A reality check on the Benghazi and IRS investigations

Guests:  Jonathan Landay and Jodi Schneider

It's been a rough couple of days for President Obama when it comes to scandal, crisis and politics. On Wednesday, the White House tried to quell criticism over how it responded to the deadly attacks on the U.S. mission in Benghazi by releasing over 100 pages of emails between administration officials in the days following the event. The correspondence shows an intense debate between the CIA and State Department over what to tell the public in a set of "talking points" which the President's critics say were drafted with politics in mind. Also on Wednesday, the President fired the acting chief of the Internal Revenue Service after revelations that it had specifically targeted conservative groups with the words "tea party or "patriot" in their names. Hearings on the matter begin this morning. In this hour of Radio Times, we get a reality check on how the Administration has handled the attacks in Benghazi and the IRS's treatment of conservative political organizations. First we'll hear from JONATHAN LANDAY, senior national security and intelligence correspondent for McClatchy Newspapers. Then we'll talk to JODI SCHNEIDER, team leader in charge of tax policy and Congressional coverage for Bloomberg News, working from the Washington, D.C. Bureau.

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Peter Edelman on why U.S. is 'So Rich, So Poor'

GUEST: PETER EDELMAN

[REBROADCAST] PETER EDELMAN has been working to raise awareness about and fighting to end poverty in the United States for four decades.  Touring the Mississippi Delta in 1967 with his boss, Senator Robert F. Kennedy, exposed him to families enduring horrifying poverty and helped shape his policy views on poverty ever since. He resigned in protest as Assistant Secretary of Health and Human Services in 1996 when President Bill Clinton signed the “welfare reform” bill into law, an act Edelman called “war on the poor of the United States” and “the worst thing” Clinton did as President. In his most recent book, "So Rich, So Poor: Why It’s So Hard to End Poverty In America," Edelman continues to attack the inequalities benefiting the few at the expense of the many, especially young people of color.

AP Photo/Mel Evans