series the one outside facing the american people, talking about the future with the sun in their face. we thank god are simply that kind of people, which is why we are too good of people to keep donald trump as our president. and that's "hardball" for now. thanks for being with us. "all in with chris hayes" starts right now. tonight on "all in" -- >> mr. vice president, there is a saying in my community, you're dipping into kool aid and flav. >> round two is over. >> we have a predator living in the white house. >> tonight the big takeaways. >> i get a little bit tired of democrats afraid of big ideas. >> the competing visions for democratic leadership. >> i don't understand why anybody goes to all the trouble of running for president of the united states just to talk what we really can't do and shouldn't fight for. >> and the front-runner's simple case for his nomination. >> i promise you if i get the nomination, i will win michigan. >> and then -- >> i think folks are making a

mistake by not pursuing impeachment. >> the growing number of democrats calling for impeachment approaches critical mass. plus -- this is a trade war. america just fired another shot, and you are about to pay. >> the latest example of why the trump economy is worse than it may look. and new reporting on real world implications of what the president is incyting. >> this dark psychic force of the collectivized hatred that this president is bringing up in this country. >> "all in" starts right now. >> good evening from new york. i'm chris hayes. we have now gone through two of these rounds of debates. the first time the big moment was between senator kamala harris and former vice president joe biden where the front-runner struggled to respond to kamala harris' criticism of his past opposition to federally mandated school integration through bussing. that was the big takedown moment, and it showed up in the polling. it definitely hurt biden's standing. you can see a bit of a dip in

biden's polling after the first debate in june. but you see the further we got from the debate, the better things looked for him. in fact, biden clawed back and came into last night's debate as the front-runner, again, by a pretty wide margin. while most people believe biden was better than the first time around, he did not have the sharpest performance. he was maybe a bit steadier, but not particularly forceful and lacking the command that you might expect from someone with his years in public service and the front-runner. so the big question before democrats as they think about who they want to nominate to face donald trump seems to me, or one of the big ones is this. do you want a guy you might trust and have affection for and who is closely associated with the last great democratic president, a guy you might think can win thanks in part to the goodwill he has built up over the course of a long career, or do you think it takes more than that? do you want the person who you believe is the sharpest, the best fighter, the person's who's views are closest to your own, whether or not that's joe biden? it's a question democratic voters are ultimately going to answer. joining me to talk about that

question much more, msnbc political analyst jonathan alter, columnist with the daily beast, msnbc analyst michelle goldberg "new york times" and danielle moodie-millmoodie-mill. what did you think, michelle? >> this isn't a new observation, but we were ill served by having these two parallel debates. >> totally, i appreciate that the dnc is not ruthlessly hierarchical the way the rnc so they didn't want to do the overcard/undercard debate. you had this very weird situation where it was idealogically polarized. you had byrne and elizabeth warren and a bunch of these sort of ringer moderates, right, who were standing in for joe biden. and then you had the reverse the next night where you had biden, warren, booker and then bill de blasio over there basically trying and kind of failing to channel what bernie sanders might say. and so in some ways, the central issue of this debate -- >> remains unresolved.

>> not only unresolved, but unlitigated. >> biden's performance? >> i mean, it was better than it was a couple of weeks ago. he seemed a bit more prepared. but he just does not seem like the biden we saw during the obama era. he is not relaxed. i don't know if it's because trump has labeled him sleepy joe that the question i keep asking and a lot of my listeners keep asking is why doesn't he have the energy? why doesn't he seem to have the vigor that a bernie sanders who is in the same age range seem to have? and i don't know if it's because trump has planted those seeds to make us believe that he is, but he's just not showing up. >> you know, one thing i thought, i want to plap this clip. there is a certain kind of a happy warrior in this that i thought few people lib, particularly elizabeth warren and cory booker which i'm psyched to be here, let's do it. let's have it out. i want to argue. that's what politics is partly about. take a look at these two clips.

>> your estimated net worth is more than $65 million. what would make you subject to senator warren's proposed wealth tax on the assets of the richest 75,000 homes, households or so in the united states. >> mr. vice president, there is a saying in my community. you're dipping into the kool aid and you don't even know the flavor. >> now in both cases, that was a practiced line clearly from booker, but you just saw the smiles. and to me, there is this question about, again, as you're evaluating as a candidate, as a primary voter about who do you want to go do this difficult thing, which is like some kind of energetic like joy in the actual grueling battle that is ahead of you. >> so the happy warrior, the original happy warrior is al smith, the governor of new york. and he had this wonderful kind of street quality, and then fdr. >> took him apart. >> took him apart. but he was also a happy warrior.

and that's what's worked, when you're enjoying yourself. if you're not, if you're a downer, it's not going to go off well. jimmy carter, what was he doing in 1976 when he got elected? smiling a lot. so this is really -- this is why booker had a good night, because he seemed to be enjoying himself last night. >> and i owill just say this. one of the things i also think set the tone was joe biden was his go easy on me, kid, to kamala harris that kind of said to me, and i tweeted this and people said why don't you like casablanca? why can't you just be nostalgic? no, it seemed very pat tron nicing and con sending. or i'm not ready. so please, please, please, don't make me look like an old fool. >> but just to take the other side of this, and this is the thing a lot of people have been talking about which is like there is a gap between the, like, most intensely following this and the vanguard most on social media and the most

invested and what the polling says about voters. and i think that gap can be both ideological in there is a lot more moderate and self-described primary voters than there are in the most active parts of the party, and also i think it can be just like intentional or dispositional level. joe biden continues to poll highly because a lot of people feel like they like joe biden and they have his politics more or less. >> right. but to me, that's where the danger of his sort of the fact that he seems a little bit slower, the fact that he seems a little bit off his game. because i think a lot of the concerns, and i believe you tweeted this earlier, but a lot of the concerns that people have about biden, the people who follow it very closely, there is people like me who disagree with him idealogically, but who can live with those differences if he seemed like a strong and vigorous candidate. >> right. >> so it's the fact that he doesn't necessarily seem like he would be particularly formidable on a stage with donald trump that gives me pause and that i think gave people pause after

the last debate with kamala harris. i don't think that it was that people said oh my god, joe biden was opposed to bussing, i changed my mind. >> no, it was not ideological. >> joe biden doesn't look strong. >> my wife compares it to watching a 6-year-old riding a two wheeler and praying is he going to go in the bushes? i hope he doesn't fall off the bike. but it might not matter. >> that's the other thing. >> i was with biden interviewing him the day after the sarah palin debate in 2008. he did not mop the floor with sarah palin. >> no. >> she sort of held her own. he did better against paul ryan in 2012. >> he did. >> but trump lost all the debates and he got elected. >> right. >> it's not necessarily automatic that the person that is the best debater is the best candidate. >> i think that's true, but to me it's not just about the debates. it's also about his sort of willingness to own his prior positions. it's about his defensiveness, about his 40 years in public life. >> and it's also about the fact that donald trump has positioned

himself as the strong man. he has also positioned himself and his base believes that he is strong, that he is vigorous. he will hammer people down, whether it's name-calling or what have you. to think about the biden that we're seeing right now on the stage with donald trump, that gives me so much pause, because i think that donald trump could wipe the floor with him, the biden that we're seeing right now. we're 400 and some odd days out. >> a lot can happen. >> a lot can happen. >> i want to talk about some of the exchanges. the first night i thought in a weird way, even though it was this proxy debate, it at least had a very clarifying ideological lines which it was a sort of discussion about what vision do we stand for in total. last night felt like this -- like angels dancing on the head of a pin debate about a bunch of marginal differences between health care plans that almost certainly probably aren't going to get passed. it does seem to me there is a lot of minutia policy debate about relatively small items particularly like say decriminalizing unauthorized entry, which i think is a good

idea. >> because -- it was because it was all a proxy debate about electability. the real debate is kind of who is going to be formidable against donald trump. who is going to be able to mobilize the people who stayed home last night. but since that debate is meta, debates have to be about issues, they were having these incredibly, like, kind of heated exchanges about not super -- not huge differences. >> also really harmful i think for a lot of people watching, because barack obama is at 95% popularity. and basically, what they're doing is they're picking away at hiss signature achievement. and they're implicitly saying -- >> you're saying on health care. >> yeah, on health care. it's not so good. and they never even mention what got them elected in 2018, which was preexisting conditions. >> right. >> how about emphasizing what democrats have done and what the republicans want to take away instead of just having this

narcissism of small differences. >> buff let me to sort of take the other side of that. i think people do have very different views on this, and that's particularly true about the medicare for all people. but i also think one of the things is both the setup of the debate is you debate the stuff you disagree on and not the stuff you have agree on, which ends up magnifying these issues, almost inherently, right? they all agree donald trump is a terrible person and a bad president and a racist and divisive and he is a corrupt yada yada. you don't talk than. they all agree on protecting preexisting conditions. so what you get, danielle, instead, they fight about the stuff they disagree with. >> and that troubled me last night. and when eric holder tweeted after the debate, and he said, look, barack obama, great president. we did a lot of good work. maybe focus on building off of what we did as opposed to tearing it down. i don't think it's helpful. i think that they keep playing into republicans' hands. i also think the questions asked last night are also straight out of republican talking points. and instead of phrasing the

conversation and making it seem like the democrats are the ones with big ideas and are so different from the republican party, republicans are trying to take away your health care. we're up here, as funny as it is, but we're fighting for the best way to provide you with health care. gillibrand was the one that kind of lifted that up and said why are we digging into the minutia. >> also, the way they were structured, again, with having these more marginal candidates on both stages i think encouraged that, because somebody like tulsi gabbard can take a lot of shots at these candidates, and nobody is going to do research on tulsi gabbard maybe until after the fact. so it gives people this incentive to try to pick -- to try to take as many shots at the front-runners as they can. >> and it's not a good look. you might are agree that they should decriminalize, but that law, which dates to the 1920s is not what led to the cages. it was donald trump. >> yes. >> made it seem like it was this law julian castro introduced this idea which is not winning

votes for democrats. it's about addition, not subextraction. >> but my bigger issue with that is this, which is a more practical concern. let's say you're elected the democratic president. you have a democratic house and democratic senate, which itself is maybe a 15% chance, somewhere in there, probably lower, 10%. if you move anything on immigration, it's going to be comprehensive immigration reform. >> right. >> then there is going to be some details, and maybe one tv fights over that is if you decriminalize. but that is down the list of a big comprehensive package. so when you're actually talking what would be the legislative agenda of a democratic president, it's comprehensive immigration reform. again, i think it's not a not important fight to have. it's just that in the context of what would you do as president, it's way down the list of what you're even going to get to. >> in the meantime, why lead with your chin? that's the big question i have for a lot of democrats. just optics, it's an overused word. think about it a little bit. what is the message this is sending in an election with stakes at this level?

if it's 1976 and it's whether gerald ford is going to get elected or not, fine. you can have these sorts of arguments. we have a man who is a menace to our democracy. we can't be out there doing these things and arguing in ways that just hurt democrats. >> arguing on the other side of, that right, because people say there are these unpopular positions they back themselves into. and i don't know what the actual nominee is going to have them. i was looking at the polling on re. the most recent polling on roe is it's 77% opposed overturning roe. they want to keep roe. people's views on abortion are variegated. the central question, should we overturn roe? donald trump ran on overturning roe. that's a 3% proposition. he promised he would have anti-roe judges, and i did not see everyone running around being this is a wildly unpopular position. there is no way the guy can get elected. >> just in general the debate never goes in that direction. i don't remember at other republican debates people saying how are you going to appeal to

democrats or how are you going to appeal to the more liberal parts of your party? there is sort of -- you don't see any countervailing pressure to marginalize the right wing fringes on the right, but at the same time, the coalitions are different. >> yes, they are. >> so democrats kind of can't simply say, well, republicans take unpopular positions all the time and they're fine and they kind of play to their base and that works for them. it does work for them, but they have a much more heterogeneous party and they're also distributed in ways that give them disproportionate power in this country there. >> is a little bit of breaking news that i think is interesting. when you think where are we politically at this moment, i keep being really fascinated by republican retirements. there are more of them than i would anticipate. will hurd, okay. >> oh, wow. >> will hurd is the lone member of congress to survive who is in a hillary clinton district. he represents the largest stretch of boarder in the united states. he's a really interesting guy, former cia officer, african american, represents a district

for hillary clinton and survived. just announced he is going to retire. that to me is a fascinating bellwether. he is the third texas republican to announce retirement in the span of about a week and a half. >> i mean, when you look, okay, texas, when we see what is happening. >> yes. >> we see what donald trump is doing, we see that the border is in a humanitarian crisis and the people that actually live, his actual constituents know what's going on and see it on a regular basis. so how is he going to look his constituents in the face, go home during recess and lie to them at these town halls and tell them that kids are not in cages, that areas are completely sanitary. oh, the private sector isn't making millions of dollars off of the fact that we're shoving kids and people into these detention centers. like you can't excuse it. donald trump can say whatever he wants and pop off at his mouth, but people -- >> when you represent the border. >> when you represent the border, what are you doing? >> he also knows he is going to lose. he almost lost the last time. remember, beto got in a lot of trouble. >> for not endorsing his

opponent. >> speaking of beto. now here is a guy who can't get arrested nationally, but they had a poll recently in texas. he crushes trump. so something's going on in texas. it might be more in play than ohio. >> oh, i guarantee you and i'll look in the camera and say it. the margin in texas will be closer than ohio in the next election. take that to the bank. and texas republicans will tell you the same thing. but that to me, i guess the reason that's interesting to me is there is a lot of discussion about democrats are fight together much and they're blowing it and when you look at on the ground, at the people who are making the highest stakes decision about where the political ground of the country is shifting, it is very interesting to me that the will hurds of the world are like peace. >> not just the will hurrids. but people who are conservative. you kind of see people basically saying that this is a losing proposition or it's not worth going to have to go back and defend what donald trump is doing. >> they know their colleagues put their integrity into a blind

trust and have become a party of enablers. they don't want to be part of a party of enablers. >> there is no excuse for it. and to their constituents, to their faces, the people who are actually seeing it day in and day out, there is no discussion for what donald trump is doing and they know it to be true. >> i think to double stress what you just said, which i think is such a great point, the guy who has the biggest border district, who is to donald trump's left on immigration and has been pretty navigated it in a fairly humane way is like no, i'm out. and that really says something about what the border politics of this president is. jonathan alter, michelle goldberg, danielle moodie-mills, that was great. >> thanks. up next, support for impeachment is about to reach an important threshold. congresswoman jamilla pry amil in two minutes. system naturally. and it doesn't cause bloating, cramping, gas, or sudden urgency.

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within the last few hours, yet another democrat came out in favor of an impeachment inquiry into president trump. california congressman pete aguilar is the 24th house democrat to do so in the eight

days since robert mueller supposedly disappointing testimony. the total number of democrats favoring an impeachment inquiry is up to 117, nearly half the caucus. other recent additions also include the vice chair of the house democratic caucus and four committee chairs, including foreign affairs committee chairman eliot engel who is close to nancy pelosi and not coincidentally happens to have a primary challenger. when pelosi was asked back in june what she will do if the majority of her caucus ends up supporting an impeachment inquiry, she dismissed saying it's not even close. we're now in a five-week recess in which all of the members of congress will be hearing from their constituents. and if one more democrat comes out in favor of opening an impeachment inquiry, that will be majority of the house democratic caucus supporting it. jared hoffman thinks that week of september ninth that's when i think they will support impeachment inquiry, a tipping point. so when congress comes back in september, impeachment may be a

very pressing issue on pelosi's leadership. joining me pramila jayapal of washington. she is a member of the house judiciary committee, which said in court filings last week, the committee is conducting an investigation to determine whether to recommend articles of impeachment. are you surprised or not by the two dozen or so folks that have come forward in the wake of robert mueller? >> not surprised. i really thought that this was going to happen. i thought mueller did what he needed to do. i think anybody who has read the mueller report knows it's damning. but what we needed to do is have robert mueller there to reinterpret the mueller report from what bill barr lied about and said it was and make sure that we got those facts on television. and i think when we did that, i knew i had been talking to my colleagues, and, you know, i think he did exactly what he needed to do. and i think, chris, you're going to see even more people coming forward. as you know from the court filing, from the court petition we did on friday, we are in the midst of an impeachment inquiry.

part of that inquiry, part of that process is being able to consider real articles of impeachment that we might even have to draft ourselves if we're going to to recommend it to the full house for a vote. and so there is some confusion. people think that nancy pelosi isn't on board with this, but in fact nancy pelosi is green lighted this strategy. we're all in the same place. >> okay. that's interesting. i just want to zoom in on that for a second. >> yes. >> there is a few different ways to do this, right? the committee could take -- the house could take a vote, opening an impeachment inquiry and then refer to it the justice department. >> right. >> judiciary committee. the judiciary committee could take a vote opening an inquiry just among themselves an open inquiry, or you could sort of start doing it and see where it goes. >> that's right. >> and then no one has to take a vote on it. i guess my understanding is you guys are in the third thing now? >> that's correct. that is right. we are in the third thing. we see the mueller hearing as an inflection point, a watershed, whatever you want to call it, it

was the moment when robert mueller said donald trump has not been exonerated. donald trump has -- there is significant evidence, ten counts in his report. we went over five in the committee hearing of evidence of obstruction of justice. we went through each of those. and robert mueller clearly said that these are serious issues, election interference. we didn't deal with that one as much that was really the intel committee. >> yes. >> but that hearing was also very compelling. so i think we have what we need in front of us. now what we did in the court filing is we said we are using -- we are asserting our highest article i powers which includes consideration of articles of impeachment. there you go. no flare, no bang. but we are in the midst of the impeachment process. >> another thing that i think just tipped over the majority caucus support in the house is the medicare for all legislation, which you're the author of, co-sponsor of, sponsor of. you have an op-ed today

responding to what you felt like were mislead iing they think we said in the debates about medicare for all. what does it mean that half the caucus is now on that bill? >> well, i think it just once again shows that this bill, this idea, medicare for all, this plan, 120-page plan in our house bill, bernie sanders's bill in the senate, this has tremendous support. remember, chris, that we have now had for the first time in the history of the house of representatives three hearings in the house of representatives. we have an unprecedented labor coalition. the polling is actually -- one of the things i take on in the article is a lot of the myths and misrepresentations that are out there. people say oh, the polling goes down. people want to keep their private insurance. people love their private insurance. no, that's just not true. people don't love their private insurance. what they love is their doctor and their hospital. and so once you say in the poll if you could keep your doctor or

hospital, would you support leaving private insurance? and the numbers go up higher than before. >> okay. but that's the -- first of all you can't guarantee you're going to keep your doctor and hospital, right? because doctors change. i mean like in some ways -- >> that's the whole point. >> it's a promise no one can keep. >> that's the whole point. with the current private insurance plan, every time you move a plan. >> sure. >> which means you lose a job. >> yes. >> you gain a job, whatever happens, you have a different insurance plan, you have to see whether that plan has your doctor or hospital, right? >> correct. >> withed me kp ed mmedicare fo would not be the case because there is no in network or out of network hospital or doctor. so what you have a consistency where you do keep your -- now i suppose if you're a doctor retired, not in practice anymore. >> no one can tell you with a straight face that they can predict the future what your health care is going to be like. that's my only point.

>> but i -- i don't know that that's true. what we're saying is the prediction is you will have stable health insurance, guaranteed health insurance, and the doctors and hospitals that you like are no longer decided by a private insurance company, right? you have more choice. you don't have a surprise billing where you suddenly go to the hospital for an emergency cancer treatment or surgery or whatever it is, and then literally just heard this from a consistent yesterday, stories all the time. a $40,000 bill. what are you supposed to do? in my op-ed in "the washington post," chris, i mention that half a million people filed for bankruptcy in one year because of medical costs. i mean, the most popular health insurance plan is gofundme. so i think that when we talk about this vision, we have to understand that this is a health care crisis, and we have to talk about the current situation

before we talk about and what people are paying right now, average of $20,000 if you have employer health care, $28,000 for that plan. >> i want to say this as a final note. i've covered two huge health care fights, two huge ones, the aca and attempting to repeal the aca. and all i will say is it's much harder to change things than to keep things. that is the one thing i have noticed. this is just indubebly the politics of the thing. it's harder to change the stats quo than to keep the status quo. and the people that learn that the most are the republican party that thought they had this in the bag with unified control of government and two took different runs at repealing the aca, which used to be unpopular and found out that actually the status quo won out. congresswoman pramila jayapal -- >> here's the big difference, chris. they didn't have a plan that they were proposing when they were repealing. >> they did. it was just bad. >> it wasn't really a plan. they just have been stripping care away. you got to look at how good, how we have to have a vision so that we can provide universal health

care for everyone. >> all right. congresswoman pramila jayapal, thank you very much. >> thank you. coming up, new evidence of the soft large underbelly of the trump campaign. the democrats so far really failing to take advantage. it's the economy, stupid. econod it's going ok? great. now i'm spending more time with the kids. i'm introducing them to crab. crab!? they love it. so, you mentioned that that money we set aside. yeah. the kids and i want to build our own crab shack. ♪ ♪ ahhh, you're finally building that outdoor kitchen. yup - with room for the whole gang. ♪ ♪ see how investing with a j.p. morgan advisor can help you. visit your local chase branch.

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with tums smoothies. just pick a door. i'm right there. nope that's my door. watch and learn. this is your door. you got a lot of bad guys behind that door? access granted. access denied. the position of the republican party under president barack obama was to dramatically cut government spending, bring down deficits and austerity, austerity, austerity. they did all that while we were in the midst of the worst recession since the great depression. they pushed for, frankly, more misery and more tangible harm to people's lives and less spending. they also attacked the fed for doing too much to help the reeling economy. so much so that when then texas

governor rick perry ran for president back in 2011, he kind of implied he wanted to beat up the then chairman of the federal reserve ben bernanke because his monetary policy was too loose. do you remember that? >> if this guy print morse money, between now and the election, i don't know what y'all will do to him in iowa, but we'd -- we would treat him pretty ugly down in texas. >> what is that? you treat him pretty ugly? rick perry was not alone that same year donald trump attacked the fed's monetary policy. quote, the fed's reckless monetary policies will cause problems in the years to come. the fed has to be reined in or we will soon greece. in 2016, donald trump railed against the ned fed care janet yellen for keeping interest rates low. >> well, it's daying at zero because she is obviously political, and she is doing what obama wants her to do. and i know that's not supposed to be the way it is. but that's why it's low.

>> that's not the way it's supposed to be the way it is, says donald trump, until he gets into office. we have seen president donald trump publicly and repeatedly brow beat the fed and in this case possibly successfully into cutting interest rates when unemployment is at record lows. we've got the republicans in power, and they pop a trillion dollars into the economy through tax cuts, and just today passed a budget deal that raises spending by hundreds of billions of dollars. and yet it looks like there is still enough slack in the economy for this all to be collectively working. here with me now to talk the state of the economy "new york times" op-ed columnist david leonhardt. so here is my theory. democrats are not asymmetrical in the way republicans are. when democrats have a republican in office, i think they kind of want federate cuts and they want spending on their priorities or social spending and they want unemployment to be low. they don't see themselves in the position of imposing austerity and tight money. >> i think that's right. look, i'm sure some democratic voters and some politicians when they hear good news under republican president have a

little moment of ooh, does that mean he is going to be reelected? but you phrase it exactly right which is democrats want government to do good things. and so they're happy to have the government doing good things, even when there is a republican president. when there is a democratic president, republicans both want to keep the government from spending, they'd rather just let rich people keep their money, and they want to keep the government from acting keynesian. but republicans become much more keynesian when there vaughn in the white house. >> the turn about on the fed is amazing. they were going to beat him up. they were going to lynch him. we were going to be greece, zimbabwe, steven moore, donald trump, rick perry, you name it. and now they're collectively browbeating powell into a rate cut. >> and to be clear, the way donald trump is behaving is completely different from what george w. bush did. george w. bush and george h.w. bush were extremely honorable how they dealt with the fed. and trump's just throwing it out the window. you know, the problem on these economic issues is it's

obviously hypocritical. it's gross, but at this point, it's hard to even be surprised about it. >> yeah. so we've got the trade war. a new trade war announcement today. he is going to post a 10% tariff on 300 billion on chinese goods in september. markets tanked on that. that comes after the rate cut he got. here is my theory on this. this is maybe imputing too much. donald trump is using the trade war as a fed that is located in the white house that he can then when he solves the trade war, when he comes out and says we've got a great new deal, like it's going to make the economy go up again. >> yeah. i mean, i would imagine there is part of that. his theories on trade are just wrong. >> yes, that's part of it too, my colleague paul krugman has been good at explaining. i think part of this is he is instinctual rather than intellectual as a politician. but look, this is dangerous stuff. >> yes. >> trade wars, you can't just turn them on and off, and they take months to filter through the economy. and we don't really know what's going happen here. but he's playing with fire here.

>> you know, there is this idea that oh, the economy is so great and the top-line economic numbers are good. unemployment is low. we are starting to finally see some real wage growth, particularly at the bottom. but it was striking to me, this polling out of michigan, this is the detroit chamber of commerce. so not like -- this is not some sort of lefty group. only 36% of people say the economy is better in the past few years. a third. almost two-thirds say worse or unchanged. that suggests to me people's lived experience of this economy does not match the top-line numbers. >> yeah, the national numbers are a little more optimistic than that. the gallup numbers, last time they did it, about 50% of americans say their financial situation has gotten better. 30% say it's gotten worse over the last year. so i think that the short-term economic fluctuations in most places have been positive. maybe they've been a little worse in the upper midwest which matters. >> yeah. >> they have been which matters for presidential politics. i still think the economy on net is short-term economy is a strength. long-term economy, people are

really frustrated by how slow growing their wages have been for years. >> right. >> they're frustrated. most americans have a net worth that is no longer back to its precrisis high. and so i think in terms of the long-term issues the democrats have a real opportunity here. that's why you see most voters favoring a wealth tax, higher minimum wage, right. >> bigger medicare. what i worry about, and i think you worry about it as well based on your last segment with the congresswoman, which is it is very easy for the democrats to get on the side of public opinion on the economy here. but they're overreaching. most americans don't want private health insurance to be banned. most americans do not want the border to decriminalize. and there are so many ways that the democrats can be on the side of public opinion here. they really should be more careful. >> yes. >> abouting you gond it. >> david leonhardt, thanks for being here. still ahead, real world implications of the president trafficking in conspiracies of the deep state in tonight's thing 1, thing 2 starts next. you wouldn't accept an incomplete job

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glamorous position. she has made it a more -- more importantly, a more important position. >> after haley quit, trump wanted former fox news anchor and state department spokesperson heather nauert, who on an official trip to saudi arabia with secretary of state mike pompeo to talk about the murder of "washington post" journalist jamal khashoggi tweeted this. now the search is over. the senate just confirmed potus' impressive nominee for the critical role of u.s. u.n. ambassador. >> a native kentuckian, kelly craft. how are you? >> hey, i am great. i'm so happy you are here. >> you probably as part of your job work a lot with justin trudeau, the very handsome canadian prime minister who everybody swoons over in america. what is he like? is he as charming in real life as he seems on television? >> he is. he is very charming. he is very smart. he is allcanadians.

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what happened last night at the u.n. when the chinese nationalists who were voted out is perhaps the most important event in the history of the united nations. it means that communist china, the most populous country in the world will be able to join the u.n., and the chinese today are hinting that they will come in and soon. >> on october 25th, 191, the united nations voted to admit the communist people's of china into the u.n. and expel taiwan from the body. the extremely controversial and important vote was opposed by the nixon administration, who

wanted to keep their ally taiwan in the united nations and keep communist china out. well, after furious lobbying, the u.s. lost that vote, which is a huge deal, covered wall to wall on network television. among the images shown were celebrations in the u.n. general assembly from countries that supported china over taiwan. that was enough to enrage none other than ronald reagan, then the governor of california, who picked up the phone to give richard nixon some offensive thoughts. >> last night after watching that thing on television. to see those people from african countries. they're still uncomfortable wearing shoes. >> and the tail wags the dog there, doesn't it? >> yeah. >> the tail wags the dog. >> you can tell by the hearty belly laugh nixon gives reagan in response to him calling african diplomats monkeys who just wear shoes, nixon loved

reagan's material so much he picked up the phone and repeated the sentiment to his secretary of state. >>, i for example, just had a call from reagan, california. you know, he's been out there and so forth. as you can imagine, there's strong feeling that we just shouldn't -- as he said, he saw these cannibals on television last night and they weren't even wearing shoes. here the united states is going submit its fate to that, so forth and so on. but that's typical of a reaction, which is probably quite strong. >> yeah, just focus grouping ronald reagan as what the reaction is in the country. reagan's racist sentiment didn't die on the phone with nixon, it was repeated and spread throughout the administration. the only reason we know about the call between nixon and reagan now is it was just released by the national archives, thanks to a nixon historian who reported saying

when the national archives originally released the tape of this conversation back in 2000, the racist portion was apparently withheld to protect reagan's privacy. for almost 20 years we didn't have this pretty important piece of information about how ronald reagan thought about the world. ronald reagan the conservative hero who's largely responsible for popularizing the term and concept of the welfare queen. we have had tapes of nixon saying extremely racist things for years. he was also a notorious violent anti-semite. it's not just these two men. the racial politics of the post-goldwater conservative movement have been pretty bad for decades before trump ever got into the white house. the old two-step was these kind of things, the things reagan and nixon said were said behind the scenes and they used code out in public. donald trump, he just tweets it all out. as presidential candidate marianne williamson called it, that is the dark psychic force of trumpism. >> this is part of the dark

underbelly of american society. the racism, the bigotry and the entire conversation that we're having here tonight. if you think any of this wonkiness is going to deal with this dark psychic force of the collectivized hatred this president is bringing up in this country, then i'm afraid the democrats are going to see some very dark days. >> that line got some chuckles and eye rolls, but it's probably as good a description of the core of trumpism as anything. it really is not an overstatement to say when the president stands before a crowd and insicites it to chant "send her back" or the nazi term for the lying press. >> that's right. >> lugen pressa. or when trump traffics in that, he is quite literally drawing

from the well of the worst, most dangerous impulses that humans have in politics. and i think it's kind of important to remember that. those are the stakes of what our politics are at this moment. does this darkness continue to be stoked by the most powerful man in the world or not? i'm joined now by sam seder and michael steele, msnbc political analyst and former chair of the rnc. sam, the president had a rally again tonight and it was insane for me to see not wrongly the news cycle, will the racist president incite the mobs at his rally to chant racist things tonight as a story that was really sort of an open question. >> yeah, well, a legitimate question. you know, i think my answer would probably be probably. if it's not going to be tonight, it will be in a week from now or two weeks from now or three weeks from now. it always gets back to me to those who have enabled him,

really enabled him. and, you know, i think he's been able to tap into something, but i think it was there on the -- just below the surface. look, this has always been with us. lyndon johnson knew this was going to be a problem 50 some odd years ago. but i think we're also in the late stages of like a change in the country where there are actually people, white men, frankly, who are losing social status and i think they're also under a significant economic pressure and the social status is one of the few things that they actually have some control over. they don't have as much control over the economic stuff because that's a function of what our government does and they don't get that. but in daily life you can try and maintain your social status and keep yourself centered in a world. >> you know, michael, we just covered at the top that will

hurd, one of only a few african-american members of the republican party in congress, is retiring. not just him, mike conaway is retiring, martha roby is in a safe seat in alabama. i do wonder, it's not fun to be in the minority, but i also wonder how much of it is like i don't want to carry water for this guy anymore? >> oh, i think that's a lot of it. it becomes too much. it becomes a burden that eats at your very dignity. you find yourself out here standing in front of a bank of cameras trying to explain the inexplicab inexplicable. you dodge and weave and it becomes too much. particularly for someone like will hurd, the only african-american republican in the united states congress who has the largest border to mexico in his congressional district of any member of congress, lacking the kind of support on this issue that he's gone to the leadership, he's gone to the

party and said we cannot stay in the space that's being created by the president. >> yes. >> it becomes too much. and he decides i'm not doing this anymore. it's unfortunate. we've lost a good public servant. we've lost for the party someone who could have been the kind of standard bearer that we at least idealize and talk about. but, you know, he's going to do something else now. >> when williamson said that line, it certificate of stuck in my head, the dark psychic force, because i think there's a degree to which, and this got lost a little bit in the debates because they're talking about things they disagree with and not things they agree with. but when there is a nominee on the democratic party, a huge part of the message is going to be like let's not be there. let's not be this. let's pull ourselves back from this. and i think that that is getting lost in the primary, but i think going to be central, it has to be central to the democratic party message. >> i mean i think so but i don't

know. i'm not sure that telling people is going to be enough. sometimes you need to show. i think the idea is that -- i happen to believe that this is not going to go away until it dies. and i don't think it's going die. i mean i don't think this is donald trump's doing. i think donald trump is as much of a product of what's happening out amongst his constituency as -- it's not going just one way. >> no, it goes both ways, i think it goes both ways. so i guess my point is that appealing to people and saying, hey, you don't really like donald trump is not going to work. they know what they like. >> but most people don't like him. >> that may be the case, but they may like other things less. >> that is the fear, right? that's the question and that to me, michael, is why it is going to be so ugly is that his own people and everyone doesn't think there's a lot more new trump voters out there, right?

>> well, yeah. >> they view it as they're going to try to win with 46% again. what that means is they have to drive down whoever is on the other side as much as possible. >> yeah. strap in, baby, because this is beyond a bumpy ride coming up. this is going to reach new depths. there are more bottoms to hit. to sam's point, yeah, the president may behave himself tonight and may try to hush the crowd and probably has passed the word from the campaign, let's not do the chant thing tonight because everyone is watching, but he's right. it will happen again. it will be encouraged further on down the line and that, again, speaks to who we are as people when we allow that to happen. >> i would just say, you know, to make sure that that other thing is not less liked than donald trump, the democrats have to move forward and actually show a different vision i think of what america could be rather than just say we don't want to be that. >> michael steele and sam seder

thank you for joining us. that is "all in" for this evening. "the rachel maddow show" starts right now with joy reid in for rachel. >> thank you very much, chris. have a great rest of the night. thank you at home for joining us this hour. rachel has the night off. our news to do list is very long tonight. we are going to be talking 2020 with democratic candidate and senator cory booker fresh off his big debate performance last night. we're going to take a closer look at senate leader mitch mcconnell, and why his new nickname, moscow mitch, is driving him bananas. we just got news just this past hour of another republican retirement, and that is number eight from the house. texas republican congressman will hurd, the only black republican in the house, says tonight that he will not run for re-election in 2020. and we have intriguing news about a fresh subpoena from prosecutors in new york asking for records from the trump organization in connection with the crime that sent