Putin's D.C. Sanctions Club; Ryan Confronted On Poverty
CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: If one were to invite you on a date for an alcoholic coffee beverage and small bite, is that a good date or does it seem like you're going cheap.</s>MICHAELA PEREIRA, CNN ANCHOR: I think it's good initial.</s>JOHN BERMAN, CNN GUEST ANCHOR: First date?</s>PEREIRA: Yeah.</s>BERMAN: I just want to know if the liquor is going to have the same burnt taste as Starbucks coffee.</s>CUOMO: That's a knock on Starbucks coffee from J.B. Strong words. Speaking of strong words, a strong man known for strong words is John King taking us inside politics on NEW DAY. Search for a plane in one part of the world. Search for meaning in American politics -- John King.</s>JOHN KING, HOST, CNN'S "INSIDE POLITICS": Tough words for Mr. Berman there. You're right about that. I'll stick to my triple espresso especially early in the morning. Busy day driving inside politics today. Something John just mentioned and with me to share reporting and their insights Maeve Reston of the "Los Angeles Times," Bill Kristol of the "Weekly Standard." Let's start with the one thing Vladimir Putin has done to unite Washington. Democrats and Republicans want to be on his sanctions list. They are bragging about it. Mary Landrieu, a Democratic senator in a tough re-election campaign says being sanctioned by President Putin is a badge of honor. John McCain says, "I guess this means my spring break in Siberia is off. Gazprom stock is lost and my secret bank account in Moscow is frozen. A lot of fun with this, Bill, but beneath this is a serious question. A lot of people believe Crimea is lost and the United States Congress and the Obama White House have not been able to agree on the sanctions and aid package. Should they stop laughing and get working.</s>BILL KRISTOL, "THE WEEKLY STANDARD": Fine for one day. Crimea looks like it lost, Putin looks like he lost. Can we win Ukraine as a price perhaps of losing Crimea? Things have to be done, bigger ramping up of sanctions I would say. Also military relationships with NATO relationships around Russia, ground troops saying that should not be ruled out to Ukraine. Across two roads that go from Ukraine to Crimea, securing Ukraine wouldn't be a crazy thing. But of course, nobody in Washington wants to talk about ground troops. I agree a little less cute and more serious about doing some stuff that would help us fight push back against Putin.</s>KING: But the president was pretty clear this week in taking that ground troop idea. He took that off the table. He said we are not we are not going to have a military excursion to the Ukraine.</s>MAEVE RESTON, "THE LOS ANGELES TIMES": The best thing that happened to Mary Landrieu. She can go home and say she's on Putin's list. She is going to have a hearing next week on energy exports. I mean, it's a great issue for her to talk about at the domestic level rather than focusing on military maneuvering over there.</s>KRISTOL: A hearing. She's chairman of the committee now, right?</s>RESTON: Right.</s>KRISTOL: Are they going to pass sanctions, liberate Europe. I think there are real issues here and a little too much posturing going on in Washington. A little too little seriousness about a real crisis in the world.</s>KING: A lot of talking, while we could use some action. You mentioned Mary Landrieu, she wants to talk about this because health care is a huge issue in her race. She is being hammered by Republicans for supporting Obamacare or as Nancy Pelosi wants to remind us the affordable care act. Listen to the Democratic leader, the former speaker of the House. She could argue she lost her job as speaker in part because of the president's health care plan, yet listen to this.</s>REP. NANCY PELOSI (D-CA), MINORITY LEADER: I believe it's a winner. By the way, it's called the affordable care act. It's called the affordable care act. Affordable. Affordable. Affordable. Affordable. Affordable.</s>KING: Repetition is a great weapon in politics sometimes. She says she even lectures the president about this sometimes because he sometimes calls it Obamacare. She says don't use that label that's what the Republicans want you to say. Affordable. Can she really make an argument for Democrats in this midterm that it's a winner?</s>RESTON: Well, I mean, honestly what else is she going to say, right? That it's not a winner? Going into these races, though, the problem the administration has every person out there who sees their health care premiums rising can blame it on affordable care act. The biggest weapon that they have right now is repeating these kinds of mantras over and over again. But when I was in Louisiana, for example, writing about Landrieu's race, what you hear over and over again for people is they are skeptical that it is going to help their families. They are worried that it's hurting them. That's a huge hurdle for her to overcome.</s>KRISTOL: She's the speaker of the House. They aren't going to lose many House seats. This is her legacy. This is the biggest piece of legislation that's passed when she was speaker. Of course, she wants to defend the affordable care act. Patient protection and affordable care act, isn't this the problem, some of the patients thought they were being protected keep their policy, keep their doctor can't. But for Democratic senators running for re-election, they are in a totally different situation than Nancy Pelosi.</s>KING: House members' smaller district statewide is a much tougher sell. Want to return to a subject we talked about here last week, Paul Ryan, the House Budget Committee chairman. He is also with military last night thinking about running for president in 2016. He was on Bill Bennett's radio show and talked about a cultural problem in inner cities, people too lazy, didn't have a culture of going to work. He is home in Wisconsin district and took some heat from an African-American constituent. Let's listen to this.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This statement is not true. As a code word for black, but there are people in the inner city who are white, Hispanic, Armenian, Danish.</s>REP. PAUL RYAN (R), WISCONSIN: This is not a race thing, it's just a poor thing. Poverty knows no racial boundaries. You don't know me, so you don't know who I am. Race has nothing to do with this.</s>KING: Give some credit to NBC News Young Jedi Luke Russert, he was at the town hall. This is a tough one for Paul Ryan. I've known him a long time. When I first came working as a protege of Jack Kemp on these issues. I know he cares passionately about these issues. He cited work of Charles Murray who has argued in some of his books that people below the poverty line are somehow genetically inferior.</s>RESTON: Well, I mean, this is a very difficult issue to talk about in a sound bite culture that we have here. The other issue for Paul Ryan is that even though he's worked so long on these issues, he's trapped in that framework of the Romney campaign where he's sort of stuck in the 47 percent comment that Romney made on the campaign trail last year. So it makes it very difficult for him to talk about substantive issues in short, quick sound bites that people are going to relate to.</s>KING: Because of the Republican Party's problem with African-American voters here, is there a higher bar for especially white Republicans to try and talk about these issues? You're mad at him because he not necessarily apologized, but he said you took me the wrong or if I misspoke, I'm sorry.</s>KRISTOL: You know what, we now can't discuss the truth? I mean, Charles Murray, fantastically good social scientist, wrote a good book entirely about white America, new book and how the new problems of the lower class in America, the unique quality, a liberal theme. Not allowed to talk about the cultural factors? In troubled neighborhoods all across this country, many of them heavily African-Americans, too few of our citizens have role models to guide them. Barack Obama. Barack Obama can say it and Paul Ryan can't, that's not a political culture that we want to have.</s>KING: The use of the Charles Murray reference, you mentioned some work. But he has argued previously --</s>KRISTOL: He's a very fine social scientist. He's argued that IQ matters. Yes. He said it's an unfortunate thing, IQ, highly educated society, harder to make a good living, that's a problem for lower IQ individuals. It doesn't mean they are morally not as worthy of health and respect. In fact Paul Ryan's point entirely was we need to figure out more manageably how to help those in poverty.</s>KING: This conversation will continue. I want to close by showing something here. Paul Ryan has talked about these issues, might want to spend more time with hero of the civil rights movement. This has nothing to do with civil rights. It has everything to do with a little bit of a, shall we say, mojo. Watch John Lewis right here dancing to "Happy" by Farrell. You guys do this in the office all the time, too?</s>KRISTOL: Not at "The Weekly Standard." Strictly forbidden.</s>KING: All right, I can't -- good luck, Congressman. Teach me that. I don't know how to do that. One other thing to watch, the president's meeting with high tech executives at the White House today. They are not happy about NSA. They are not happy about privacy issues, the future of the internet. So keep an eye on that one. Chris and Michaela and Mr. Berman, we continue our day with politics.</s>CUOMO: Techy should be worried about their own privacy standards. John King, you can dance. It's all in the hips. See the congressman using the hips. I hope that wasn't his voice, that falsetto singing "Happy?"</s>KING: I have no rhythm.</s>CUOMO: I know the song is Farrell, but I wondered if John Lewis' voice. Dig on it. Dig in on that, J.K. I know you can dance.</s>KING: We'll dig deep.</s>CUOMO: Coming up on NEW DAY. It is being called the most remote place on earth. The distance is not the worst part for searchers. We're going to take you to the map and the conditions and challenges searchers are facing. Some of the worst anywhere. Our meteorologist, Indra Petersons, will take us through it.