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The Rachel Maddow Show, Transcript 04/25/13

Guests: Amy Smithson, Tommy Vietor, Steve Clemons, Wayne Slater

RACHEL MADDOW, HOST: Good evening, Chris. Everybody within the sound of both of our voices, I just want to say, if you missed what Chris just said about the chemical plants and the regulation and how that all went haywire during the Bush administration, stay up and wrap the rerun. That was outstanding. CHRIS HAYES, "ALL IN" HOST: Thank you. Thank you very much. MADDOW: Totally riveting. Amazing. It`s amazing. Thank you. Great reporting. And thanks to you at home for staying with us for the next hour. There is a lot going on in the news tonight. There is a lot going on in the news tonight, even if you`re only talking about the news tonight from Texas. There is a lot to get to. But we`re going to start tonight right here, in San Diego, California, in the fancy Rancho Santa Fe neighborhood in San Diego, California -- where in March, 1997, the local sheriff`s office got a tip that something was very wrong inside one specific mansion in Rancho Santa Fe. Inside that mansion, they found 39 cult members dressed identically, all tucked away neatly in beds, all dead. It`s a mass suicide. Their cult was called the Heaven`s Gate. And as best as anybody could figure, the Heaven`s Gate cult members killed themselves because they thought doing so would somehow convey them to an alien spacecraft they wanted to be on, that they believed was trailing behind a particular comet, absolutely bizarre and tragic, 39 people killed in that cult mass suicide. The people who indeed that Rancho Santa Fe mansion were all members of the cult. At least this cult in its mass suicide did not try to take anybody else out with them. That was not the case in Jonestown. Jonestown was a cult that was founded in the Midwest. It grew hugely in the San Francisco Bay Area. And then it eventually moved to South America in 1976. The Jonestown cult is, of course, remembered for its mass suicide in Guyana two years later, in 1978, 900 people dead. But not every Jonestown cult member who died made a decision to die. It was not all suicide, including the cold-blooded murder of a U.S. congressman and NBC News reporter and NBC News cameraman and photographer for the "San Francisco Examiner" and member of the group trying to defect back to the U.S., those people were all shot to death on the airstrip in Guyana, while they were trying to leave to get the story out. Five people killed, nine other people shot and injured including now Congresswoman Jackie Speier of California. Even the cults we think of as suicide cults do not always want to kill themselves. They often want to take somebody else with them when they go. In 1995, it was the apocalyptic pseudo-Christian death cult Aum Shinri Kyo that turn out to be not just foretelling the end of the world, they were also kind of working on the end of the world themselves. They`ve worked on things like trying to develop a massed spraying system for the botulinum toxin, so they could spray it over large numbers of people maybe from moving vehicles. They had worked with cholera. They had worked with anthrax. When their compound was eventually raided in Japan, it turned out they had managed to get themselves not only explosives, not only those toxins, but also things like, oh, yes, a Russian MI-17 military helicopter. So, who knows what their larger plans were. But what they did do was this. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) REPORTER: Through the night, anti-chemical warfare troops searched Tokyo subway stations for more nerve gas containers but found none. Searched for clues who would have done this, terrorized the subway system that carries 7.5 million people a day, twice that of New York. Seven people are dead including a worker who tried to remove a suspicious container and died instantly, more than a dozen critically injured, over 3,400 treated, some choking for air. Some were blinded. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It got dark all around and I couldn`t see. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I saw something on the train wrapped in plastic. REPORTER: Investigators found six container wrapped in plastic and doctors said the poison was sarin, a nerve agent that cripples the nervous system. A drop can kill almost instantly. (END VIDEO CLIP) MADDOW: In the end, that sarin attack the Japanese death cult/terrorist group released on the Tokyo subway in March 1995. In the end, that sarin attack killed 13 people. It sent thousands of people to the hospital. Law enforcement then realized at the time that same group had also been responsible for a previously unsolved gas attack on another Japanese site a year earlier, about three hours west of Tokyo. That one killed fewer people but it was the same basic idea. The sarin they used in both instance instances was homemade. The second batch stronger than the first batch. Authorities say it was only because the group had not rigged better means of dispersing the poison that they were not able to kill hundreds more people. Sarin was invented by German scientist in the late 1930s. They were trying to build a stronger pesticide at the time and they came up with this nerve agent. For anybody waiting for me to mispronounce something spectacularly in this show, I can tell you that it`s proper name is isopropyl methlphosphodfluoridate. I`m sure that`s not how you say it. Sarin is a chemical that does not occur naturally in the world. You have to make it in a lab. It`s considered one of the most toxic substances on earth. It`s 500 times more deadly than cyanide. The deadliness of this drug was not lost on the scientist who developed it. They promptly turned it over to the German military who promptly turned it into a weapon for use in World War II, although the Nazis did not end up using it in combat. Sarin works essentially by jamming the nervous system. It causes the synopsis to fire the same message over and over again and that has lots of effects on the body, none of them good. One of the things it does is pretty quickly, it paralyzes the muscles that make breathing possible. Exposure to enough sarin, and it does not take much, can lead to fatal suffocation within minutes. Sarin, again, which does not occur in nature, which has to be made by man, it makes a terrifying weapon. Human skin absorbs sarin, so it can kill on contact. In liquid form it is clear and odorless. It mixes well with water, which, of course, makes it a potent poison that can be added to food or water or anything else. It, of course, can also be used in chemical warheads. There would be a cluster munition. Sarin is not, however, the most stable compound in the world. The process of putting it on a missile or rocket or cluster munitions can mean relatively complicated weapon design. Lots of countries have sarin or have had it at some point. The United States and Russia both used to mass produce sarin during the Cold War. In the war between Iran and Iraq that raged through the 1980s. Saddam Hussein used sarin in combat against the Iranians. He famously used sarin and mustard gas both -- the same mustard gas in World War I -- Saddam used sarin and mustard gas in 1988 against his own Iraqi people. He bombed the civilian Iraqi-Kurdish population in the northern Iraqi city of Halabja. He bombed them with sarin and mustard gas. The death toll from that attack was estimated in the thousands. Sarin is technically illegal now. An International Chemical Weapons Convention banned it in 1983. But not every country in the world signed on to that convention. Angola, North Korea, Egypt, the new country of South Sudan, Somalia and Syria have not touched the chemical weapons convention that banned sarin. And that last country there, Syria, is thought to have the largest stocks of sarin in the whole world. Syria reportedly started making chemical weapons in earnest in the 1970s. They really stepped it up during the 1980s. That was a strategic decision made by the Assad government. For whatever reason now, the Assad government has huge stockpiles of chemical weapons. In the bloody civil war that that has been raging for two years in Syria, there are frequent allegations the Syrian government is using its chemical weapons against the rebels, against its own civilians. The Syrian government itself has even alleged that chemical weapons were used by the rebels, not by the government, but by the other side. But either way, it should be noted the use of chemical weapons is much easier to allege than it is to prove. I mean that in the technical sense. It is hard to prove if chemical weapons have been used, especially for trying to prove it from a distance. This is not the same kind of situation it was in Iraq where the debate is about whether or not this particular guy has chemical weapons. In Syria, it`s clear that they do. We know they have stockpiles of chemical weapons. The question is whether or not they have been used. It`s not that easy to tell, especially far away. Tear gas and other riot gases that are not counted as chemical weapons technically, the use of those can cause some of the same superficial effects chemicals especially if they`re used in really concentrated doses. Chemical contamination on the battlefield or besieged areas where traditional weapons were being used, it can be hard to distinguish from the effects of chemical weapons. The way you really tell if you want to be sure chemical weapons have been used or not is by taking physical samples. Positions for Human Rights, the American human rights group, was one of the first groups in the world to prove that Saddam really had used sarin and mustard gas against the Iraqi Kurds at Halabja. They were not able to conclusively prove it, though, until four years after the attack, four years after the fact when they were finally able to collect soil samples that showed trace evidence of the elements that sarin breaks down to over time. Well, today, I say all that because today, knowing that much about sarin, knowing how sarin is used, knowing how you can tell if it has been used, knowing that much about sarin today suddenly became really important for all of us -- for understanding what it means for us a country our defense secretary today said this very carefully worded thing. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) CHUCK HAGEL, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: The U.S. intelligence community assesses with some degree of varying confidence that the Syrian regime has used chemical weapons on a small scale in Syria, specifically the chemical agent sarin. As I have said, the intelligence community has been assessing information for some time on this issue. The decision to reach this conclusion was made within the past 24 hours. (END VIDEO CLIP) MADDOW: Some degree of varying confidence. What does that mean? If we`re saying this country, Syria, has used chemical weapons in this war, our president, President Obama has said that would be a red line. That would be a game changer in terms offing the going about the United States potentially getting involved somehow in that war over there we have thus far stayed out of. So, when you say it has been assessed with some degree of varying confidence that they`ve crossed that red line, well, what the heck does that mean? Does that mean some U.S. intelligence agencies think that sarin got used and some don`t? How do we know? What are we basing this on? I mean, forgive me for splitting the hairs, but if the split in this hair is the difference between America going to war again and us not going to war again, then this hair needs splitting. The letter the White House sent to Congress today does add this important detail. Quote, "The assessment is based in part on physiological samples." Physiological samples. OK, well, that would imply they have physically tested something to come to this conclusion. They`re not relying on diagnosing it from afar just by sight or by allegations, right? They tested something. There was a follow-up call with reporters today to explain what this all means. But the White House would not elaborate at all what these physiological samples showed or how definitive their results were. There`s been some other reporting today that maybe it was blood samples with people who were gassed by sarin, blood samples smuggled out of Syria and tested by U.S. analysts. That was reported at "The Danger Room" blog at "Wired" magazine today. There`s also been other reporting this week from the "New York Times", quoting Syrian rebels saying Americans, the CIA specifically, were asking the Syrian rebels to go collect samples. But that`s the reporting. We don`t know. U.S. officials are not explaining it yet. So, we have the mainly (ph) qualified assertion but really don`t have any proof. If there were proof, President Obama has said repeatedly that would cross a red line in terms of the possibility of U.S. intervention. Another war in this Middle East right next door to Iraq. With war and peace on the line, with potentially American war and peace on the line, the official word from the White House today about this sarin issue is that they want U.S. inspectors to be allowed access to the sites where people say chemical weapons were used and want U.N. inspectors to be able to test properly, to test the soil, to test the victims to determine conclusively whether it really did happen and it`s not just the same old allegations we`ve been hearing for month from people who want us to go to war in Syria. The line from the White House is let the U.N. inspectors in to determine the truth. Is it starting to sound familiar to you? Here at home today, a senator named John McCain reacted to this news, by saying that to him, it`s obvious this is already a slam-dunk case, that WMDs were used. So, let`s start arming the rebels. Let`s start shooting down Syrian planes right now. He said today, the intel is good enough for him already. I assure you that we are not just reenacting an old script for old time`s sake to celebrate the opening of the George W. Bush Presidential Library today. I assure you that this is new news breaking today. Joining us now is Amy Smithson. She`s a senior fellow at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies. She`s chair of the global affairs council, a nuclear and biological and chemical weapons of the economic forum. When newsbreaks like this today, the person you want to ask about it is the person who wrote "Germ Gambits," the bio weapons dilemma, Iraq and beyond. That would be Dr. Smithson. Dr. Smithson, thank you so much for being here. AMY SMITHSON, CNETER FOR NONPROLIFERATION STUDIES: It`s a pleasure to be with you this evening. MADDOW: So, first of all, I am no expert in this field and you are. Would you tell me if I screwed up anything materially in that explanation about sarin? SMITHSON: No catastrophic mistakes. I can pick a few nits but let`s not. MADDOW: OK, thank you. Fair not. Deploying a chemical, using a chemical weapon against a civilian population, against an opposing Army, that`s a really specific thing. It is in fact a specific crime. But lots of other things can look like that from afar without actually being that. How do you tell if the use of chemical weapons has actually happened? SMITHSON: Well, this is one of the things this team hopefully will be able to do. -- the investigators for the Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon. And they have a series technical steps that they will go through. Among them are taking a variety of different types of samples. One of the telltale marks is if a munition was actually used to deliver a chemical warfare agent. So they`d be looking for fragments of munitions. They`ll be testing vegetation. They`ll be looking for biomedical samples from humans, or from animals, food and water sampled, clothing and also just general environmental samples from the soil. MADDOW: None of that is going to happen until the U.N. inspectors can get in and do that. There`s sort of woolly reporting that there may be efforts to get samples out of Syria, two outside analysts that may have been the source of this assessment from the U.S. intelligence community, we don`t know for sure. In that case, where you can`t necessarily identify the providence of some of these samples, we can`t say for sure where they came from or when they came from, is it possible they can seem to indicate something that might be disproven had we understand their providence better? SMITHSON: Well, if you`re using samples indeed genuine, then you`re probably running them through very specific equipment like gas chromatograph mass spectrometer, which would be analyzing soil or water samples, and there are very particular chemical signatures for all the chemicals that are out there and also their degradation by-products, how they were able to identify sarin being used in Halabja four years after the fact. But in this case, the problem, which is cited in the letter to Senator Levin is chain of custody. Now, that`s something that your viewers will be familiar with from all the law enforcement shows like "CSI" and the like. his is a procedure, a use of procedures law enforcement used to make sure that a jury has confidence that the evidence that was collected has been properly collected, sealed so that it can`t be tampered with, and every single step from the crime scene to the laboratory, somebody is certifying the possession of that to be in law enforcement hands. So you can`t be accused of spiking the sample, so to speak. MADDOW: I see. SMITHSON: In this case, it`s possible maybe they could train some of the Syrian opposition to take these samples and put video cameras in their hands so that they can document this process to the satisfaction of the international community, if the Syrian government continues to balk at letting the inspectors in. MADDOW: Why are chemical weapons and biological weapons as well, but chemical weapons in this case, treated so differently from different weapons in terms of international law, in terms of the kind of international red line President Obama has rhetorically drawn in this case? Why is there such a hard distinction made between types of weapons? SMITHSON: Well, chemical weapons are the lowest on the ladder of weapons of mass destruction. They were used widely during World War I. They are generally considered a battlefield weapon that can tactically the course of a battle. But weapons like biological weapons and nuclear, those are considered strategic and can change the course of the war. In this case, the civilians and any opposition fighters or troops in this area of combat that are not equipped with protective gear are particularly vulnerable. That`s one of the reasons why the military generally does not like to use these types of weapons. MADDOW: Dr. Amy Smithson, senior fellow at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies -- it`s very helpful to have you and your expertise here on the show with us tonight. Thank you very much. SMITHSON: Pleasure to be with you. MADDOW: All right. We`ve got lots more ahead, including the very first ever mention on this show of the poop cruise. And I promise that we are not bringing up the poop cruise in a chemical weapons context. It`s a whole different thing. Stay with us. (COMMERCIAL BREAK) MADDOW: Coming up, the gala opening celebration of the George W. Bush Presidential Library. Who feels like celebrating? Come on. Who? Come on. Anyone? Come on, you guys. Come on. (COMMERCIAL BREAK) (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: A president bears no greater decision, and no more solemn burden that serving as commander in chief of the greatest military that the world has ever known. As President Bush himself has said, America must and will keep its word to the men and women who have given us so much. Even as we Americans may at times disagree on matters of foreign policy, we share a profound respect and reverence for the men and women of our military and their families, and we are united in our determination to comfort the families of the fallen and to care for those who wear the uniform of the United States. (APPLAUSE) (END VIDEO CLIP) MADDOW: That was President Obama speaking today at the dedication of the George W. Bush Presidential Library in Dallas, Texas. President Obama spoke at the Bush Library at around 10:40 a.m. Central Time this morning. Just about 25 minutes before he spoke, this was the news that crossed the wires. U.S. Defense Secretary Hagel says U.S. intelligence confirms to some degree of varying confidence that Syria has used chemical weapons on a small scale. Sometimes the gods of national karma are not subtle. President Obama gets handed fuzzy intelligence about a Middle Eastern dictator suppose WMDs while he`s dedicating the President George W. Bush Presidential Library? If this were fiction, this turn in the plot would be rejected as ham-handed and way too obvious. But the official letter to Congress on this issue makes it clear that nothing looms larger on a news day like today than the disastrous presidential mistakes of the guy who got his new library today. Quote, "Given the stakes involved and what we have learned from our own recent experience, intelligence assessments alone are not sufficient." In "The Washington Post" reporting this news today, same idea, "A senior U.S. defense official said the Pentagon did not want to repeat the mistakes of the Iraq war." Quote, "We have seen very bad movies before when intelligence is perceived to have driven policy decisions that in the cold light of day have been proven wrong. You can seen see it in the reporting on this claim today, not just the commentary but the reporting, "The New York Times" taking care to not pull another Judith Miller this time. The "New York Times" taking these claims to outside experts today who told them for their main article about this news today it`s not a smoking gun. The evidence that has emerged so far is suggestive of chemical attacks but not conclusive. Not conclusive. Imagine needing something to be conclusive before starting a war about it. How much does the Bush administration`s experience with intelligence a decade ago color what`s happening right now? Color the way that this administration is dealing with this intelligence right now? Let`s ask somebody who knows. Tommy Vietor served as National Security Council spokesman in the Obama administration. Before that, he served as assistant press secretary under Robert Gibbs. Tommy, I`ve talked to you many times and never had you on the show before. Thank you so much for being here. TOMMY VIETOR, FORMER NSC SPOKESMAN: Thanks for having me. MADDOW: So you have been close to the national security decision making process in this administration. How much does getting it wrong in Iraq, blaming the bad intelligence about Iraq, how much does that loom from the previous administration over the decisions of the current one? VIETOR: I think it`s something that looms in every single meeting about intelligence or matters of war and peace. I think that letter makes clear the president doesn`t want to go to war over a piece of intelligence by definition isn`t black and white, but always shades of gray. You know, I worked a lot with the intelligence community and saw a lot of intelligence. You almost never get a piece of intelligence that says x is true. It`s we assess with medium confidence that the following could be true or low confidence or high confidence. But these are analytical judgments made by human beings and so, they can be wrong. They sometimes are. That`s not to take anything away from our intelligence community. What they do is extraordinary, you know, the things you get to see when you`re in those positions would make your jaw drop. But it`s important to keep in mind. It`s also important to remember that we had 150,000 troops in Iraq, they couldn`t prevent a sectarian war. And a lot of people think that Syria has become a sectarian war. MADDOW: Tommy, after this news came out today, the kind of reticence you are describing and I think we are observing in the administration to not jump to conclusions on this, we saw the opposite from a number of members of Congress, mostly Republicans, but a few Democrats, that are now using this to pressure the White House really to say, all right, let`s intervene in Syria now. Does the administration -- is the administration likely to have anticipated that? Do they feel like they have political mechanisms in place to resist that kind of pressure? VIETOR: Yes, I think there`s nothing new to hearing comments what Senator McCain said. I think what`s important is in-depth reporting like you did tonight, which is to talk about what these options really mean. And so, when we talk about a no-fly zone we should tell the American people the Syrians have the fourth best air defense system in the entire planet. And that means we have to hit targets not just on borders, but in population centers, civilians will be killed. It`s very likely that U.S. service members could be killed or wounded in the process of taking out those air defense systems. Similarly with the humanitarian corridor, that`s euphemism. Let`s call it what it is. It`s invasion of part of Syria. It`s more likely that you`d have to do it in the north near Turkey because geographically that makes sense, but the population isn`t necessarily in the north. There`s lots of people in Damascus that are innocent that are being killed. So, it`s not just that there aren`t great options available to the president. There really are no good options. There`s also the question of the legal basis, which is something you almost never hear discussed. MADDOW: And that in this case, I mean, we have seen the president, White House already coming out saying what they want in terms of a response to these assessments so carefully couched but released today is the U.N. to be involved in trying to substantiate what we are saying now with no degree of confidence whatsoever. Do you expect that a sort of multi-lateral approach trying to look for leadership from the U.N. or for some other sort of multi-lateral alliance would be the next step if the president decides he`s got to move? VIETOR: I mean, they`ll make a decision based on the evidence and then they will tee up a series of policy options for the president. I`m sure, you know, people are meeting right now trying to do that. We had a very similar sort of chemical weapons scare when I was still in the White House. And what happens is the most senior people in administration and national security get together. The I.C. presents them the evidence and they make decisions and offer the president options. And so, the easiest option, which is still very difficult is going to the U.N. and getting international support or maybe a U.N. Security Council resolution. Now, the problem is that the Russians and the Chinese have been shameful in their blocking of any meaningful action at the U.N. Security Council, and as the Russians have continued to sell them arms, not even to mention the Iranians which have pumped in material support, weapons, fighters, you know, they have gone all in to continue propping up the Assad regime. So, there are all these factors internationally making things more difficult. But let`s be clear. This is a global problem. We all need to put as much pressure as we can on Russia and China to take meaningful action. MADDOW: Tommy Vietor, former National Security Council spokesman in the Obama administration -- Tommy, thank you very much for helping us through with this. I appreciate it. VIETOR: Thanks for having me. MADDOW: Now, I want to bring in Steve Clemons, senior fellow at the New America Foundation. He`s also Washington editor at large for "The Atlantic" magazine, and he`s my friend, full disclosure. Steve, thank you for being here. STEVE CLEMONS, THE ATLANTIC: Rachel, great to be with you. MADDOW: Thinking about the crucial parts of the administration outside the White House in a moment like this, Steve, we heard this first today from Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel, quickly thereafter from Secretary of State John Kerry. Do the Defense Department and State Department operate with the same kind of framing in mind about not jumping to conclusions when it comes to intelligence that Tommy was just describing at the White House? Do they think about these things differently than the White House does? CLEMONS: Well, I think they have different missions. And I think by nature, it`s a good thing not every element of the national security breaks is on the same vector. John Kerry has been worried how to organize the diplomatic echo system around Syria, working with Lavrov in Russia and others to try to pull the Russians into some more compliant mood. He`s, I think, very concerned that you could see a disintegration inside the Syrian state that was a lot like Iraq when you had the severe Baathification and disillusion of the army there and you had utter chaos follow. So, Kerry has been worried about that and trying to put those pieces. Chemical weapons kind of moved Syria from being a humanitarian issue into the realist camp, because as you just pointed out, chemical weapons are clearly on everyone`s concern of U.S. national interests. So, what do you? And I think in that case, the Pentagon focused on those elements have to begin and have been for some time laying out scenarios how they might respond and either using allies and partners or various interventions inside Syria, what they would do to secure those chemical weapons, and keep them from falling in other hands. The White House, as Tommy Vietor just said, really plays the role of systems integrator and the brain of the system. But it`s not unusual for I think State and DOD to be in different tracks, I think we`re lucky that they are. MADDOW: Steve, one of the things that I have been surmising about Washington from afar, while this whole thing has been going on, we`ve seen a lot of allegations about chemical weapons before today. And, obviously, this is a big thing to have the intelligence community saying in this melliemouth way, yes, sort of we`re on board with this as well. When we were previously getting leaks less substantiated, I felt like the one thing that prove -- didn`t prove anything about chemical weapons, but it proved that there were people inside the administration who were trying to force the president into going to war in Syria. Are there enclaves inside this administration that are pushing for it? CLEMONS: You hit something a taboo subject hard to discuss, because you asked, what are the motives that certain players in this discussion have had? They want to see an intervention and thus they want to organize evidence to try to trigger the behavior from the U.S. government they want to see, an intervention with what they see as the FSA and they often present it as a more organized and synthesized and warm and friendly operation than it really is. And I think that`s critical. And so, when I talk to both people in the Pentagon today and in the White House, the chain of custody issues are critical, because you could have any number of scenarios. I`m not saying these scenarios are the ones that I believe. Let`s take Lindsey Graham`s favorite movie reported, "Seven Days in May" made many years ago. And we said we`ve got to be wear military demagoguery. And in that movie, you had parts of the military operating against the White House. What if you had something similar inside Syria? MADDOW: Right. CLEMONS: What if you had rogue elements operating in Syria? And what if you had people like Senator McCain or others looking for triggers to trigger what they want, which is an all in involvement of the U.S. military. So, I think we need to be very, very careful. And even the foreign governments that have come out, France, England, Israel, others, none of them with the exception of one general in Israel, not even the Israeli government in full, have made the robust -- fully robust comment about the chemical weapons. So, our media has already jumped on and kind of decided this is a done deal, but it is not even a done deal for the government that have said, probably there is something going on but they don`t know how, why, or who is in control? MADDOW: And neither Israel nor England nor France have produced physical evidence that this happened whatsoever, physical evidence is the only way to prove it. We have assertions that there is some physical evidence, but no detail about that at all. And I am reserving judgment with a capital R or capital J with exclamation point here. CLEMONS: That`s the right the move. MADDOW: Steve Clemons, senior fellow at New America Foundation, Washington editor at large for "The Atlantic" -- Steve, thank you so much. CLEMONS: Thanks, Rachel. MADDOW: Thanks. All right. I really never thought that I would mention on this show the cruise ship with the power outage and broken toilets a couple months ago, but the poop cruise has new news value today, thanks to another big story in today`s news. The poop cruise is suddenly important, kind of. That`s coming up. (COMMERCIAL BREAK) MADDOW: So, did you get invited to Texas today for the George W. Bush administration reunion? The big George W. Bush Presidential Library VIP dedication gala thing? Did you get invited? No. Sad. (COMMERCIAL BREAK) MADDOW: This is not CNN, so I have never talked about this on TV before. But, hey, how about that poop cruise? The poop cruise, also known as the Carnival Triumph, the cruise ship that was stuck for five days in the Gulf of Mexico with more than 4,000 people on board and no working toilets. It happened in February. I will not go on and on about the details. You probably heard them, but perhaps this one line from one passenger`s pending lawsuit against Carnival cruises will suffice to give you the basic idea. Quote, "Plaintiff was forced to wade through human feces in order to reach food lines only to receive rations of spoiled food." Here also is a picture of people on board the cruise ship trying to use their bodies to spell the word "help" for the purposes of news helicopters. It`s a little hard to make out. Kind of -- we help them. This was a nightmare, even without the wall to wall tabloid TV coverage. It was just a real low point for the cruise industry in particular. I mean, whoever is going to book a cruise again after the poop crew cruise? If you work in the cruise industry, you might be worried about the long term impact of the poop cruise on your business, right? It turns out, no. Not really super concern. A chief executive of European cruise line called MSC was quoted right after the poop cruise thing saying the industry was pretty confident nobody was ever going to remember this. The CEO reminded "Reuters" that actually the cruise industry had a disastrous year in 2012 as well. 2012, of course, included the Costa Concordia nightmare when the cruise ship ran aground and killed 32 people. That was 2012. But the CEO told "Reuters" people forgot about even that fatal incident in 2012 right away, so it stands to reason he said even if 2013 is the year of the poop cruise, by next year, by 2014, people will have forgotten all about it. He said, quote, "It`s amazing how 2012 has been forgotten. We have seen already the new wave season, 2013, that the first comers are coming back again." So, in other words, poop cruise, schmoop (ph) cruise, people forget, it doesn`t matter. It was the same line from another crisis management expert interviewed after the poop cruise debacle. He said, quote, "Americans have short memories." Americans have short memories. That`s idea number one from the business world. Here`s idea number two. This was the president of the United States on May 1st, 2003, 10 years ago next week, President George W. Bush putting on a fake flight suit complete with the ejection harness and did a fake fighter pilot landing from an S3 Viking jet. The USS Abraham Lincoln was carrying soldiers return home after an 11-month deployment. But before they got to go home, they got lined up to watch as President Bush stripped off his flight suit, put on his suit and stood in front of a banner that said "mission accomplished" and gave a speech that said the Iraq effectively war was over. And it wasn`t just over, it was awesome. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) GEORGE W. BUSH, FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT: My fellow Americans, major combat operations in Iraq have ended and the battle of Iraq, the United States and our allies have prevailed. (APPLAUSE) (END VIDEO CLIP) MADDOW: That was day 43 of the Iraq war that would go onto last 8 1/2 more years. So, idea number one, the poop cruise idea is Americans have short memories. Idea number two is we are fast approaching the 10 year anniversary of the "mission accomplished" speech on May 1st. So, next week is the 10 year anniversary. These are two seemingly unrelated ideas, but nevertheless offer the best help I can spring together for understanding the public relations onslaught we are enduring as a nation. You`ve probably noticed over the past 24 hours, a very familiar face all over your TV. Like this interview on CBS, for example, that featured either the most impressive segue ever or really strange edit. Watch. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Some argue and I think Karl Rove has said this, if there had been no weapons of mass destruction probably the decision would never have been made? BUSH: It`s hard to tell. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And what does painting bring you? BUSH: Relaxation and a whole new way of looking at the world. (END VIDEO CLIP) MADDOW: So, cool with the war? Yes, whatever. Painting? So relaxing. CBS got one of these interviews. FOX News got two and aired them on these interviews an hour apart on the same night. One of them on the left there, that`s Dana Perino interviewing President Bush. Dana Perino now works at FOX News. But she used to have a different job. She was President Bush`s White House press secretary. So, her getting the interview is kind of all in the family. The event that was supposed to warrant all this news coverage today was the big stately ceremony dedicating the George W. Bush Presidential Library, all five living U.S. presidents were there. All the first ladies, except for Nancy Reagan, were there. Heads of state from around the world. The presidents all spoke and had very kind words for President Bush. President Bush talked about his friendship with Dick Cheney and he talked about other stuff, too. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) BUSH: My deepest conviction, the guiding principle of the administration, is that the United States of America must drive to expand the reach of freedom. When future generations come to this library and study this administration, they`re going to find out that we stayed true to our convictions. (APPLAUSE) (END VIDEO CLIP) MADDOW: If that alone, Mr. Bush`s cadence and style and doctrine, if that alone is not enough to stir memories of how it all actually went for all those years, take note also that today was just the private opening, the first day of the general public can go visit the George W. Bush library would be next week. The first day the general public can go with specifically be May 1st, May 1st, 2013, ten years to the day after this happened on May 1st, 2003. They are opening the George W. Bush Presidential Library to the public on the 10-year anniversary of the mission accomplished speech, which is either an inside joke or this is some kind of crisis management business school test of the poop cruise thesis that Americans really do have shockingly short memories. (COMMERCIAL BREAK) (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) BUSH: The honor of a lifetime to lead a country as brave and as noble as the United States. Whatever challenges come before us, I will always believe our nation`s best days lie ahead. God bless. (APPLAUSE) (END VIDEO CLIP) MADDOW: Former President George W. Bush at the end of his 13-minute speech in Texas today, dedicating his presidential library. Joining us now is Wayne Slater. He`s senior political writer for the "Dallas Morning News." He`s co-author of the seminal Bush administration users manual called, "Bush`s Brain." Wayne was there today for the dedication. Wayne, thanks so much for being here. WAYNE SLATER, DALLAS MORNING NEWS: Great to be with you, Rachel, as always. MADDOW: You know, when I saw that clip, I had read before that President Bush teared up at the end of his speech. But I didn`t know it was quite as dramatic as it was until I saw the clip. Having been there, do you have any insight into him becoming so emotional at the end of his speech? What else was going on there? SLATER: Yes, I mean, you know George Bush. He`s the guy who says I don`t want to be psychoanalyzed on the couch, I don`t want to be so emotional, I don`t want to look this way. And yet, you saw a very emotional guy today. And to be honest, this was a moment I think he recognized it`s over. I mean, it`s really, really over. The monument has been built. That`s the end of a long process. And I think what`s very important to him was his mom and dad were there, not only did you have the alumni, the extended Bush legacy project network, but you had mom and dad. And frankly, I don`t want to say too much about it, but anyone who watched that moment where George Bush 41 talked briefly, we all know our parents won`t last forever. And I think he was awfully happy they were there on this day. MADDOW: Wayne, when I have found it to be noteworthy and strange and sort of surprised that it`s not bigger news that the date they picked for the public opening of the library is the 10-year anniversary of mission accomplished. It`s not even like the random 16th anniversary which nobody would notice. It`s 10 years. Is that -- is that an oversight? It seems like impossibly awkward timing. SLATER: I talked to a guy today in the -- couple people in e crowd, one of whom said -- was talking about the accomplishments of the Bush administration. Iraq was an accomplishment. Flat-out. So there are those folks, the Bushies, the loyalists, who consider virtually everything he did as a great accomplishment, the history be damned. But on the other hand, I think if, in fact, the folks at the Bush library -- putting this thing together had really thought this thing through, they probably wouldn`t have wanted this to be the 10-year anniversary. If they really thought that that was no big deal, that America`s short-term memory would be completely vanished, you know, be 10 years later, which is obviously not the case, we could see the banner inside the library. Rachel, the banner ain`t there. MADDOW: Was there any substantial mention, other than conversations like you had in the crowd there? Were there any substantial mention of Iraq? Was that word mentioned today from the podium? SLATER: No. Amazing. MADDOW: Not once. Amazing. SLATER: So, the most significant thing to define the Bush administration, the Iraq war, a decade of war, the word "Iraq" was never mentioned. Now, the word "wars" were, something about a dictator, and a whole lot of sentences that had the word "freedom" in them. That`s the word that Bush uses "freedom" as a kind of cloak to cover everything. So "Iraq," the most significant thing, was never spoken from the stage. MADDOW: Astonishing. Wayne Slater, senior political writer with "Dallas Morning News", co- author of "Bush`s Brain: How Karl Rove Made George W. Bush" -- Wayne, it`s always great to have you here. Thank you so much. SLATER: Great to be with you. MADDOW: Thank you. That`s -- the word "Iraq." not going to be there in the transcript. You can search for it. Not there. All right. Tomorrow morning, President Obama is going to do something that is going to make the right go nuts, at least I think it`s going to. It was something that was supposed to happen tonight. It`s now been rescheduled for tomorrow. I`ll tell you what that is, next. (COMMERCIAL BREAK) MADDOW: There`s a lot going on in the world right now. One consequence, we have had an intense schedule for the president and the vice president, and a lot of high-profile, high-emotion events in the past few days. Yesterday, Vice President Biden was in Massachusetts for the funeral of the police officer who was shot in his patrol car a week ago, allegedly by the suspects in the Boston bombing. Then this morning, the president attended a rare gathering of all of the nation`s living presidents, all five of them in the same place at the same time for the first time since early 2009. Also there, almost all of the living first ladies. The only one missing was former first lady Nancy Reagan. The occasion today, of course, was the dedication of the George W. Bush Presidential Library in Dallas. When that was done, though, President Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama stayed in Texas. They flew by helicopter. They flew in Marine One, south from Dallas out toward Waco. They circled over the small town called West, where President Obama saw the flattened remains of the homes and buildings devastated when the fertilizer plant there exploded last week. President and first lady then continued another 20 minutes to the city of Waco, and a memorial service for the 14 victims of that explosion, including 12 first responders represented by flag-draped coffins at the service. They, of course, died trying to protect their neighbors. The president previously had other plans for tonight. The president originally had been announced as the keynote speaker at the big gala for Planned Parenthood that`s happening right now in Washington, D.C. The right, of course, is all poised to go nuts about that Planned Parenthood speech tonight, but the speech has been postponed until tomorrow morning. The political right will still go nuts about that speech, but they`ll be able to do it now after a good night`s sleep. Now it`s time for "THE LAST WORD WITH LAWRENCE O`DONNELL". Have a great night. Thanks for being with us tonight. THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED. END