Melissa Harris-Perry, Transcript 05/17/15

HARRIS-PERRY: This morning my question -- what`s on your play list, rock or hip hop? Plus, President Obama settles on Chicago. And billions to build stadiums that are now just parking garages. But first, the U.S. military strike against ISIS inside Syria`s borders. Good morning. I`m Melissa Harris-Perry. We begin this morning with the latest on the U.S. special operations forces entering Eastern Syria late Friday night with the intention of capturing an ISIS leader and his wife. That senior leader known as Abu Sayyaf was shot and killed when he engaged with Army Delta Force commandos. Abu Sayyaf`s wife, an Iraqi, known as Um Sayyaf was captured and is now in detention. Along with Abu Sayyaf, about a dozen ISIS fighters were killed. Now just as crucial as who was killed with how, this was a boots on the ground, cross border operation inside Syria, the first successful raid by American ground troops since the military campaign against the Islamic State began last year. The operation came three months after three unsuccessful raids by American commandos in Syria and Yemen to free American hostages. The decision to put U.S. boots on the ground this weekend highlights several factors. One, that on the ground intelligence from within Syria seems to be increasing and improving. Also, that the administration will continue to send in ground troops in order to capture and kill suspected terrorists. Now the debate around U.S. counter terror operations especially in Syria and Iraq tends to focus on the U.S. military reliance on drones. Aggressive U.S. drone use has faced mounting criticism, especially due to evidence that the military tactic has resulted in innocent civilian casualties. Among those innocent are our own. Last month, the U.S. government disclosed that two men held hostage by al Qaeda, one American and one Italian, were killed in a U.S. drone strike in Pakistan in January. The death of an American by a U.S. drone was met with a personal apology by President Obama. The president did not sign off on that specific strike because he has authorized the CIA and military to carry out drone attacks on their own if those attacks meet certain criteria. For the latest on Friday night`s raid, we go now to NBC News correspondent, White House correspondent, Kristen Welker at the White House. Kristen, what was -- how involved exactly was President Obama in this particular operation? KRISTEN WELKER, NBC NEWS WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: He was very involved, Melissa. He`s the one who authorized it at the recommendation of his national security team. This weekend he has praised the success of those who carried it out. As you underscored it was incredibly risky. Now we are learning more about how it all went down. U.S. officials say American Delta Force commandos took off from Northern Iraq in Blackhawk helicopters and Osprey plane helicopter hybrids and they flew into an ISIS strong hold in Eastern Syria. The target of the mission, as you say was Abu Sayyaf. He is not really known to most Americans, but U.S. officials say he was a top ISIS operator, who managed ISIS` oil and gas income. That is incredibly significant. He was also close to ISIS leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, but taking him down wasn`t easy. There was a gun fight as you also said, Melissa, there was a hand to hand fight. Abu Sayyaf was killed along with 12 other ISIS fighters. Now no U.S. forces were killed. That is significant. They did take Abu Sayyaf`s wife into custody. She is known as Um Sayyaf. She is apparently talking to her interrogators. Now the mission is significant for a couple of reasons. First, it shows the U.S. is willing to take on ISIS in its safe havens. The mission was incredibly risky as we`ve been pointing out. And if any of those commandos have been captured, they would have almost certainly been tortured and killed as we have seen with other ISIS hostages. It could potentially yield new intelligence about where other ISIS fighters are and about where other hostages are. Again that interview being conducted and the interrogation is being conducted with Um Sayyaf, the wife of that ISIS leader. Melissa, back to you. HARRIS-PERRY: Thank you to NBC`s Kristen Welker at the White House. Joining me now, Earl Catagnus Jr., founding director of the Valley Forge Military College`s Center for the advancement of securities studies and an Iraq war veteran, and Noah Shachtman, who is executive editor of "The Daily Beast." It`s so nice to have you both here. OK, how important is the raid? Is this the administration and media excited because it feels that we have a clean win or is this actually important in the battle against ISIS? NOAH SHACHTMAN, EXECUTIVE EDITOR, "THE DAILY BEAST": I don`t think we know yet to be honest. I think that this guy`s position hasn`t been entirely clear, you know, judging on the reports yesterday he was either super senior or he was kind of mid-level. He was either controlling all their finances or maybe just some. I don`t think we quite know yet about this individual raid. I think we`ll know if there is a series of raids that there is a series of cascading intelligence successes. That may be a big deal. But I think the other thing to point out is that while this raid was going on and while we were killing this guy, no matter how essential or not he was, one of Iraq`s key cities fell to ISIS, Ramadi. EARL CATAGNUS JR., FOUNDING DIRECTOR, VALLEY FORGE MILITARY COLLEGE: That`s really not true. Ramadi, there was a series of attacks on the police and what`s the key in the language of the reporting in Ramadi is that there were police engaging the insurgents. There wasn`t -- the Iraqi military just sent three regiments to them. But the Iraqi military, the actual government forces pushed in. So there is -- it`s tenuous. It could fall, but who is in control? Who knows? The reporting has said that ISIS as pulled back from the government buildings. It looks like it was a raid. They pulled back. There is no doubt that Ramadi is contested space. HARRIS-PERRY: It`s so interesting, Earl, that you bring it up in part because from the moment that I heard the reporting on Ramadi, I thought, I really wanted to talk to Earl about this. We talked before particularly as a vet as well as a scholar of these questions. What that space in Iraq means for you. I was wondering whether or not what was happening in Iraq and what happened here, how closely connected they are in the administration`s decision-making. CATAGNUS: I think the administration looked at this isolated raid as the raid. The planning and preparation that took place and there was already a precedence. Even though there were three failed attempts, it wasn`t that they weren`t failed in the operational part of it. They were failed that they didn`t secure the hostages. What happened here was a completely different situation. You had a target that you were going to capture or kill. Whatever the situation was there, but he was going to be there, generally speaking. If not him, the information they were going after. There is a huge electronic footprint that they saw and they know that they had to go there and get it. That`s why they didn`t use a drone strike. Now with the other raids there were hostages. That`s a crap shoot whether or not they are actually there. They were right on the heels of all them. They were all successful in the fact that they were able to insert, conduct the raid and then extract without any major casualties, American casualties. HARRIS-PERRY: So let me -- SHACHTMAN: Well, except for the hostages eventually getting killed. That`s a major American casualty. CATAGNUS: That, again, is one of those things when you go on hostage rescue there is actually calculus that we are going to take this risk. They actually do an assessment whether or not they can negotiate, this. What`s the immediate danger and will that immediate danger if they are successful override the long-term danger. HARRIS-PERRY: And so part -- SHACHTMAN: I just have to say I don`t think it`s clear that Abu Sayyaf, this guy we are talking about, was the target of the raid. We are hearing at "The Daily Beast" and I think our sources on this are really good, that there were many other ISIS types that were targeted but had fled the area before U.S. forces -- HARRIS-PERRY: So do you think this is post hoc advertising? SHACHTMAN: I`m not saying it definitely is. I don`t think it`s clear to me at this moment, that Abu Sayyaf, the guy that is now being trumpeted at this major win was necessarily the target. HARRIS-PERRY: So part of what I want -- I`m interested in is sort of the difference in tone and tenner of this than the conversations that were happening around drones. You know, for me, sort of the instruments of war, the technology of it, are amoral, and the question of the morality or ethics of them have to do with how they get deployed one way or another. But it does feel like drones have taken on their own sort of discourse and I guess I`m surprised at what feels like almost celebratory mood about boots on the ground in the way that we have been so critical generally of drones. If you think there is something to that in this case. CATAGNUS: No. I honestly think that the drones -- I don`t think this was a political decision. I think it was an actual tactical or an operational decision by the president. There are certain targets that drone strikes -- they know that they can effectively engage and kill. There is no reason to endanger American lives. Again this was the planning part of this. I honestly believe because Americans are very good at signal intelligence that there was a huge electronic footprint there. I also think that there might be some merit actually that there were other people in play there. There could have been a meeting. Timing is off. Timing in all of these raids are very critical if you`re off by 5 minutes or a minute. HARRIS-PERRY: It can make all the difference. You say electronic footprint. You said that to us earlier. If you`re the finance guy you might have more of an electronic footprint because of the ways that you are managing -- CATAGNUS: As opposed to a battlefield commander where you can actually engage with troops on the ground. HARRIS-PERRY: On the face to face. Earl Catagnus Jr. and Noah Shachtman, thank you so much for being here. I will be interested to continue to follow what`s going on with who we think the targets were. Stay right there. Up next, new developments in the Amtrak train derailment. We are going to live to Philadelphia for the latest. (COMMERCIAL BREAK) HARRIS-PERRY: As the investigation into the cause of this week`s deadly Amtrak train derailment deepens, more evidence of projectiles hitting trains on that route have surfaced. A passenger traveling along the same route the same night of the derailment, but on another train now says an object hit his train shattering the window. Justin Landis, a Johns Hopkins student snapped this photo of the damage and Landis said the incident happened about 20 minutes away from the Philadelphia station. This development came just one day after the NTSB announced its investigators had spoken to the staff of the derailed train including the engineer, Brandon Bostian. An assistant conductor told investigators she heard Bostian say an object had hit the train. Meantime, another engineer on a different train said his train was hit. When the train derailed Tuesday night, eight people were killed. More than 200 people were injured. Friday, the youngest victim, 20-year-old Justin Zemser was laid to rest. The U.S. Naval Academy midshipman had been traveling home to Rockaway Beach in New York on leave. Hundreds of people attended his funeral which included full military honors. Yesterday afternoon, the Federal Railroad Administration ordered Amtrak to take measures to improve safety on the northeast corridor. Joining me from Philadelphia, MSNBC correspondent, Adam Reiss. Adam, what are the orders that were issued by the administration? ADAM REISS, MSNBC CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Melissa. Three orders, one is to assess curves, one is to assess speed and also to install ATC, automatic train control. That would alert the engineer if the train is going too fast. If the engineer doesn`t slow it down, the system will slow down. I also want to tell you about the FBI investigation looking into a pattern. Is there a link between three trains getting hit by projectiles? Let`s look at them. First, we have the Acela at 9:05 Tuesday night. Then the Septa train claiming it was hit at 9:10 and then, of course, Amtrak 188 at 9:28. NTSB officials say it was a fist-sized projectile that went through the front windshield killing eight people. It`s possible criminal charges could come from this investigation. Engineers along the route call it getting rocked. Actually happening so often along the northeast corridor, they have to protect themselves by putting grills in the front windshield -- Melissa. HARRIS-PERRY: Thank you to MSNBC`s Adam Reiss in Philadelphia. We`ll continue to follow this story. Up next, the president wants it. Republicans want it. The private sector wants it. What`s the debate all about? (COMMERCIAL BREAK) HARRIS-PERRY: She endured brutality and bondage. She escaped from slavery in 1849. She spent years liberating other enslaved people and she is probably America`s best known abolitionist. Now Harriet Tubman just might end up on the $20 bill. No, it`s not imminent, but the grassroots group "Women on the 20" has been petitioning for months to retire the current bill that features the face of President Andrew Jackson and is advocating for Harriet Tubman to be the face of the next 20. The decision to make the new bills ultimately lies in the hands of Treasury Secretary Jack Lew and his department and if the treasury decides to print new Harriet Tubman bills, it would still take years for its partner, the Federal Reserve to distribute all of the redesigned bank notes. This week, the Federal Reserve and its bill distributing power at the center of another money story, the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal. The agreement which has been in the works for almost ten years would update the terms of the trade between the United States and 11 countries bordering the Pacific Ocean. As the largest trade agreement in decades the deal would be a major part of President Obama`s legacy. If you think the idea of putting Harriet Tubman on the 20 is controversial it has nothing on how contentious the proposed trade deal has been. Big business interest like tech and pharmaceutical companies favor the pact for its potential to spur economic growth while many progressives and labor groups voice concern for American workers. The deal has been so fraught that the Senate initially voted against debating the president`s authority to speed trade pacts through Congress, which would give the lawmakers power to either vote for or against the deal, not to alter it. But in a reversal, the Senate voted two days later to consider the legislation that would let President Obama complete trade negotiations and fast track the trade deal through Congress. The president applauded this decision Thursday and continued to make his case. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: I want to thank all the senators who voted to provide that authority. At least begin the debate on moving the process forward, those who didn`t vote for it. I want to keep on trying to make the case. The approach we are taking here, I think, is the right one, not just for big U.S. businesses, but also for small U.S. businesses and medium-sized U.S. businesses and most importantly ultimately American workers. (END VIDEO CLIP) HARRIS-PERRY: The Senate`s change of heart happened only after senators passed partner legislation to prevent any of the 11 countries involved in the trade deal from engaging in currency manipulation. Now opponents worry about the macro economic effects of countries that stock pile U.S. dollars in order to take them out of circulation and artificially increase the value of the dollar while decreasing the value of that country`s currency. Proponents of the trade deal are less concerned about currency manipulation, arguing that such artificial manipulation of currency`s value begins to stall the economy the fed would step in and pump more bills, Washington`s Jacksons or Tubmans in the future into the system. Currency manipulation is not the only pressure point in the debate. Opponents like Senator Elizabeth Warren have voiced concerns about the deal easing the displacement of jobs overseas and hindering competition among businesses. President Obama and supporters of the agreement balk at the idea that the deal would help big business at the expense of the American worker. Let`s be clear. I`m no expert in trade deals, but I have invited experts to join me this morning to talk about it. Joining me now is Zephyr Teachout, a former candidate for the governor of New York and a former at Fordham Law, Gordon Chang, columnist at forbes.com, Dorian Warren, MSNBC contributor and host of "Nerding Out" by MSNBC, and Ambassador David Adelman, who is a former U.S. ambassador to Singapore and a partner at Reid-Smith. Thank you all for being here. So let me just ask why this deal now, why this array of nations at this moment? GORDON CHANG, FORBES.COM: I think it`s largely because there is a concern about China in the region. Got to remember that President Obama announced this in November 2011, which was really the heart of the pivot. This was the idea that we would spend much more of our diplomatic and military attention towards the Pacific and people were concerned about China`s predatory trade behavior. So this is a response to what was going on in Asia. HARRIS-PERRY: OK, so this idea that this part of the world is our new critical space -- right? I guess part then of what I`m interested in is since China is in certain ways the nation, why China then isn`t part of this at the same time it is clearly part of it. AMBASSADOR DAVID ADELMAN, FORMER U.S. AMBASSADOR TO SINGAPORE: This is really not just about China. It`s about growth in all of the Asia- Pacific. You know, something happened in March of 2010 that`s a little bit obscure but was very significant. For the first time in history, American exports to Asia exceeded American exports to Europe. In some ways this trade negotiation is following the explosive growth in Asia. It`s very important -- HARRIS-PERRY: So is that about population or is that about buying capacity within those nations? ADELMAN: It`s about the growth and economic strength of many of the economies that are participating in the Trans-Pacific Partnership talks. Hundreds of millions of people are clawing their way to the middle class. They are very interested in American goods and services. They are the safest and highest quality goods and services in the world. HARRIS-PERRY: So your point about them being the safest is also underlying this. The idea in part that this kind of trade agreement would actually raise the level of not only pay, but also safety, security, not only for the goods we would be importing as Americans, but for the circumstances under which workers would be operating in these nations. Yet, a lot of progressives on this the side say, that`s not our worry. Our worry is what will happen to American workers and American jobs. DORIAN WARREN, MSNBC CONTRIBUTOR: It should be our worry because whatever happens to those workers, if we raise the global floor for workers in developing countries, it actually could potentially influence and help American workers. Because the issue now is the worry about the threat of American jobs going to places like Bangladesh or Vietnam, say apparel. If that`s the case, why not lift the global floor using our trade policy? In fact, under our current trades policy the president and the U.S. trade representative have the authority to threaten or issue sanctions for countries that don`t enforce their labor rights. We could be making a progressive case to lift the global floor using trade policy which might end up benefitting American workers. HARRIS-PERRY: But in a very long run. ADELMAN: Dorian is right. You know, in many ways the trade floor has already been lifted. Most of the apparel and footwear we are wearing today on the streets in the United States were manufactured in Vietnam, Bangladesh and other markets in Asia. WARREN: But we still haven`t -- we haven`t used our trade authority to the extent that we could. It`s uncomfortable position for progressives. It`s about imperial hegemonic power. It`s about state power of saying to countries we are not going to trade with you unless you have this minimal standard. We refuse to do it. That should be the call to action around this trade policy and all our trade policies. ZEPHYR TEACHOUT, FORDHAM LAW: What`s interesting and helpful, the three different stories we are told. I happen to agree with Gordon that I actually suspect that the real reason that President Obama, who I agree with on a lot of things -- not this thing is pushing this and has really actually taken some political risks on this -- HARRIS-PERRY: Yes. TEACHOUT: -- is because he believes -- not the reasons you`re giving, but that he is motivated by this concern about China. HARRIS-PERRY: He`s being competitive from the beginning. TEACHOUT: Yes -- and his own sense of legacy is tied to that. The reason I think it`s important, I know the TPP is very complicated and unknown is that when we are debating it, these are three different arguments. If you believe the core reason is China then we should be measuring it along those terms and deciding whether the real risks that come along to our domestic sovereignty are worth it. If we think the real reason is American jobs, I actually find the evidence weak on that. Let`s debate on that front. If we think the real debate is about raising the floor, that`s what the "New York Times" sort of suggested when it endorsed the basic premise of the TPP. But I find it implausible that`s the current thrust and the process through which we are negotiating this deal does not make sense if that`s the goal. Another trade deal could serve those goals. HARRIS-PERRY: Those three different stories then give us different standards on which we would measure whether or not we think this deal is good or not. On the China piece, is it a good deal? I mean, is it a reasonable decision to make? CHANG: Yes, it`s very important for us to do that because as the president said -- and he`s absolutely correct -- you know, who writes trade rules? Is it us or is it China? When you write the trade rules, you write trade flows. You know, the question is, are we going to have trade among these 12 countries with each other or are 11 countries going to trade with China and then China takes the end products and sells to us? This is a really important issue that will go on and I know that the trade deal is imperfect. There are a lot of things wrong with it. When you look at the geopolitical aspects of it, this is important for the United States and for leadership in the region which is a volatile state. We want to make sure that the U.S. is the one that guarantees security and the one that trades with all these countries. HARRIS-PERRY: I will let you back in when we come back. I do want to ask this question. Why does big pharma love the trade deal so much? That`s next. (COMMERCIAL BREAK) HARRIS-PERRY: Making a case for the Trans-Pacific Trade deal, the office of the U.S. trade representative, writes that the TPP deal aims to set high standard rules for trade and address vital 21st Century issues within the global community. One of those vital 21st Century issues is the distribution of affordable generic medicine to low income nations. People with illnesses like cancer, tuberculosis, Hepatitis C, HIV/AIDS, who live in impoverished nations rely on the trade of affordable generic drugs to treat infections. As an organization that provides affordable medications to people in low income regions, Doctors Without Borders has launch a campaign to inform people the damage that the patent provisions of the TPP could do to global public health. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The TPP is slated to become the most harmful trade agreement ever for access to medicines. The TPP could impose new rules that will extend monopoly protection for medicines, keeping prices sky high for longer and blocking generic drugs from entering the market. (END VIDEO CLIP) HARRIS-PERRY: Could these intellectual property provisions create a widespread public health problem? I like Doctors Without Borders. They say things and I`m generally like OK. You know, I also like intellectual property protection. TEACHOUT: OK, well, I actually think it is a great example. I want to step back because my concern about the TPP is as an American constitutional scholar. My concern has to do with a locus of decision- making, who has authority to make decisions and then who has the authority to adjudicate those decisions. Patents is one area where the TPP would change both the locus of the decision-making authority and the place of judicial arbitration. HARRIS-PERRY: So moving towards the administrative? TEACHOUT: Well, first of all, it is moving into the trade area. We are calling this a trade deal. As Elizabeth Warren frequently reminds us, you know, of the 29 alleged chapters in this unknown deal, really only five of them have to do with traditional trade elements with tariffs. The rest of them are really forms of law-making, legislation through the secret practice that 600 lobbyists are engaged in as something of a Patriot and anti-monopolist, I just want to point out Thomas Jefferson wanted an anti-monopoly clause in the constitution because of concerns about extended patents. Patents have always actually been a quasi-democratic threat because they give monopoly quasi governing power over whole areas. To have extensive patent protection which we believe exists in this secret trade deal is actually quite concerning. It`s concerning for the other countries and for people in those other countries but it`s also concerning for us. There is a growing anti- monopoly movement inner our country. If we wanted to reduce the length of our patents, it would actually be somewhat foreclosed by the TPP provisions. ADELMAN: The point is important, but it`s really not what Doctors Without Borders is talking about. America invests more in medical and pharmaceutical research and development than any other country on the globe. The reason we do that is because we have strong patent protections. Our patent system encourages further research and development investment by protecting that investment and what the TPP will do is take those protections overseas to some of the markets, which are most important trading partners. This is one of the difficult places, Melissa, where opponents of the TPP want it both ways. They want labor and environmental standards American-style in the Asia-Pacific, but they are concerned with an American style patent regime in the Asia-Pacific. HARRIS-PERRY: So, so is there a way -- to slice this that then allows for a recognition of certain kinds of needs and a kind of hierarchy that says -- all right. I get the point. Research and development comes from a kind of profit motivation that says because you have patents you can protect intellectual property. So investment in intellectual goods, is it actual value that that rises here and it doesn`t -- if you don`t have those patents, those protections around intellectual property. On the other hand -- I mean, I get the argument. I`m not saying I agree. I get the argument, right? But part of what I`m saying is once we start talking about what that cost is relative to a basket of goods in another nation that there actually are ways -- the best way I can say this in TV moment is a sliding scale. What you can charge in a nation where median income is $50,000 is different from what you can charge in a nation where median income is $5,000. CHANG: You can have a work around though. The point is there are really important concerns that Doctors Without Borders talk about. The way you do it is not to reduce patent protections. You`re absolutely right on that. The way to do it is direct government assistance to groups like Doctors Without Borders. You sort of help the generics that way. You don`t do it by taking the patent protections and breaking them down because then you are just not going to get drugs in the first place. HARRIS-PERRY: I promise I will let you back in. You had the constitutional point about the question of the fundamental process as well. After the break, we are going to talk about the spectre of NAFTA and the giant sucking sound that we still may be asking about the TPP. (COMMERCIAL BREAK) HARRIS-PERRY: Helping big businesses at the expense of American workers is a claim we have heard before long before the Transportation-Pacific Partnership negotiations were under way. Well, before President Obama was even a senator. The argument took center stage in 1993 during a televised debate between Texas billionaire, Ross Perot and Vice President Al Gore. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The problem is this is not good for the people in either country. If this is true why is corporate America downsizing? If this is all true, why do we have the largest number of college granule watts unable to find jobs since any time in the 40s? (END VIDEO CLIP) HARRIS-PERRY: Ross Perot, jobs, jobs. During the debate about the North American Free Trade Agreement between Canada, Mexico and the United States, Perot frequently articulated his belief that NAFTA could create more U.S. jobs and massage the economy. Much like their current concern about TPP deal, many trade unions were concerned that NAFTA could result in a loss of manufacturing jobs in the `90s. Still President Clinton signed the agreement in December of 1993 of after facing congressional opposition and the deal was a major policy victory for his administration. Joining in the celebration, of course then was then First Lady Hillary Clinton and a Secretary Of State Hillary Clinton called the TPP the, quote, "gold standard" in trade agreements. But as a presidential candidate, Clinton has been pretty vague and general about the TPP, unlike likely Democratic candidate, Martin O`Malley, who has been a vocal opponent of the deal. In fact, during the April campaign stop in New Hampshire, Clinton restrained her comments to this. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) HILLARY CLINTON (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Any trade deal has to produce jobs and raise wages and increase prosperity and protect our security. We have to do our part in making sure we have the capabilities and skills to be competitive. (END VIDEO CLIP) HARRIS-PERRY: So what will the trade deal mean for the politics of where we are right now? WARREN: Former Secretary Clinton was right. Any trade deal has to produce jobs. NAFTA produced lots of jobs in Mexico, Canada and not the U.S. So the evidence on that is pretty clear. You don`t hear people pushing back against that because the studies are pretty unequivocal about the effect of NAFTA on American workers. HARRIS-PERRY: I need you to pause. You just underlined one of the great moments in American politics. I want you to listen to Ross Perot talking about the giant sucking sound. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What will you do as president to open foreign markets to fair competition from American business and to stop unfair competition here at home from foreign countries? ROSS PEROT: That`s right at the top of oh my agenda. We have shipped millions of jobs overseas. We have a strange situation. You don`t care about anything, but making money there will be a giant sucking sound going south. (END VIDEO CLIP) HARRIS-PERRY: I`m sorry. You may go on. WARREN: He was prophetic in the case of NAFTA. For trade deals going forward, what are the trade-offs between the loss of American jobs and increased jobs in people in poverty in other places of the world. Can we have that debate about the trade-offs for the American workers standard of living versus those around the rest of the world? That`s the debate I want to have and if we go there then the question is, again, what kind of protections can we put in place for American workers, but especially for those workers in Vietnam and other countries? Will we demand that those countries enforce a robust regime of workers` rights? We have not done that. HARRIS-PERRY: So Dorian wants to have an argument about both U.S. jobs as well as the standard of quality of jobs overseas. Zephyr wants a conversation about what all of this means in terms of the process and health of American democracy. We are thinking a little bit here around the questions both of our relationship with China and I have heard you say, Zephyr, a question of national security as well as these long-term relationships. Of course also what it means not only for jobs when we think about manufacturing, but also the intellectual property rights, the thing the U.S. still has. That seems complicated. Zephyr, your point was therefore we ought to have a big open debate about it. Not have it happen behind closed doors. ADELMAN: The debate is about protectionism. Protectionism is the close cousin to isolationism. That`s what you heard in the campaign. Candidate Buchannan and Perot were really promoting isolationism which is at odds with the increasingly interconnected economies of the world. Those interconnected economies have served America well. The other part of NAFTA that`s not disputed is the trade flows between Canada, the United States and Mexico have increased. This has been a good 20 years for the American economy. WARREN: The protectionism for whom. In this case, it`s protectionism for the profits of pharmaceutical companies that will result in millions of deaths for people that don`t have access to generic drugs. That`s in plain language, it`s like which protectionism do we want to argue for? It`s OK for companies but not for workers. When we want to protect workers around labor rights that`s bad, but we want to protect intellectual property, we place that higher in the moral scale than we do around workers` rights. HARRIS-PERRY: Zephyr will be back in the next hour. I want to say thank you to Gordon Chang, Dorian Warren and Ambassador Adelman. We are going to be still talking about this. Coming up next, when is the last time people were this excited about a new library? (COMMERCIAL BREAK) HARRIS-PERRY: On Tuesday, President and First Lady Obama made it official. The Obama Presidential Library will be located on the south side of Chicago. The first couple explained that the decision was an extremely personal one for them. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) MICHELLE OBAMA, FIRST LADY: Every value, every memory, every important relationship to me exists in Chicago. I consider myself a south sider. PRESIDENT OBAMA: All the strands of my life came together and I became a man when I moved to Chicago. That`s where I was able to apply that early idealism to try to work in communities, in public service. That`s where I met my wife. That`s where with my children were born. (END VIDEO CLIP) HARRIS-PERRY: The library sighting decision is a reminder of how novel it is to have an urban first family. Not since FDR has an American president so fully and readily rooted his identity in one of our nation`s great cities. Living in D.C. and vacationing Hawaii or Martha`s Vineyard, we haven`t have much of a chance to see the Obamas as south siders. Not since the days of trick or treating just before the 2008 election. But with the announcement that the Obama Presidential Library and Foundation will live near the University of Chicago near the Woodlawn and Washington Park neighborhoods, we are reminded once again of the Obamas unique connection to the city. The economic impact of the library could be significant. Granted a presidential library isn`t like opening a new factory and there is little evidence from previous presidential libraries of sustained direct economic effects except for the Clinton Library, which according to one analysis has brought $2.5 billion in investment to Little Rock, Arkansas, since 1997. This is not just any library in any community. This is the library of the nation`s first black president who made history and then made it again through both of those elections that he won. His archives may be an academic destination for decades. He`s chosen to place those archives in a community that`s rich in tradition and history, but is also predominantly African-American by enormous margins and also home to substantial levels of poverty. And while the murder rate has declined in Chicago overall since 2012 the city`s economically disadvantaged south side is still burdened by a crime gap that leaves its residents vulnerable to violence. So the choice to locate the Obama library in a community that`s largely poor, mostly black and actively struggling is a meaningful one. It`s worth asking what difference will it make. Here to talk about this with me is Khalil Muhammad, director of the research center for research in black culture which will receive the National Medal for Museum and Library Service at the White House tomorrow. It`s so nice to see you. KHALIL GIBRAN MUHAMMAD, DIRECTOR, SCHOMBURG CENTER: Thank you so much. HARRIS-PERRY: You`re also a Chicagoan. What do you think? Is it important? MUHAMMAD: Yes, of course it is. Chicago is one of the most important destinations and historical landmarks of this country`s great industrial history. Unlike New York as a finance capital, unlike Los Angeles as the capital of entertainment, Chicago is the capital of industry and big shoulders. In this sense, this presidential library has a chance to tell the Chicago story on a national and global stage in ways that it`s really never been told before. HARRIS-PERRY: Khalil, it`s also the city of black politics and some really important ways. I mean, to remember that Martin Luther King Chicago campaign was a crucial part of his legacy to remember Jesse Jackson in `84 and `88 making the first presidential bids is coming out of there. Harold Washington, Carol Mosley Brawn, Ida Wells, I mean, right, Chicago is specifically that south side like home to black politics. MUHAMMAD: It is. Drawing on history it tells a story that`s often over looked. It is the first place to send a black representative to Congress after reconstruction in 1928 with Oscar Depriest, which precedes Adam Clayton Powell Jr., the more powerful and well known congressman from New York City in 1944. So you`re right. That`s the question. In some ways it`s the million dollar question or the billion dollar question in presidential library terms. How much of that story will be front and center in an Obama Presidential Library? The same way the Smithsonian National Museum of African-American History has to wrestle with the question of how to attract as many tourists as possible with an ecumenical story of America`s greatness with black people at the center of it, how much do you deal with slavery? How much is it an ongoing legacy? The truth is how much will the story be able to tell black politics or black Chicago story in order to meet its economic goals? HARRIS-PERRY: So the other piece of potential critique and concern here, when I say it will be located near the University of Chicago, for folks in the know about the south side, there is angst about the University of Chicago`s relationship with that south side community sometimes described as imperial in the way it pushes into African- American communities and now we are talking about pushing south into Woodlawn potentially. I wonder if this idea of, this is an exciting sighting might be one that has property owners, communities a little bit worried about who and how those influences are potentially gentrification could move in. MUHAMMAD: Right, but this is a question that every major city wrestles with generation after generation in terms of economic development. The pattern doesn`t look good in terms of what gen really happens, whether it is a stadium, whether it is Olympic development in communities all across the world. You get these beautiful buildings. You have the promise and the optimism and inspiration that they bring with them. Then the question is who is coming? Who`s paying for it? What`s the vision of the leadership? Those are questions that one hopes, given the president`s commitments to Chicago, given the first lady`s attachments as a native daughter of that community will be answered differently and some of the economic development questions will be answered with a kind of thoughtfulness for residents, which often are left at the table. There is often a lot of window dressing. We are going to have town halls. We are going to get community involved and then when all the dust settles the question remains like who does this really benefit? HARRIS-PERRY: I could imagine it though. I don`t know what it will be called. We`ll have the community event at the Obama library. We`re having Woodlawn kwanza at the Obama library. I can imagine those things and they seem not surprising to me. MUHAMMAD: But Melissa, can I jump on that, so this is really important. There is already an African-American history museum. HARRIS-PERRY: That`s right. MUHAMMAD: So there is a question here about -- HARRIS-PERRY: Does it eat that one? MUHAMMAD: Right, an existing infrastructure to tell the black history of Chicago founded by a black man. I think that`s an important opportunity. With the leadership of the library is a trickledown effect where there are more people in the community -- more people in the area, more tourists, more dollars and Desavo is lifted up or does it draw down? That`s the question that has to be answered. HARRIS-PERRY: It could potentially link to Desavo, link back to science and industry and create a park space not unlike what happens on the lake front or it could eat Desavo. MUHAMMAD: That`s right and we don`t want that to happen. Let`s be clear. HARRIS-PERRY: No, we do not want that to happen. I keep being reminded of how young they both are, both President and First Lady Obama have a long future in front of them in public life. Watching not only the physical space of the library but their public work will be fascinating. Thank you to Khalil Muhammad for coming in and talk south side and to Schomburg for its terrific award tomorrow at the White House. Still to come this morning, Dave Ziren on Brazil`s most expensive parking lot. The mayor`s race is being influenced by outside millions and the shared legacy of rock and roll and hip-hop. More nerdland at the top of the hour. (COMMERCIAL BREAK) HARRIS-PERRY: Welcome back. I`m Melissa Harris-Perry. We are we learning new details about the raid inside Syria in which U.S. special operation forces killed a senior ISIS leader. Abu Sayyaf was killed after a team of Army Delta commandos flew from Iraq into Eastern Syria in an effort to capture him. Heavy firefight ensued after he resisted capture and was killed. According to U.S. defense officials Abu Sayyaf was involved in ISIS military operations and also helped direct the terrorist organization`s oil, gas and financial operations. His wife, an Iraq national was captured and is now in detention. No U.S. forces were killed and injured during the operation. Joining me now is NBC News White House correspondent Kristen Welker. Kristen, talk to me about the significance of this operation. KRISTEN WELKER, NBC NEWS WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Melissa, the mission is significant for a couple of reasons. Really, first of all it sends a message to ISIS that the United States is willing to take them on in their safe havens. On their own turf. So, that`s significant. This was incredibly risky and if any of those U.S. commandos had been captured they would have almost certainly been tortured and killed as we have seen with those other ISIS hostages. Now, it is also significant because while the ISIS Leader Abu Sayyaf was killed his wife Umm Sayyaf as you point out was taken into custody and is talking to her interrogators. That could yield new intelligence about whether other is fighters are and where other hostages are being held potentially. We are also learning new details about that operation this morning. U.S. officials say American Delta Force commandos took off from Northern Iraq in Black Hawk helicopters and osprey plane helicopter hybrids and they flew into an ISIS stronghold in Eastern Syria. The target of the mission was Abu Sayyaf. He`s not really known to most Americans but U.S. officials say he was a top ISIS operator. He managed ISIS` oil and gas income. Taking him down was not easy though, Melissa. There was a gun fight and there was even a hand to hand fighting. Abu Sayyaf was killed along with 12 other ISIS fighters. The operation is being hailed as a victory but it does comes against the backdrop of Ramadi falling to ISIS this past week which really underscores the fact that the campaign against ISIS will be protracted and has been predicted -- Melissa. HARRIS-PERRY: Thank you to NBC`s Kristen Welker at the White House. We are going to turn now to a critical time for the city of Philadelphia. In the immediate aftermath of the Amtrak train derailment, Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter was front and center practically from the moment the accident happened late Tuesday fight. He was seeking and providing answers day after day Nutter was there on the scene fielding questions from reporters providing the latest on the devastating crash that claimed eight lives and injured more than 200 passengers. The train derailment has put Philadelphia at the center of a renewed debate over the safety of our nation`s infrastructure and underscores a significance of the nation`s fifth largest city and the people who lead it. Nutter is in his second and because of term limits his final term as mayor. Because of those term limits in Philadelphia, he`s not eligible to run again so he`s not on the ballot for the city`s mayoral democratic primary this Tuesday. A race that even before the derailment was seen as noteworthy in the national debate over several key issues. The Amtrak tragedy did forced the candidates to curtail some campaigning in the home stretch of the race. But before the events of this week took over the headlines, the candidates were sending much of their time talking about another issue that has put Philadelphia in the spotlight in recent years. Its troubled school system. In a poll taken just days ago improving education was far and away the top concern of likely voters and for good reason. Right now the school system is facing a projected $85 million short fall. And a May 30th deadline to adopt a budget, a deadline the district is likely to miss for the second year in a row. In 2013 Philadelphia made national headlines when it closed 23 schools and laid off thousands of workers in the face of a deficit that topped $300 million. That spring thousands of students walked out of classes to protest proposals to eliminate after school sports, extracurricular activities and counselors. That May, we spoke to one of the student organizers in the 2013 protests about her concerns. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN: And classes going to be over crowded. The teacher won`t be able to teach and school will be hectic. We don`t have the right resources, like the books, computers and stuff like that. We don`t have that. (END VIDEO CLIP) HARRIS-PERRY: This education issue has been the driving story line between the two top candidates in Tuesday`s democratic mayoral primary. And each has a distinct approach. Listen, in a heavily democratic city like Philadelphia winning the democratic primary typically means you will going to be the next mayor. So, where these candidates stand is likely where Philly policy will go. Former City Councilman Jim Kenney, and advocate of traditional public schools currently has the backing of the Philadelphia Federation of Teachers and a commanding lead in the latest polls. Which is significant considering the big money behind his main opponent. State Senator Anthony Williams, who is a strong proponent of charger schools and vouchers and who speaks passionately about education in his campaign commercials. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) UNIDENTIFIED MAN: I have no use for the tired old practice of pitting some parents and some schools against other parents in other schools. We should be lifting up all Philadelphia school students. (END VIDEO CLIP) HARRIS-PERRY: Williams has an enormous financial edge. Thanks to the backing of three wealthy suburban investors who, through their Super Pac, have spent nearly $7 million on Williams` behalf. As of May 4th, that was nearly equal to all of the other candidates and Super Pac fundraising combined. And it is part of a trend of a growing national trend of Super Pac donations in local elections being used to support proposals like the privatization of public schools. Right now, all that money does not appear to be deciding Philadelphia`s mayoral race but it is a sign of things to come, maybe in your next local election. Joining me now is Zephyr Teachout, a law professor at Fordham and former New York gubernatorial candidate. And from Philadelphia, Dan Denvir, a contributor for The Nation and a contributing writer at CityLab. Nice to see you, Dan. DANIEL DENVIR, CONTRIBUTOR, THE NATION: Hey, thanks for having me. HARRIS-PERRY: Help people around the country understand just how empowered the Philadelphia mayor is relative to education. Why does it matter who the mayor is. DENVIR: So the schools in Philadelphia have been under funded and segregated off from the more affluent suburban schools for a long time. And in 2001 the state took over the school district and then imposed a school reform commission. So, the mayor controls two out of five seats. The governor, the other three seats on the SRC. So, those two sits are critical. And the city`s contribution to city public schools which is decided by the mayor and city council through the city budget process is also really important. So, this race has been about a lot of things but most of all about education and the candidates with starkly different visions of how to solve the Philly public schools crisis. HARRIS-PERRY: So, stick with us Dan, don`t go away. But Zephyr, I want to come out to you on this, because one way to tell the story is, okay. Here you have a major city debating education as a central concern, big money coming in on one side. But it doesn`t seem to be mattering. The people are choosing this kind of education. Isn`t that an indication that Citizens United doesn`t matter. The big money doesn`t matter. What matters is the democratic process and people voting their interests. ZEPHYR TEACHOUT (D), FORMER CANDIDATE FOR NY GOVERNOR: That`s right. HARRIS-PERRY: Okay. That wasn`t the answer I was expecting. TEACHOUT: You know, actually but there is a point that is actually really important. Is that outside money can have a huge, huge, huge impact when people aren`t paying attention. And a lot of times they`re not, a lot of different issues. But there is recent research, Jeff Smith just came out with a paper. Sort of looking at when there is a high level of attention. Big money matters a lot less. HARRIS-PERRY: Democracy can push back against the big money. TEACHOUT: Right. But I think is concerning -- this is exciting. What`s concerning is how few people in New York, a few hedge funders really driving education policy with millions of dollars of investment in Chicago and Philadelphia. There is this new trend of the billionaire behind privatization of public education. And they are really out for undermining, you know, what I see as the infrastructure of democracy and the theory that, you know, trains are going to figure out their own safety systems and schools are going to figure out their own funding as opposed to -- this is something we actually really need to invest in, really need to fund. And I think we should continue to call it out for what it is. HARRIS-PERRY: So, Dan, when you talk about folks calling it out for what it is. Part of what was impressive to us over the past couple of years has been the extent to which students have been the ones calling it out. And you know, we talk about the Black Lives Matter movement. You know, over the course of the past year largely around police violence that I always think of it as beginning in part in students saying student lives matter. Particularly students of color, students from communities that are under resourced. Are they the ones who ultimately are making, you know, kind of change the discourse for this election? DENVIR: And indeed they have been connecting the dots between those issues and talking about how the disinvestment and marginalization of Philadelphia public school`s systems is part and partial of building the school to prison pipeline. And that`s why I think that the big money matters but it`s really backfired in Philadelphia. Because you can`t really spin the crisis. Students know what they are going through. Parents know what they`re going through. Teachers know what they are going through. We lost thousands of teacher and staff positions. Schools are just, you know, shells of their former selves. And you can`t really spin that. Nearly $7 million can`t change the reality on the ground. And transparency pushed by the media, I think, by aggressive reporting in the city, you know, really highlighting these three suburban financers pouring nearly $7 million into Williams` campaign efforts, I think, that has backfired. I think that these three libertarian suburbanites have in very little in common politically with your average Philadelphian. And so I think that in many ways Williams`s greatest campaign asset indeed up to be truly costly. HARRIS-PERRY: Why do they care what happens to the Philadelphia public schools? DENVIR: I think, you know, you`d have to ask them. But to me it seems more ideological. You know, I think there certainly are people with direct financial interest in the privatization of public schools but I think that at times that`s overplayed on the Left. I really do think there is a strong ideological commitment among many of these people in Silicon Valley and Wall Street to seeing an education system that mirrors their own idea of how society should work and kind of flatters their own idea of how they themselves achieve success. HARRIS-PERRY: Thank you to Daniel Denvir in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. And here in New York, thank you to Zephyr Teachout. Dave Zirin is coming up next for some Sunday morning sports talk. For starters, you aren`t just not going to believe what is going on in Brazil with those stadiums that they built the lives here for the World Cup. (COMMERCIAL BREAK) HARRIS-PERRY: Deflate-gate continues to dominate headline in the sports world but we have a story that has nothing to do with the firmest Tom Brady`s footballs. Let`s take a visit to Brazil. It`s been a year since the ultimate soccer carnival when Germany defeated Argentina at the final world cup match-up in Rio de Janeiro. Now, behind the matches the fans, the spectacle was the backdrop of civil unrest. The tournament cost Brazil $15 billion and many of the people of Brazil believe that those billions should have been invested in schools, health care, transportation, sanitation, not sports. Under the rallying cry of there will be no cup protesters argue that the World Cup money would end up creating colossal shrines likely to become white elephants or unfinished infrastructure projects. Brazil spent more than three billion dollars on stadiums. A stadium construction which was plagued by accidents over spending, and delays also resulted in nine building related deaths. The most expensive World Cup stadium located in Cup dole of Brasilia cost $550 million. And today according to a new report by NPR, it is been used as a parking lot for buses. Then there is the stadium in Cuiaba which cost more than $200 billion to build and it was shut down for an emergency repair after officials discovered structural problems. Meanwhile, the stadium in natal has been hosting weddings and kids parties to increase revenue. Right now it`s up for sale. Brazil`s own legend -- soccer legend Romario who is now a congressman called the 2014 World Cup the biggest heist in the history of Brazil. Brazil will also host the 2016 Olympics in Rio. Spending is expected to top $15 billion. Joining me now Dave Zirin, sports editor for The Nation Magazine and author of the book "Brazil`s Dance With The Devil: The World Cup, The Olympics and the Struggle For Democracy." So, you`re not supervised. DAVE ZIRIN, SPORTS EDITOR, THE NATION MAGAZINE: I am not surprised. You mentioned some of the statistics. Other statistics. Two hundred and fifty thousand people it is estimated displaced by stadium construction. And, you know, there is an expression in Brazil that statistics are like a man`s thong. They show so much but they hide the most important parts. And in this case the most important parts are an economic agenda of debt displacement and the militarization of public space that allowed soccer and the World Cup to be used as a kind of neo liberal Trojan horse to push through infrastructure projects that people would otherwise have rejected. The difference in Brazil though is that in 2013 millions of people took to the streets to oppose this with a rather beautiful slogan. Because FIFA, the organization that oversees international soccer, they always say, we want FIFA-quality stadiums. That`s their expression. That means it has to have all the amenities and people said, no, we want FIFA quality schools. We want FIFA quality hospitals. We want FIFA quality jobs. And they took to the streets in huge numbers. Unfortunately their calls were not met with actual listening and change. What they were met with was actual, a brutal kind of counter offensive by the police, by the military and now the Olympics are coming in 2016. HARRIS-PERRY: So, explain to me why the stadiums built for the World Cup can`t just be repurposed? I mean, why isn`t this like exactly how shouldn`t always be, World Cup and then Olympics and then it all works together? ZIRIN: Because the World Cup and the Olympics really, they don`t exactly go together like peanut butter and jelly. They more go together like nuts and gum. Because the World Cup is a national event. Brazil is a country that`s bigger than the continental United States in terms of land. The Olympics is just in a city -- in Rio. So, everything is Rio-centric for the Olympics. And all of the stadiums that were built all over the country in 2014 are going to be like bystanders, looking on at the Olympics wondering, I mean, if the stadiums could think and talk, they would be like, why are you building now with even more stadiums and structures in Rio when we are right here collecting dust. HARRIS-PERRY: And buses. ZIRIN: Yes. And in Manaus, which is the famous amazon stadium they were talking about converting it into an open air prison to deal with prison shortages in Brazil. A politician has put that forward in Brazil. It`s obviously meeting with great deal of protest. But it is a stunning connection. People talk about the school to prison pipeline. What about the stadium to prison pipeline? HARRIS-PERRY: Okay. That said, for all of what we now about how these big events -- Olympics, World Cup, there is a game on right now to bring the Olympics to Boston. ZIRIN: To Boston. HARRIS-PERRY: Think about that. ZIRIN: And there is a lot of resistance in Boston. I think that the people who are pushing the Boston 2024 bid have not been honest with the people of Boston. The people of Boston are organizing and protesting. Because what they`re doing and I`m actually going up to Boston, June 2nd to speak about this. Because people are saying, you know what, we see what`s happened in other places. We see the debt displacement and militarization. Do we really need more that in Boston? Because in Boston which is a city which has seen a lot of displacement, a lot of gentrification. I mean, for them that displacement, militarization, they might call that a Tuesday. And so, the idea of bringing the Olympics there, it`s like supersizing the actual urban issues that people are dealing with in Boston. And we have to -- HARRIS-PERRY: Making it Super Tuesday. ZIRIN: Exactly. Super Tuesday. And you think about like, we have discussions about Baltimore and the idea of using the building and stadiums, football and baseball stadiums as a substitute for urban policy. You see that in postindustrial cities or de-industrializing cities all over the United States. The Olympics and world cup is the same economic agenda. With the same lies, the same nefarious tactics except its supersized. HARRIS-PERRY: So, is there a way to do it ethically? I mean, people love the World Cup. ZIRIN: Yes. HARRIS-PERRY: People love the Olympics. They have to be somewhere. ZIRIN: Yes. I think there is some ethical way to do it. I think the best way to do it would be if you had permanent locales that could perhaps rotate between three different spots on the planet. We could think of very nice politically correct areas where it could be. One in South Africa, one Europe, one South America. HARRIS-PERRY: Rome. ZIRIN: Yes. And if you were able to rotate them to these different areas, then you could justify actually spending for upkeep on the stadiums. The problem though is go to Beijing and you see the famous bird`s nest for that was the host of the 2008 Olympics, one of the most beautiful stadiums I have ever seen. It`s now imploding, it`s falling it onto itself. Still lapidated or in Greece which shows for the 2004, Olympics is now being used to squatter housing for the homeless in Greece. HARRIS-PERRY: Because we don`t come back around. ZIRIN: Exactly. HARRIS-PERRY: Well, that said, if Boston did in fact get the Olympics and you got a big new stadium then Tom Brady have, you know, a new place to deflate his balls. ZIRIN: Yes. HARRIS-PERRY: Dave Zirin, thank you so much for joining us and talking sports. You have to come back. Because I do have a lot to ask about Preakness and Kentucky Derby and all that stuff. ZIRIN: Oh, yes. HARRIS-PERRY: Many of those that stuck up as well. Up next, stumbles and tumbles of 2016. And still to come this morning, a special performance by hip-hop artist FM Supreme. (COMMERCIAL BREAK) HARRIS-PERRY: Last night in Des Moines, Iowa, the GOP, state party provided 11 White House hopefuls with ten minutes each to make their case at the annual Lincoln dinner. For the pleasure of hearing those speeches and mingling with the political big wigs and the subsequent reception, Iowans could pay $100 for a place in general seating, there`s a bearable bargain when you consider the night`s bill included among the ever growing field of official and potential candidates, Ben Carson and Carley Fiorina, Lindsey Graham, Bobby Jindal, George Pataki, Rand Paul, Rick Perry, Rick Santorum, Donald Trump and Scott Walker. When you break it down for a single seat, that is ten speeches for $10 apiece. With each speech at ten minutes, seats at last night`s event really cost just $1 a minute. But wait. There`s more. I said there were 11 GOP hopefuls. That`s right. This deal got even better because after the week this man had, what political observer wouldn`t want to see what he had to say, next. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) FMR. GOV. JEB BUSH (R), FLORIDA: Look, many of you all know me as George and Barbara`s boy, for which I`m proud. Some of you may know that W is my brother. I`m proud of that, too. Whether people don`t like that or not they`re just going to have to get used to it. (APPLAUSE) (END VIDEO CLIP) HARRIS-PERRY: And that is former Florida Governor Jeb Bush, how he capped off what has been the worst week of his running/not running/non- official campaign for president so far. It`s worth noting that nothing happened to Governor Bush this week. By that, I mean, there is no news story that turned the political cycle against him. There was no opposition research unearthed that cast a shadow over his non-candidacy candidacy. There was no big race changing endorsement for one of his many opponents. No. That`s just old fashion, stumbles and tumbles that came from littler more than speaking out loud. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) BUSH: I`m running for president in 2016 and the focus is going to be about how we -- if I run -- how do you create high sustained economic growth. (END VIDEO CLIP) HARRIS-PERRY: Whoops. The hashtag running, not running Mr. Bush is not supposed to say, quote, "I`m running for president." Now, forget the fact that Speaker John Boehner`s press secretary just quit his job to move to Miami and work for Jeb Bush`s PAC. We are still supposed to be pretending that the former Florida governor is just thinking about running. Because if he says that he is running, well, there would be major restrictions on the fund-raising that he can do. So, Mr. Bush quickly cleaned up the "I`m running" comment but that was far from the biggest talking out damage control that Jeb Bush had to do this week. Here he is talking about the war in Iraq. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) MEGYN KELLY, FOX NEWS ANCHOR: Knowing what he know now would you have authorized the invasion? BUSH: I would have. So would have Hillary Clinton, just to remind everybody. And so would have almost everybody that was confronted with the intelligence they got. (END VIDEO CLIP) HARRIS-PERRY: Oops. I mean, sure. I mean, it was his brother`s war and all but in 2015 even on the republican side that`s just not the right answer. That was Monday. Here`s Tuesday. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) SEAN HANNITY, FOX NEWS ANCHOR: So in other words if in 2020 hindsight, you would make a different decision? BUSH: Yes. I don`t know what that decision would have been. That`s a hypothetical. But the simple fact is that mistakes were made, as they always are in life. This is not an informed policy. And so, we need to learn from the past to make sure that we are strong and secure going forward. (END VIDEO CLIP) HARRIS-PERRY: Nope, nope, nope. That didn`t fix it. Acknowledging mistakes were made in the Iraq war at this point is basically politically akin to saying we want a better future for our children. I mean, it`s not exactly a bold stance. On Wednesday, Governor Bush took one more shot at it. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) BUSH: When I was governor, I got to -- I felt a duty -- I didn`t have to -- to call all of the family members of people who lost their lives. So, going back in time in talking about hypothetical what would have happened, what could have happened I think does a disservice for them. (END VIDEO CLIP) HARRIS-PERRY: Well, can we get one more pass of this? Let`s look at Thursday. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) BUSH: If we are all supposed to answer hypothetical questions, knowing what we know now, what would you have done, I would have not engaged, I would not have gone into Iraq. (END VIDEO CLIP) HARRIS-PERRY: Oh, there it is. Knowing what we know now I would not have engaged. One question, four days, four answers. But we finally got there, even if Governor Bush had to stumble and tumble his way there. In the process, he also learned one of the most important lessons of running for president. It`s hard. You have to answer hard questions. And you are expected to have the answers. Real answers that show us that you think about them. Not just that you have practiced lines droned out to do damage control. Because if you want to be our president, you should not be getting anointed. You have to win. Of course Mr. Bush is still only thinking about it. Maybe this week gave him some more thinking to do. (COMMERCIAL BREAK) HARRIS-PERRY: A new study from a team of London researchers is the most comprehensive analysis ever attempted for American pop music. They ran nearly every single that charted on the bill board 100 over the last 50 years to a computer program to search for a recurring trend and the songs musical properties. What they found is that American pop music`s evolution has been defined by distinct moments of musical revolution and that America`s most influential revolution, a music eclipsed even the 1960s British rock and roll invasion led by bands like the Beatles and the Rolling Stones. According to the researchers the explosion in popularity of hip-hop music in 1991 was the single most important event that has shaped the musical structure of the American charts. Of course that`s probably old news to long-time hip-hop heads but what makes the study unusual is that it relied on digital analysis of the songs musical properties rather than kind of stories and history to uncover the cultural influences of pop music. Here in Nerdland there are few things that we love more than a study with some meaty quantitative analysis. But also cultural revolutions aren`t necessarily built on chord patterns and tone characteristics. In the case of both rock and roll and hip hop the shifts at American pop music were driven by young people who heard in those songs their own counter cultural sound track. Sex, drugs and rock and roll were embraced by 1960s youth who chafed against the norms and standards of the generation that came before. In the next decade hip-hop emerge from New York`s South Bronx neighborhood as a sub-culture that gave voice, and the lived experience of Black and Latino youth. But today both genres and their fans have reached small little age and come a long way from their anti-establishment beginnings. So, what happens to revolutionary music when it becomes the music of the main stream? Joining me now Jessica Disu who`s a humanitarian rap artist better known as FM Supreme. Alan Light, a contributor for "The New York Times" and "Rolling Stone" magazine. Elysa Gardner, who is a critic and reporter for "USA Today." And Christopher John Farley, senior editorial director for Features at the Wall Street Journal and author of Game World. So, I want to talk about the research for one second. Because it`s fascinating to me this idea of like the sonic influence being the way that you would measure influence. What do we think about that as just kind of a strategy? ALAN LIGHT, "THE NEW YORK TIMES": Well, I think it`s, you know, I think it demonstrates both the desire and the limitations and fallacy of using data analysis to deal with technical and cultural history. I mean, so much of the impact of something like the Beatles -- and let`s start with these are both revolutionary phenomenon that absolutely transformed the world. There is not a question. But when you are talking about the Beatles, you are talking about a group that introduced the idea of being a band to the world. The idea of writing your own songs to the world. The idea that you would change and evolve as a pop artist album to album. You know, none of that is going to show up in any kind of quantifiable statistical analysis. And these are things that transform the very way that music is made. HARRIS-PERRY: I mean, maybe laughable but because of the, you know, all the controversy around Robin Thicke and the Marvin Gaye which basically got adjudicated on this similar kind of like looking at the actual patterns of the music rather than the point that Marvin Gaye`s music is in fact influential in the ways we normally think of influence. So, what does it mean to say that hip-hop is somehow more influential than even the London invasion? CHRISTOPHER JOHN FARLEY, THE WALL STREET JOURNAL: Well, we have to talk about it a little bit because we have to acknowledge that comparing these kinds of apples and oranges things is a little bit ridiculous. Impressionism better than surrealism? HARRIS-PERRY: Yes, right. FARLEY: I don`t know. But I think it is important and interesting that we are acknowledging that hip-hop is now on that level. That wasn`t more influential than rock? We`re going to have a serious discussion about that. We should also talk about the methodology here of the study. And looking at the billboard 100, is that the best representation about what`s going on in American music or world music? Probably not. I mean, obviously that`s the stuff that`s selling. But we all know by their very natures underground art forms. The real stuff that`s changing things, changing the world, changing the game is often the underground stuff. The mixed tapes, the alternative stuff. Before it bubbles up to the main stream. HARRIS-PERRY: That`s actually part of what I was wondering if this is indicative of the failure of hip-hop. Right? The idea of hip-hop being influential in the top 100 when I think about the kind of authenticity claims initially made around hip-hop being we don`t ever want to be in the top 100. That`s not who we are. We are not here to sell music. ELYSA GARDNER, USA TODAY: Yes. But on the other hand, I mean, I can`t think of a modern rock equivalent for somebody like Jay-Z, for example, you know, who is so aspirational and ambitious. And the Beatles really were, I think they transcended genre. And I think when you`re dealing with a lot of artists who have come up since, certainly artist in the `80s, the biggest artists when you define them, you know, Madonna, Prince, Michael Jackson. You wouldn`t define them as new wave, I don`t know if you define them all as rock and roll or pop. In the hip-hop right now we have artists with strong individual voices who represent -- who are cultural icon in ways that I can`t think of a single rock and roll artist who would means that much individually. FARLEY: There are also millionaires and billionaires, too. I mean, hip-hop has been about almost from the very beginning, these folks wanted to not just -- it wasn`t about selling out. It was about buying in. About people like Kanye West, and Jay-Z and -- HARRIS-PERRY: But Kanye West and Jay-Z aren`t the beginning of hip-hop. FARLEY: Right. HARRIS-PERRY: I mean, I guess, part of what`s interesting to me is the idea of that millionaire when, in fact, initially part of the authenticity of it was rooted in communities of poverty. JESSICA DISU, FM SUPREME: Right. Absolutely. I want to say that I think the study -- you asked how the study was created with the whole sonic peace or whatever. And I think that the study shows what we already knew. In the words of Dr. Michael Eric Dyson, it went from intuition to empirical evidence. Right? And so, I think it`s great that the study shows that. But as she said, when I think about hip hop and its cultural influence as you know, from Jay-Z to whomever, to Sean Combs, you know, like Jay-Z when he was, and I got Obama on the text, right? Now we have an executive office. Right? It was started in the late `70s, you know, with D.J. Hollywood, Africa, Cool Herb, it`s now still here. And it`s only about 44, 45-years-old. So, I think that`s - - HARRIS-PERRY: Less 40. No, 41. Because I was born the same year as hip-hop. But the idea of hip- hop being 40. Right? The very fact that you point to Jay-Z, right? Who ain`t 20, right? No matter what the lyrics are. Right? GARDNER: Yes. HARRIS-PERRY: Yes. Yes. But young only, not in the sense of music. Right? Elderly in the sense of that kind of underground musical. LIGHT: I think that`s a thing that we wait for in a lot of ways. I think when you look at, you know, hip-hop being around, depending 35 years on the pop charts. Doing rock and roll was around 35 years on the pop charts it was it, you know, 1990. There was no sense that this was oppositional. That this was, you know, that this was mass culture, this was now a generation. There is no question around that. I think that one of the -- HARRIS-PERRY: The boomers are not opposition anymore. LIGHT: One of the things that I think speaks, you know, to the great power of hip-hop is that it has retained some sense of oppositional culture, some sense of, you know, of not just sub cultural but counter cultural. And I think that, you know, this many years in the game. That`s an amazing thing to think about. At the same time what we are waiting for is, you know, what`s going to be the punk rock for hip-hop? What`s going to be the thing that looks at how big and how mass this has grown and shakes it up -- we need to get back to some of the, you know, the things that it came from. HARRIS-PERRY: Is it Kendrick Lamar? LIGHT: There are still great artists. But what`s going to transform at this mature stage? HARRIS-PERRY: Stick with us. We can keep talking more about this. About, like this idea of transformation. I wondering if part of the transformation is in the synergy between rock and hip-hop when we come back. (COMMERCIAL BREAK) HARRIS-PERRY: So we have just been talking about how in their movement from the margins to the main stream both hip hop and rock and roll have softened to maybe some of their counter cultural edges. Perhaps no one best exemplified how to bring music to the masses about sacrificing its great authenticity than the American musical who we lost this week. Blues legend B.B. King who died Thursday at the age of 89 has over the course of his six decade-long career reigned as America`s king of the blues. And along with his beloved electric guitar, Lucille brought main stream acceptance and international prominence to the blues sound his native Mississippi Delta. President Obama underscored the reach of king`s influence in a statement this week saying, "No one worked harder than B.B. No one inspired more up and coming artists, and no one did more to spread the gospel of the blues." And so, by invoking both gospel and blues and the memory of course the rock influences, I mean, I guess part of it is really that question. So, what now comes next out of the thing that is hip-hop? And I`m wondering if some of it is the fusion. Like, again, I`m original hip-hop. So like, I love run DMC and Aerosmith as like sort of the first moment. And Lincoln Park and Jay-Z. And I mean, these for me were moments like I love seeing them come together. LIGHT: Well, it`s quite interesting now, I mean, there have been a bunch of those where it`s kind of like you have a big beat, I have a big beat. We can do that together. I think I don`t love the stuff necessarily that we have heard, you know, Kanye and Paul McCartney have been working on together. But I think it is interesting that they are working on something that is more nuanced, that is more about bringing, you know, these approaches together. Not just kind of piling one on top of the other and doing a different sort of emotion around that. I think there is an interesting thing happening with country music and hip-hop. You know, both sort of working class based music that we have seen either Jason Aldean and Ludacris or have seen some country artists who clearly grew up listing their hip-hop and really using beeps and that delivery in structure -- HARRIS-PERRY: Right. To the extent that hip hop is increasingly southern, right. It`s going to have the country -- LIGHT: That feels much more organic. Like my question is, you know, just to go back to the beginning of this is, if we are talking about hip-hop and the Beatles, you know, it`s 50 years later and we are still listening to Beatles songs. It`s 65 years later and we are still listening to early B.B. King songs. Are there hip-hop songs, are there artists that we`re still going to care about 30, 40 years down the line. DISU: I think artists like emcee. I mean, his time, period, I mean, he`s amazing. But I want to say speaking of the Paul McCartney and Kanye West, hip hop`s influence like is so strong that, yes, you know, Paul McCartney is a Beatle but you have people like who is the old white guy like the Kanye West. Like, they have no idea. So, it`s just like it shows how fame -- everything is for a time. See more signs -- intern at Warner Music group, and Warner Brothers and he talks about how hip- hop, it documents time, hip-hop, the music that comes out is very relevant, it has to come out really fast because it`s documenting what`s happening. Speaking up, I`m from Chicago. Drew music, rock is revolutionary. Hip-hop is evolutionary. We don`t know really where it is going. Because this Drew music in Chicago is actually really gang infested. Like drugs and violence type of music. But you know, the King Louis, you know, from Chirac (ph), right? These titles came out of what they are seeing, what they witnessed. And so, when I went to London for the International Peace Movement there, I went there by myself. And I was, you know, nervous, I`m on the train headed to Stratford. HARRIS-PERRY: And you heard the music. DISU: And I heard the music. You know, he`s listening to Chief Keef. He said what do you know about Chief Keef? He`s like, what do you know about him? I`m from Chicago. Like he`s from Chirac. It just shows you how the music and people in the hoods are connected. HARRIS-PERRY: I have to say, when I first started traveling, that was the thing, what was most stunning to me was to be standing in a South African club in Cape Town and here. And what I will say -- what I heard was hip-hop. Like, I guess, part of what I would be interested in is maybe I`m in the wrong clubs. But are they spinning rock still in global -- GARDNER: Well, I think that`s a good question. We are talking about, you know, country-western, we`re talking about hip-hop, pop. We`re not really talking about, you know, rock and roll as much these days. I mean, and I think that that has something to do with the fact that, you know, who is the modern rock star? Who was the equivalent of the Paul McCartney? Do we have one right now? HARRIS-PERRY: Do we? GARDNER: I don`t know. Because we went through this period in the late `80s and `90s with the emergence of Indy rock and a big commercial way. Where there was almost this idea that it was gauche to be a pop star. And I don`t know if rock has ever really fully recovered from that. You have, you know -- HARRIS-PERRY: Because the very idea of being a rock star, I mean, like in certain ways hip-hop stars are performing the thing that is being a rock star. Right? GARDNER: They are ambitious. Aspirational. You can be cool and establishment at the same time. FARLEY: And what I find interesting is that at the very beginning of hip-hop people, thought this was a fad, it won`t last. But we have seen people last for a long time, over time and still have tremendous cultural influence. Think of L.L. Cool J., I mean, he`s still doing it. On TV, huge influence. You know, Kanye West, Jay-Z. The list keeps going on and on. Dr. Dre is 50 years old, you know, people are still waiting to see what he`s going to produce next. HARRIS-PERRY: And they evolved into other things. FARLEY: Right. HARRIS-PERRY: So, ice cube becomes -- like, you know, my kid knows ice cube from like fun family, family movie. And Latifah. So, they also turned into things other than. FARLEY: That`s also fascinating. If hip-hop has had a huge influence on Hollywood in a way rock and roll hasn`t. On the sound tracks maybe. But it`s hard to name more than one or two rock stars who have become actors we respect. But you can name about hundred actors -- even Marky Mark is a great actor. And that`s the power of hip-hop. LIGHT: I think that speaks to what Elysa was saying. I also think that, you know, hip-hop, today came in as characters. And they came in even with other names. HARRIS-PERRY: Right. LIGHT: If they were going to transform into a movie star, a TV host, a billionaire, you know, technology mogul, you can see them shape shift. The fact was, when Mick Jagger was on screen playing a part you could never get past, that`s Mick Jagger up there. HARRIS-PERRY: Right. So, right, as opposed to come, you always came with a separate identity. In fact one of our identities FM Supreme is going to do something a little some amazing for us next. But I do want to say thank you to Alan Light, Elysa Gardner and to Christopher John Farley. Like we could go on and on about this. FM Supreme is sticking around after the break. You are not going to want to miss her performance. (COMMERCIAL BREAK) HARRIS-PERRY: Back in December of 2013, the Anna Julia Cooper Center, the academic center I direct hosted a symposium on gender, sexuality and hip-hop. That dynamic event with many terrific presenters but one of the most compelling voices belonged to Chicago artist and activist Jessica Disu also known as FM Supreme. Now, Jessica is organizing a major conference of her own in her hometown of Chicago, the conference is a call to action for young people in Chicago throughout the United States and across the world to craft communities rooted in more peaceful and just ways of being. To call together a new generation for mentoring and movement building, FM Supreme wrote this original piece and she here to share with us this morning. DISU: In the beginning was the Word. And the Word was with God and the Word was God. The Word was with God in the beginning. Chicago, your bridges were built on backs of men who adored you. The Sauk Tribe named you "Chicagou." Metaphorical for great strength. Allured by your scent of wild onions. Du Sable embraced and claimed you. In 1832, your Chief was defeated. Black Hawk who wrote profuse love letters. He refuse his reign break, his break over his losses. He wrote profuse love letters to fellow tribesmen, apologies for failure. You see my mother had me in the late `80s. Chicago birthed me like her baby. Our city has been divided since 1919 after white men drowned Williams Eugene for crossing that invisible colored line at the beach. Our children see more cemeteries than graduations, more prison bars than convocations. More police arrests and government occupations and they wonder why our youth express rage and violence across this nation. My brother Philip Agnew asked this in 2013, that`s the word in 2013, can we dream together, can we dream together? Now I ask the same thing. Our sons dream dreams not in words but kings in words, daughters give birth to things like vision. Chicago that be my mission. The light keeps giving. Speaking life not death or you shall leave and not die, you shall live and not die. Hold your head up black boy, hold your head up brown boy, hold your head up brown girl, hold your head up brown boy. We need you strong. We need you to survive. The term Chirac is genocide. It`s suicide. A generational -- the term Chirac is suicide. A generational genocide. A cultural divide. Spike Lee. And what we need is a cultural shift. And I still believe and we still believe and we know that education is key. Chicago, you peps need your help in our streets. It takes a village for a village has raised me. I`m grateful for women like MHP. She is raising the powers of young women like me. Peace. HARRIS-PERRY: FM. So tell us a little bit more, when is the event? DISU: Absolutely. So, our conference is June 4th through the 6th, it`s happening in Chicago at the Chicago Theological Seminary, we`re organizing 300 young people from Chicago public schools, we`re gathering 15 global millennial leaders from across the country. Philip Agnew, Jamir Birdie (ph), Caress Hughs, Ashley Ellis, myself amongst others. And our global millennial leaders who will be serving as a leadership training committee to train our young people. We were inspired to create a leadership train committee after reading Dr. King`s why we can`t wait. HARRIS-PERRY: Right. DISU: Where he wrote in Birmingham -- and him and Andy Young and his comrades and colleagues were organized and had a teams. And so, we decided to bring these leaders to Chicago who traveled around the world who are at the forefront of the social justice movement, to empower, motivate, and show skills and to help our young people organize themselves for peace in Chicago. HARRIS-PERRY: Dr. King used to talk about the importance of being creatively maladjusted, not being adjusted to racism, not being adjusted to sexism, not being adjusted to the violence of police and that creative maladjustment always has a sound track. What`s your sound track? DISU: Absolutely. Sound track that we`re listening to is just different. Honestly it`s the youth. I make music but I`m really more about pushing the positive music coming out of our cities. So, I`m very inspired by just the young artists on the underground who are pushing for peace. And I believe that we can change, reframe the narrative about violence in Chicago, we can change the narrative from Chirac to Chicago youth peace. And I believe that this conference was his been vision since 2012. He is coming to pass June 4th through the 6th in Chicago and I. And we need help, we need people to support. And we believe that this is going to be it. HARRIS-PERRY: I`ve been following you for one. I love that you have been traveling internationally, that you see this as a global effort and national one. And of course, it`s also all rooted back home in Chicago. That`s our show for today. Thanks to you at home for joining us. Coming up next, "WEEKENDS WITH ALEX WITT." Hmm. I love it. DISU: I love you. 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