Meet The Press – July 7, 2013

Guests:

Tom Costello

Debbie Hersman (NTSB)

Mohamed El Baradei

Nabil Fahmy (Fmr. Egypt Amb. to U.S.)

Sen. Bob Menendez (D-NJ)

Robin Wright

Tom Friedman

Jeff Goldberg

Chuck Todd

Andrea Mitchell

EJ Dionne

David Brooks

Gene Robinson

Rep. Raul Labrador (R-ID)

Gregory: wow what's up with the plane crash in San Francisco?

Costello: the tail slammed into the sea wall

Gregory: yikes


Costello: the FAA will listen to 
voices in the cockpit


Gregory: can they hear the voices in my head?


Costello: no David 

Gregory: welcome Debbie –
how's investigation coming?


Hersman: we will interview surviving
crew members and find out what happened


Gregory: I know you can't jump
to conclusions but just tell why
this happened right now


Hersman: I can't do that Fluffy


Gregory: what is terrorism? or a hurricane?


Herman: are you some kind of moron?


Gregory: that's not the point Debbie


Gregory: Mohammed El Baradei
was supposed to be Prime Minister
of Egypt then denied it and now
he claims he has a fever and the
only cure is to cancel his 
appearance on Meet The Press


El Baradei: and more cowbell!


Reporter: no one has any idea who
the military will install to will run Egypt


Gregory: they need a permanent guest host


Reporter: well it's utter chaos here


Gregory: who the hell is going 
to govern Egypt?


Fahmy: I have no freaking idea David


Gregory: is it right to have the military
overthrow a democratically elected official?


Fahmy: this was like having 50 million
people protesting on Capitol Hill –
the military had to do something!


Gregory: we don't cover protests -
my god they're full of hippies


Fahmy: any President where half
the country hates his guts has a problem


Gregory: that never stopped George Bush
and he wasn't even popularly elected


Fahmy: well that's your problem


Gregory: won't islamists now
believe that democracy doesn't work?


Fahmy: no I love the islamists -
I just don't want them in power


Gregory: what about Americans
vacationing in Egypt right now?


Fahmy: did they hear not hear we
have mass protests, riots and a military coup?


Gregory: sorry all the news networks
are covering the Zimmerman trial


Fahmy: oh right


Friedman: I was just in Egypt and
my cabdriver told me what the
country needs is unicorns and ponies


Goldberg: the muslim brotherhood
is totalitarian, misogynist and just
generally a bunch of jerks


Gregory: but they were elected


Goldberg: if the protesters has just been
patient the Brotherhood would 
have collapsed but now they've 
got people feeling sorry for them 
- as Deep Throat said of Haldemen
- I didn't think that was possible

Robin Wright: this coup set a bad
precedent for middle east democracies


Gregory: yes a coup will do that


Mitchell: free and fair elections
do not mean democracy –
the brotherhood was elected
but did not represent the people


Gregory: of course this makes
Obama look bad and uninvolved


Todd: this time Obama is hands-on and involved


Gregory: I don't care I like
my narrative and I've memorized it


Todd: The United States owns Egypt


Gregory: I did not know that


Todd: Obama won it in a poker 
game in Turkey in 2009


Mitchell: don't kid yourself the U.S.
is behind this coup Fluffy


Gregory: but how does this 
make Obama look bad?


Friedman: we are freaks! 
Americans are freaking freaks!


Gregory: have you been reading 
my diary again Tom?


Friedman: well don't post it online Fluffy


Wright: the Egyptians have to
decide what kind of government they want
not just who they want in charge


Goldberg: the Muslim Brotherhood
waited for decades to take 
power and they blew it


Gregory: but they are martyrs in a coup


Goldberg: they staged their own
coup last year when they tried
to seize absolute power


Gregory: Bob please bash Obama for me


Menendez: we should use 
our leverage in Egypt


Gregory: how do we do that?


Menendez: strongly recommend Egypt
get a new and better Constitution with
an electoral college and right to bare arms


Gregory: should Obama pressure Egypt to respect Islamists?


Menendez: Morsi was a dictator you know


Gregory: but he's a handsome man


Menendez: that's true


Gregory: what should we do if other
countries offer Ed Snowden asylum?


Menendez: we should cut off all
trade if they accept that hacking fool


Gregory: what about delaying the
employer mandate in the health
care reform law?


Menendez: 96% of companies were
not affected by the mandate anyway


Gregory: panel health care reform 
is difficult isn't it?


Brooks: we should work through
the messiness rather than 
putting off the messiness


Gregory: Eric Cantor told me that mandates are bad


Dionne: Congress will never fix
the health care law because they want to destroy it


Gregory: I don't understand
health care reform but I do understand
that I'm paying more taxes and
it makes a lot of people mad


Robinson: which people?


Gregory: a lot of people


Robinson: ok


Mitchell: Obama has made a
concession to critics and it 
politically damaging


Robinson: is it a good law?

Mitchell: how should I know?


Todd: Republicans are 
trying to sabotage the law


Brooks: but they are trying to destroy
a rube goldberg law – which shouldn't
have employer health care at all


Dionne: um what?


Gregory: Raul talk tea party to me


Labrador: the health care law just
doesn't work – if it affected so few
employes why was this big law necessary?


Gregory: will Republicans pass
immigration reform is George W. Bush 
asks them to?


Labrador: I'm all for immigration
reform but only if we close the border first


Gregory: right


Labrador: I don't trust Janet Napolitano
because she says the border is pretty
secure right now


Robinson: it's 2,000 miles long –
the border will never be impregnable!


Brooks: the Republican argument
against the immigration reform is
one of the worst i've heard – it's mystifying


Labrador: that's ridiculous – 
the American people want a 
100-foot high wall topped 
with razor wire 1,000 miles long


Gregory: I like it


Labrador: also local police
should enforce immigration laws


Brooks: the law would cut illegal
immigration – isn't what you want?


Labrador: but not by enough!


Brooks: but a lot more than the current law!


Labrador: we need walls not amnesty


Brooks: generally when something
is an improvement you support it


Labrador: booo!!


Gregory: George W. Bush is 
throwing his enormous prestige 
behind immigration reform


Todd: he was becoming less unpopular
because people forgot all about him


Gregory: Obama has no real
second-term agenda and I hate him


Mitchell: there is no House
version of Marco Rubio


Todd: it was supposed to be
Paul Ryan but it turns out he's a weasel


Gregory: Raul don't you want hispanic votes?


Labrador: if we enact a bad bill it
will be the death of the Republican party


Gregory: whoa


Labrador: but if we can cut down
on illegal immigration it will be 
a big achievement

Gregory: we already have – it's way down


Labrador: 20,000 guest workers per
year is much too low


Gregory: Michelle Obama called
the White House a prison!

Mitchell: the nuts in the conservative
blogosphere totally lied about that


Gregory: I'm shocked they're
usually so reliable


Mitchell: indeed


Gregory: and that's another

episode of Meet The Press