good evening. i'm don lemon. this tuesday is the new hampshire primary. the second contest on the road to the white house this year. front-runner mitt romney had a narrow victory against former senator rick santor n oorum in n the iowa caucuses. a gop candidates had a chance to make their case to voters not only in new hampshire but across america this weekend at the abc news/yahoo!/wmur debate. cnn is going to bring you an encore presentation of that debate tonight, and it starts right now. tonight, all eyes on new hampshire. after just eight votes in new hampshire separated him from him -- >> game on. >> we will win this election. >> the game has changed.

>> i have decided to sand aside. >> and now, everything is different. >> what do we need to do as a country to get back on the right track? >> can anyone overtake mitt romney as he tries to close in and seal the nomination. can rick santorum build on his stunning iowa success? is time running out for these candidates to catch the front-runner? save their campaigns? >> we've got some tough decisions to make. >> we are going to take america back. >> believe me, this moment sum going to continue. >> the voting has begun. the stakes couldn't be any higher. n tonight, we put them all to the test. so what's next in this campaign season filled with so many dramatic surprises? this is the abc news republican presidential debate. your voice. your vote.

now joining us tonight from new hampshire's own wmur, political director josh mckelvin. >> good evening to all of you. welcome to st. anselm college and the first debate of 2012. those eight votes in iowa reminded us on tuesday, every vote counts. >> we are off and running. great to be here with you, josh. >> now let's introduce the candidates. former governor jon huntsman, ron paul, former governor of massachusetts, mitt romney, rick santorum, former speak of the house newt gingrich and texas governor rick perry. >> time to remind everyone again of the rules, they were negotiated and agreed to by the candidates themselves. so let's take you through them. one-minute responses with 30

seconds for rebuttal and showing everybody at home the candidates will see green and then when there's 15 seconds left yellow and red. >> our audience was chosen by the college and wmur and all of you at home can watch on abc news.com and yahoo!.com. you can download yahoo!'s into now app on your iphone. pitch in your opinions during the debate. >> so let the debate begin. governor romney, we'll begin with you. we just saw 200,000 new jobs created last month. and there are optimists who say this is the signal that this economy is finally turning around. your with those optimists? >> i'm an optimist and i certainly hope it turns around. we have millions of people who have been suffering too long. 25 million people that are out of work or have stopped looking for work. and also a lot of people who have got part-time jobs and need full-time employment. it's very good news. i hope we continue to see good news. it's not thanks to president obama. his policies have made the

recession deeper. and his policies have made the recovery more tepid. as a result of everything from obama care to dodd/frank to a stimulus plan that was not as well directed tass should have been to a whole host of new regulations put on american businesses, he's made it smaller for small entrepreneurs to invest in america and grow jobs here. so the president is going to try to take responsibility for things getting better. it's like the rooster taking responsibility for the sunrise. he doesn't do it. what he did is make things harder for america to get going. >> senator santorum, you have said we don't need a ceo. we don't need a manager as president. what did you mean by that? >> we need a leader. someone who can paint a positive vision for this country. someone who, you know, has the experience to go out and be the commander in chief. i have experience and eight years on the armed services committee. i managed major pieces of legislation through the house, through the senate on national

security issues like iran, which is the most -- you want to talk about the most pressing issue that we're dealing with today, it's iran. and as newt's talked about many times, there's no one that has more experience in deal with that country than i do. and that means we need someone who can go out and paint a vision of what america's strength is about. let our allies know they can trust us. let our enemies know that they have to respect us and if they cross us, they should fear us. >> it has been written you were talking about governor romney, were you? >> well, i am talking about -- oh, in the case of a manager as far as commander in chief or the manager part? >> the manager. >> yes, of course i was talking about governor romney. i was talking about someone who brings to the table, he says i'm going to be -- i've got business experience. well, business experience doesn't necessarily match up with being the commander in chief of this country. the commander in chief of this country isn't a ceo. it's someone who has to lead and it's also, being the president is not a ceo. you can't direct members of

congress and members of the senate as to how you do things. you've got to lead and inspire. and that's what people here in iowa and new hampshire are looking for. someone who can inspire and paint a positive vision for this country. i've been the one that's been able to do it and that's the reason we're doing well in the polls. >> i think people who spend their life in washington don't understand what happens out in the real economy. they think that people who start businesses are just managers. people that start as entrepreneurs to start a business from the ground up and get customers and get investors and hire people to join them, those people are leaders. and the chance to lead in free enterprise is extraordinarily critical to also being able to lead a state like i led in massachusetts and lead the olympics. my experience is in leadership. the people in the private sector who are every day making this country a stronger nation and hiring people, they're not successful because they're managers. they're successful primarily because they are leaders. i wish people in washington had the experience of going out and

working in the real economy first before they went there and they'd understand some of the real lessons of leadership. >> let me bring speaker gingrich in. a group supporting you, one run by one of your closest long-term advisers has put out a scathing attack just today on governor romney. on his tenure as the ceo of that investment firm bain capital. it calls that tenure a story of greed, that's a quote, saying that bain made spectacular profits by, again, quote, stripping american businesses of assets, selling everything to the highest bidder and often killing jobs for big financial rewards. do you agree with that characterization? >> well, i haven't seen the film, but it does reflect "the new york times" story two days ago about one particular company, and i think people should look at the film and decide if it's factually accurate and raises questions. i'm very much for free enterprises. i'm very much for exactly what the governor just described. create a business. grow jobs. provide leadership. i'm not nearly as enamored of a

wall street model where you can flip companies, you can go in and have leveraged buyouts, basically take out all the money leaving behind the workers. >> is that the bain model? >> i joung think you have to lo the film. the governor has every right to defend that, but i think it's a legitimate part of the debate to say on witness, were people better off or worse off by this particular style of investment? >> back in december you said that governor romney made money at bain by, quote, bankrupting companies and laying off employees. >> that was, i think, the "new york times" story two days ago. they took one specific company. they walked through in detail. showed what they bought it for. how much they took out of it and the 1700 people they left unemployed. now that's -- check "the new york times" story but that's their story. >> governor romney, your response? >> well, i'm not surprised to have "the new york times" put free enterprise on trial. i'm not surprised to have the obama administration do that either. it's a little surprising from my colleagues on this stage.

we understand that in the free economy, in the private sector, that sometimes investments don't work and you aren't successful. it always pains you if you have to be in a situation of downsizing a business in order to try and make it more successful, turn it around and try and grow it again. i'm very proud of the fact that the two enterprises i led were quite successful and the olympics was successful and my state was successful. the state of massachusetts. but in the business i had we invested and over 100 different businesses. and net-net, taking out the ones where we lost jobs and those we added, those businesses have now added over 100,000 jobs. i have a record of learning how to create jobs. >> there have been questions about that calculation of the 100,000 jobs. if you can explain a little more, i read some analysts who look at it and say that you are counting the jobs that were created but not counting the jobs that were taken away. is that accurate? >> no, it's not accurate. it includes the net of both. i'm a good enough numbers guy to make sure i got both sides of that. some of the biggest, for

instance, there's a steel company called steel dynamics in indiana. thousands of jobs there. bright horizons children's centers. about 15,000 jobs there. sports authority, about 15,000 jobs there. staples alone, 90,000 employed. that's a business that we helped start from the ground up. but -- >> that includes jobs created even after you left? >> oh, yes. those are businesses we started that continue to grow. and we're only a small part of that. we were investors to help get them going. but in some cases, businesses clunk. we tried to help turn them around. but let's not forget. this is a free enterprise system. we don't need government to come in and tell us how to make businesses work. we need people with passion, willing to take risk and help turn things around. and where that works you create jobs. >> let me bring governor huntsman in on this. supporters have taken aim at the governor's tenure at bain. so on balance, should republicans worry about this attack? is governor romney's record at

bain a weakness or a strength? >> well, part of his record, and, therefore, it's going to be talked about. and i think it's fair for the people of this nation to have a conversation about one's record. and governor romney can say whatever he wishes to say about it. i also have private sector experience. i combine a little of what rick santorum talked about and what governor romney has. i think it's a good balance. i come from manufacturing. people find something in my record. but, you know, it's important for the people to look at our records because everybody up here has a record that ought to be scrutinized. but it goes beyond the private sector. i served as a governor. mitt served as a governor. others up here have had positions of responsibility. take a look at what we did as governor. i think that is probably more telling in terms of what i would do or what mitt rould woas president of the united states. i put bold proposals forward. i delivered a flat tax for my state. i took my state to number one in job creation. with all due respect to what

rick perry has said about texas, we did a little better. we reformed health care without a mandate. we took our state to number one as the most business friendly state in america. now in a time in our nation's history when we so desperately need jobs, i think that's going to be a very material part of the discussion. >> governor romney, 30 seconds. >> i congratulate governor huntsman on the success in his governorship to make the state more attractive for business. that's got to happen. but what -- i actually think it's helpful to have people who have had a job in the private sector, if you want to create jobs in the private sector. we've had a lot of presidents over the years who have wonderful experience, and right now we have people whose backgrounds are in the governmental sector and the private sector. i think now, given what america is facing globally, given an economy that's changed its dynamics dramatically over the last ten years, you need to have someone who understands how that economy works at a close level if we're going to be able to post up against president obama and establish a record that says

this is different than a president who does not understand job creation. >> congressman paul, let's stay on the issue of records. you have a new ad in south carolina taking direct aim at santorum. you call him a corporate lobbyist, a washington insider with a record of betrayal. you also call him corrupt in that ad. senator santorum is standing right here. your willing to stand by those charges and explain them? >> well it was a quote. somebody did make a survey. he came out as one of the top corrupt individuals because he took so much money from the lobbyists. but really what the whole -- there it goes again. >> they caught you not telling the truth, ron. >> what really counts is his record. i mean, he's a big government, big spending individual because, you know, he preached the fact he wanted a balanced budget amendment but raised the debt to five times. he's a big government person. and we as republicans know something about right to work.

he supported -- he voted against right to work. he voted along with no child left behind to double the size of the department of education, and he also voted to -- for prescription drug program. so he's a big government person, along with him being associated with the lobbyists and a lot of funds. and also, where did he make his living afterwards. he became a high-powered lobbyist on -- in washington, d.c. and he's done quite well. we checked out newt on his income. i think we ought to find out how much money he's made as well. >> do i have 20 minutes to answer these? let's talk about the corruption issue. the group that caught me corrupt was a group called crew. if you haven't been sued by crew, you aren't a conservative. crew is this left wing organization that puts out a list of every election of the top republicans who have tough races and calls them all corrupt

because they take contributions from pacs. it's a ridiculous charge. and you should know better than to cite george soros-like organizations to say that they are corrupt. so that's number one. ron, i'm a conservative. i'm not a libertarian. i believe in some government. i believe that government has -- that as a senator from pennsylvania, that i had a responsibility to go out there and represent the interests of my state. and that's what i did to make sure that pennsylvania was able and formulas and other things to get its fair share of money back. i don't apologize for that any more than you did when you earmarked things and did things when you were a congressman in texas. as far as the money that i received, you know, i think i'm known in this race, and i was known in washington, d.c. as a cause guy. i am a cause guy. i care deeply about this country and the causes that make me -- that i think are at the core of this country. and when i left the united states senate, i got involved in causes that i believe in. i went and worked at the ethics

and public policy center and wrote on the coughs iran and wrote and lectured all over this country. i got involved with a health care company because i was afraid of what was going to happen and i was asked by a health care company to be on their board of directors. i don't know whether you think board of directors are lobbyists. they're not. that's the private sector experience that i'm sure that mitt would approve of. you also -- i also worked for a coal company. as i mentioned the other day. my grandfather was a coal miner. i grew up in the coal region. when i left the united states senate, one of the big issues on the table was cap and trade, global warming, and i wanted to stay involved in the fray. so i contacted a local coal company from my area who -- and i asked. i said, look, i want to join you in the fight. i want to work together with you. i want to help you in any way to make sure we defeat cap and trade. and i'm proud to have engaged in that. >> congressman paul? >> it is true. i believe congress should

designate how the money should be spent. but the big difference between the way i voted and the senator voted is i always voted against the spending. i always voted against the spending. there's only been a couple of appropriations bills i've voted for in the past 24, 26 years i've been in washington. so you are a big spender. that's all there is to it. you are a big government conservative. and you don't vote for right to work and these very important things, and that's what weakens the economy. so to say you are a conservative, i think is a stretch but you've convinced a lot of people of it. somebody has to point out your record. >>y in, i think i have an opportunity to respond here. i've convinced a lot of people of it because my record is actually pretty darn good. i supported and voted official a balanced budget amendment, the line item veto. i used to keep track when i was in the united states senate of all the democratic amendments. and all amendments that increase spending. i put on the board something called a spendometer. if you look at my spending record and take a look at the

spending groups iwas rated at the top or near the top every single year. i go back to the point. i'm not a libertarian. you vote against everything. i don't vote against everything. i do vote for some spending. i think government has a role to play, particularly in defense. >> we'll let everybody get in here. first, i wanted to bring in governor perry on this. we'll stay on this second. >> i'll let you back in here, ron. >> i think you have just seen a great example of why i got in this race. because i happen to think that i'm the only outsider with the possible exception of jon huntsman who has not been part of the problem in washington, d.c. the insiders in washington, d.c. we have to nominate someone that can beat barack obama, that can get the tea party behind them, that can go to washington, d.c., and stop the corrupt spending that has been going on. and it doesn't make any difference whether you are an insider from washington, d.c., or an insider from wall street. that is what americans,

rightfully, see is the real problem in america today. they want someone who has a record of executive governing experience, like i have in texas. i've been the commander in chief of 20,000-plus troops that get deployed. i have been the governor of a state that has created a million net new jobs. that is a record that american people are looking for. that is what americans are looking for. and outsider that is not corrupted by the process. >> governor, you are saying congressman paul is an insider? >> i am telling you, anybody that has had as many -- i mean, here's what frustrates me is that you go get the earmarks and then you vote against the bill? now i don't know what they call that in other places, but congressman paul, in texas we call that hypocrisy. >> well, i call it being a constitutionalist because i believe we should earmark or designate every penny. you designate weapons systems. you designate money to go to spend a billion dollars on an

embassy in iraq. that's an earmark, too. i say the congress has more responsibility. but back to senator santorum. he ducks behind this, he's for this balanced budget amendment but voted five times to increase the national debt by trillions of dollars. this is what the whole tea party movement is about. government is practically stopped over increasing the national debt. you did it five times. what's your excuse for that? that's trillions of dollars. you kept this thing going. you didn't do very much to slow it up when you had a chance. >> i did do a lot to slow it up when i had the chance. i was the author of the only bill that repealed a federal entitlement, welfare reform. i promoted and talked -- and tried to pass social security reform. i worked on medicare and medicaid. i was one of the only guys out there in a time, ron, when we were running surpluses that was out there talking about the need for long-term entitlement reform which is where the real problem is. when the government runs up a

tab and you don't have the money -- no longer to pay, then you have to increase the debt ceiling. but every time we tried to tie it with reducing spending. we are in a point right now where we've blown the doors off of it. as you know, back in the last go round istood up and said, no, we shouldn't increase the debt ceiling because we've gone too far. routine debt ceiling increases have happened throughout the course of this country for 200 years. >> if i can, i'd like to pivot and go to another topic here, which is the issue of commander in chief and national security. and governor huntsman, you have already said that the iranians have made the decision to go nuclear. you think they want a nuclear weapon. tell us why you would be better as commander in chief than the other candidates on this stage. >> because being commander in chief is less about having the discussions that we've just heard a moment ago. a lot of insider gobbley degook.

it's about leading people and creating a vision. i've done that my entire career. i did that as governor. i took my state to the best managed state in america. i took that economy to the number one position, number one in job creation. as compared and contrasted with massachusetts, which was number 47 during a time when i think leadership matters to the american people. but more than anything else, i believe that this nation is looking for not only leadership but leadership that can be trusted. because, let's face it. we have a serious trust deficit in this nation. the american people no longer trust our institutions of power. and they no longer trust our elected officials. and i'm here to tell you that we must find not just a commander in chief, not just a president, not just a visionary. but we've got to find somebody who can reform congress and do what needs to be done with respect to leading the charge on term limits. everybody knows congress needs term limits. everybody knows that we've got to close the revolving door that is corrupted washington. and everybody knows as well that

we've got to have someone who can deliver trust back to wall street, which is also lost the american people's trust. >> do you want to speak specifically about anybody on this stage. >> they can all speak for themselves. but i can tell you having served as governor successfully, the only person on this stage as well to have lived overseas four times, i've run two american embassies, including the largest and most complicated we have in the world. the united states embassy in china. i think i understand better than anyone on this stage the complex national security implications that we will face going forward with what is, we all know, the most complex and challenging relationship of the 21st century. that of china. >> governor romney? >> you have a question or shall i just -- >> my question is the governor has just said he can speak better than anyone else -- >> he can do a lot better than barack obama. let's put it that way. we have a president who had no experience in leadership. he never led a business. never led a city.

never led a state. and as a result, he learned on the job being president of the united states and he has made one error after another relating to foreign policy. the most serious of which relates to iran. we have a nation which is intent on becoming nuclear. iran has pursued their ambition without having crippling sanctions against them. the president was silent. over a million voices took to the streets in iran. voice he's should have stood up for. he's failed to put together a plan to show iran that we have the capacity to remove them militarily from their plans to have nuclear weaponry. this is a failed presidency and the issue in dealing with the responsibility of commander in chief is the issue of saying who has the capacity to lead. who is someone who has demonstrated leadership capacity. who has character, shown that character over their career, who has integrity. and each of these people -- i don't want to be critical of the people on this stage. any one of these people would do a better job in many respects than our president. i will endorse our nominee.

i believe in the principles that made america such a great nation. this is a time when we're faced not with a nation that is extraordinarily secure in a very, very calm world. we're facing a very dangerous world and we have a president now who unbelievably has decided to shrink the size of the military. who unbelievably has said for the first time since fdr we're going to no longer have the capacity to fight two wars at a time. this president must be replaced. >> i want to bring in josh now. >> i want to stay on the topic of commander in chief. that puts you in charge of the most powerful forces in the world. only two of you on stage have served in the military. dr. paul and governor perry. there are 25 million veterans in this country. 3 million currently serving active duty. so this question is very relevant to a large number of voters out there. and the question goes to you, governor perry. do you believe having worn a uniform and been part of a unit better prepares you for the job of commander in chief than those on the stage who haven't served? >> i think it brings a very

clear knowledge about what it requires for those that are on the front lines. but also having been the governor of the state of texas and been the commander in chief for 11 years there and 20,000-plus troops that we've deployed to multiple theaters of operation. but i want to go back to this issue that we just brought up earlier when we talked about one of the biggest problems facing this country. and iran is a big problem, senator, without a doubt. but let me tell you what this president is doing. with our military budget is going to put our country's freedom in jeopardy. you cannot cut $1 trillion from the department of defense budget and expect that america's freedoms are not going to be jeopardized. that, to me is the biggest problem that america faces, is a president that doesn't understand the military and a president who is atlollowing th deduction of the dod budget so he can spend money in other places and it will put america's freedom in jeopardy.

>> let's go to you, speaker gingrich. recently dr. paul referred to you as a chicken hawk because you didn't serve given what you just heard governor perry say about understanding the military and dr. paul's comments. how do you respond? >> dr. paul makes a lot of comments. it's part of his style. my father served 27 years in the army in world war ii, korea and vietnam. i grew up in a military family moving around the world. since 1979, i have spent 32 years working, start with the army's training and doctrine command. i served on the defense policy board. let me say something about veterans. as an army brat whose family was deeply engaged, i feel for veterans. we had a great meeting in wolfboro with veterans. i made a commitment in new hampshire we would reopen the hospital in manchester, develop a new clinic in the north country using telecommunications, and we would provide a system where veterans could go to their local doctor

or hospital. the idea that a veteran has to go all the way to boston is absolutely totally fundamentally wrong. i'd say as an army brat who watched his mother, brother and sisters for years, i have a pretty good sense of what veterans families need. >> congressman paul, would you say that again? would you use that phrase again? >> yeah, i think people who don't serve when they could and they get three or four, even five deferments aren't -- they have no right to send our kids off to war and not be even against the wars that we have. i am trying to stop the wars but at least i went when they called me up. but, you know, the veterans problem is a big one. we have hundreds of thousands coming back from these wars that were undeclared, unnecessary, they haven't been won. they're unwinnable. we have hundreds of thousands looking for care. and we have an epidemic of suicide coming back. and so many have -- i mean if

you add up all of the contractors and all of the wars going on in afghanistan and in iraq, we've lost 8,500 americans and severe injuries, over 40,000. and these are undeclared wars. so rick keeps saying you don't want this libertarian stuff. what i'm talking about, i don't bring up the word. you do. but i talk about the constitution. constitution has rules. and i don't like it when we send our kids off to fight these wars and when those individuals didn't go themselves and then come up and when they are asked they say, i don't think one person could have made a difference. i have a pet peeve that annoys me to a great deal because i see these young men coming back, my heart weeps for them. >> speaker gingrich? >> well, dr. paul has a long history of saying things that are inaccurate and false. the fact is i never asked for deferment. i was married with a child. it was never a question. my father was, in fact, serving

in vietnam in the mekong delta at the time he's referring to. i think i have a pretty good idea of what it's like as a family to worry about your father getting killed and i personally resent the kind of comments and aspersions he routinely makes without accurate information and then just slurs people with. >> i need one quick follow up. when i was drafting iwas married and had two kids, and i went. >> i wasn't eligible for the draft. i wasn't eligible for the draft. >> congressman paul, the speaker said you have a history of inaccurate statements. there's been quite a bit of controversy over this newsletter that went out under your name. a number of comments that were perceived as racist, as inaccurate. you have said that even though they were written under your name, that you aren't necessarily -- that you didn't necessarily know they were written. you don't necessarily stand by them. can you really take the time now and explain to everybody what happened there? how it was possible that those kind of comments went out under

your name without you knowing about. >> it's been explained many times and there were things written 20 years approximately that i did not write. so concentrating on something that was written 20 years ago, that i didn't write you know, is diverting the attention from most of the important issues. you bring up the inference, racial overtones. ask me what my relationship is for racial relationships and one of my heros is martin luther king because he practiced the libertarian principle of peaceful resistance and peaceful civil disobedience as did rosa parks did. but also, i'm the only one up here and the only one in the democratic party that understands true racism in this country is in the judicial system and has to do with enforcing the drug laws. the percentage of people who use drugs are about the same with blacks and whites. and yet, the blacks are arrested way disproportionately.

they are prosecuted in prison way disproportionately. they get the death penalty, way disproportionately. how many times have you seen a white rich person get the electric chair or get, you know, execution but poor minorities have an injustice. they have an injustice in war as well because minorities suffer more. even with a draft they suffer definitely more and without a draft, they are suffering disproportionately. if we truly want to be concerned about racism you ought to look at a few of those issues and look at the drug laws which are being so unfairly enforced. >> we want to thank you for the first round of this debate. and we want to take a break right now. when we come back, there's so many family issues, issues of gay marriage that have been front and center in this campaign. we'd love to have you address some of those again. thank you for being with us. this is the 2012 debate.

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you've got a new ad up in you have a new ad up in south carolina taking direct aim at senator santorum. you call him a corrupt -- a corporate lobbyist, a washington insider with a record of betrayal. you also call him corrupt in that ad. senator santorum is standing right here. your willing to stand by those charges and explain them? >> well it was a quote somebody did make a survey, and i think he came out as one of the top corrupt individuals because he took so much money from the lobbyists. but really what the whole -- there it goes again. >> they caught you not telling the truth, ron. >> but, really -- what really counts is his record. i mean, he's a big government, big spending individual. the group that called me corrupt was a group called crew. if you haven't been sued by crew, you aren't a conservative. it's a ridiculous charge. and you should know better. for a limited time, passages malibu

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live from st. anselm college in manchester, new hampshire, once again dirks ann sawyer, george stephanopoulos and wmur-tv's josh mcelveen. >> back in manchester, governor romney, back to you. senator santorum has been clear in his belief the supreme court was wrong when it decided a right to privacy was embedded in the constitution. he believes states have the right to ban contraception. i should add that he said he's not recommending that states do that -- >> i want to be clear. >> absolutely. giving you your due -- >> tenth amendment -- >> i want to get to that core question. governor romney, do you believe that states have the right to ban contraception or is that trumped by a constitutional right to privacy? >> george, this is an unusual topic that you're raising. states have a right to ban contraception? i can't imagine a state banning contraception. i can't imagine the

circumstances where a state would want to do so -- >> supreme court had to rule -- >> -- or a legislator of a state, i would totally and completely oppose any effort to ban contraception. so you're asking -- given the fact there's no state that wants to do so and i don't know of any candidate that wants to do so, you're asking could it constitutionally be done? we can ask our constitutionalist here -- [ laughter and applause ] >> i'm sure congressman paul -- >> okay, come on back -- >> but i'm asking you. do you believe states have that right or not? >> george, i don't know whether a state has a right to ban contraception. no state wants to. the idea of you putting forward things that states might want to do that no state wants to do and asking me whether they could do it or not is a silly thing. >> hold on a second. governor, you went to harvard law school. you know very well -- >> has the supreme court decided

that states do not have the right to provide contraception? >> yes, they have. 1965, griswold v. connecticut. >> i believe that the law of the land is as spoken by the supreme court, and if we disagree with the supreme court and occasionally i do, then we have a process under the constitution to change that decision, and it's known as the amendment process. and where we have, for instance, right now we're having issues that relate to same-sex marriage. my view is we should have a federal amendment to the constitution defining marriage as a relationship between a man and a woman. but i know of no reason to talk about contraception in this regard. >> you accept the supreme court decision finding the right to privacy in the constitution. >> i don't believe they decided that correctly. in my view, roe v. wade was improperly decided. it was based upon that same principle and in my view if we had justices like roberts, alito, thomas and scalia and more justices like that, they might well decide to return this issue to states as opposed to saying it's in the federal constitution. and, by the way, if the people say it should be in the federal constitution, then instead of

having unelected judges stuff it in there when it's not there, we should allow the people to express their own views through amendment and add it to the constitution. this idea that -- >> should that be done in this case? >> pardon? >> should that be done in this case? >> this case to allow states to ban contraception? no. states don't want to ban contraception. so why would we try to put it in the constitution? with regards to gay marriage, i told you that's when i would amend the constitution. contraception, it's working joust fine. just leave it alone. >> i understand that, but you've given two answers to the question. do you believe that the supreme court should overturn it or not? do i believe the supreme court should overturn roe v. wade? yes, i do. >> he mentioned my name. >> go ahead. >> i didn't know whether i got time when it was favorable or not. but thank you. no, i think the fourth amendment is very clear.

it's explicit in our privacy. you can't go into anybody's house and look at what they have or their papers or any private things without a search warrant. this is why the patriot act is wrong because you have a right of privacy by the fourth amendment. as far as selling contraceptives, the interstate commerce clause protects this because the interstate commerce clause was written not to impede trade between states but written to facilitate trade between the states. so if it's not illegal to import birth controls from one state to the next it would be legal to pass out birth control pills in that state. >> senator santorum. >> what's the question? >> the question -- the right to privacy and the response to congressman paul. >> well, congressman paul's talking about privacy under the fourth amendment which i agree with him. i don't necessarily agree that the patriot act violates that. obviously we have a right to privacy under that fourth amendment. that's not what the griswald decision nor the roe v. wade decision were about.

they created through a number of rights a new right to privacy that was not in the constitution. and what i -- that's, again, i sort of agree with romney's assessment, legal assessment, it created a right through boot strapping through creating something that wasn't there. i believe it should be overturned. i am for overturning roe versus wade. i do not believe we have a right in this country, in the constitution, to take a human life. i don't think that's -- i don't think our founders envisioned that. i don't think the writing of the constitution anywhere enables that. >> i want to turn now, if i can, from the constitutional elevated here to something closer to home and to maybe families sitting in their living rooms all across this country. yahoo! sends us questions, as you know. we have them from real viewers. and i'd like to post one because it is about gay marriage but at the level -- i would really love to be able to ask you what you

would say personally sitting in your living rooms to the people who ask questions like this. this is from phil in virginia. "given that you oppose gay marriage, what do you want gay people to do who want to form loving, committed, long-term relationships? what is your solution?" and speaker gingrich. >> well, i think what i would say is we want to make it possible to have those things that are most intimately human between friends occur. for example, you're in a hospital. if there are visitation hours, should you be allowed to stay. there ought to be ways to designate that. you want to have somebody in your will. there ought to be ways to designate that. but it is a huge jump from being understanding and considerate and concerned, which we should be, to saying we're, therefore, going to institute the sacrament of marriage as though it has no basis. the sacrament of marriage was based on a man and woman. has been for 3,000 years. is at the core of our civil civilization and is something

worth protecting and upholding. and i think protecting and upholding that doesn't mean you have to go out and make life miserable for others, but it does mean you make a distinction between a historic sacrament of enormous importance in our civilization and simply deciding it applies everywhere and it's just a civil right. it's not. it is a part of how we define ourselves. and i think that a marriage between a man and a woman is part of that definition. >> governor huntsman, you've talked about civil unions. how do you disagree with the others on this stage? >> well, personally i think civil unions are fair. i support them. i think there's such a thing as equality under the law. i'm a married man. i've been married for 28 years. i have seven kids. glad we're off the contraception discussion. 15 minutes worth, by the way. and i don't feel that my relationship is at all threatened by civil unions. on marriage, i'm a traditionalist. i think that ought to be saved for one man and one woman.

but i believe that civil unions are fair. and i think it brings a level of dignity to relationships and i believe in reciprocal beneficiary rights. i think they should be part of civil unions, as well. and states ought to be able to talk about this. i think it's absolutely appropriate. >> i'd like to go to senator santorum with a similar topic. we're in a state where it is legal for same-sex couples to marry. 1,800 couples have married since it became law here in new hampshire. they're trying to start families, some of them. your position on same-sex adoption. obviously you are in favor of traditional families. but are you going to tell someone they belong in -- as a ward of the state or in foster care rather than have two parents who want them? >> well, this isn't a federal issue. it's a state issue, number one. the states can make that determination in new hampshire. my feeling is this is an issue that should be -- i believe the issue of marriage itself is a federal issue.

that we can't have different laws with respect to marriage. we have to have one law. marriage is, as newt said, a foundational institution of our country and we have to have a singular law with respect to that. we can't have somebody married in one state and not married in another. once we -- if we were successful in establishing that, then this issue becomes moot. if we don't have a federal law, i'm certainly not going to have a federal law that bans adoption for gay couples when there are only gay couples in certain states. so this is a state issue, not a federal issue. >> let me ask you to follow up on that if you don't mind, senator. with those 1,800 -- we have a federal constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage, what happens to the 1,800 families who have married here? are their marriages basically illegitimate at this point? >> if with have -- if the constitution says marriage is between a man and woman, then marriage is between a man and a woman and, therefore, that's what marriage is and would be in this country. and those who are not men and women who are married would not be married. that's what the constitution

would say. >> if i can come back to the living room question again, governor romney. would you weigh in on the yahoo! question about what you would say sitting down in your living room to a gay couple who say we simply want to have the right to, as the person who wrote the e-mail said, we want gay people to form loving, committed, long-term relationships. in human terms, what would you say to them? >> the answer is that's a wonderful thing to do. and there's every right for people in this country to form long-term, committed relationships with one another. that doesn't mean they have to call it marriage or they have to receive the approval of the state and a marriage license and so forth for that to occur. there can be domestic partnership benefits or a contractual relationship between two people which would include as speaker gingrich indicated hospital visitation rights and the like. we can decide what kind of benefits we might associate with people would form those kind of relationships state by state.

but to say that marriage is something other than the relationship between a man -- a man and a woman i think is a mistake. and the reason for that is not that we want to discriminate against people or to suggest that the gay couples are not just as loving and can't also raise children well. well, but it's instead a recognition that for society as a whole, that the nation presumably will be better off if children are raised in a setting where there's a male and a female. and there are many cases where that's not possible, divorce, death, single parents, gay parents and so forth. but for society to say, we want to encourage through the benefits that we associate with marriage people that form partnerships between men and women and then raise children, which we think that will be the ideal setting for them to be raised. >> speaker gingrich -- >> i just want to raise -- since we spent this much time on these issues, i just want to raise the point about the news media bias. you don't hear the opposite question asked. should the catholic church be forced to close its adoption services in massachusetts

because it won't accept gay couples which is exactly what the state has done. should the catholic church be driven out of providing charitable services in the district of columbia because it won't give in to secular bigotry? should the catholic church find itself discriminated against by the obama administration on key delivery of services because of the bias and bigotry of the administration? the bigotry question goes both ways. there's a lot more anti-christian bigotry today than there is concerning the other side. none of it gets covered by the news media. [ applause ] >> as you can tell, the people in this room feel that speaker gingrich is absolutely right and i do too. i was in a state where the supreme court stepped in and said marriage is a relationship required under the constitution for people of the same sex to be able to marry. and john adams who wrote the constitution would be surprised. and it did exactly as speaker gingrich indicated. what happened was catholic charities that placed almost

half of the adoptive children of our state was forced to step out of being able to provide adoptive services and the state tried to find other places to help children. we have to recognize this decision about what we call marriage has consequences which goes far beyond a loving couple wanting to form a long-term relationship. that they can do within the law now. calling it marriage creates a whole host of problems for families, for the law, for the practice of religion, education. let me share this, 3,000 years of human history shouldn't be discarded so quickly. >> congressman paul, let me bring this to you. you're running here in the republican primary but you haven't promised to support the party's nominee in november. and you refuse to rule out running as a third party candidate if you fail to get the nomination. why not rule that out? >> well, i essentially have. it's just that i don't like absolutes like i will never do something but no --

>> you never vote for a debt ceiling. >> please don't interrupt me. so i have said this in the last go-around. they asked me that about 30 times. i think maybe you've asked me four or five already. and the answer's always the same. you know, no, i have no plans to do it. i don't intend to do it. and somebody pushed me a little bit harder and say, why don't you plan to do it and i say i don't want to. i have no intention. i don't know why a person can't reserve judgment and see how things turn out. in many ways, i see the other candidates as very honorable people, but i sometimes disagree with their approach to government. and i'd like to see some changes. i want to see changes. where they're talking about a little bit of a difference in foreign policy. an interest in the federal reserve. a change in the monetary policy. we haven't heard one minute of talk about cutting any spending. we've talked previously about cutting the military spending. that's cutting proposed increases.

this is why i have proposed we cut a whole trillion dollars that first year. if we're serious as republicans and conservatives, we have to cut. so i want to put as much pressure on them as i can. but beside, i'm doing pretty well, you know. third wasn't too bad. i wasn't too far behind. doing pretty well. catching up on mitt every single day. >> governor perry, do you think everyone on this stage should rule out third party candidacy? >> i think anyone on this stage is better than what we've got in place. let me just address this issue of gay marriage just very quickly. and it's a bigger issue, frankly. i am for a constitutional amendment that says that marriage is between a man and a woman at the federal level. but this administration's war on religion is what bothers me greatly. when we see an administration that will not defend the defense of marriage act, that gives their justice department clear

instructions to go take the ministerial exception away from our churches where that's never happened before, when we see this administration not giving money to catholic charities for sexually trafficked individuals because they don't agree with the catholic church on abortion, that is a war against religion and it's going to stop under a perry administration. [ applause ] >> i would like to turn now if i can back to foreign policy and governor huntsman, afghanistan, 90,000 troops tonight, and we salute them all, serving in afghanistan. what is the earliest you think they should be brought home? >> you know, we've been at the war on terror for ten years now. we've been in afghanistan. and i say we've got a lot to show for our efforts. and i as president would like to square with the american people on what we have to show for it. the taliban is no longer in power. we've run out al qaeda. they're now in sanctuaries.

we've had free elections. osama bin laden is no longer around. we have strengthened civil society. we've helped the military. we've helped the police. i believe it's time to come home. and i would say within the first year of my administration, which is to say the end of 2013, i would want to draw them down. i want to recognize afghanistan for what it is. it is not a counterinsurgency. i don't want to be nation building in southwest asia when this nation is in such need of repair. but we do have a counterterror mission in southwest asia, and that would suppose leaving behind maybe 10,000 troops. for intelligence gathering, for special forces rapid response capability and training. >> governor romney, time to come home? >> well, we want to bring our troops home as soon as we possibly can. and governor huntsman says the end of 2013. the president and the commanders are saying they think 2014 is a

better date. we'll get a chance to see what happens over the coming year. we want to bring our troops home as soon as we possibly can. and i will -- if i'm president, i will inform myself based upon the experience of the people on the ground, i want to make sure we hand off the responsibility to an afghan security force that is capable of maintaining the sovereignty of their nation from the taliban. but i can tell you this, i don't want to do something that would put in jeopardy much of the hard-earned success which we've had there, and i would bring our troops home as soon as we possibly can. of course based upon my own experience there, going there, informing myself of what's happening there and listening to the commanders on the ground. >> governor huntsman, you have a disagreement? >> yeah, i would have to tell mitt the president of the united states is the commander in chief. of course you get input and advice from a lot of different corners of washington, including the commanders on the ground. but we also defer to the commanders on the ground about 1967 during the vietnam war, and we didn't get very good advice then. here's what i think is around the corner in afghanistan. i think civil war is around the

corner in afghanistan. and i don't want to be the president who invests another penny in a civil war. i don't want to be the president who sends another man or woman to harm's way that we don't -- we're not able to bring back alive. i say we've got something to show for our mission. let's recognize that and let's move on. >> speaker gingrich, do you have any quarrel with that? >> well, i think -- look, i think we're asking the wrong questions. afghanistan is a tiny piece of a gigantic mess that is very dangerous. pakistan is unstable and they probably have between 100 and 200 nuclear weapons. iran is actively try to get nuclear weapons. they go out and practice closing the straits of hormuz where 1 out of every 6 barrels of oil goes through every day. if they close the straits of hormuz you have an industrial depression within months.

you have the muslim brotherhood winning the elections in egypt. the truth is we don't know who's in charge in libya. you have a regionwide crisis. which we have been mismanaging and underestimating which is not primarily a military problem. we're not going to go in and solve pakistan militarily. we're not going to go in and solve all these other things. look at the rate at which iraq is decaying. i mean they began decaying within 24 hours of our last troops leaving, and i think we need a fundamentally new strategy for the region comparable to what we developed to fight the cold war and i think it's a very big, hard, long-term problem. but it's not primarily a military problem. >> senator santorum, would you send troops back into iraq right now? >> well, i wouldn't right now -- >> if you were president -- >> what i would say is newt's right. we need someone who has a strong vision for the region and we have not had that with this president. he has been making mistakes at every turn. in iran. in egypt. i would argue libya, syria, israel. all of these places he has made mistakes on the ground that have