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Obama Strikes Climate Deal, GOP Reacts; Strategist Tad Devine Joins Senator Sanders; Robot Landing on Moving Comet; Mormon Church Founder Had Up To 40 Wives

Aired November 12, 2014 - 07:30   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


NIA-MALIKA HENDERSON, "THE WASHINGTON POST": This is something McConnell ran against, the EPA. He ran against any sort of regulations when it comes to the environment. I think the president struck this deal, which is sort of a big deal, I mean, getting China to agree to some of these limitations.

I think the question for Republicans is what do they want to do? You have a situation where now someone who is going to be in charge of the energy committee is a bit of a climate change denier so is that where the Republican Party goes in terms of dealing with anything?

JOHN KING, CNN HOST, "INSIDE POLITICS": It's one of the issues, you make that point, it's Jim Inhoffe, I believe were you talking about on the Senate side, there are some people who deny the science, number one, or who say, even if you agree with the science, what the president wants to do is too devastating to the economy. The president wants to do this for his legacy. This will be one of the points of contention over the next two years.

RON FOURNIER, "NATIONAL JOURNAL": A couple of things, I don't know, if Mitch McConnell and the Republicans want to be seen as harder to strike a deal with Obama than the Chinese. Secondly, all the Chinese did here was agreeing to peak their emissions at 2030. It's not really a huge concession on their part.

And lastly, I can understand why Mitch McConnell and people are supporting Republicans are worried about the war on coal and their way of life. Maybe have some doubts about climate change, but why bet so heavily on the earth's health that all the scientists are wrong?

That's what I worry about. They're placing a very heavy bet that they're right and the scientists are wrong. Because if they're wrong? And we don't do anything about climate change? The earth is in a mess.

KING: And if they stay off in their corners too, it's hard to have a conversation about how do you protect coal jobs or how do you help people get transition or is there technology that can extend coal or whatever it is.

You have to have the conversation to do that. Another conversation, remember, Republicans ran saying they were going to try again to repeal Obamacare. They took majority in the Senate. They expanded majority in the House so they're going to try again.

They won't have the votes. They won't get 60 in the Senate most likely. If they did, the president has that veto pen that he has. But listen to Senator Orrin Hatch, writing an article in "USA Today," he says Republicans will continue to push for a full repeal and replacement of Obamacare in the next Congress, meaning beginning of January.

Conservatives should also take advantage of all opportunities to repeal any part of the law and replace it with better policies that empower Americans, not Washington. To me that is a message from Orrin Hatch to the conservative base saying when we fail to get full repeal because they don't have the votes.

They're going to try to do some other things and that the base should accept that if they try. Will the base accept that?

HENDERSON: You know, we'll see. Those, everybody is talking about the medical device tech, very small-bore things, not taking it out root and branch in the way of it, even Mitch McConnell campaigned on. I think in some ways, conservatives should be looking at the Supreme Court. They're the ones who are looking at a case that could really up-end this law with the state exchange and getting federal money.

KING: The subsidies -- the court would rule the subsidies unconstitutional. That would pull the financing essentially from the law. But in the meantime we have this situation where we have a newly empowered Republican Congress, a Democratic president.

We are looking for battles between them. But the Republicans have internal battles have to figure out too. Will this one rip apart when they have to concede, we can't repeal it, let's try to talk to the president about fixing it.

FOURNIER: I think it's going to be hard to convince the Republican base not to keep trying to get rid of Obamacare. Just like it's going to be hard for Obama not to impose an executive order on immigration. That's the problem.

Both the leaders of both parties are scared to death of their bases, don't have the courage to stand up to their bases and come together to talk about things like climate change and immigration reform and health care, that need to be addressed in a bipartisan manner.

HENDERSON: And in 2016, are Republicans still talking about repealing Obamacare?

FOURNIER: It's not going to be repealed. It does need to be fixed. Work with Democrats to make it a better law and move on.

KING: Work with Democrats, yes, right. Somebody write that down. Another priority possibly for Democrats in this lame duck Congress, meaning between now and at the end of the year is having the Senate Democrats pass the Keystone pipeline.

Essentially pass a law, send it to the president, passing the Keystone pipeline. The Republican House has already done this. Democrats are now talking that maybe this could help Mary Landrieu, the Louisiana Democratic senator in her run-off next month.

And this morning, as Michaela, just noted, we've called the Alaska Senate race, so if Mary Landrieu loses that runoff, Republicans will have 54. They will go from 45 in the current Congress to 54 senators in the next Congress, really?

Number one, if it's important to do, why didn't you do it months ago? Number two, do they really think Mary Landrieu's whole campaign was, if we're in the majority I'll be the chairwoman of the energy committee. No matter what happens, she will not be in the majority. Can they save Mary Landrieu by passing the Keystone pipeline?

FOURNIER: Not unless voters are stupid and that's the problem, both these parties think voters are stupid. The one message that came out of these elections that cuts across everything is that the voters are tired of gridlock. It's the second issue to the economy that they want these parties to work together. They see what the Democrats are doing for what it is, just pure politics.

HENDERSON: Yes. In the meantime, the Democrats are pulling money out (inaudible) about $2 million in ads over this next period. The run- off is December 6, this isn't going to help. It's sort of the least they could do at this point.

FOURNIER: I think it shows how political she is and her party is. If you do something like this, it just makes it worse.

KING: A couple of points on the 2016 presidential primary in the Democratic side. MSNBC reported yesterday the Hillary Clinton campaign is going to meet with the progressive coalition. When they said that publicly, the progressive coalition announcing, Hillary Clinton wants to reach out to us, she must be nervous about her left flank.

Maggie Haberman, our friend, tweeted this, "The quickest way to not keep an open line of communication to Clinton land is to tell people about it. Good advice there. And at the same time, Bernie Sanders is bringing in Tad Devine, an old Democratic man. I met him in the 1988 Dukakis campaign.

He knows delegates. He knows filing deadlines. He knows the process. Bernie Sanders sending a clear signal here that he's serious about to challenge Hillary Clinton. What do we make of these?

HENDERSON: Good for him, you know, good for Bernie Sanders, for getting out there, possibly. You know I think it would do Hillary Clinton some good to have some challenge. I think the question is, whether or not this is a serious challenge in the way that somebody like Elizabeth Warren would be or a less serious challenge in the way that Dennis Kucinich or Ralph Nader would be.

KING: He's a feisty guy, Bernie Sanders. I don't think he can beat Hillary Clinton, but he can give her some grief.

FOURNIER: She might lose and end up winning, but it would be good for her if she was really challenged.

KING: Since Fournier and I got our gray hair and lost our hair during the Bill Clinton administration. Alisyn, as we get back to you, you'll love this. Bill Clinton was on "Ellen" yesterday.

He was asked about his new granddaughter. He was asked if that was going to keep Hillary out of the presidential race. But he was also asked a question about imagine U.S. president in the world of how they portray this on "House of Cards" or "Scandal." Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

FORMER PRESIDENT BILL CLINTON: The thing about "Scandal" and "House of Cards" that makes it fun to watch is I can't imagine that either President Spacey or the president's chief of staff on "Scandal" could really get away with murder. I wish I had known about that. You know think of all the opportunities I missed -- so little time, so many people that have it coming.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: For some, Alisyn, the Clinton administration never ended and those comments are only going to stir up all his friends.

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: Absolutely. Some Republicans will see that as an admission of controversy somehow. Wow. But it got a great laugh on "Ellen."

KING: A lot of fun.

CAMEROTA: Yes, that's so much, John. All right, a daring and historic moment for a spacecraft, it is landing this morning on a comet for the first time ever. Bill Nye, "The Science Guy," is here to explain how. Hi, Bill!

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

MICHAELA PEREIRA, CNN ANCHOR: As we speak, scientists at the European Space Agency are monitoring the final approach of the Philae lander as it tries to land on a moving comet. This is mind-boggling, the first of its kind mission.

Scientists are hoping to study this comet over the next year. So what exactly big discoveries are they looking for? The man to ask, the author of "Undeniable Evolution Of Science And Creation," the one and only Bill Nye, "The Science Guy" is here.

A two-pronged proposition, an engineering marvel and a scientific exploration, we'll get to that in a second. We've received a tweet, Bill Nye. Yes. Let's look at the tweet. "The kids, finally I'm stretching my legs after more than ten years landing gear deployed." This is momentous.

BILL NYE, "THE SCIENCE GUY", EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR OF THE PLANETARY SOCIETY: So it worked, that's an important step. So there's mutual gravity even though these things are quite small. They still have gravity.

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: What does that mean, mutual gravity?

NYE: Just everybody remember when you see dust on the book shelf, not only is the earth pulling the dust down, but the dust is ever so slightly pulling the earth up. That's what Isaac Newton realized watching the apple fall from the tree.

CAMEROTA: You're blowing my mind.

NYE: So when you do a mission like this human kind, really, it's exploration. So two things are going to happen, you're going to make discoveries. What are you going to find there? We don't know, that's why we're going. Is it a bunch of little pebbles? How much ice is it? How is the ice and pebbliness mixed together?

Is it soft, hard, like sandpaper, is it smooth? That's one thing and the other thing, is you will have an adventure. Discovery is an adventure. From a practical standpoint, I remind you all, there is no evidence at all that ancient dinosaurs had a space program and that cost them.

So when the earth got hit with an asteroid, the ancient dinosaurs were wiped out, OK? We don't want that to happen to us. From a practical standpoint, someday, somebody is going to have to deflect --

CUOMO: The movie "Armageddon."

NYE: Yes, but you don't want to blow it up. I love the Bruce Willis, but that's not the way to go -- probably not. So by the way, you guys, this is an exciting time and this is a robotic mission and this is cool and we at The Planetary Society are very supportive of this.

If you haven't done so already, please check out planetary.org, and read Emily's blog. That said, if there are people on this mission, we would all be out of our minds with excitement.

CUOMO: We're pretty into it. We're taking it on pretty big here.

NYE: So just keep in mind that space exploration really is, an extraordinary thing that humankind does. We look -- we look farther and deep near space to learn about our origins. There are two questions, everybody, that get us all. Where did we come from and are we alone in the universe?

PEREIRA: So help us understand how landing on a comet will help us understand where we came from?

NYE: So the comet is made of primordial stuff, the stuff of the earliest solar system. And learning more about that material informs more about what the early earth was like. So there's a lot more water in the solar system than used to be presumed.

And by water, I'm talking about water ice, and ice. And so the earth was probably forming and a bunch of comets came in and put water there. What kind of water was it? Was it salty, ammonia-full water? Were there amino acids which seem to form like crazy in the solar system and they hooked up and here we all are?

It's like these are cool questions. We chip away at this and we are, it's very reasonable that we are the first generation of humans to find out if life is common in the solar system or common in the universe or just extremely rare, which either way is spooky.

And then we are the first generation of humans that could prevent the only preventable natural disaster, which would be the earth getting hit with an asteroid.

PEREIRA: Are we making too much of the fact that this was a ten-year orbit --

NYE: No, no, no.

PEREIRA: -- or that it's such a difficult mission.

NYE: There's so much space in space.

CUOMO: That's deep, Bill.

NYE: It is deep space and it's icy and cold and black and space. And so just -- it's extraordinary that you can find the object as we say, looking for a typical asteroid. And a comet is like an asteroid, it has enough water to make a tail when it's near the sun.

And the word "near" the sun, it's millions of miles. It's like looking for a charcoal briquette in the dark. That's one thing, it's hard. Then the other thing is getting your washing machine to show up going 34,000 miles per hour. This is really hard, guys, hitting a bullet with a bullet.

CUOMO: There you go.

PEREIRA: Thanks, somebody finally --

CUOMO: Bill Nye, "The Science Guy."

PEREIRA: Check out his new book "Undeniable Evolution: Science And Creation." Always a treat to have you here with us.

NYE: I have in here a little chapter about the asteroid test. Maybe the reason we've never heard from another civilization is you have to pass the asteroid test. If you get hit with an asteroid it's like -- what is it, on a PC, control-alt-delete where everything wipes out? If we get hit with an asteroid or a comet, it could just -- kill everybody.

CAMEROTA: On that cheery note --

NYE: No, but it's preventable, if we support space exploration, we can prevent this.

CAMEROTA: It's great. That is a cheery note.

NYE: That's cool. It brings out the best. Thank you. CUOMO: Segue way, these questions have spawned lots of different ideas of where we come from and what-not, which has spawned a lot of ideas about faith. And that takes us to our next story.

The Mormon Church, a huge and growing area of faith has battled the stain of bigamy or polygamy for a while. One of the key defenses was that their founder was a one-woman man. It turns out, not so much. We'll explain ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CAMEROTA: Polygamy is a controversial part of the Mormon Church's history. Now the Church of Latter-day Saints has shocked many by releasing a bombshell about its founder, Joseph Smith.

The church acknowledging that Smith took as many as 40 wives, some of whom were already married and one was as young as 14 years old. Why is the Mormon Church coming forward with this information?

CUOMO: Let's get an answer. We have Michael Peppard with us, a professor of Theology at Fordham University. Professor, always good to have you here.

MICHAEL PEPPARD, PROFESSOR OF THEOLOGY, FORDHAM UNIVERSITY: Thank you.

CUOMO: So what is going on with this? Obviously, we have to believe if it's true, but if they're saying it, why would they lie, but what does it mean?

PEPPARD: What's new here this is an official admission on lds.org on the official website of the Mormon Church. As you said, we have a surprising extent of the number of wives, up to 40.

We also have an admission about Emma Smith his first wife and that might be actually the most interesting piece of the admission. Emma Smith then went on to not be a member of the LDS Church and to be a part of the different branch of early Mormonism that was against polygamy. So there is an admission of the historical reality of some troubles between Joseph and Emma.

CAMEROTA: They were supposed to have this blissful union, right, the story was that they were monogamous. People held him up as a pillar of the community and monogamy and the fact he had alienated and hurt his wife so much by doing this, that is a bombshell.

PEPPARD: It is. It calls it an excruciating ordeal in the document for Emma and when we contrast this with the way Joseph and Emma Smith are presented, for example, in Temple Square in Salt Lake City, there is a statue of them holding hands looking like the image of marital monogamous union. So I think for Mormons in the pews, it's been a challenge to the kind of understanding they've had --

CUOMO: Why they create the other story?

PEPPARD: It's not like this is from eras ago. This was going to be discovered if people wanted to look in the right places and they just hadn't decided to yet, I guess.

PEPPARD: So one thing I would say is that early Mormon history is quite fuzzy from the period of 1831 until the arrival in Utah. There's a period of a number years where there's not a whole lot of material record outside of the papers of Joseph Smith.

Now the LDS Church has a web site called "Joseph Smith Papers" and they are starting to unveil and be more transparent both in print and online about his personal effects and his writings.

CAMEROTA: We have an excerpt from the report that they've put out on their web site about this bombshell. I'll read it to you, "After receiving a revelation commanding him to practice plural marriage, Joseph Smith married multiple wives and introduced the practice to close associates.

This principle was among the most challenging aspects of the restoration for Joseph personally and for other church members. Plural marriage tested faith and provoked controversy and opposition." So why did he do it?

PEPPARD: He certainly believed that he was receiving special revelations from God, which were going to overwhelm civil law and scriptural practices before him. He said that he prayed on the testament, Old Testament, stories about the biblical patriarchs from the Hebrew scriptures that revealed their plural marriages and believed God was revealing this to him.

Now the article also says that he was visited three times by an angel, the third of which threatened him with a sword if he did not consent to this revelation of plural marriage as restored by God in this day.

CUOMO: Certainly not an uncommon practice through the ages although to some it will smack a little bit of the doth test too much against something he obviously indulged in very heavily. It's good to know the truth. Thank you very much, Professor Peppard.

PEPPARD: Thanks for having me here.

CUOMO: All right, so here's one groundbreaking information piece we have for you. Here's another one, a deal in China between the U.S. and China. Two countries usually don't agree on much, but they do appear to be making a big move on climate change. We'll tell you what it took to get this deal in place and what it could mean for you.

CAMEROTA: Plus, Ferguson, Missouri, preparing for protests as the grand jury gets closer to revealing whether the officer who killed Michael Brown will be charged. We're joined by a local official for reaction for the governor's plans.

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