How well are local officials handling SC shooting tragedy?
Former NYC Mayor Rudy Giuliani weighs in
This is a rush transcript from "Sunday Morning Futures," June 21, 2015. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.
MARIA BARTIROMO, HOST: This is a live picture of Charleston. The bells ringing once again at Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, South Carolina, as the city's people show their strength after the tragic and senseless massacre of nine parishioners.
Good morning, everyone. I'm Maria Bartiromo. This is "Sunday Morning Futures."
How does a city move forward from such an awful event. Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani will join me in moments.
Plus, the Federal Reserve giving clues that interest rate will move higher at a much slower pace than expected. The head of Merrill Lynch wealth management, John Thiel, with me this morning on what it means for your retirement money.
And the GOP field of presidential candidates set to grow to 13 with Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal preparing to announce a run. We'll take a look inside Larry Sabato's crystal ball as we look ahead on "Sunday Morning Futures."
Happy Father's Day, everyone.
And it is a day of remembrance and mourning in Charleston, South Carolina, today as that community begins the long road toward healing. Mourners are leaving flowers at makeshift memorials, holding prayer vigils. And this morning, churches are ringing their bells in unison to honor the nine victims who were murdered inside their historic church during Bible study class. Their accused killer, 21-year-old Dylann Roof, has reportedly confessed to the police. During his bond hearing, family members of the victims confronted Roof directly with emotional reactions and some remarkably even offering forgiveness.
Joining me now, someone who is well versed in tragedy and healing and leading, former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani.
Great to see you, mayor. Thanks for joining us.
RUDY GIULIANI, FORMER NEW YORK CITY MAYOR: Nice to see you, Maria.
BARTIROMO: It's a tough day today to look at what's going on in Charleston. How does a community move past and get beyond something so awful?
GIULIANI: Well, they have something in Charleston that is remarkable, and that's this deep faith in Jesus Christ. And they are -- they are doing exactly what the founder of my religion, their religion told them to do, something that some of us are not perfect enough to be able to do, they're turning the other cheek. They're showing love. They're showing that love can overcome hatred. They're showing that you have to forgive. This is -- this is all astounding and remarkable for most people, but what a beautiful -- I mean I would love to be at that -- at that service. I think it would be one of the best experiences of your -- of your life.
But they're showing what they truly believe. And I think they're showing what is the heart and soul of the black community and of Christianity, black or white or whatever race. So I think that's how they're overcoming it.
At the same time, what he did is horrendous and I'm -- my background I wanted to be a priest but a long time ago. My background as a prosecutor. And, for me, this guy, you know, deserves the harshest punishment of the law and then let God figure out how to ameliorate it if he wants to.
BARTIROMO: So what does that look like now for this 21-year-old obviously troubled child?
GIULIANI: Well, I find a remarkable sort of similarity between him and the four people who were arrested in New York in the last five, six days who were involved in -- they're all in their -- roughly in their 20s. They were involved and wanted to help ISIS. Some of them wanted to go overseas to help ISIS. Some of them wanted to do bombings here. They're all over the Internet, just like he was, spewing his case, racial hatred. In their case, hatred for Christians and Jews and for basically, you know, western society.
It probably indicates that -- honestly, I think it really indicates that we have a certain number of really sick people in our society that these causes can affect. So these causes of hanging out there, you know, bin Laden -- part of bin Laden's plan, realizing that there are these evil, weird people that he could affect them and he has a whole plan for actualizing them and ISIS is carrying it out even better than al Qaeda did.
The case of racism, we have a -- I mean, just a long history in America and throughout the world.
BARTIROMO: Yes.
GIULIANI: America is not the only country with slavery. Almost every country in the world had slavery. Horrible thing. And I don't know which presidential candidate calls it our original sin. I think Ted Cruz. He's right. It is. It's a blot on America. And every once in a while it rears its -- it rears its ugly head.
But these are not just -- here's the strange thing. These are not isolated completely. They do connect to ideologies. The ISIS case, they connect to the ideology of jihadism. To his case, they connect to the still remaining ideology of racism. It is smaller. It isn't what it was 10 years ago. It certainly isn't what it was 50 years ago. But we fool -- we'd be foolish not to realize that you do have skinheads, you do have these people who are moved by what, again, is an irrational, insane ideology.
When September 11th happened, the last thing I said at my press conference was, let's not apply group blame to the people who did this. That is exactly what they do. Let's not fall into their trap. Let's show we're better than they are.
And that's what racism is about, group blame. All these group associations that are made. That's what this jihadism is about. And you want an answer to it? The answer to it is that church in Charleston. It's the teachings of Jesus Christ or similarly good men and women.
BARTIROMO: It's amazing what's going on and how strong the people of Charleston have been really and it's just so impressive to see this kind of strength in face --
GIULIANI: This could help us.
BARTIROMO: In the face of such horrible --
GIULIANI: This could -- this could help us the way after September 11th we had about two months of just wonderful, bipartisan cooperation. I got more help than I needed. The amount of love that was shown for the people in New York I think helped the healing in New York.
BARTIROMO: That's right, yes.
GIULIANI: And I think the amount of love they're showing in South Carolina might help some healing in the -- I n the United States.
BARTIROMO: Yes, but, mayor, I've got to ask you about something else that's going on in the country because we are seeing a spike in violence in large cities across the country. Look at these numbers for a second.
The number of shootings in Baltimore nearly doubled through May 31st compared to the same period a year ago. The New York City Police Department said it had about a 9 percent increase in shootings, almost a 20 percent spike in homicides in the same period. Chicago reporting a rise in homicides as well. What is going on in our cities across the country?
GIULIANI: Sort of -- sort of as a statistical nerd about crime statistics, I read them every day for the last 40 years, including being in charge of the FBI crime statistics and very proud of COMSTAT (ph), which I helped create with Bill Bratton and Jack Mable (ph).
It's alarming. That's not the trend you want. The numbers in New York are so low that a 10 or 20 percent increase means 10 murders, 20 murders, that number. But if it keeps going in that direction, we're in deep trouble. And the fact that it's happening nationally is also very, very troubling. And I can't help but think it has to do with the anti-police rhetoric that has been almost constant since last summer. In fact, I know it has to do with that rhetoric because I travel all over the country and police officers and other people tell me that. We are sort of teaching young people, the police are your enemy. I was taught as a young person the policeman is your friend.
BARTIROMO: Right.
GIULIANI: I was also taught, you say "yes, sir," "no, sir." If he tells you to put your hands behind your back, you put your hands behind your back.
BARTIROMO: Yes. So what did you do in your command? Under your leadership, overall crime was down almost 60 percent. Murder was cut by 65 percent. New York City was one of the most infamous cities in the world to be tough and bad and cleaned it up. What did you do?
GIULIANI: And -- and -- and -- civilian -- and civilian complaints were down 35 to 40 percent, meaning police interactions and complaints against the police. Howard Safer (ph), who was my second police commissioner, started a program and you see it on every New York City police car. What it next time it goes by. Courtesy, professionalism, respect. That's actually a course in the police academy. Every New York City police officer is taught. Now, not everyone can do it because not everyone, as we know, is able to control themselves. Some people lose it. They're -- no matter how bad the criminal, you deal with the person with respect, you call them "yes, sir," "no, sir," if you can.
BARTIROMO: Right.
GIULIANI: Get rid of the darn curse words.
BARTIROMO: That comes from leadership. I mean the leadership --
GIULIANI: It comes from teaching. They are taught that as 22-year-olds, 23- year-olds in the academy. There is a course called courtesy, professionalism and respect. And we put it on our police cars because at that moment when, look, you chase a guy that just shot two people and maybe he's trying to shoot you. They're pretty angry. They're human. As a police officer, you can't be human. As a police officer, you have to -- that's your profession. You have to learn how to contain that.
BARTIROMO: What about these incidents where you've got white police officers, you know, killing black men and that's what we're seeing on television every day.
GIULIANI: This is -- this is -- this is not white police officers killing black men. In Baltimore, three of the defendants are black and the principal defendant is a black police sergeant.
BARTIROMO: So it's a misperception?
GIULIANI: This is a misperception in terms of police -- white police, black children in terms of large numbers. There are small numbers of those. It can just as often be an Hispanic police officer and a black person. It can be a black police officer, as in Baltimore, with a black mayor and a black district attorney.
BARTIROMO: And we're not hearing that from the leadership of the cities.
GIULIANI: Yes, we've got to get this out of the racial issue.
BARTIROMO: Right. Exactly.
GIULIANI: Now, the issue we've get into is the issue of heavy crime that causes the heavy police presence. Now what -- no, we're on Father's -- today is Father's Day. This is a good day to focus on how many children are growing up without fathers. Now, a single mother can do a wonderful job. To me, they're heroes. But isn't it better that young men, particularly, have a strong father figure?
And when they do, even if it isn't their own father, it's the grandfather or somebody that takes over as a big brother or big sister or whatever, it really, really helps.
BARTIROMO: Right.
GIULIANI: These are the issues we have to work on.
How about choice in education so that these children in poor neighborhoods can have the same benefit my children had to be able to get a really good education?
If we really care, the biggest civil rights issue of this century is vouchers and choice in public schools for black and Hispanic children, for all children.
BARTIROMO: Comes back to education --
GIULIANI: That's our biggest civil rights issue.
(CROSSTALK)
BARTIROMO: Thank you so much for joining us. We so appreciate it. Rudy Giuliani there.
Meanwhile, the GOP field growing bigger by the week.
Who has the best chance at clinching the nomination? Larry Sabato is next with an inside look at his crystal ball.
I hope you'll follow us on Twitter @MariaBartiromo, @SundayFutures. Stay with us as we look ahead on this Sunday on "Sunday Morning Futures."
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BARTIROMO: Welcome back. The Republican field growing even bigger in the run up to 2016. Candidates trying to gain traction at places like the Faith and Freedom Conference this weekend, but what is it going to take for someone to really separate themselves from the pack?
Joining me now to take an inside look at the crystal ball is Larry Sabato. He is the director of the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia and the author of "The Kennedy Half-Century."
Good to see you, Larry. Thanks so much for joining us.
LARRY SABATO, CENTER FOR POLITICS AT THE UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA: Wonderful to be with you, Maria.
BARTIROMO: First, I want to ask you your take on the ever-expanding field of candidates for 2016.
Do you think when you see so many candidates for the party it's a negative because they can attack each other?
Or is it a positive to see that the Republicans have real depth in terms of a bench?
What do you think?
SABATO: Well, Rand Paul estimated the number at 55. That's a little high. It's mid-teens. Could grow to 18 or so.
Look, it depends on how they handle it, Maria. They could, during the debate and during the primary campaign, end up focusing more on Hillary Clinton than on themselves. That would, from the Republican Party's perspective, be the ideal.
Now you and I both know it doesn't work that way, that there will be a lot of internal attacks. But you know, here is where Republicans will benefit from two things.
One is, they have a much better, deeper field for 2016 than they had in 2012 and, second, this is a very polarized partisan era. Even if the Republicans divide six ways to Sunday, I'll bet you right now that, for the eventual nominee, they will join back together fairly quickly because they're going to be looking at Hillary Clinton.
BARTIROMO: All right. Let's talk about the field right now.
Who do you think has the best chance to actually win over Hillary Clinton?
SABATO: Well, the three top runners -- I'm not going to call them front- runners, I'm going to call them top runners and I'm going to give them to you in alphabetical order --
BARTIROMO: OK.
SABATO: -- because I don't think there is any one single front-runner: Jeb Bush, Marco Rubio, Scott Walker.
Why those three?
Because they have about the right combination of money, organization, name, new proposals in some cases. You put it all together and you can see how they could be in the sweet spot for the Republican Party for 2016 -- not maybe as they are right now but as they are evolving.
Now that's not to say that nobody else can compete. I think Ted Cruz has a lot of strong support. Rand Paul has a lot of strong support. I picked two governors to give you examples, John Kasich. Any party that dismisses out of hand the two-term very popular governor of the super swing state of Ohio doesn't deserve to win. They need to at least look at him. Think about him for V.P. if you don't think about him for president.
And then Chris Christie, everybody's written him off. We don't think he has a very good chance to win the nomination, but I'll tell you where he could influence the entire race. He's putting all his chips on the New Hampshire table. And by doing that he is rivaling Jeb Bush. That's where Jeb Bush wants to make his breakthrough, which probably isn't going to come in Iowa, probably isn't going to come in South Carolina or Nevada, the first four states.
He should win one. He doesn't have to win one of the first four states. But Bush should win one. And Christie could really foul him up.
BARTIROMO: So you've gone through who you think is the top three, then you've got a second tier and a third tier group of candidates.
What differentiates, you know -- what makes a person good for the second tier and not for the first group?
Tell me what differentiates these guys and gals.
SABATO: Sure. It's a primary campaign, Maria. You have to have excitement and excitement is measured in terms of organization, volunteers, reactions to the public presentations. Of course money, although I would caution people.
Money does not necessarily buy a nomination. It's always better to have more of it than the others, but it is not the single criterion that determines dominations.
BARTIROMO: I want to get to your map because we have this map where you indicate, you know, what's going on in terms of the candidates right now.
Can you walk us through what these findings show as we look at this map that we have from your -- from your research?
SABATO: OK. Is this the map of the swing states?
BARTIROMO: Yes. We've got the swing states showing which candidates could actually be victorious in some of those swing states.
SABATO: Oh, yes.
No, those are -- look. You have to look at the broad picture of presidential elections. We are down to a handful of swing states that actually can go one way or the other.
It's frightening, really, to consider that 40 of the 50 states are already decided. We're in the first half of 2015 and almost everybody in the political community knows you can color in 40 of those states, either blue or red, on this very day, but the remaining seven are the key seven.
BARTIROMO: Right.
SABATO: You've got Florida, of course, the biggest one. Ohio, Virginia. Some small states like New Hampshire, Iowa, Nevada.
BARTIROMO: Yes.
SABATO: These are states that could swing back and forth and as the parties are picking their nominees, they really ought to be thinking primarily about who can win those states.
BARTIROMO: Right. Sure. Sure.
Well, real quick, Larry, what's your - your thought on Hillary Clinton at this point? You know, so much noise around her candidacy with these scandals. Another one with the boys and girls school just this morning. What's your take in terms of how it's impacting the candidacy?
SABATO: She's still the overwhelming favorite of Democrats. But you know something, Maria, I'm going to personally be surprised, and I'm surprised all the time -
BARTIROMO: Right.
SABATO: But I'm going to personally be surprised if Hillary Clinton really wins all of those primaries and caucuses. Already we can see Bernie Sanders doing well enough in neighboring New Hampshire.
BARTIROMO: Right.
SABATO: He's from Vermont. He's got a lot of excitement in Iowa. It's going to be very tough for her to win all of those. And the first time she loses one, Maria -
BARTIROMO: Yes.
SABATO: Katy bar the door. Everybody's going to talk about how Hillary's falling apart.
BARTIROMO: Wow. Larry, great insights, as always, from you. Thanks very much.
SABATO: Thank you, Maria.
BARTIROMO: We'll see you soon. Larry Sabato.
The Federal Reserve basically sticking with the status quo, leaving interest rates unchanged. What does that mean for your bottom line? We'll talk with the head of Merrill Lynch wealth management. Back in a minute.
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BARTIROMO: Welcome back.
The big economic number to watch next week, the GDP report. The Federal Reserve leaving interest rates unchanged last week while also giving no real tipoff as to the future intentions about when interest rates will move higher perhaps this year or next.
Joining me right now to talk more about business and your money is John Thiel.. He's head of Merrill Lynch Wealth Management.
John, it's great to have you on the program today.
JOHN THIEL, HEAD OF MERRILL LYNCH WEALTH MANAGEMENT: Thank you for having me, Maria.
BARTIROMO: Thank you so much for joining us.
So I want to get to a couple of things with you because it feels like this weekend is a weekend of fear. In Greece you've got an emergency meeting happening on Monday.
THIEL: Right.
BARTIROMO: With Greek leaders and the European Union leaders. Then, of course, we have the Federal Reserve last week. And then I want to talk to you about how people out there watching can actually achieve the right things with their money. How do you actually create value and create wealth for yourself? Let me start on Greece.
THIEL: Sure.
BARTIROMO: Do you worry about what's happening there with this emergency meeting tomorrow? How should we be assessing this?
THIEL: I worry in the context that it creates uncertainty and that when we think about for our clients uncertainty can lead to volatility in the markets, you know, up and down. And the fear is that the client, because of this volatility, might react wrong and might do something that in the long term might hurt them. So while it's a small percentage of the GDP in Europe, it is something that hasn't happened before and it does creates uncertainty and the markets will react.
BARTIROMO: So if we were to see a situation where, you know, Greece defaults on its debt that it owes the IMF, it think it's due June 30th, if it defaults and the markets see a disruption and the market sells off, you're saying clients need to be prepared for something like that.
THIEL: Right.
BARTIROMO: And don't have a knee-jerk reaction and change everything just because the markets are trading down.
THIEL: Yes, the awareness we're trying to create is how you feel when that happens because 10 years from now it won't matter. We will remember, but it won't have an impact. But if you feel scared and you want to do something, and let's say you sell at a time when it's not opportune, then you can have a real impact. And if we can help our clients really get in touch with how they're going to feel and sort of work through that and not react, we think they're better off.
BARTIROMO: Yes, it's interesting because how you feel really does dictate everything you do, doesn't it? And, you know, we're seeing an economy where we see good headlines on jobs and then we see one step back, you know, not a good headline on GDP. We have a GDP number out next week and the Federal Reserve last week basically said, look, we're going to downgrade our assessment of the U.S. economy. As we look at how to achieve those goals for our money, how would you assess the backdrop for investing, and that is the economy. Did you learn anything from the Federal Reserve last week? Does that matter?
THIEL: Yes, I don't know that we learned anything other than the pace of growth continues to be real, but slower than anyone would expect for a recovery. And I think one of the things that we - we want to remind folks is while this recovery hasn't been really robust, it has been long. It's 70 months now, which I think is the sixth longest expansion since the Civil War. So there's real growth coming out of that. And so what the Fed is saying is, we can be mindful about how we take interest rates up. And I think they signaled that they're going to - the trajectory, Janet Yellen did, is going to be key and it may be slower than people think.
BARTIROMO: But it also is going to be dependent on what we see out there in terms of the data.
THIEL: Yes.
BARTIROMO: Now, when we were on the phone preparing for this interview, you said to me, there are two simple questions that I want to hear our clients ask themselves all the time. Let's go through those questions.
THIEL: Sure.
BARTIROMO: Because I think viewers will want to know what's most important in terms of achieving that they - that they're trying to.
THIEL: Right. Well, so many people get coached on what to say and what to ask. And a lot of that comes from, you know, multiple sources. And what we really want people to think about is, what's the primary intent for the money you have. That's really critical because what is it that you're trying to accomplish with your money because that's going to dictate how you invest it, how long you invest it. You need to think about the risk tolerance you have. How much of that volatility we talked about can you really absorb and stay committed to a plan?
So that question isn't often asked. We end up talking about a benchmark like the S&P 500 as our guide. And while performance is critical, it's really what you're trying to accomplish with your money.
BARTIROMO: Yes.
THIEL: And if you have a 20 year goal for retirement, you absolutely can stay in the market.
BARTIROMO: So, in other words, if I want that money to retire in 20 years, I should be invested in stocks. If I need the money next year to pay for a child's wedding, or need the money in two years to pay for a child's college, it's a different situation.
THIEL: Much different.
BARTIROMO: Yes.
THIEL: Right. You would be in - probably in cash in those situations.
BARTIROMO: So that was the first question. The second question is, do you feel that you have just enough, more than enough or not enough?
THIEL: Yes.
BARTIROMO: This is your second question.
THIEL: Well, it's such a critical question. It's behavioral finance at its core. And what we're really saying is, how you feel is more important than almost the fact. And I'll give you an example.
So, coming out of 2008, you know, a lot of people were very concerned. We had a client who actually had a lot of money, plenty of money. We could demonstrate to him factually that he wouldn't run out of money in his lifetime. But he called his adviser and suggested that perhaps I need to go back to work. It was because he didn't feel like he had enough money. We couldn't prove it to him. He didn't sort of buy the notion that these projections would come true because of the experience of '08. So we need to understand how you feel because that's going to dictate your ability to withstand that - those market ups and downs.
BARTIROMO: Has a lot changed since the financial crisis in terms of sentiment, in terms of perception of the industry?
THIEL: Yes, we might suggest that no one's really bought into the market. No investor class has really accepted equities, you know, like they did before 2008.
BARTIROMO: Even though the market's at record highs?
THIEL: Absolutely. But, again, that's that feeling that still is, you know, I think it's pretty profound for a lot of people coming from '08.
BARTIROMO: John, it's great to have you on the show today.
THIEL: Thank you so much for having me.
BARTIROMO: Thank you so much. John Thiel is the head of Merrill Lynch Wealth Management here in New York.
Major advancements are being made leading to longer life expectancy. A man who mapped the human genome is next, Dr. Craig Venter on living into our second century, as we look ahead on "Sunday Morning Futures."
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BARTIROMO: Welcome back. Health tracking device company Fitbit made a big splash on Wall Street this past week by offering stock to the public. Investors loved it and ate it up, sending the stock up amidst a revolution in health care, technology and longevity.
Earlier I caught up with the father of longevity, Dr. Craig Venter, who mapped the human genome more than 15 years ago. He says the data that he's been looking at over that 15 years suggests we will be living into our second century in the next 10 years.
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DR. CRAIG VENTER, MAPPED THE HUMAN GENOME: We all differ by about 3 percent in our 6 billion letters of our genetic code, but it's across the population. So we need large numbers of genomes from people across ethnogeographic backgrounds, different diseases. And that's what we're in the process of collecting now. And we're getting their genetic code and we're measuring all kinds of measurements on their phenotype, their biology, their clinical state, to start to analyze this.
And so most of the discoveries that will take place from the human genome will be in the next decade. And we'll have more in the next decade, more discoveries overall than the last 100 years in biology.
BARTIROMO: What have you learned so far about the human body and about disease? What are the most important discoveries from all of the data that you've collected in these last decade and a half?
VENTER: Well, I think the biggest changes that we've seen in medicine have been in the most common diseases, heart disease and cancer. Just in the last two to three years, there's a revolution going on in cancer. If you have cancer, the most important thing you can do is get the genome sequence of the tumor cells. Some people are just measuring a finite number of genes. We're doing that as well as measuring the entire genome.
There are so-called driver mutations in about a dozen different genes right now that, if you have one of those driver mutations in a certain kind of cancer, it tells the cancer doctor exactly what drug they should use on your tumor. And it's totally beginning to change cancer therapy.
But, you know, cancer is not easy to lick, and so it's going to be a combination of these new immune therapy approaches with understanding these driver mutations.
An example is with lung cancer. Pfizer had a drug they took into phase 3 clinical trials to try and treat lung cancer and the trial failed miserably. But then it was found retrospectively that one gene called ALK, a translocation or a change in that gene occurs in about 4 percent of lung cancer patients. In that 4 percent of patients, the Pfizer drug works extremely well on over 60 percent of them to shrink their tumors.
BARTIROMO: Wow.
VENTER: So this is what the future position of medicine is, understanding your specific genome, your specific gene changes, determining which drugs are out there that will likely work on your tumor. Fifteen years ago it would have been giving that same drug to everybody that had cancer whether it worked or not.
BARTIROMO: Right.
VENTER: Now we know only 4 percent would have responded.
BARTIROMO: Wow. So it's a real...
VENTER: It's a very big difference. So it's really getting to the precise medicine that President Obama talked about recently.
BARTIROMO: You told me that you do believe that there is a chance that, in the next 10 years, we will live into our second century. Is that right?
VENTER: Well, more and more people are living into their second century, but it's from changes across the board. The biggest changes were in infectious disease. In fact, most people still die from pneumonia or some type of infectious disease. But we've had antibiotics; we've had antivirals; we've had increased sanitation. We've been able to do prophylactic treatment for heart disease with statins, et cetera.
And all these, sort of, increase survivability over time. As we take that even further, it will have basic increases in our average lifespan.
Our goal's not to increase the number. Our goal at Human Longevity is to have a healthy life span. So if you can predict what diseases you're likely to have and even understand preventive measures you can take, or driving the pharmaceutical industry in new directions.
For example, with Alzheimer's disease, using a combination of MRI imaging and the genetic tests we do with sequencing the genome, we can predict relatively accurately out 20 years, maybe, before you would have symptoms that you might get dementia.
BARTIROMO: Such important insights. Craig, great to have you on the show today.
VENTER: Nice to be with you.
BARTIROMO: Thank you so much, Dr. Craig Venter, joining us on longevity.
And now with a look at what's coming up on "MediaBuzz," let's check in with Howard Kurtz, top of the hour.
Good morning to you, Howie.
HOWARD KURTZ, FOX HOST, "MEDIABUZZ": Good morning, Maria. I've got an exclusive sit-down with Ted Cruz, who punches back hard at the mainstream media which he sees as terribly unfair to Republicans -- we go around on that -- and which he says are ready for Hillary.
Also, of course, we will cover the coverage of the Charleston tragedy. And, as a guy who's covered Donald Trump on and off for 30 years, how is it that he is getting so much coverage in this 2016 presidential race?
BARTIROMO: It sounds like a great show. We'll see you in about 20 minutes, Howie. Thank you.
And as you just heard, the announcements keep on coming. We will give you a preview of who's getting into the 2016 political fray next, what contenders are still to come.
It's the governors' time to shine, so which ones will be trailblazers and which ones will be left in the dust? Our panel on all of that, ahead, on "Sunday Morning Futures." Stay with us. The panel is next.
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BARTIROMO: Welcome back. The governors showing they are ready to give it a go in 2016. Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal set to make his announcement this Wednesday. Two more look like they are ready to make decisions of their own as well. Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker is setting up a "testing the waters committee" to start raising money last week. And Ohio Governor John Kasich told -- could make a decision soon.
Want to bring in our panel, Ed Rollins is former principal White House adviser to President Reagan. He has been a long-time strategist to business and political leaders. And he's a FOX News political analyst. Judith Miller is adjunct fellow at the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research. She is a Pulitzer Prize-winning author and journalist, and a Fox News contributor. And Steve Moore is a distinguished visiting fellow at the Heritage Foundation, joining us now on the field.
So what's your take on the ever expanding field and now the governors, really?
ED ROLLINS, FOX NEWS POLITICAL ANALYST: The governors are very important. The two biggest names in Republican politics got out last week, one being Jeb Bush, the other being Donald Trump. Jeb Bush is a contender and could win. Donald Trump basically is going to surprise a lot of people, I think, because he's a loud voice. And he's going to say what he's going to say.
And if he gets to that debate forum, he's not going to be the nominee, but he certainly could be a factor. The governors, I think, there are three to go. You did mention Christie, but you have got Kasich, you have got Christie, and you have got Walker. All three of those could be factors.
I think certainly Walker is a potential front-runner. Obviously Kasich is someone who could move to the forefront. Christie, I think, is like Bobby Jindal, his day has kind of come and gone.
BARTIROMO: Come and gone, wow.
And you had dinner with Bobby Jindal just this.
STEPHEN MOORE, HERITAGE FOUNDATION: Yes. I mean, think about this, I mean, you have got 12, 14 people in this race, and, you know, you have got now two Hispanics. Bobby Jindal is Indian, you have a black, you have a woman.
You know, the Republican Party is starting to look like the rainbow coalition. And the Democrats don't have much of a field at all.
I agree that governors make really good candidates and good presidents generally, especially after a failed senator who's now in the White House. So I think that kind of executive branch leadership, Maria, is what people are looking for in a president.
BARTIROMO: Judy, how do you see it?
JUDITH MILLER, FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR: I think on the Republican side it's, of course, getting really crowded. But I think we've seen a change of tone that should be very worrisome for Republicans, especially with Trump getting in, because he has been nastier and more assertive about his -- the other candidates than has -- heretofore it has been kind of speak very little evil of fellow Republicans.
Now they're really getting into it. The question I have about Trump is, is he willing to spend his own money? Because if he is, then he could be very problematic for the Republican field.
MOORE: And he's problematic for another reason. The appeal of Donald Trump, and I'm not for him, but that he is a non-politician. And what is he doing? He's attacking Washington. He's attacking the corruption of the whole political system.
And that's very appealing to voters right now, in both parties, by the way. It reminds me very much of Ross Perot in the 1990s where he got, you know, over a third of the vote.
ROLLINS: I totally agree with that. I think that he will tap into a certain element out there, I mean, "Joe Sixpack" or whatever. I don't think he's going to be the nominee. But he's going to more of a factor than people give him credit for at this point in time.
And I'd sure as heck hate to be on a debate with him sitting next to me.
BARTIROMO: But I wonder if, you know, what Peggy Noonan has written about, and that is, when you have that kind of sort of divisiveness and you don't know where Trump is going to go, does it become a negative for the party because he's basically attacks everybody?
MILLER: I think it does. And that's exactly what I think the Republicans ought to be worried about, because on the Democratic side you simply don't have that, even with the little "Bidenista" petition campaign, you know, let's bring in Joe.
But basically, it's hard. Now, yes, Bernie Sanders is doing very well. He's polling very well, but it's not. She's it, whereas, on the Republicans it's beginning to look like a kind of gutter fight.
MOORE: But, you know, it's not -- I don't view it, as a Republican, as such a bad thing if Trump goes out there and attacks some of these other Republicans, because they have got to get toughened up a little bit. I mean, my goodness, Hillary isn't going to pull her punches against them.
So, you know, let's see.
BARTIROMO: Right, that's true.
MOORE: . how they respond to this kind of.
(CROSSTALK)
MILLER: But they're giving her the talking points.
(CROSSTALK)
MOORE: Sort of like Newt Gingrich gave the talking points against Romney.
MILLER: Right, exactly.
ROLLINS: I come back to this is a guy who has been an entertainer. He has been on television for six years drawing 6 million, 7 million people. People -- and he's going to have big, gigantic crowds.
He has already lit up -- I mean, he overshadowed totally Bush's announcement on Monday this week. And I think to a certain extent to underestimate him would be foolish. I think he may go out and put some ideas forward.
The more important thing, though, is we're talking about the governors. Two of these governors, Bobby Jindal and Christie, have been damaged by their governorships. These were two hot candidates a couple of years ago.
BARTIROMO: That's a good point.
ROLLINS: And unfortunately -- and Kasich and some of the others, you have got to run on that record. And in some cases it's good, some cases not so good, and sometimes it changes on you.
Kasich obviously is the new voice to come in here. But Jindal and Christie four years ago were two of the hottest.
(CROSSTALK)
MOORE: Well, Kasich, I think, is really the interesting one. I mean, it's Ohio for goodness sakes. And the Republicans have to win Ohio. And I'll make a prediction. I don't know if he's going to be a presidential nominee but I would say there's a pretty high probability that John Kasich is the vice presidential nominee.
If you have a Rubio and a Kasich, and you've got Florida and Ohio, that's a big deal for the Republicans.
ROLLINS: But he has to do well. The critical thing is you don't get to be vice president by not doing well. And so he has got to go out and win some things.
BARTIROMO: All right. Let's take a short break and then go to the international part of the story, foreign policy: growing problems between Russia and the West with the Kremlin boasting about powerful new weaponry. The Pentagon's message to European allies as we look ahead on "Sunday Morning Futures" with our panel, next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BARTIROMO: Welcome back. Secretary of Defense Ash Carter headed overseas for a week of meetings with European counterparts. The Pentagon's top official is trying to reassure allies that the U.S. has their back amid growing concerns over Russian aggression. Moscow's role in the Ukraine conflict has sparked heavy sanctions from the U.S. and the European Union, but the Kremlin is continuing to flex its military might, saying it will add more than 40 new intercontinental missiles this year to its arsenal.
We'll bring back our panel right now, Ed Rollins, Judith Miller and Steve Moore.
And, Judy, you've been writing about this a lot. What's your sense of what's going on between Russia and the U.S. right here?
MILLER: Look, this is -- we've come a long way from reset to, kind of, the nadir of this relationship. This is as bad as it's been since the Cold War. When you have Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia, as NATO members, all asking the United States and NATO for ground troops, you know we have a problem.
But Putin is in bad shape. And I think we have to remember that. Economically, he's just been devastated, and yet the prime minister of Greece shows up at the St. Petersburg summit, asking, along with 12 out of the 24 CEOs representing American companies, asking for Russia's blessing, asking for Russian aid.
And so he's able to play this game that far surpasses his economic strength. If the Europeans can hang together, America can hang together on sanctions, it's going to hurt. I'm not sure we can.
MOORE: He was so brash and brazen, and it was almost Putin just thumbing his nose at the United States. And, you know, we haven't seen that since Jimmy Carter was in office.
(LAUGHTER)
And it's very worrisome. And, by the way, here we are in the year 2015 and we still don't have an anti-ballistic missile system to -- you know, if he's to be believed, they have missiles that could pierce our anti-missile system and attack the United States. That's a really dangerous situation -- by the way, at a time when we've been cutting our military budget at home.
BARTIROMO: Unbelievable.
ROLLINS: People underestimate the Russian will. They have gone through tough economic times before. They're not going to roll over and play dead. And Putin's not the hardest-liner in that country. Putin is obviously going to be there a long time. He sees a weak, weak president who is lame duck at best, and he's going to take as much run at this administration as possible. He's not going to go to war, but he's certainly going to shake his fists big and loud and clear and he's going to be -- have a lot of applaud from other countries around the world.
BARTIROMO: Well, who would be able to stand up to Putin?
ROLLINS: Not this president.
(LAUGHTER)
I mean, isn't -- that's the whole problem, right, is that I don't think that this is a president -- this is a president who wants America to be liked rather than to be feared. And I'd rather be feared than liked, especially when you're dealing with someone like Putin.
ROLLINS: Or even respected.
MOORE: Even respected, right.
ROLLINS: And I think, again, the Russians went through a very tough economic time when they were the Soviet Union. They're willing to do that. My sense is that there's nobody going to roll over. The billionaires who were thousandaires when he came in are not going to basically say, "Please, please, the sanctions are killing me. I've still got $20 million on my house in Morocco and the Hamptons and downtown New York."
BARTIROMO: By the way, the European Union has set up this emergency meeting tomorrow to talk about Greece paying this debt of 1.5 billion euros to the IMF. If they default, it would be the first time it's ever happened with a developed country.
So here we see the prime minister of Greece show up with Putin. And what are we supposed to think? Russia is going to give them money? Russia's economy has plummeted. So I don't know where Russia's going to get the money to help Greece.
MILLER: And they're not. And they didn't. All they did was sign an MOU on a gas pipeline that may or may not ever get built. No, look, this is where Russia is really bragging. This is where it's trying to -- it's talking above its financial weight.
If you -- I think Ash Carter, the new defense secretary, understands, if you hang tough and you support our allies and you get them to spend a little money on defense -- why should we be the only country spending money on defense?
BARTIROMO: Well, I think you guys make -- make a great point in terms of - - in terms of Russia thumbing its nose at the U.S. He's just -- he doesn't care. He sees Obama as...
(CROSSTALK)
ROLLINS: Thank God we have this -- this energy revolution in the United States because that's driven down the price of oil and gas and it's really hurt -- that's probably been the one weapon we've actually used against Russia.
BARTIROMO: That's absolutely right. All right. Let's take a break and then get the one thing to watch for the week ahead with our panel on "Sunday Morning Futures" next. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BARTIROMO: Welcome back. Back with our panel. The one big thing to watch for the week ahead, Ed Rollins?
ROLLINS: I'm watching the Iran deal that's supposed to be done in the next week or two, and obviously it's not making progress. The Iranians are bad- mouthing us every single day while they're at the table, and if we basically do a deal here, we're fools.
BARTIROMO: Judy?
MILLER: I'm watching Grexit. I'm watching the Greeks possibly leaving or collapsing. Will this prime minister make the concessions he needs to make to get the $1.7 billion loan that he needs?
BARTIROMO: He hasn't yet.
MILLER: He hasn't yet, no.
BARTIROMO: Steve Moore?
MOORE: There was a big, big game-changer this week in the Republican presidential race when Rand Paul came out with a 14.5 percent flat tax we talked about on your show this week.
I predict that, in the next couple of weeks, you're going to see Republican candidates come out with all sorts of reform plans to simplify the system. By the way, even IRS agents wrote in and said they like the...
(LAUGHTER)
BARTIROMO: Wow.
MOORE: ... the flat tax.
BARTIROMO: That's a new one.
MOORE: By the way, on the Democrat side, you've got Bernie Sanders saying he wants a 90 percent rate. There's a big difference between the Republicans and the Democrats.
(LAUGHTER)
BARTIROMO: Ninety percent tax rates? Go figure.
Thanks to our panel. It was great to see you guys.
That will do it for "Sunday Morning Futures" for today. Thanks for being with us. I'm Maria Bartiromo. I'll see you this week on "Mornings With Maria," 6 a.m. to 9 a.m. Eastern on the Fox Business Network.
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