that speech, and the greatest job ever, the speech
like everybody else said, was an announcement speech.
Take a listen to Chris Christie.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CHRISTIE: Oh, please, it is such a burden about you speculating about
me being a burden of the free world, stop, that is a huge ego to be
complaining about that. It`s complimentary. It`s flattering.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: So, he is stoking it in his sort of narcissistic fashion.
Do you think -- I think Sandy has a potential as a political issue to
be his Bain Capital, because it`s one of those things, no, I`m sorry,
because it`s like -- at of end of it, did you do your job? And what did
you do in your past? And I think it`s going to follow him soon.
SEDER: That speech last night was really for a bunch of cable hooves.
America was not watching the speech. There are a lot of New Jerseyites, I
think, who -- you know, the ones who have a real problem with what the
reality of Sandy is, they`re not being heard obviously. That was there to
start the narrative that other people will carry for him as he gets closer
to 2016.
And I think you`re right. They`re going to build on it, this could
come back to bite him.
HAYES: Andrea Kassimatis, it`s so wonderful to have you here tonight.
Thank you very much. And good luck with rebuilding and recovering.
KASSIMATIS: Thank you very much.
HAYES: MSNBC contributor Joy Reid, and Sam Seder from the great
"Majority Reporter" -- thank you all.
REID: Thanks.
HAYES: Coming up --
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What about the people Medicaid expansion
promises to help? Under Medicaid today, participants experience. No
significant improvements in physical health. And according to a UVA study,
facts reveal that Medicaid patients are twice as likely to die during
surgery as with patients with private insurance.
Tell your legislator today to vote no on Obamacare. Vote no on
Medicaid expansion.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: That ad by our old pal, the Koch brothers, has been making the
rounds in Virginia. We`ll tell you why it didn`t work, ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HAYES: We love hearing from on Facebook and Twitter. Last night,
Chris Christie invoked the spirit of Sandy. So, my question for you is,
what would you say to the spirit of Chris Christie is? Tweet your answers
@allinwithchris or post at Facebook.com/allinwithchris. I`ll share a
couple later in the show when we talk about this. So, definitely stay
tuned.
We`ll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HAYES: Ken Cuccinelli lost his bid last night to become the next
governor of Virginia, which may well be the end of his political career.
But now, the conservatives are doing the thing they always do after they
get their butts kicked, trying to explain how this loss is actually a
secret win.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What did you learn from seeing Cuccinelli almost
take McAuliffe in the last weeks of this race?
SCOTT BROWN (R-MA), FORMER SENATOR: That libertarian had he not been
there, I think the election would have gone to Cuccinelli. Cuccinelli
brought in his base. He talked about the things that matter, because
remember, he was the first person, the first attorney general to actually
file on Obamacare, did a great job of presenting it. And people remember
that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: This is an idea conservatives have really latched onto. The
race narrowed so much in final weeks, that really they should consider it a
victory. And it narrowed because of the bang-up job Ken Cuccinelli was
doing running against Obamacare. That is the conservative line today.
You`ll see it everywhere.
But there is simply no evidence in the data that that`s true. Take a
look at the exit poll, for example, from Virginia, 53 percent of voters
oppose Obamacare, compared to the 46 percent who support it.
Actually, here`s a fun game, take a look at these graphs, three of
them. They all look remarkably similar. First graph is how voters feel
about Obamacare in Virginia. A second graph is how they feel about it in
New Jersey, and the last graph shows how people feel about Obamacare
nationally.
It is all pretty much the same. Essentially the same in New Jersey,
where the Republican won in a landslide, as it did in Virginia where the
Democrat won, and they`re about the same in the national means, which means
it doesn`t seem to be driving anybody`s vote. It`s just a regular old
bipartisan split.
But on Monday, when Florida Senator Marco Rubio said this to a crowd
of Cuccinelli supporters --
SEN. MARCO RUBIO (R), FLORIDA: This is the first time people have a
chance to speak clearly at the ballot box, about the impact this law is
having on their lives and on our economy.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: That`s right.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: He was right about one thing, Obamacare was on the ballot in
Virginia, and Obamacare won. And here`s why - Virginia Governor Bob
McDonnell opposed the Medicaid expansion under Obamacare. He was not
planning to expand Medicaid in the state.
Ken Cuccinelli, the Republican running to replace McDonnell also
opposed it, calling the health reform, quote, "The unaffordable health care
act." Get it?
Pledging to work against the Medicaid expansion if elected governor.
Meanwhile, Terry McAuliffe supported it, even went so far to talk
about the benefits of expanding Medicaid during the campaign.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TERRY MCAULIFFE, VA GOVERNOR-ELECT: Beginning next year, 400,000
Virginians will get access to quality, life-saving care. Number two, this
is our money. It is now the law of the land. Twenty-nine other states
have agreed to accept it. Some very conservative governors have agreed to
accept it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: Make no mistake, this was not a symbolic win for Obamacare,
this was a very tangible win for more than 400,000 people in Virginia who
now stand a very good chance of getting health insurance.
Joining me now MSNBC policy analyst, "Washington Post" columnist Ezra
Klein.
Ezra, I have found the tail of Medicaid expansion, one of the more
fascinating political tales in American politics, because it`s always kind
of surprising where it pops up. It`s a little unpredictable -- predictable
on the Democratic side, the Democratic governors, it`s a no-brainer.
You would think it would be a no-brainer for everyone. It isn`t.
What is your understanding of the politics of this a day after
Virginia?
EZRA KLEIN, MSNBC POLICY ANALYST: So, I don`t think the politics have
changed dramatically nationally. The question is simply who is in power?
So, as you say in Virginia, Terry McAuliffe supports the expansion,
then as he says it is 400,000 people who get Medicaid. And it is not just
400,000 people, there is actually an important point for it. It is tons of
money. It`s like a stimulus for Virginia, for any state that accepts it.
That is all federal government money. If they don`t accept the
Medicaid expansion, they wouldn`t get it. If they do accept it, for a
couple of years, it`s all federal government money and after that it`s
federal government. This is the federal government dumping a truck of cash
into Virginia. And McAuliffe is saying, I want to do it.
Now, the issue here is that Republicans still control the Virginia`s
House of Representatives. They have the speakership and the Republicans
there so far don`t want to expand Medicaid. And so, the question is, how
and whether McAuliffe will be able to cut a deal with them that ends up
expanding it.
But we`ve seen in a bunch of states that Republicans, a lot of them
have realized, this is an incredibly good deal for their state, you saw it
in Ohio, in Pennsylvania, in Arizona, even in Florida, it doesn`t always
work to get it through legislature. But there is at some point, the
Republicans listening to the business industry and the health of their
state saying okay, we`ll take your free health care dump truck of money if
you make us.
HAYES: Yes, the last thing you said there I think is important. To
stress about the interest group politics of this end up working out. And
we saw this famously in Florida, Rick Scott who was the former health care
company CEO, that this is also very meaningful for all of the health care
providers in a state, hospitals, chief among them, who tend to have a
pretty good direct line to those state`s governors.
KLEIN: Yes, not only that, but if they don`t take the Medicaid money
the hospitals will be in a lot of trouble because the way the law works,
all the groups will get the money from Medicaid, ratcheting it back some
insurance revenue they get now. If they don`t get the Medicaid money, you
could see a lot of hospitals that served so-called safety net populations
beginning to buckle and close. So it is not just that you don`t get this
expansion, you actively make your health care system works. And, by the
way, you make the lives of a lot of people in the health care system works,
right?
I mean, there is on the Republican side right now, this enormous
outpouring of anger and fear and regret of folks who had their health care,
and are going to see the health care change. We`re going to see the couple
of million folks in the individual market whose plans are going to change
under Obamacare. But you`re talking about a vastly large group of people,
about 8 million people, who could get health care who don`t have it at all
now. And there is no concern on the Republican side for them. They don`t
seem to have the same kind of moral outrage for these people who can`t get
health insurance because they`re poor, they just do because of the folks
that will see their insurance change.
HAYES: You know, it`s actually deeper than that, and I`m glad you
raised that because I want to talk to you about this. It`s deeper than the
sort of the lack of concern and hypocrisy on the Republican side. It is
actually the fact that people who are losing their coverage right now who
are getting the health insurance plan, we`re seeing their names and faces,
what they do for a living. I know them from the packages I have watched,
different nightly news programs.
Those 400,000 Virginians are just faceless. They`re statistic.
They`re people you gesture towards. Now, I really think there is a real
imbalance in the kind of the relative amount of social capital and power
these folks who are losing something have, and these people who are on the
precipice of getting something important have.
KLEIN: Yes. And they`re politically powerless. I mean, there are
two things colliding, one, sort of the human tendency to fear what we are
losing more than what we`re gaining, right? This is well founded behavior
economics literature. There`s just this kind of law of aversion. It is
always this way in politics. When something is changing or they`re losing
it, the reality of that. The tangibility of that far outweighs that which
you`re abstractly going to gain.
But on the other side of it, you have the situation where the folks
who are seeing something change are, probably change for the worse tend to
be self-employed, they tend to be relatively well off, not extremely well
off, but could be 60, 70, or 80, otherwise they would be getting subsidies
to help them out. And they do have political power. They are people who
politicians hear from.
We have enormously good evidence on the fact that the political system
simply do not care what the poor think. It does not hear them. It does
not listen to them.
If you look at this, there is literally no relationship between the
policy preferences of poor Americans and what actually happens in the
federal government and so you have these folks that really need this help.
But they are not politically powerful and they are not organized. And these
are not folks who are good at working their way through the bureaucracy or
the political system to get it. And so, their interests don`t count as
much, particularly now when they don`t even know what they`re supposed to
be getting.
HAYES: And the big first test for Terry McAuliffe, who I will say
right now, I`m Terry McAuliffe skeptic, "Mother Jones" headline today, I
can`t believe Terry McAuliffe, governor of Virginia, his first big step is
can he get this through?
"Washington Post" and MSNBC`s Ezra Klein, thank you so much.
KLEIN: Thank you.
HAYES: Coming up --
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If you want to have homosexuals pretending allowed
to be married, they need to go to the Democrat Party. And everybody knows
that homosexuality is wrong, I consider this pro-family and pro-marriage.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: That was the Tea Party candidate Dean Young who is running for
Congress in Alabama, he did about as well as the rest of the Tea Party did
last night. I`ll explain ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: Last night was the first election night since the Tea Party
Waterloo we know as the government shutdown. They got their way with that
shutdown, they brought conspicuous well-substantive government functions to
a halt, costing the U.S. economy $24 billion, according to an estimate by
Standard & Poors. And, it drove the GOP to historically low approval
ratings.
There was an open question going through the last night about how the
Tea Party would fare in the first election since that debacle. We now know
the answer is, "not well." The big loser was of course Virginia attorney
general, Ken Cuccinelli; the Tea Party favorite running for governor, who
lost a completely winnable state.
There are three other results that I think are kind of canary in a
coalmine warning for the Tea Party about what is about to happen
electorally to them. In Alabama`s first congressional district, the place
you would think would be pretty welcoming to the Tea Party message. There
was a runoff in the republican nomination and a special election to replace
a republican congressman who resigned to take another job.
That race lead an establishment conservative republican Bradley Burn,
back by the chamber of comers and nearly nominated for the gubernatorial
nomination in 2010, against this guy, Dean Young, who basically comes
across as a drunk liberal stand of a Tea Party caricature. In his
interview with the guardian, he was asked, "Apart from the United States,
which other country do you admire?" Young answered, "I am not a big world
traveler, so I don`t know."
Question, "Who is the current treasury secretary." Young, "It was
Paulson. Is it King Geithner, now?" Question, "Where was Barack Obama
born?" Young, "That is what we call the $64,000 question. I have no
idea." But, when pushed for an answer, He replied, "Kenya." And, here is
young last night, defiant to defeat after a losing a Byrne by 5 points.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DEAN YOUNG, (R) ALABAMA CONGRESSIONAL CANDIDATE: The entire nation
focused on South Alabama. The establishment republicans did everything
they could. They poured all their money into it, and they barely, barely
beat you guys. This is the first warning shot that goes out across the
nation that people in the United States are tired of where our government
is going. And, I thank God for all of you.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: Have to give him credit for this. The Tea Party faithful
losing is always still a win. And, then there are the Koch Brothers`
attempts to buy the elections of the small Iowa town of Coralville. The
Koch Arch Conservative Group Americans for Prosperity was calling voters
and knocking on their doors, and the latest leaflet denouncing the town`s
growing debt, comparing it to the financial woes of Detroit.
All to defeat, local democratic lawmakers, but two democratic
incumbents were re-elected to the city council, along with another
democratic newcomer. John Lundell was elected mayor of Coralville and he
received a congratulatory call from none other than vice president Joe
Biden.
And, finally, there is this guys, a group led largely by the county
commissioners of 11 world Colorado counties, pushing to secede from
Colorado to form the 51st state. They race a broad spectrum of grievances
ranging from expanded regulation of oil and gas production to social
issues. Here are some of the residents of Cheyenne Wells speaking with
America.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE SPEAKER (1): They have no idea what real Americans
are really like. How hard we work?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE SPEAKER (2): There were gun laws passed that went
against our way of life.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE SPEAKER (1): We do not want the government to
take care of us. We don`t want to live in a nanny state.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE SPEAKER (3): Marijuana, gay marriage, in my opinion
are issues of the left tweaking conservatives.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: Here is one of the secession movement leaders Weld County
Commissioner Sean Conway.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEAN CONWAY, WELD COUNTY COMMISSIONER: We are facing next year the
probability of having a statewide frocking ban on the 2014 ballot. When I
say our very way of life is under attack, that is what I am talking about.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: Sounds like real conservatives want to get out from under the
tyrannical thumb of the big government, big city liberals. And, yet, only
five of those 11 counties approved the measure to pursue secession, six
counties rejected it.
In fact, in that out of zero forms in Cheyenne Wells, when the
residents were asked to raise their hand, if they intended to actually vote
for secession, almost no one did. There were a few maybes. It may seem a
low bar that in 2013, a secession vote pushed by this frontal right-
winger`s failed. But, after the shutdown and all the craziness, man, these
days I will take it.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HAYES: Forget everything you have heard from every pundit about last
night`s elections in the last 24 hours. What election 2013 really shows us
is ahead. First, I want to share the three awesomest things on the
internet today. We begin with version of the vice president, Joe Biden,
that we love the most.
Last night, Democrat Marty Walsh was elected mayor by the great people
of Boston and Vice President Biden wanted to give the former labor leader a
congratulatory call. Only problem, he called this Marty Walsh, the wrong
Marty Walsh, president of a government relations firm in Boston. The
Boston Globe has the details of the Biden`s, "You son of a gun, Marty. You
did it." He let him down easy, for a dime a dozen in Boston, he said, "I
probably know he is Marty Walsh.
Joe Biden mixing up his Boston Martys or should he call Minneapolis
mayor, Minneapolis Mayor and Congreswoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz. So,
the Biden club that take us the most calling up memories of our favorite of
our favorite Joe Biden headlines, like Joe Biden shows up to the
inauguration with a pony tail and a classic shirtless Biden washes Trans Am
in White House driveway.
And, the second awesomest thing on the internet today, government in
action, only moments after the members of the legislature celebrated the
passage of the marriage equality bill. When the state representative Sandy
England put the law to the test, carrying an engagement ring with him just
so if the law passed he would propose to his long-time partner, Louie
Jaffey. This happened minutes after Jaffey showed up to the celebration.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
LOUIE JAFFEY: I wanted to take to an hour to tell a 30-second story.
I love that you care more about other people than yourself and I love you
so much. I want to spend the rest of my life with you.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE SPEAKER: Oh, my God!
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: They plan to marry next summer when the law takes effect.
Congrats to the couple and to the entire state. And, the third awesome
thing on the internet today, people around the world are finding out what
we already knew, admitting crack-smoking near Toronto Rob Ford is endlessly
entertaining after his wild press conference yesterday. He got more the
full Perry treatment from Steven Colbert, another late night comics.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
STEVEN COLBERT, LATE NIGHT SHOW HOST: I am personally inspired by
Mayor Ford`s courage to come clean about my own mistakes. Have I ever
smoked crack? Yes, but that was in the past.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: And, today, wrestling legend Iron shake paid a visit to
Toronto city hall to challenge the mayor to an arm wrestling contest. But,
of all the post crack on the site that brought down the house is that blew
up the Mayor Ford`s story in the first place. Gawker compiled the best
photos of Rob Ford that you will ever find. Photos that look like -- oh,
boy, and yikes.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HAYES: You have probably heard a lot about how yesterday`s election
counts came down to the candidates performances. Voter`s response to big
external factors like the government shutdown and Obama Care. But one
thing that is clear to analysts is the single biggest determiner of the
success in election is the demographic make up of the electorate. Who
comes out to vote.
If you want an illustration of just how important that is, look no
further than the result yesterday out in Virginia. In 2012, President
Obama beat Mitt Romney by 3 points. A year later, you had two completely
different campaigns under very different circumstances for a totally
different office but for the same results. The democrat won by three
percentage points.
This and despite the fact the candidates were in no way similar. The
glad-handing Clinton insider McAuliffe, poll opposite Barack Obama, a guy
that he has spent a year before he spent time attacking him in the primary.
And, Ken Cuccinelli is a social issues warrior, in a way that the pro-
choice Mitt Romney never was. So, forget what you might have heard the
most important lessons from the 2013 elections are not about Obama Care or
the ads or the candidates themselves. They`re about who came out to vote.
And understand that helps us understand the defining question of
progressive politics looking forward. Will the Obama coalition remain
intact when Barack Obama himself is no longer on the ballot. Joining me
now, Eric Klinenberg professor of sociology of New York University, the
author of "Going Solo: The Extraordinary Rise and Surprising Appeal of
Living Alone." Heather McGee, Vice President of Demos, a left leaning
Think Tank and Silicon, Columnist and progressive activist.
And, Eric I want to begin with you, and the reason that I wanted you
to be in the table tonight is because your book is excellent. And, we
talked about it before. Here are the splits, married and unmarried, which
are just remarkable splits. This is out of Virginia, married women went
for Cuccinelli 51-42. So, Cuccinelli, wins married women. He loses
unmarried women 67-25. He gets annihilated by 42 points. With men,
married men, he loses unmarried men 58-33, not as big as unmarried women.
The single person, married person divide in electoral politics is in
emerging demographic category trumps almost any other divide.
ERIC KLINENBERG, NEW YORK UNIVERSITY PROFESSOR: That is right, I am
glad we talked about it. This is one of the biggest changes in modern
American History. We now have about half of all adults, single voters,
single people. That is about 100 million people.
And, we know that single women, in particular, have a strong
preference for democratic candidates. They are interested in gun control
and interested in funding for public education. They`re interested in
reproductive rights. And, there is another significant thing given the
odiousness of some of the candidates, which is you can really turn off the
voters by grandstanding on the old values system.
HAYES: That is right. Interesting. Right. And, part of this, two
things you look at in the sub categories, Heather. What are the margins
and how many of them are there? And Eric`s book turned me on to that, that
category of person is growing. You can`t lose a category that is a growing
category by 45 points.
HEATHER MCGEE, VICE PRESIDENT OF DEMOS: The category is growing, and
actually under-represented at the polls, some of the lowest turnouts, which
is really unfortunate. One of the interesting things, what is the
psychology of single women, including myself.
And it is more about being a security voter than a freedom voter. And
she really sort of laid that out. Right? The idea that women who were
single, they don`t have the family, the home, the husband to take care of
them, two incomes, or wife, thank you very much. But, they also tend to
not live -- move a lot more and not have as much religious affiliation. So
that actually some of the kitchen table economic issues are really really -
-
HAYES: You are more exposed to disruption and risk if you are really
single than if you are living with someone else, simply as just the
insurance of a double income.
KLINENBERG: It can be an insurance --
HAYES: Hold the thought on the ideological vote. I want to talk more
about that. I also want to talk about the sort of moral woman? Hot that
playing out after we take this break.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HAYES: We`re back, I`m here with Eric Kleinenburg and Heather McGeei,
Sally Kohn. Eric I interrupted you mid thought on this amazing split that
is happening in American politics between with folks who are single in
terms of their voting behavior.
KLINENBERG: Just one, there is a split with single women and single
men still trending for Republican candidates. And the thing is, single men
are insecure also and need the welfare state as much as anyone. They`re
more likely to be lonely, and subjected to all the whims of poverty.
HAYES: I am glad you brought up the single men, because the
male/female split got a ton of attention in the early exit polls. You have
basically what always happens every election, which is the republican wins
men, the democrats win women.
And, it is a question of what they look like, in the case of Terry
McAuliffe, they were sizable, 51 to 42. There was a degree of strategy,
really nailing ken Cuccinelli on his very, very extreme views on the
reproduction, which actually seemed to be sort of the winner here.
SALLY KOHN, COLUMNIST: I`m glad we`re focusing on Virginia, because
frankly, people are losing the fact that as much as any problem, Christie
was anti-choice, but the difference, he is sort of an aberration in the
republican party, he could be caught sleeping with a blow-up doll and get
away with it.
It is literally hurting them in the polls with the growing
demographics, as well as other demographics, young people, people of
color, you cannot have a winning political strategy in this country
anymore if you`re alienating the parts of the base that are growing the
fastest. If they don`t do something, in 20 years we`ll be a one-party
country.
HAYES: There is another really important part of this when we talk
about gender, when you break down gender by race, you get something more
revealing. McAuliffe wins black women, 91 to 7%, white women are won by
Cuccinelli. I said this a bunch, said it on air, a bed rock truth is that
anything good that happens in American politics, the corner stone for
that good thing happening, the electoral corner stone, are the black
women.
They are the corner stone electorate consistency on the elections.
When they talk to pollsters, they are the most progressive in terms of
their views. And they turn out. Democrats need to understand, everybody
needs to understand this fact.
KOHN: And, there will be more of them, whereas there will be fewer
and fewer more white men in the electorate going forward, it is just a
fact.
HAYES: Heather, I`m curious to hear you talk about this. The big
question, can you get the Obama electorate without Barack Obama? If you
project out demographically, the nation is getting less white in this sort
of multi-racial multi-gender preference coalition that he has built.
You can only -- check this out. The 2012 or 2013 electorate based on
age in Virginia, here is exactly the problem. In 2012, the presidential,
you get 18 to 29-year-olds making up 90% of the electorate? Last night,
13%, the 44-year-olds, last night, 23%. The two electorates drop off, the
two oldest demographics go increase. That is a problem, when you have
stuff like that, what you get is 2010.
MCGEE: It was very interesting, and there is a really great pie on
this. What saved McAuliffe, actually, was the young vote went down but the
black vote stayed the same. I think it is pretty remarkable with 2012,
with the president at the top of the ticket, you had 20% of the African-
Americans being at the top of the vote.
HAYES: Some ask because you have a black president, is it the fluke
of Obama being president. And, I think the evidence shows, not
necessarily.
KOHN: Time will tell, there is also the issue of off elections. And
there is the reality of what we see, which is in part, driving black young
voters and driving single voters. Is the fact that this is not 2010. In
2010, the tea party looked vaguely moderate. They were the economic back
lash movement --
HAYES: Well, they were sort of a stand-in for something.
KOHN: Some said there were viable grievances. But 2012, they had
fully emerged with a traditional social wing of the conservative party that
will continue ton off the demographics.
HAYES: One problem, you talk about young voters and single voters is
that they tend to move around more. A fact, married households that is a
big problem. You have to register to vote.
MCGEE: They get caught in the red tape.
KLINENBERG: On the other hand, the other cities, what we see in New
York, Los Angeles, Boston, a bunch of cities in play for two political
parties, are solidly democratic. Let`s not forget about this big news,
we`re seeing urban areas move in potentially power house directions. This
is being swept up into the demographic change we`re discussing here.
HAYES: And every time you watch Virginia state return, same thing,
Southwest part of the state comes in red, they come in first, very high.
As you creep up north, more urban areas, where you have younger people you
see the margins start to come up. Right there, that story is the story of
the current coalitions in nutshell. Eric Klinenberg from New York
University, Heather Mcgee from Demos and columnist, Sally Kohn. Thank all.
That is "All In" for this evening.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY
BE UPDATED.
END
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All In With Chris Hayes, Wednesday, November 06, 2013
Read the transcript from the Wednesday show