and we are laughing this morning because we just love coming to work early. good morning, everyone. welcome to the earlier part of "early start." i'm ashleigh banfield. >> and i'm zoraida sambolin. very glad to be here. we're bringing you the news from "a" to "z." let's get started. >> it's such a super day. super tuesday has become super

wednesday. mitt romney racking up six super states, including that classic cliff hanger in ohio. he's kind of talking like it's over, but did he land that knockout blow? >> no. >> if your support really means everything to ann and me, and i'm not going to let you down. i'm going to get this nomination. >> while rick santorum wins three states because mitt romney still cannot convince conservatives that he's the man. we're taking a look at the exit polls. this is my favorite part actually. different numbers are revealing some big problems for the front-runner. christine romans is breaking it all down. she's going to talk about electability and the economy and what folks are saying about that. >> i'm not sure it's my favorite part because the information is so revealing or whether it's christine romans, who's my favorite person. we're going to get to her in a moment. but after taking the most states and the most delegates on super

tuesday, mitt romney walking the walk and talking the talk, pretty much looking like the nominee, but all candidates are staying in the race. >> it was too close to call until very early into super wednesday, but romney was able to squeeze out the win over santorum. romney taking ohio, alaska, idaho, massachusetts, and virginia, where neither santorum nor newt gingrich on the ballot. rick santorum taking oklahoma, tennessee, and north dakota. and newt gingrich, as he predicted, won his home state of georgia. >> mitt romney pretty much dominating in two key voting blocs in ohio. dominating in women voters, dominating in catholic voters. those two blocs helping to pro hell him to the narrow victory in ohio. >> what's the updated delegate count? romney 396, santorum 158,

gingrich, 153, ron paul, 60. >> all the people behind us who you can sometimes see behind us, they work very hard at us, and it's a very difficult job. the delegate formulas are crazy. it's a moving formula. this is a moving piece. you have to keep your eye on cnn to see how the delegate count changes. extremely long, incredibly close. that's pretty much how things played out in ohio. it's the biggest surprise, kind of. really the biggest psychological prize in the super tuesday conte contest. even before mitt romney won ohio, smiling, glad handing, this guy had already set his sights down the road to the nomination. >> i'm not going to let you down. i'm going to get this nomination. tonight we're doing some

counting. we're counting up the delegates for the convention, and it looks good. and we're counting down the days until november, and that looks better. >> as for rick santorum, win or lose ohio, he didn't change his pitch as the outspent underdog overcoming the odds. >> i'm excited to win the race. i'm outspent 12-to-1, and it's great to be in the race. >> the question now becomes where do romney and santorum go from here? and the other two guys way, way back in line. mark preston is live in atlanta. mark preston, the fact you are in atlanta this morning is a problem because i brewed a triple espresso for you because of your very long night, and i'm holding it here for you in new york. so we'll just have to pretend that you're awake. here's my question. the guy wins six states. mitt romney pulls off ohio, and he pulls off six big states in super tuesday, and still we're having this conversation that he hasn't delivered the knockout punch.

why? >> because rick santorum actually came out with three big wins. and rick santorum neither has the organization nor the money right now in this race for the republican nomination. although we shouldn't underestimate the fact that mitt romney did have six wins. he did win ohio last night. had he lost ohio -- or i should say had he lost ohio just a couple of hours ago, we would now be talking about how mitt romney would be in trouble for this republican nomination. however, we're talking about how mitt romney is going to try to go on and try to collect delegates and close out this very, very divisive fight for the republican nomination. >> divisive fight, but if you look at the delegate count, romney is a shade below 400. 396 delegate. rick santorum is a long way behind with 158, and then you've got newt and you've got ron paul. to the average guy who doesn't know the arcane and fine points of how the election works, that

sort of looks like he's got all the momentum and he's on the move, and it's a fait accompli, but it isn't, is it? >> no. because you need 1,400 delegates to secure the nomination. while super tuesday is important, we're looking ahead to kansas, who is already holding caucuses, and on to next tuesday where mississippi and alabama will be holding primaries. as we talk now, we have the candidates setting up their days to look forward to the contest. we're going to see rick santorum in kansas for an event, and he's going to move over to mississippi to try to secure support in those two states. meanwhile, newt gingrich is going to be in four events in alabama. let's not forget while newt gingrich won georgia last night, he was unable to win tennessee. he's talked about a southern strategy for his path to the nomination. who's not on the campaign trail? mitt romney. he's going to be raising money in boston. and ron paul, who has yet to win a contest, is also on the cnot

campaign trail. >> i feel like raising money is on the campaign trail because you have to put on a happy face for that too. i'm still waiting to find out who the southern son is, whether it's newt gingrich or rick santorum. >> it is six minutes past the hour. to the big prize, ohio goes to mitt romney but barely. >> a bit of a squeaker, folks. here's the final tally if you had to go to sleep before it was over. buckeye state, mitt romney with 38% of the vote. rick santorum edging in right next door with 37% of the vote. newt gingrich getting completely trounced at 15%. and ron paul was doing what ron paul does best, he comes in last a lot, but he comes in with really good statements about it and sounds real positive going forward. >> he's always fun. christine romans is breaking down the exit polling for us. how did ohio play out the way that it did? >> ladies, there's three numbers

about ohio that are important. 63 delegate thes at risk. 7.9 unemployment rate. and one-quarter of all homes under water. these are the exit polls. we asked more than 20 questions of people in ohio as they were leaving. you can see from the faces on the screen who was winning what. you see a lot of romney and a lot of santorum. talk about top candidate quality and who's the best to beat the president. we'll start with electability. who can be the president? of those who said that was the top quality, who can beat the president, 52% chose mitt romney. 27% went for santorum. let's talk about the top issue. i'm actually a little surprised by this one. of those who said the economy is the top issue, 41% said romney. 33% went for santorum. a little more narrow of a distinction than i would have

thought simply because mitt romney has such a long history in business, right i want to take a look at how it broke down depending on how much money you make. what your income was and how that affected how you are likely to vote. let's pull this out in a pie chart format. like we've seen in a lot of places, the more money you make, the more likely in ohio they were to go for mitt romney. as you go down the income ladder, rick santorum starts to appeal to people. they call these lunch bucket democrats. people who make right in the middle. now they call them sam's club republicans. this new breed of republican, middle or lower income republican who seems to be voting more for santorum. 37% for those who make less than $50,000 a year. a lot of states, ladies. sit tight. we're going to go through the numbers. >> lunch bucket. >> have you heard that? lunch bucket democrats, sam's club republicans. every election season, there's

new labels, soccer moms, angry moms. >> why not costco? why sam's club? >> because the costco income is $90,000 on average. >> the things you learn. i love this, christine. >> it's sad these numbers come exploding out of my mouth like that. >> you are creepy. >> but so a costco republican would have a higher income probably. that's interesting. thanks. >> nine minutes past the hour here. this was not the outcome the romney camp was hoping for. rivals rick santorum and newt gingrich doing more than enough to extend this race. >> we survived the national elite's effort to kill us in the summer because of you, because people who said we are not going to allow the elite to decide who we are going to nominate. >> we have won the west, the midwest, and the south, and we're ready to win across this country. >> everybody still sounding the

same. let's talk to our panelists live from chicago. we have conservative commendator lenny mcallister, and live from san diego cnn.com contributor ruben navarrete. thank you, gentlemen, for joining us this morning. lenny, i'm going to start with you because you're all atwitter over our conversations. we've been talking about your predictions. you just tweeted. romney got seven states. i'm off by one. will she give me hell about being off by one on national television? you betcha i'm going to. but i'm also going to deal with your predictions. before the election, you said, if romney won convincingly in virginia, this would be over. 60% of the vote to ron paul's 40%. this does not sound convincing, though. you say the republican establishment is biting their nails. explain. >> they're biting their nails because i feel he needed to be closer to the mid-60s in order to signal to the rest of the country that, listen, when there's two people on the ballot, the romney sentiment is

a lot stronger than the non-romney send itiment. if you look at virginia, the weakest of the four got 40% over mitt romney. you still have a strong not mitt romney sentiment out there. you look at tennessee. mitt romney had the establishment behind him in tennessee. he needed that seventh state. he needed to win a southern state to be able to signal to folks i can win in a close race. i can win a southern state other than virginia where there's only two of us on the ballot. and it signaled to the rest of the states moving westward that i am the guy. start getting behind me. that didn't happen in virginia. he wasn't even close in tennessee. and you will now see that this race will extend. if he gets a big win, the republican establishment is very happy. if he gets a loss in ohio and loses in tennessee, the republican establishment is extremely nervous. instead, the republican establishment and many republicans are probably just shaking their head and saying, wow, more malaise as we continue

through the spring. >> ruben, jump in on that. >> i agree. in the one sense, it was a great night for romney because of ohio. you can't stop talking about ohio. this is a very significant win because, let's not forget, ohio is probably one of the most important states in november. it's in that purple area. it's in play. it's an important state. but in the overall, if you look at the big picture, he won in virginia where he only faced ron paul on the ballot. romney won in vermont and his home state of massachusetts. so that's sort of the same neighborhood. this is not a very convincing performance by mitt romney. >> romney outspent santorum almost four-to-one in ohio. i know it's a win, but how do you call it a win? >> santorum can call it a wip because he came within a whisker of beating mitt romney of the that plays well with his supporters. but the argument is we're talking about electability. people are voting for mitt romney because they think he can beat barack obama.

if that's the case, why don't they just nominate him and get it over with? he can't win the nomination, how can he beat barack obama? >> the jfk comment really bit him in the tail. if he doesn't make the comment about jfk, a fellow catholic, if he doesn't make the comment for president obama being a snob for wanting to go to college. that's what people do, they work blue collar to send their kids to college to get white collar jobs for the next generation. those two comments and without having the structure to be on the ballot throughout the state of ohio was the difference of 50,000 votes that he lost by. if you can not be on the ballot throughout the state and still make the front-runner sweat, that's not good for mitt romney. yes, it's a win, but it's not a convincing win, and it doesn't reassure mitt romney that he's a strong candidate going into november. >> it says that romney is losing in the areas that republicans

are likely to win in the fall, which is the rural areas, and winning in the areas that democrats are likely to win, which is urban areas. how problematic is that, lenny, as we look into the long term? >> well, this is going to be the narrative from president obama. and other candidates on the republican side have already said this. you can have obama and obama light. if you're going to go with obama and obama light, why not keep the incumbent that's been there for four years and has four years of presidential experience. the economy is getting better. he's doing very well with foreign affairs. he's taken out osama bin laden. he's taken al qaeda and pushed them into the background a little bit. why vote for obama light? and that is becoming the narrative that a lot of conservatives are getting very nervous about, which is why you still see rick santorum without the structure, without the money winning tennessee. that's why you still see rick santorum winning oklahoma. that's why you see rick santorum winning north dakota. that's why you'll see this race continue on through march and through april and beyond. >> lenny, for a second there, i

thought you were working for the other side. lenny and ruben, thanks for joining us this morning. we'll talk to you again shortly. >> at 15 minutes past 4:00 a.m. on the east coast. still ahead, why democrats say super tuesday was a great night for them. and also, we love hearing from sarah palin, especially when she's in wa sila. these are the pictures of her out on the stump, but when she goes to vote at her own polling station, will she admit who she's voting for? and will she still jump in this race? >> anything is possible. i don't close any doors that perhaps would be open out there. >> oh, it just got better, didn't it, folks? our cnn exclusive interview with the former vice presidential nominee. >> there are lots of bunny rabbits that run through. i'm the tortoise. i just take one step at a time.

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president obama seems to believe he's unchecked by the constitution. he operates by command instead of by consensus. in a second term, he'd be unrestrained by the demands of re-election, and if there's one thing we cannot afford, it's four years of barack obama with no one to answer to. >> that looks like one very confident candidate. mitt romney picking up six wins on super tuesday. why is it then that the democrats say that's just a great night for them? >> joining us now, hillary rosen, democratic strategist and cnn contributor. thank you. we know that you have been working way overtime. we really appreciate having you here. >> no problem. hi, ladies. >> what is your overall reaction to the super tuesday results? did anything there surprise you? >> i guess i was surprised that mitt romney outspending the other republicans four and five to one. didn't get in bigger margins in more states. but overall, i think it was kind of a mixed bag night for all of the candidates.

>> but mitt romney still sounding very presidential. he's setting himself up as a contrast to barack obama. listen to this. >> president obama raised the national debt. i will cut, cap, and balance the budget. finally. he passed obama care. i will repeal obama care. he lost our aaa credit rating. i will restore our aaa credit rating. >> it may not have been a decisive win for him, right? but in the ohio exit polls, romney is really trusted on the economy. are you worried about that in a battle with president obama? >> no, i guess i'm not because everything mitt romney said in that speech is wrong. actually, it's mitt romney's plan that adds $5 trillion to the deficit, and president obama's budget cuts $4 trillion. we've had 23 straight months of job growth, and when mitt romney was governor of massachusetts,

they were 47 out of 50 in job creation in the state of massachusetts. >> but you really can't blame the governor for that. >> well, he said he knows how to create jobs. that's what he did when he was running a state. so, yeah, you've got to go on your record. but you know, i think that this is kind of the democrats' dilemma right now. it's great that the republicans are all fighting with each other and this is going to go on for quite some time. the thing that might not be so great -- and some of my democratic friends disagree with me on -- is that going head to head with mitt romney for the next several months would actually be fairly good for president obama because mitt romney is going to talk down this economy. he's a pessimist about it. he doesn't really have any answers that are new, and i think that the american people wouldn't like that the longer it went on. i think that president obama could handle that conversation and debate really well. >> there's something that you said last night -- and i want to be clear again -- you're a

democratic strategist. last night you were saying that democrats have a tough battle ahead of them because romney keeps having these ugly wins. could you explain that. >> the one thing about mitt romney. democrats love to talk about how weak mitt romney is as a candidate, and he is in my view. but every time he gets counted out. santorum is raging ahead in ohio, gingrich is going to surge from south carolina. every time he's been down, he has a good organization, he has a smart campaign team. he gets up, he recovers, and he chalks up some wins. there's nothing better in a long-term campaign than somebody who can recover and win. you know, that's going to make november -- we're going to take this right down to the end. >> it's going to be a long haul. another thing you said last night that you wanted to talk about. you said internal democratic polling asked women about the race. you said that women were not

paying attention before and now they are paying attention. why and what effect is that having? >> that's a really great question because not a lot of discussion about women in this campaign. virtually nothing about women from the republican candidates until we had -- >> except for the contraception issue. >> until all of a sudden we find ways to discriminate against women in their health care coverage yet again. do you ever notice how, when men have medical issues, they're medical. but when women have medical issues, they're somehow political. >> i think i may agree with you this morning on that one. >> so what's happened, though, is women historically over the last year have paid much less attention to this election, but the republicans have actually woken women up with this crazy conversation about contraception. >> i know that mitt romney did well with women and catholics in some of the exit polls. we're going to get to that

later. i appreciate your time. thank you for being with us. i think we're going to chat with you again. >> it is 24 minutes past 4:00 in the morning on the east coast. still ahead on the early, early version of "early start," super tuesday not as super as mitt romney hoped. he may look happy, but if you look behind the numbers, another story brewing. also, peyton manning, wow, what a guy, right? >> a little injured but -- >> now reportedly parting ways with the indianapolis colts. how does it happen that you can be the most prolific passer in franchise history and still end up cut from the team? >> money. expensive. >> big time free agent. where do you think he's headed? i'm always looking out for small ways to be more healthy. like splenda® essentials™ no calorie sweeteners. this bowl of strawberries is loaded with vitamin c. and now, b vitamins to boot. coffee doesn't have fiber. unless you want it to. splenda® essentials™ are the first and only

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good morning to you. 28 minutes past 4:00 a.m.

you heard me. >> what happened? >> we both just woke up early and came into work. it's a mistake. no, it's early because of the super tuesday coverage. >> we've got christine romans with us. we've got you working overtime, girl. >> let's give you your super tuesday scorecard. mitt romney picking up six states, including a big one, ohio, edging rick santorum by just one percentage point there. santorum finished strong, taking three states, including a surprise win in north dakota. newt gingrich won his home state of georgia. meantime, president obama held his first full-time news conference of the year on super tuesday. the president blasting his critics for, quote, beating the drums of war by demanding the united states take military action to deal with iran. >> the one thing we have not done is we haven't launched a war. if some of these folks think that it's time to launch a war, they should say so, and they

should explain to the american people exactly why they would do that and what the consequences would be. everything else is just talk. syrian forces pounding rebel held towns overnight, blasting a bridge used by refugees who are escaping to lebanon. meantime, the u.n. humanitarian chief arriving today to urge the government to allow relief for civilians caught in the cross fire. the suspect in the chardon high school shooting returns to juvenile court. suspect t.j. lane spoke for the first time at a preliminary hearing. lane is charged with three counts of murder. a hearing next month will determine if lane will be tried as an adult. the indianapolis colts will reportedly release peyton manning today. that official announcement expected at a news conference. the star quarterback sat out last season with a neck injury. he was due a $28 million bonus tomorrow. manning becomes perhaps the most

coveted free agent in league history. speaking of football, the nfl's new orleans saints admitting to a bounty system that paid bonuses for vicious hits on opposing players n. in a joint statement, coach sean payton and mickey loomis took full responsibility for the practice and said it wouldn't be repeated. and a big day for apple investors. the company expected to unveil the ipad 3 today in san francisco. it will come with a faster processor, a better camera, and siri. >> if anderson cooper thinks he's the only guy with breaking news, he's got nothing on us. this just in to cnn. we have a brand new delegate count. low budget, so here's your drum roll. >> right off the top. cnn political director mark preston live in atlanta, you have that for us. >> low budget, but at 4:30 in

the morning, very important news in the race for the republican nomination. cnn has a new delegate estimate. we talk about the race for the republican nomination, and how do you win it? you collect delegates. we have just now added in the alaska delegates. let's take a look. >> broke 400. >> mitt romney broke 400, 404. rick santorum at 165. newt gingrich at 106. and ron paul at 66 delegates. >> look how close santorum and gingrich are. >> they are very close. but the big question now for newt gingrich is what's going to happen on tuesday. his whole campaign is predicated on having a southern strategy. he only won georgia. he did not win oklahoma or tennessee last night. he really needs to do well in mississippi and alabama, who are voting on tuesday. >> hey, mark, i love looking at the maps. can we look at the winning states? can you tell us what the map tells you? >> yes, sure. if you want to just pull it up right here, it really shows that

things are broken up last night. we expected mitt romney to do very well in the northeast, and he did. he won massachusetts and vermont. virginia, which should have been a very important state, wasn't contested very much because only mitt romney and ron paul were actual loly on the ballot. rick santorum and newt gingrich didn't qualify. but romney hasn't won in the south. we were all talking about ohio. he needed to win in the rust belt. mitt romney did that. his next effort is to show that he can win in the south. he'll have that opportunity on tuesday. >> it's far from over. mark preston live for us. thank you. >> 4:33 on the east coast. we kept asking who's going to be able to deliver the knockout punch? can mitt deliver that punch? everybody is saying, no, not so much. here to talk about it from chicago, conservative columnist lenny mcallister. and from san diego, cnn contributor ruben navarrete.

lenny, i was reading in politico a comment saying mitt has failed to claim the front-runner status here. at six states, what exactly was he supposed to do last night to be able to claim front-runner status? >> what he should have been able to do, what people wanted to see him do was win something he wasn't expected to win. we have to remember, even with ohio, santorum had a huge lead that he lost. when you're losing that lead in ohio, the guy with the money and the structure should be able to close the gap and win. that's exactly what romney did. however, you look at a state like tennessee, you're hoping that with the structure and the establishment behind him, he can finally break into some new ground, win a southern state where it's actually a competition there, and be able to say, listen, i'm gaining momentum. i'm gaining new ground. i'm gaining new support. and thus we're able to move forward into tampa and move forward into november. that's what people wanted to see

from mitt romney when it came to momentum, when it came to claiming front-runner status. that did not happen last night. that's the reason why people are still tentative. >> it sure looked like it, though, the way that guy campaigned. almost looks like a cyborg. he was made for campaigning. he gets up there, and he looks like the presidential candidate. in ohio, told really interesting numbers about why people pulled that lever. economy on 54% of their minds. the budget deficit on 26% of their minds. then you get down to the social issues. abortion, only 12% gave a hoot. illegal immigration was almost nonexistent at 5%. if rick santorum was basing so much of his campaign, particularly in ohio, on those social issues, i'm still having a tough time figuring out how he did so well there, particularly since he was outspent in the advertising. the negative ads were just trouncing him. what the heck happened there? >> what the heck happened is that mitt romney continues to have the same liabilities he's

had since we sat back here and talked about the iowa caucus. throughout every state, we've talked about the same set of liabilities. the republican base doesn't like him, doesn't believe him, doesn't trust him, and can't relate to him. other than that, he's doing fine with them, right? those are all serious problems. >> it just defies logic. other than, ruben, i will give you this. on that little chart i showed you with economy, budget, abortion, immigration, electability wasn't on it. >> look at the polling. you've seen the polling. they'll ask a question about does he believe what he's saying? typically, what republicans say is that mitt romney will say anything to get elected. that's why they have chosen anything but romney. that's what the anything but romney campaign is about. it's always a reflection on romney's sincerity. even if you donlike what he's saying, he could sell you down the river in november. >> while we're talking about

santorum who's the energizer bunny here who can do no wrong, he's done some wrong. he screwed things up in ohio. i'm not sure had he might have been able to win ohio had he gotten those congressional delegates on the ballot like he should have. i'm not so sure he could have done well in virginia. not on the ballot in virginia. if you make those kinds of mistakes this early in the game, can't we extrapolate that he might not be as organized as he needs to be in a general election? >> well, what does organization mean? organization means money. it means people believing that he could actually win some of these contests. people were not believing that he could win. let's go back to the origin of this. july, august, september. people liked rick santorum in ohio, but they said, oh, he's not going to catch up. as recently as december, he was averaging about 2.7% in the polls. he was tied with jon huntsman. people did not expect him to be able to compete. >> are you saying his screw-ups don't matter?

>> no. what i'm saying is these screw-ups a lot of times come from not having the organization or the money to get the volunteers and drive yourself onto the ballot. let's go back to the electability issue for just a second. >> hurry. >> i want to start seeing polls that ask people the question, does electability mean that you think he can actually beat the candidate or he has the structure and money to go to november? i think people are saying the electability issue with romney because he has the structure and the money, not because he can actually beat president obama on the issues. if he did, he'd have more support now within the base. >> lenny mcallister and ruben navarrete, don't go anywhere. everybody on this team is working overtime. you do not get an escape on this one. >> lenny is actually a night owl. he's tweeting in the middle of the night. so he hasn't slept. >> you could say we are too. still ahead, mitt romney squeezing out a win in ohio really early this morning. santorum was ahead most of the night. the results are showing a huge

party divide. however, this is a state with a knack for picking presidents, right? we're going to dig deeper into the numbers. we're going to see what this could mean for mitt romney and his chances in november. and cnn catches sarah palin on the wasila caucus cam. what if her name comes up on convention night? what will she do? will it be palin for the save? >> anything's possible. i would seriously consider whatever i can do to help our country to put things back on the right track. >> well, that could be fun. a special early edition of "early start" is back after a quick break. [ male announcer ] lately, there's been a seismic shift

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way too much coffee this morning, miss banfield. >> you get wired when you're up all night dealing with the delegate counts. >> we're counting delegates. that's what we're doing. >> that victory in ohio narrow, but it kept super tuesday from becoming a super disaster for mitt romney. >> here is the scorecard. mitt romney eking out a win. how did he do it? here's cnn's john king. >> reporter: mitt romney can claim to be the biggest winner on super tuesday in part because he won the biggest contested prize, and that was the state of ohio. early on, rick santorum was ahead. then romney, then santorum, then romney, then santorum. in the end, governor romney winning. how did he do it? you can see, if you look at the map of the state of ohio, a lot of counties for rick santorum. motor vehicle of these counties smaller, rural counties. yes, senator santorum winning by a decent margin, but look at the vote count. romney won down here, southeast

of the state, hamilton county, always important. look at this margin, 20 points, and about 16,000 votes in this hamilton county here. key to governor romney's victory. go to the northeast corner of the state, cuyahoga county, where cleveland is, nearly a 20-point victory for governor romney over senator santorum. add other key urban and suburban areas. romney wins in akron and the suburbs. youngstown and the suburbs, romney wins by a smaller margin but still a victory. franklin county, 10% of the population, not as big a margin as in the corners, but romney wins again. his wins in urban and suburban areas offset huge santorum gains in the rural area. so a state where santorum was ahead a few weeks ago, romney

ekes out a narrow victory. it gives him the big prize on super tuesday, and most importantly, it gives him this. the moral argument he won a key battle ground state. romney had already won michigan. now he's won ohio. it helps him make this case. if this state were people, governor romney has a much harder time going forward saying i am your front-runner. ohio the biggest prize on super tuesday. >> i think john king should be able to go to sleep now. that's my official response. 4:40 on the east coast. what a night. >> a huge night for ohio. dennis kucinich losing his bid for re-election in the republican primary. he was defeated by veteran congresswoman margie captor. the two congressmen forced to face off because of new district lines. >> that's a huge story. holy cow, dennis kucinich. and congresswoman captor is going to go head to head with

the republican candidate. are you ready? >> this deserves a drum roll. >> it's joe the plumber. what you might not remember is his real name, sam wuerzelbache. he became famous in 2008 when he challenged president obama on his economic plan. coming up, mr. sarah palin be a game changer and enter the 2012 presidential rate? guess what? she has not ruled it out. find out who she told us and who she voted for on super tuesday. here's a total right turn. a new warning from the fda, not how you want to wake up. apparently, there's mercury being found in soaps and skin cremes. you'll need to know if you're affected by this.

it is 4:49 a.m. on the east coast. we're on an hour early because we love you. welcome back to "early start." i'm ashleigh banfield. >> and i'm zoraida sambolin. time to check in for morning headlines. brand new delegate numbers for you coming in after the super tuesday contest. mitt romney now leading the pack with 404 delegates. santorum and gingrich trailing far behind in a close race for second. results have also come in now for alaska with romney winning that state and five others, including a nail biting victory in ohio. he beat rick santorum there by

just one percentage point. santorum finishing strong, taking three states last night. newt gingrich won his home state of georgia. ron paul did not win any. president obama choosing super tuesday to announce his plan to lower the cost of your mortgage. the president planning to lower refinancing fees for millions of fha home loans. his administration predicts that change could lower the average mortgage payment by about $1,000 a year for 2 million to 3 million people. detectives reveal in court that tyler clementi, the rutgers college student who killed himself after being secretly broadcast over the internet, viewed his roommate's twitter page 38 times right up until the day he died and saved screen shots of two messages posted there. clementi's roommate dharun ravi is accused of using a web cam to screen clementi's gay encounter. he posted images from the web screen on twitter.

we'll hear next month whether ohio shooting suspect t.j. lane will be tried as an adult. lane is charged with three counts of aggravated murder at the chardon high shooting. he appeared in court for a pretrial hearing, telling the judge he did understand the charges against him. and a new warning from the fda. mercury discovered in anti-aging and skin lightening creams and soaps. these products are made overseas. they're sold in the u.s., mainly in latino, african, asian, and middle eastern neighborhoods. these products claim to remove age spots, wrinkles, other blemishes. officials say, if you have a product that fits this description, you have to stop using it right now. mercury is highly toxic. exposure can cause brain and kidney damage. the winners of last month's $336.4 million powerball jackpot is an 81-year-old woman from rhode island. the ticket was sold at a stop

and shop store in newport. the lump sum payment will be $210 million. whoa. usually, i say something, now be careful, plan for the long term, make sure that you really have really good estate planning. honey, you spend it. you can have whatever you want. go for it. >> get a yacht. get a mega-yacht. she went to go get rainbow ice cream or something. that was her mission, to go get rainbow ice cream. which proves to me everyone should eat ice cream on a regular basis. thanks, christine. 53 minutes past the hour here. look who cnn found at the wasila, alaska, caucus site. yes, sarah palin. >> she's somewhere in there. >> trust me. is she right there? >> not yet. she's coming any minute now. >> there she is on the right-hand side. way over in the green jacket. >> she stopped to answer a few questions when she showed up to vote yesterday. >> and sarah palin did not shoot down any possibilities of actually running for office, big

office, presidential office in 2016. and then went as far as saying wouldn't be so bad to even swoop in this year on convention night. have a look. >> if we wind up with an open convention and someone wants to place your name, throw your name into the hat, would you stop them? would you be open to that? >> as i say, anything is possible. i don't close any doors that perhaps would be open out there. so, no, i wouldn't close that door. my plan is to be at that convention. i would seriously consider whatever i can do to help our country, to put things back on the right track, our economy, the foreign policy proposals that we have to see put forward in order to secure our homeland. and the americans especially are brave fighting men and women who are overseas right now in places that perhaps we shouldn't be right now. anything that i can do to help, i will be willing to help. >> in that legume colored green

nra jacket, she first resisted our interview, but then admitted a little later on she voted for newt gingrich. we got it out of her. >> legume must be a word of the day. good gracious, really? >> it was yesterday's. i couldn't get it in the show yesterday. i've got two more to go. check our tweets. coming up, a winning wednesday or maybe not. depends who you're talking to. super tuesday results. something for everyone. a little something something for everyone in their treat bag. primaries and caucuses adding up to delegates for all the presidential hopefuls. what about that guy? how well did he do compared to the other guys? i'm always looking out for small ways to be more healthy. like splenda® essentials™ no calorie sweeteners. this bowl of strawberries is loaded with vitamin c. and now, b vitamins to boot. coffee doesn't have fiber. unless you want it to. splenda® essentials™ are the first and only

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ahead on "early start," a truly super tuesday. spinning the wins and losses from the biggest day of the presidential race so far. >> and we've got the results from every contest. we're going to give each one to you. you'll have to take notes. male d standard in anti-aging. roc® retinol. found in roc® retinol correxion deep wrinkle night cream.

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nomination. >> mitt romney lands his lead with super tuesday wins but can't land the knockout blow. >> we need a fighter. >> rick santorum keeps hanging around thanks to the romney doubters in the reddest of red states. >> we have won in the west, the midwest, and the south, and we're ready to win across this country. >> and newt gingrich. have you learned not to count him out? >> there are lots of bunny rabbits that run through. i am the tortoise. i just take one step at a time. >> the republican race moves forward on your early start. and a very good morning to you. it's two minutes past 5:00 a.m. on the east coast. and it's a very "early start." >> i'm ashleigh banfield. >> and i'm zoraida sambolin. let's get started. it is the morning after super tuesday. all candidates are still standing, but mitt romney is starting to sound more like the nominee. here's where we stand the morning after. romney took ohio and alaska, two

races that weren't called until most of you were sound asleep. he also won massachusetts and virginia. rick santorum taking tennessee and idaho. and newt gingrich won his home state of georgia. new delegate estimate. romney at 404. santorum at 165. gingrich at 106. and ron paul at 66. that's not the number we wanted to put up for you. >> that's how he did with the catholic vote. we're going to get to that in a minute. mitt romney telling his supporters that he likes that math. >> tonight we're doing some counting. we're counting up the dell the gats f -- delegates for the convention, and that looks good. and we're counting down the days until november, and that looks even better. >> folks are working very, very hard to bring you the numbers. so i apologize for the graphic. >> mitt romney squeaked by in ohio. 44% of catholics chose romney.

31% chose santorum. political editor paul steinhauser is in columbus, ohio, and he is breaking down those numbers for us. >> aren't you, paul? are you there? can you hear us? >> i am right here. >> and you're looking nice and bright and chipper this morning. >> reporter: thank you. always for you guys. it was the closest of victories, no doubt about it. i think you can say everyone was a winner on super tuesday because all four candidates did kind of what they wanted to do. let's take a look at ohio. of it a romney victory by just about 10,000 votes. you mentioned the catholic vote. that helped him here. if you look at those exit polls, he had trouble with very, very conservative voters. he had trouble with born again christians, evangelicals, and blue collar workers who voted in this contest. advertising dollars helped. they vastly outspent the santorum campaign here in ohio. let's talk about santorum. you mentioned his victories. let's take a look at tennessee. he had a big lead there in

tennessee at one time. things tightened up. in the win, he won by nine percentage points, a pretty convincing victory there. he also took oklahoma, as we thought he would, and north dakota. that was a big surprise for him. newt gingrich did what he said he needed to do and did it convincingly. look at the vote totals in georgia. it was a very, very big win for newt gingrich there. so they all came away a winner in one aspect. and ron paul won more delegates. he didn't take a state. he would have liked to have done that, but he did get more delegates. >> now we're headed south. we're talking about the conservative vote there. what can we expect? >> reporter: the calendar ahead at least for the next couple of weeks is not so favorable to mitt romney. he did what he needed to do by winning a lot of delegates. look what's next? kansas, those caucuses on saturday. rick santorum will be in kansas today. a very conservative state, a lot like oklahoma. as you mentioned, down south, mississippi and alabama are the

big two primaries next tuesday. hawaii as well. everyone is asking me if i get to go to hawaii. not going to happen. those southern states are going to be favorable to santorum and gingrich. we've got a while to go. no real big, big day again until april 24th when new york, pennsylvania, and three other states have primaries. zoraida? >> a lot of people are asking whether gingrich will actually drop out of the race now. some folks saying, that would be really bad news for romney, wouldn't it? we're going to talk about it later. >> reporter: he would not like that. >> thanks for clearing up those numbers. i vote for you to go to hawaii, for what it's worth. >> reporter: i like that. thank you. >> just so it ain't me. i'm telling you, i'm not in bikini mode. that's what i'm saying. >> i'd go anyway. >> you're always in bikini mode. >> i'm certainly in warm weather mode. keep an eye on the bottom third of your screen. that's where we'll be posting the results and the delegate

results from each of the ten super tuesday states. those numbers are changing. >> this may not have been the outcome that mitt romney was hoping for. i'm sure he's thrilled with ohio, but those rivals, those pesky rivals, rick santorum and newt gingrich really picking away at him and doing more than enough to keep this race alive. >> we survived the national elite's effort to kill us in the summer because of you, because of people who said we are not going to allow the elite to decide. >> this is a pig night tonigbig lots of states, we're going to win a few and lose a few. we're going to get a whole bunch of gold medals and a whole pack full of silver medals.

>> john king is with us this morning. smiling away because he loves this wonky stuff. and also live from atlanta is strategist maria car ddona. all right, you two. i want to put up a map. the map is of mitt romney's wins last night. the win i wanted to put it up is because it shows a very disparate kind of win. take a look at all those regions. he's got wins in the northeast. he's got wins in the south. he's got wins in that blue collar belt. and he's got wins sort of way out west in libertarian states and alaska as well. here's my question, john avalon, doesn't that sound like a guy who can pull off a general election win if he can cover wins in all those kinds of states? >> that's exactly the argument team romney is making today. if you outspend your opponents four-to-one, and you're struggling to put rick santorum away, you clearly haven't won the appeal of your base.

the math of this process, because it's proportional, does not lead to a knockout punch. mitt romney still has a long way to go, more than 1,000 delegates. by my calculation, the earliest he could clinch this could be may. so this is going to go on. that's just the reality. the next couple of contests unlikely to be friendly to mitt romney. >> although i'm still fascinated by the facts that all sorts of different kinds of folks and different strokes turn out for him and like him. here's someone else that lots of different strokes for different folks like, one sarah palin. she's emerged from the ethereal clouds of alaska to give us a great sound bite about running, even as soon as this year for 2012. let me have her tell you, and then we'll talk on the other side. here she is. >> it's the open convention question. if we wind up with an open convention, and someone wants to throw your name into the hat, would you stop them? would you be open to that? >> as i say, anything is possible. i don't close any doors that

perhaps would be open out there. so, no, i wouldn't close that door. my plan is to be at that c conventi convention. >> all i can say is yea. maria cardona, say what you will. she has her lovers and has her haters, but doesn't she energize people? that's what's missing in this race right now. people are just fatigued by these four. >> i think that's exactly right. and that's one of romney's problems. he not only hasn't been able to seal the deal but even his own supporters aren't passionately looking to him in terms of someone who really moves the whole republican coalition that he's going to need not just to really clinch the nomination as soon as possible, but to go into the general as a strong, competitive candidate. i completely agree with john, which is that's how his campaign is going to spin last night, which is that he was able to win everywhere. but the fact of the matter is

that he was not able to win key southern states that most republicans will need to win in the jgeneral election, and he's tanking with independents, john avalon's people, he's tanking with latinos, he's tanking with women. while he might have won last night, he still has not come over the finish line to clinch this nomination. even at the end of the day, most people still think that he will be the nominee, but what kind of nominee is he going to be? >> there's an old line, fake it till you make it. if you watched him out on the campaign trail last night with his speeches, wow. watch this particular sound bite where he sounds every bit of confident. >> your support really means everything to ann and me, and i'm not going to let you down. i'm going to get this nomination. >> i'm going to get this nomination. john avalon, is that taking the nomination just a little too soon? >> that's been a danger he's had all along, but the fact is,

look, he is in poll position. he did win six states. nobody should doubt that. he's got 404 delegates now, but he still needs over 1,000 to clinch this thing. and he can't seal the deal with the activist base that can't trust him. if newt gingrich were to get out, the majority of those votes would go to rick santorum. there are still some votes he has to make. he's going to win states in the deep south. he's in a strong position, but he does not have this locked down, at least not by a long shot. >> that means we have hard work for weeks and months to come. thanks so much, you guys. see new a bit. it is 12 minutes past the hour. ron paul shut out on super tuesday. the texas congressman hasn't won a single state so are fa, and he's still trying to convince voters that he is the alternative they're looking for. >> you look at the candidates today, there is very little difference except for one.

the rest of the candidates support the status quo. foreign policy has never changed. monetary policy doesn't change. there's no challenge to the federal reserve system, and most of all, there's no desire to protect personal liberty, personal privacy. >> and ron paul admits his chances are slim of winning the gchl gop nomination, but he's pressing on with events scheduled in kansas on friday and missouri on saturday. >> and at 15 minutes past 5:00, we did not forget about the other guy, president obama. political maneuvering of his own. he's off to north carolina today, key battle ground state. a speech on the economy he's up to. he tried to steal a little super tuesday thunder from the republicans with this big old speech. his first news conference of the year held at the white house. president blasting the gop candidates for their casual talk about war while on the campaign trail.

>> this is not a game. there's nothing casual about it. when i see some of these folks who have a lot of bluster and a lot of big talk, but when you actually ask them specifically what they would do, it turns out they repeat the things that we've been doing over the last three years. >> and it didn't stop there either. the president had a couple of other harsh words too, saying that the candidates' talk on the campaign about starting a war with iran was, quote, irresponsible. adding, hey, you know what, it's different to say it when you're out there than when you're in here and really making those decisions. you've got to keep it on cnn for the best political coverage in television at 7:00 a.m. soledad o'brien will be joined by former minnesota governor tim pawlenty. and the rnc chairman reince

priebus will join her as well. >> still ahead, sarah palin talking to cnn on the wasila caucus cam. who did she vote for in alaska, and could she still jump into the race? to completely do a right turn, let's talk football. colts reportedly set to part ways with peyton manning. could there be two mannings playing quarterback in new york? >> wouldn't that be something? >> oh, man, oh, man. first a quick check of your travel weather forecast. rob marciano busy for us this morning. how does it look out there? >> good morning, guys. warming up and windy in many spots. compared to earlier in the week and last week, atmosphere breathing a sigh of relief. temperatures 10 to 20 degrees above average across the eastern third of the country. speaking of wind, boy, vegas got it and so did so cal yesterday. 105 mile an hour wind in big bear. and las vegas 63 miles an hour. blackouts in some parts of the city. definitely blowing pretty good. going to blow across southern california.

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i'm feeling it this morning. that's lenny kravitz. it ain't over till it's over, my friend. six states for romney on super tuesday. is it over? is it depends who you ask. >> "the wall street journal" said it this way with its editorial. romney had a good night and stretched his lead among delegates, rick santorum did well enough to more than justify staying in the race. the voters are in charge, and their split decision shows that republicans still haven't settled on a standard bearer. >> and washington post-op ed sees it differently. "no one, since the modern system was fully in place in the 1980s, has ever come close to losing after building this kind of lead. there's really not very much suspense here." >> i'm not sure what they mean by this. i've got to be honest. i need more editorial on that

one. it's 19 minutes past 5:00 in the a.m. top stories making news for you this morning. mitt romney capturing six of the ten states on super tuesday, including that white knuckler in ohio. rick santorum, though, promising to stay put. staying in this race after taking three states -- tennessee, oklahoma, and north dakota. and starting this morning, newt gingrich is getting secret service protection. it's not because of his super tuesday win in georgia. his campaign had already submitted the paperwork requesting protection last month. as usual, no comment about it from the secret service. north korea threatening to turn the capital of south korea into a sea of flames. state television is showing rarely seen footage of north korean military drills near the disputed border. the fiery language comes as diplomats hold talks on the u.s. restoring humanitarian aid to the communist nation. >> did you see those weapons? goodness. this just in.

gas prices down this morning for the second day in a row. the national average now $3.76. that's a drop of about $.03. >> that kind of money means nothing to this guy. look at this, peyton manning about to become the most coveted nfl free agent ever. the indianapolis colts will reportedly announce they are releasing manning. that is at a news conference expected for today. manning missed all of last season with a serious neck injury. so he was due a $28 million bonus if the colts kept him. there's a lot of talk about whether or not he is coming to new york. >> his doctor says he is just fine. >> that he's in fine shape. but you just never know, right? it would be nice to have manning, manning, though. >> it would be like lynn's tv ratings. they'd go sky rocketing. the big super tuesday prize, ohio officially belongs to mitt

romney this morning. officially, i said, but just barely. >> here's the final tally in the buckeye state. romney pulling out a squeaker, 38% to santorum's 37%. christine romans is breaking down the exit polling for us. christine, the next key battle ground is the south. >> it sure is. let's move south from ohio and talk about what's happening in the south. georgia, of course, went to newt gingrich, his home state. those poll data really showed that was a gingrich victory, no doubt in georgia. in tennessee, you get a snapshot, quite frankly, of this race between rick santorum and mitt romney. i want to look at this very quickly. in tennessee, if you considered yourself very conservative, it was santorum. if you considered yourself somewhat conservative or moderate or a liberal republican, you went for mitt romney. what about your opinion of the tea party? according to exit polling, if you supported the tea party or were neutral on it, you went for rick santorum. however, if you opposed the tea party, you went for mitt romney.

interesting. whenever there was anything that was moderate, it was definitely something that went for mitt romney. let's talk about the top candidate quality. you can see here the faces on each of these points. let's break it out in the bigger pie charts and show you how that fared. for the people who said the top candidate quality was beating obama, this was a romney-gingrich story in tennessee. electability really important to republicans. for those who say the top quality is being a true conservative, it was santorum, 53% there. again, that is the storyline we've seen playing out across the country, but especially in the south. what about character? if the top quality for you is character, this was a santorum, 65%. look at gingrich coming up there in tennessee at only 5 %. if you think that experience is the most important thing, romney and gingrich. i'm telling you that tennessee is a snapshot of what could happen across the south, except

for georgia where, of course, gingrich, it's his home state. but each state is a little bit different. guys. >> christine, thanks so much. if the republican race is not resolved by the time the gop convention rolls around in august, sarah palin says she's not ruling out the run for the white house she was considering months ago. sarah palin spoke with cnn last night in wasila after she voted in alaska's caucuses. here's what she said when she was asked pointedly about the possibility of stepping into the race at an open convention this year. >> it's the open convention question. if we wind up with an open convention and someone wants to place your name, throw your name into the hat, would you stop them? would you be open to that? >> as i say, anything is possible. i don't close any doors that perhaps would be open out there. so, no, i wouldn't close that door.

my plan is to be at that convention. i would seriously consider whatever i could do to help our country. to put things back on the right track, our economy, our foreign policy proposals put forward in order to secure our homeland. the americans especially are brave fighting men and women who are overseas right now in places that perhaps we shouldn't be right now. anything that i can do to help, i will be willing to help. and after resisting in our interview when we asked her who she voted for in that wasila polling station, she finally admitted she voted for newt gingrich. >> her husband had revealed that early on. >> he busted her? >> no. he revealed that's who he was supporting. >> different, though. >> yes. >> i know lots of couples, just look at james carville and mary matalin. do you think they vote the same when they go into a voting booth? >> i think they're of the same mind. >> todd and sarah? >> yes. >> sometimes i wonder.

i watched the reality show. call me crazy. after a 14-year marriage, peyton manning and the indianapolis colts are reportedly splitting up. we've got the scoop on this. cnn sports guy carlos diaz weighs in. homicide of young people in america has an impact on all of us. how can we save these young people's lives? as a police chief i have an opportunity to affect what happens in a major city. i learned early on if you want to make a difference you have to have the right education. university of phoenix opened the door. my name is james craig, i'm committed to making a difference and i am a phoenix.

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rick santorum lives to fight another day, riding a conservative wave to three wins on super tuesday. listen. >> we have won in the west, the midwest, and the south, and we're ready to win across this country. >> well, maybe, but the exit polls show that his views on women's issues may have actually cost him the biggest prize of the night and maybe cost him some bragging rights too. we'll fill you in because you're watching "early start."

that was a quick hello. wre we're used to using a little music to get in here. mitt romney landing six states on super tuesday, but he couldn't land the knockout blow that everyone was talking about on rick santorum, who won three states. newt gingrich, who took his home state of georgia? one other nonpresidential super tuesday result, ohio representative dennis kucinich lost his bid for congress. the winner was marcy ckaptur.

they were forced to face off after a redistricting battle. president obama lost his battle to lower mortgages. president obama said yesterday he is planning to lower refinancing fees for millions of fha home loans. his administration predicts that could lower the average mortgage payment by about $1,000 a year, folks. two police officers in oregon are earning medals of valor for a rescue that was right out of the movies. here's their dash cam video. take a close look last september. it shows these heroes risking. look at this, risking their own lives, heading into the inferno to pull an unconscious man out of an overturned car. the car is just to the left of the fire. look at that. one of the officers said the heat was so intense he thought his uniform was going to catch fire just from being close to it. that's why we call them our

bravest. that's why you win a medal, folks. that's why you thank your next police officer even if he's going to give you a ticket. the nfl's new orleans saints admitting to a bounty system that paid bonuses for vicious hits on opposing players. in a joint statement, coach sean payton and gm mickey loomis took "full responsibility" for the practice and promised it would not be repeated. back to politics. 31 minutes past the hour here. even though he won 6 out of 10 states last night, mitt romney failed to deliver the knockout blow that he was hoping for. a lot of people actually hoping for, except his rival rick santorum, who won three states. newt gingrich captured georgia. both candidates doing more than enough to extend this race. >> we survived the national elite's effort to kill us in the summer because of you. because of people who said we are not going to allow the elite to decide who we are allowed to

nominate. >> this was a big night tonight, lots of states. we're going to win a few. we're going to lose a few. but as it looks right now, we're going to get at least a couple of gold medals and a whole pack full of silver medals. >> the gop was probably hoping for a presumptive nominee here. let's talk about this. john avalon, senior political columnist for "newsweek" and the daily beast. from atlanta, we have strategist maria cardona. john, you were tweeting it's absurd romney is actually struggling against santorum. he did win ohio but kind of squeaked by there. a lot of people are saying, even though santorum lost, it was impressive. would you agree? >> mitt romney outspent rick santorum four-to-one. even then, ohio was a squeaker with romney ultimately pulling it out. most of the night, rick santorum was ahead. convincing win for santorum in tennessee. so this race is going to keep going. it's going to keep going not

just because of momentum, but because of math. mitt romney simply doesn't have the delegates he needs to lock this up. he clearly hasn't sealed the deal with the conservative base. there's a lot of reasons for this to move forward. >> mitt romney's camp had said a win is a win is a win. but online they were saying that only applies when it's sports. this could actually hurt him, right? >> richard nixon once said a silver medal in the olympics is still something to brag about, but a silver medal if politics gets you oblivion. >> maria, want to give you props. you were on cnn espanol and now you're with us. can you think in english here? >> i'm trying. >> you were saying if mitt romney doesn't win in ohio, it's a bad omen for his campaign.

>> that's correct. >> he did win. >> but it was a squeaker. we should not have been on the edge of our seats in a state, where again to john's point, romney outspent santorum four-to-one. it was the same in his home state of michigan, which was also a squeaker. this underscores mitt romney's challenge in terms of being able to seal the deal and come out of this as a very strong nominee and being competitive with all of the voters, the coalition of voters that he's going to need in order to be strong in a general election. >> i'll tell you where he was strong, right, in ohio, in particular, he was strong with women, which is where your candidate apparently has his strength. how do you think that's going to play out? >> well, i think that, at the end of the day, president obama is going to be really speaking to what women are very concerned about, which are the economic issues, what he announced yesterday that you all were just talking about in terms of really helping families who were struggling with their mortgage. those are the key issues that

women really care about. and i think that what has gone on in the republican party so far in terms of this intrafighting, especially on women's health care issues, has really hurt the whole republican party, and romney in particular, with not just independents, but with independent women who are fleeing the gop because they're scared to death that this is a party that wants to take them back to the 19th century. so i think president obama is in a good position with women, and he'll continue to focus on the issues that we care about. >> john, i want to stay on the noubs from last night and focus on virginia. romney got 60% of the vote. ron paul got 40%. neither santorum or gingrich on the ballot there. what does this mean for the electorate in the anti-romney vote? can you call that a decisive win there? >> no. first of all, very low turnout. it does represent the absurdity of our ballot access laws that these folks couldn't get on the ballot. ron paul got 4.5% in virginia

four years ago. the fact that he gets 40% this year is a proxy vote for the anti-romney folks in virginia to coalesce behind ron paul here. that's outlines what romney needs to do to get the nomination. he has the money. he has the organization, but he doesn't have the love of the activist base. that's a problem when you're trying to seal the nomination, especially with proportional delegations going forward. >> thank you so much for joining us. we'll talk to you again. >> thanks, zoraida. >> and you can keep it here on cnn for the best political coverage on television. at 7:00 eastern on "starting point," soledad o'brien will be joined by former minnesota governor tim pawlenty and the rnc chairman. >> coming up, the indianapolis colts reportedly saying sayonara to star quarterback peyton manning.

and remember joe the plumber? he became joe the congressional candidate. and now he's joe who won the republican primary in ohio. we're going to tell you who he's going to face off against. and we'll tell you what his real name is. here's a hint, it ain't joe. [ phelps ] two things i need before the race. music. and the confidence to win. [ male announcer ] head & shoulders active sport with the high-performance hydrazinc formula, helps lock in scalp moisture for hair that's up to 100% flake-free. head & shoulders active sport for men. wash confidence in. he8% every 10 years.age 40,rt we can start losing muscle -- wow. wow. but you can help fight muscle loss with exercise and ensure muscle health. i've got revigor. what's revigor? it's the amino acid metabolite, hmb to help rebuild muscle and strength naturally lost over time. [ female announcer ] ensure muscle health has revigor and protein to help protect, preserve, and promote muscle health. keeps you from getting soft. [ major nutrition ] ensure. nutrition in charge!

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it's 41 minutes past 5:00 on the east coast. the indianapolis colts are getting ready to let go of that guy, the star quarterback peyton manning. news conference this morning. everyone is super, super cagey, saying, unh-unh, not going to go there until tomorrow. peyton manning has won mvp awards four times. that's more times than any player in nfl history. he did have three neck surgeries in the 2011 season. doctor says he's in good shape, though, and the colts finished 2-14 for the season, though. that is tough. big name teams already reporting to look at him and bring him on like new york, the jets. seattle seahawks, miami dolphins. all big names, big teams. they just don't get bigger than that name peyton manning, though, unless you're carlos diaz, who is also a really big name. he's joining us to take a look. the question, especially for a nonsports person. i don't follow football, but i know that dude probably because of his dancing on "saturday night live." but i also know he's a big deal. i know he's a super duper major

stats guy. he's got the winningest of everything. why would they let him go? >> no truth to the rumor that he actually injured his neck on "snl" dancing. they let him go. peyton manning is gone because he has to make room for the next peyton manning, which is andrew luck coming in with the probable number one pick in the draft, which the colts own. they have the number one pick in the draft. you're looking at andrew luck right there. it was basically a series of perfect events, or in peyton's case, imperfect events. him not playing this season, which allowed the colts to have the worst record in the nfl and get the number one draft pick. if they did not have the number one draft pick, if they didn't have the opportunity to draft andrew luck, peyton manning would be staying an indianapolis colt. that is the reason he is gone. >> so it's basically happenstance. the fact that he got injured, the fact that it gave them the crappy statistics, which gave them the awesome first round draft pick, which basically shoves peyton out. i was looking. how long has this guy been

around? he must be getting close to 40, but he's only 36, which makes me think that teams would want to squeeze every last ounce of awesome out of him. >> he's not even 36. he turns 36 at the end of the month. i'm from indianapolis. i can tell you -- and i interned at wish-tv, by the way. i can tell you right now, indianapolis loves peyton manning. peyton manning has done more for that city than any sports figure in the history of the city. if it wasn't for peyton manning, the colts may not even be in indianapolis right now. they may be out in los angeles. they don't build that stadium, lucas oil stadium. they definitely don't get the super bowl without peyton manning. there's going to be a lot of tears today in indianapolis because not only is peyton manning an amazing football player. >> he's religion. >> basically, he could run for mayor and win in a landslide. he has his own children's hospital on the north side of indianapolis. the guy is a hero in that city. now he'll be, as you hope, a new york jet. >> yeah, basically. that wouldn't be so bad.

he's up for the jets. he's up for the seahawks. dolphins all in the rumor mill. when will we find out, though? >> as soon as he's released today, teams can start talking to him. he will not interview with teams. teams will have to come to him. >> begging. >> the number one thing with peyton manning, he wants to win a championship. it's not about money. it's about winning a championship. >> carlos diaz, you've made me a football fan. congratulations. >> i've done the impossible. >> you got your wish, shall we say. >> how is that the topic of conversation? >> thank you, carlos. >> such a smart guy. fun to watch. 45 minutes past the hour. coming up, super tuesday results. something for everyone to talk about. primaries and caucuses adding up to more delegates for all the republican presidential hopefuls. we'll break down all the numbers for you. if you are one of the millions of men who have used androgel 1%, there's big news. presenting androgel 1.62%. both are used to treat men with low testosterone.

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welcome back. it's 5:48 on the east coast. 6 out of 10 ain't bad. not a meatloaf song, but the results of last night's super tuesday voting. santorum pulled off three states, and gingrich took georgia, no big surprise. both of romney's rivals are vowing to stick it out and stay in this race. six british soldiers reported missing and presumed dead now with an explosion in southwestern afghanistan. no other details have been releaseded about the blast which happened a short time ago in the helmand province. and also in politics, joe the plumber, remember him? he's now joe the congressional candidate. joe's real name is samuel

werzelbacher, and he became the nominee. he became famous in the 2008 presidential race when he challenged barack obama over his tax plan. boy, did the media eat that up. for an extended look on all our top stories, head to our blog. or you can like won the catholi

vote. newt gingrich came in second for catholics at 34%. for those who said character was the most important quality for their candidate, rick santorum, 53% won that vote. mitt romney came at 19%.

paul 15%. gingrich in his home state came at the bottom of the pack for character. for those who say this is the candidate that can beat obama, 55% went for mitt romney. we've seen that state after state after state that electability is pretty key overall. when i show you all of this exit polling for georgia, yes, it is a story of newt gingrich across the board. when you dig into the numbers a little bit, you can see some of those other themes that translate nationwide as well, guys. >> thank you for that. i love seeing that. it's so telling. you try to extrapolate into all the upcoming states, and you get them wrong. >> that character count was super high at 53%. i don't know, i was a little surprised by that one. >> five minutes now to the top of the hour. out of bed. you're going to be late. ahead on "early start," a truly super tuesday for some but not for others. some thinking it should have been more superer. big night for romney. what do the others say about his chances moving forward.

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super mitt. >> i'm not going to let you down. i'm going to get this nomination. >> mitt romney pads his lead with super tuesday wins but can't land that knockout blow. >> we need a fighter. >> rick santorum keeps hanging around thanks to the romney doubters in the reddest of red states. >> we have won in the west, the midwest, and the south, and we're ready to win across this country. >> and newt gingrich, have you learned not to count him out? >> there are lots of bunny rabbits that run through. i'm the tortoise. i just take one step at a time. >> the republican race moves

forward on your "early start." a very good morning to you, folks. it is one minute to 6:00 a.m. this is "early start." i'm ashleigh banfield. >> and i'm zoraida sambolin. we're bringing you the news from "a" to "z." let's get started here. >> morning after. morning after super tuesday, can i say? all ground but not as much ground as we would like to be stand on? here's a look at where we stand the morning after. mitt romney taking ohio, the much sought after state. also alaska, two races that couldn't even be called until most of you very well sound asleep. he also won idaho and vermont. of course, massachusetts which he trounced everybody. that was expected. he won virginia, too. rick santorum though can't be counted out. he took oklahoma, tennessee, and he also really smoked them in north dakota, too. newt gingrich no, surprise here, he took his home state of georgia by a massive margin. so brand new delegate estimate,

including alaska. thank you to the wonderful and talented robert yun who does the math for us. 404 delegates for mitt romney. 165 for rick san santorum. and 106 for newt gingrich and 66 for ron paul. mitt romney telling supporters, though, i am so into that math. have a listen. >> tonight we're doing some counting. we're counting up the delegates for the convention. it looks good. we're counting down the days until november, and that looks even pbetter. >> how did he get into good at the man smiling at the mike. catholics, catholics really helped mitt romney squeak by in ohio. 44% of the catholics chose mitt romney. only 31% chose the catholic, rick santorum.

our political editor paul steinhauser is in columbus, ohio, live for us this morning. it ain't the first time i heard that story, that the catholic didn't go for the catholic. was that a surprise to you? >> you know our cnn poll from yesterday -- from two days ago indicated it could happen. there it goes, it happened. it's like deja vu all over again. michigan, a squeaker for mitt romney, but a win is a win. the latest vote totals, close, a little over 10,000 votes separating romney in santorum. how did he do it? greatly outspending santorum. here in ohio, you mentioned the catholic vote and the exit polls. but he has trouble. we saw it in michigan and elsewhere. he's not doing very well with very conservative voters. romney didn't do well with working class voters or evangelicals here in ohio. but, ashleigh, a win is a win.

dead even a couple days ago, but, look, eked out -- more than eked out. 90-point victory in tennessee and oklahoma, doing well in the southern states, conservative states. newt gingrich, totals in georgia, he said he had a win no, problem. look at that. convincing win. over 20 points ahead of romney and the rest of the field in georgia. ron paul we're not talking a lot about him but he did win delegates. you know, that's his game plan. win delegates, ashleigh. >> up to 66 which might surprise some people because they keep wondering since he hasn't won any states so far how does he keep racking them up? he does. our viewers get up early so they're on the ball and already looking to the next prize. on saturday, we've got kansas. on tuesday of next week we've got mississippi and alabama. those are no jokes. what are we looking at? what's the story in those states?

>> yeah, you know, for our viewers super tuesday was so yesterday. these states may be tough for mitt romney because they're conservative. where is rick santorum going to be today? kansas. santorum would also do well in the southern primaries next tuesday, alabama, mississippi. santorum campaign could be spending big bucks on ads. romney, you know a lot of favorable states are down the road, like on april 24th, a long way down the road are new york and pennsylvania vote. but that's a long ways away, ashleigh. >> it's that pennsylvania i keep waiting for because it's always michigan, ohio, and pennsylvania that stream headlines in the general election. i can't wait for that one. in the meantime, though, i can't wait. appreciate it. >> thank you. mitt romney did win six of the ten states during super tuesday but this was not the outcome his camp was hoping for. rick santorum winning three states. tennessee, oklahoma, north dakota.

newt gingrich winning georgia. both doing more than enough to extend this race. >> we survived the national elite's effort to kill us in the summer because of you, because people who said, we are not going to allow the elite to decide who we are allowed to nominate. >> this was a big night tonight. lots of states. we're going to win a few, we're going to lose a few. but as it looks right now, we're going to get at least a couple of gold medals and a whole lot of silver medals. >> and what does that all mean? john avlon, senior political columnist of news week and the daily beast and from atlanta, democratic strategist maria cardona. maria, i'm going to start with you. we heard last night newt gingrich said he's going to stay in the race. i want you to listen to this and then let's talk about it. >> remember when it was tim

pawlenty who was going to crowd me out and remember then twen it was michele bachmann? and then it was our good friend herman cain the first time and then it was herman cain the second time, and now it's santorum. and you just can't quite get across to them, it's all right. there are lots of bunny rabbits that run through. i'm the tortoise. i just take one step at a time. >> i love all these sound bites. so if santorum really wants to win, gingrich needs to get out. but analysts are saying that it's in romney's best interest for both of them to stay in the race. and that way they divide the votes and he can pull off the squeakers like he did last night. do you agree? >> i think that's exactly right, zoraida. part of what the story line that was last night for romney that is not a very positive one, and christine romans went through these numbers, he still can't seal the deal with the tea party, the most conservative voters. but as long as both newt gingrich and rick santorum stay

in that race and those voters split their vote amongst those two, mitt romney continues to win states even though they're squeakers and he continues to rack up delegates. about newt gingrich, i call him the lazarus of politics. he does keep rising. but the fact of the matter is he's going to need to do more than win just georgia. so who knows. maybe it will take more than jesus christ this time around to revive his campaign. >> he stays in and hits vowed to do it this time. we'll see if that happens. i want to look at the exit polls, john. 41% of the voters has reservations for the candidate they favor. we saw the gop wage rates like it seems like the rpsz want to unite around romney. and some did but a lot are holding out. what does this say about the race? when they can't wrap their arms around it. i think they said they wanted romney to be the presumptive

nominee but he looks like the inevitable nominee. >> right. well, there's nothing inevitable about romney. that becomes clearer and clear especially. the establishment however is rallying around mitt romney. in years past super tuesday is the day where the nominees able to seal the deal. he's able to sort of win big enough to say, you know what, it's functionally over, let's move to the convention and then i'll take it to the general election. it's not true this year. it's not a winner take all fight. it's not about momentum, it's about math. mitt romney still has 1,000 delegates to go. even if he wins all the delegates going forward it could take him up until may to clench the number. most importantly, these other candidates in the race, newt, santorum, ron paul, it's very unlikely they're going to get out of the race. this is going to be protracted even as establishment tries to rally and solidify support

against mitt romney. >> did you say it was going to go on until may earlier? >> yeah, if you look at the delegate math. mitt needs 1144 to clench this nomination. that takes a while. that's just a function of the way the primaries are set up. >> i want you both to weigh in on this last issue here. the number one issue in the exit polls seems to be the economy. let's use ohio as an example here. 54% say the economys a t as the important issue. we've been seeing a lot of issues on trail as well, like contraception. timothy wrote this, the republican con stes than side tlak tracked by issues of little immediate importance to most voters. contraception, gay rights, abortion, et cetera. the gop primaries have become a private conversation to the exclusion of the rest of the country. we're headed into really conservative states like alabama and mississippi. social conservative issues play well here. so is he right? i'm going to start with you, john. >> well, look, economic issues

are the best case republicans have to make. it's how they can connect with independent voters. the problem is preoccupation with social conservative issues does rally the base and special interests and the bowie a candidate like rick santorum. look at the cost. rick santorum almost lost ohio last night because he lost women voters. they are a distraction from the real debates they want to have, which is all about the economy. >> i know you're a democrat, maria, but i'm going to let you weigh in on this one. >> i think that's exactly right. i think the problem with not just romney but with santorum and frankly the whole field as they do delve into these social issues is their negatives continue to go up. frankly, the more that voters hear about what these candidates have to say the less they like them. that's not the way to win the general election. >> john and maria, thank you for joining us this morning. keep it here for the best

political coverage on television. on 7:00 a.m. eastern on "starting point" soledad o'brien will be joined by tim pawlenty and rnc chairman reince priebus. still the come on "early start," mitt romney may have pulled off six of ten, but is that a big winner thing or is that chicken dinner? you know what thoel thing, winner, winner chicken denner? never mind. it will tell you what that campaign needs to know moving forward. all right. it's building. have you heard about this? apple about to unveil a brand new ipad. >> wahoo! >> yes, wahoo indeed. we'll give you details on that and whether you should trade in your old one. [ male announcer ] how can power consumption in china,

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nice. cleveland rocks. it's cleveland rocks but you know what's close to cleveland? columbus. columbus, ohio, is close to cleveland. >> works for me. >> it's 14 minutes past 6:00 on the east coast. it means it's time to get you caught up on the top stories this morning. mitt romney capturing six of the ten states were up for grabs. >> lock at that smile. >> they're happy. or are they? they did win the knuckler, the white-knuckler, ohio. rick santorum just won't go away. and newt gingrich still there, too. both vowing to stay in the race. santorum took three states, tennessee, oklahoma, and north dakota. gingrich took the biggest, georgia. and new this morning, violent raids in syria. soldiers storming villages with tanks. government forces blasting a bridge. wounded refugees were using to escape into lebanon. nearly 8,500 people killed in

this year long crack down. most of them are civilians. former u.n. secretary general kofi annan is heading to syria on saturday to try to convince president bashar al-assad to end all of this violence. and state television in north korea is showing rarely seen footage of military drills near the disputed border with south korea. take a look at this video, folks. a commander is threatening to turn the capital city of seoul into a sea of flames. the fiery language comes as diplomats hold talks on the u.s. restoring humanitarian aid to the communist nation. gas prices down this morning. and that's the second straight day that we can report that happily. national average is at $3.76. that's a drop once again of about .3 of a cent. ten states were up for grabs but ohio was the big prize.

it belongs this morning to mitt romney barely. >> yeah, just barely. if you look at the numbers you see there's a 1% margin between romney and santorum. here's the final tally in the buckeye state. mitt romney eking out the squeaker, 38-37. our christine romans has been going behind the numbers, digging in, finding out what was on the voters' minds as they were coming in and, more importantly, coming out. >> geeking out is what we call it. geeking out with the numbers. >> but you're the prettiest geek i know. >> that's nice. >> what have you got. >> takes one to know one. let's talk about kcatholicism ad religion. if you look at the ohio breakdown of how different religions voted, the catholics went for the mormon. they went for romney, 44%, over rick santorum 31% which who is catholic. protestants went for the catholic, rick santorum. people who said they were

protestants went for mitt romney. gingrich, who is lgs kalso cath len%. i want to see the importance of religion to your vote in ohio. and if you look here, i'm going to pull them all up for you. it really tells an interesting story, i think. for people who said religion didn't matter, they mostly went for mitt romney. 44%. right? for people who said, it matters not much, again, mitt romney here. but look, somewhat mattered, 50%. whenever something is somewhat or maybe or middle of the road, maybe go for mitt romney in these republican exit polls that we've seen. and for those who said that religion mattered a great deal, 53% went for rick santorum but so that's how it broke on the religion front on ohio. i know paul steinhauser has talked about it before, the catholic vote went for the mormon, the protestant vote went for the catholic. interesting, snuff. >> thanks for the nod on the new

gingrich tweet. it's gratifying he tweets -- it's gratifying to win in my home state. so decisively to launch our march momentum money bond. donate now. >> i told you earlier a lot of people were reaching out to me saying why aren't you talking about gingrich, the gingrich win in georgia, his home state. gingrich clearly trying to take that -- strategy all along. focus on his home state and make that move through the month to raise some money and get some other states in the south. >> get the mojo. >> that's a decisive win. also, still to come, folks, the next generation of, you guessed it, ipad. but don't go calling it the ipad 3. it may be a widely popular tablet but its upgrade is kind of fancy and funky. there's an hd in the spelling of the new one. so we're going to break it down for you and tell you what the newest elements are and whether you need to spend the money on a

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this could be big news for gadget lovers. apple is unveiling a new ipad, it's not that one that she has in her hand. >> no. >> it's going to happen later today in san francisco. >> getting ahead of ourselves here. >> it never is the one that i have. >> how many generations back are you? >> i'm not too bad. i do have the ipad 2. i was thinking, of course, i would get the ipad 3, right? and i would be wrong. yes, big changes are coming. yes, some upgrades are coming. but the new name is not going to be the ipad 3. so what is it going to be and

what is it going to have and do i need to really get rid of this because i'm just getting to know it. the senior editor of "cnet" with the inside scoop. do i have to get rid of this? >> i don't think you have to get rid of it. in fact, probably looks just like the one you have in your hand. they're thinking it's going to be called the ipad hd, not the ipad 3. it's third generation but it has the same look, it's just going to have better iners. make it a better camera, better high resolution screen, high definition screen. it's going to be more -- a better experience but kind of the same look and feel. >> so there's the statistic that will my mind, although anything apple shouldn't surprise me, and that is the sale of the number of units they had in 2011. 40.5 million ipads were sold world wide, bridget, in 2011. listen. that's a 62% share, market share, of tablet market.

and that statistic for me was fascinating because i thought if you sell 40.2 million units in 2011, how are you going to launch the new version in '12? >> i know, apple is a juggernaut. i would not be surprised if they sold more now because now you've had the ipad out for two generations. if you were the kind of person saying i'm going to wait, there might be a new one out. now is the year where it's all around you. tablet is a craze, whether it's a orl another brand. now you're going to say, well, i think it's the sim to get it. >> here's the weird thing. when the camera comes back to me i'm actually shooting my view of the camera that i'm looking at. and there's pete. say hi, pete. wave. here's what i loved about this one, bridget. i can do this. i can just turn this camera around with one little point and i can shoot two different ways at any moment. >> yep. as a camera in the front and in the back. this next one will probably have a same thing, just a better

camera. the back camera eneven as good as the latest iphone camera. >> what? you're saying i look crap by and maybe ten years older than i should when i'm doing this? >> i'm not at all. >> so here's the deal, pricew e pricewise, a, is it going to be really expensive and, b, what the heck do i do with this? can i sell it, get as much for it? >> apple products really old their value. if you're going to resell it, you're going the get good money for it still, yes. if you're going to upgrade chances are they are going to keep it about the same price as the ipad 2. $500, $700. the ipad 2, the one you have will probably lower in price maybe 50 bucks or so. yeah, you can resell these things. walk into a best buy or go on amazon and get a gift certificate. there's a lot of buyback programs that makes it easy to get your money back. >> or ebay it to china because i

hear they are having a tough time to get their hands on these thing. hope you will come back to us and talk to us again. >> of course. >> thanks. >> i want apple to swap them out. say i want that one and you can buy this one. >> it want apple to send us free samples so we can show them on the air. >> great idea, too. ahead on "early start," the spin after the win. all of the republicans claiming important victories on super tuesday. which candidates benefitted the most from the results? "starting point" anchor soledad o'brien is starting early with an a. lot of analysis. you're watching "early start." look at all this stuff for coffee. oh there's tons. french presses, espresso tampers, filters. it can get really complicated. not nearly as complicated as shipping it though. i mean shipping is a hassle. not with priority mail flat rate boxes from the postal service. if it fits it ships, anywhere in the country for a low flat rate.

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a very good morning to you. it is 30 minutes past the top of the hour, which means it's an "early start." i'm ashleigh banfield. >> i'm zoraida sambolin. thanks for being with us this morning. it is time to check stories making news. mitt romney padding his lead, winning ohio and five other states on super tuesday.

but he could not land that knockout blow on rick santorum who won three states, or newt gingrich, he took his home state of georgia. in a primary battle that pitted two long-time members of congress against each other, ohio democrat dennis kucinich, lost his bid for re-election. the winner was fellow long time democrat marcy captor. the veteran lawmakers were forced to face-off after a redistricting battle when ohio lost two congressional seats. full disclosure from the new orleans saints. though the team admits to paying players bonuses for hitting other players viscously. coach and gm issued a joint statement apologizing for those, quote, bounty systems that they promised it wouldn't happen again. the saints faced fines, suspensions, even lost draft picks. and the winner of last night ears 336 -- it's hard to say the number.

$336.4 million powerball jackpot has come forward and she is adorable. 81-year-old from rhode island, the winning ticket sold at a top and shop super marquett in newpo newport. lump sum payment is that young lady right there, $210 million. as christine romans says, go girl, spend it. don't save, don't invest, just spend it. >> happy story. spend the money. spend the money. >> 32 minutes past the hour here. mitt romney won six states last night building his delegate lead to a whopping 400, breaking the 300 mark. >> the magic number of 1144, that's what you have to have to clench the nomination, which is what this is all about. "starting point" anchor soledad o'brien getting up a lot earlier today. >> as we all did. >> half the time i don't know if your going to be at a polling station at midnight. >> me, too>> and th.

>> and then the diner. >> it's fascinating to watch though. it was interesting before super tuesday to hear mitt romney saying, listen, i believe if i win ohio i'm going to win the nomination. of course, last night the big take away was, no really big front-runner. that's a big problem. here's what he said when he gave his speech last night. >> and tonight we've taken one more step towards restoring the promise of tomorrow. tomorrow we wake up and we start again and the next day we'll do the same. so we'll go day by day, step by step, door by door, heart to heart. >> day by day, step by step, door to door, that means it's not ending any time soon. that's how you read that. it's interesting, of course, to hear rick santorum talking at his victories last night and some of this losses, too, which he framed as the silver medal. that's kind of interesting. >> a passel. >> yeah. >> this was a big night tonight. lots of states.

we're going to win a few, we're going to lose a few, but as it looks right now, we're going to get at least a couple of gold medals and a whole passel full of silver medals. >> of course, the big question is, is a silver medal enough when you try to wrap up a nomination. when you look at ron brownstein at our show at the top of the hour, he's going to say the problem is everyone is doing really well among the people they do really well among. meaning if you don't expand the base there's no way you can actually fight your way quickly to a big victory. >> however, if, you know, the question is, will newt gingrich stay in the race, right? any lasting? >> yeah. i was going to say, he did. >> yeah. >> no. >> the elitist, right? >> he just thought it was a rid class question. like why should i get out of the race? he basically pointed to rick santorum, he was told to get out of the race too and then he surged. >> he only got that one state. >> he has southern strategy.

i think he's looking forward to alabama. he's looking forward to mississippi. on saturday, here's what he said last night about bunnies. >> remember when it was tim pawlenty who was going to crowd me out? and remember then when it was michele bachmann? and then it was our good friend herman cain the first time. then it was herman cain the second time. and now it's santorum. and you just can't quite get across to them, it's all right. there are lots of bunny rabbits that run through. i'm the tortoise. i just take one step at a time. >> but as you point out, zoraida, if the tortoise doesn't start winning more actual primaries that could be a big problem. he could be a spoiler for santorum in that southern strategy. so it will be interesting to watch that. maybe that's sort of what people are looking for it to be decided or maybe not. i think with the super pac money, what's the real incentive to get out at this point. >> silver medals are nice for your wall but there's only one

goot guy who gets to run up against obama. >> first time i've ever heard someone talk about a loss as a silver medals. >> i think the republicans really want to have a candidate finally. they're probably the one most frustrated. >> the word of the week is coalescing. we're finally coalescing. conservatives coming out in support of mitt romney and the coalescing doesn't seem to have reflected in the polls. >> the word at day was legume. >> like vegetable? >> sarah palin had a legume colored jacket. >> i'm with you. i'm with you. >> i just missed it. studying. >> o'brien, man. >> thank you. >> 36 minutes past the hour. still to come on "early start," romney wins six of ten states during super tuesday. we've been tell you that all morning. we're going to go me hind the numbers to see where this race might be headed next. you're watching "early start." i'm always looking out for small ways to be more healthy. like splenda® essentials™ no calorie sweeteners.

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it is 39 minutes past 6:00 a.m. that means we're back live. hi, everybody. i'm ashleigh banfield. >> i'm zoraida sambolin. we now know how republicans vote aid cross the ten super tuesday states. joining me now is the president of the poeing company woman trend kellyanne conway. she's a poster and senior strategist for newt gingrich. thank you for being with us. >> good morning. >> good morning. since you're a pollster i'm going to put up some polls and graphics. ohio came down to the wire here, right? it seems that electability is what won here over empathy. this is a cnn exit poll. 42% of ohio republicans felt

that the most important quality in a candidate was electability. an overwhelmingly there, 42% went for romney. however, 41% of ohio voters say they have reservations about the candidate. this is a key swing state in november. what does this say to you about the republican field? >> it says several things. particularly it's an indictment of mitt romney and his campaign. i mean, he's been called the inevitable elect i believe candidate for over a year now. he ran on inevitability, not ideas, zoraida, and it's caught up with him. you can have infrastructure, organization, money, but if you don't have message and you don't connect with the voters and if you're not a true conservative, these contests are important but the most important thing that happened in the last week was mitt romney saying, i'm not going to light my hair on fire to prove i'm a conservative. if you're a conservative you won't have to touch the hair, we'll just know it. he's having a problem not just connecting with, quote, average people. that's its own challenge for him, but he's having trouble convincing voters that somehow 2012 will be different from 1996

and 2008 where the republican party nominated moderates who had lost the time before and the election went to bill clinton and barack obama. they won't want that all over again. you can say i can win, and i can win about electability. but 2010 showed many underfunded candidates sitting in our state congress and state houses saying you want win, you're not the front-runner, they ran on a message and they won. i think that's what voters are looking for this year. >> i think newt gingrich would probably like to be in romney's place right now, right sfl you're advising newt gingrich. he won home state of georgia last night. the second state he won after is south carolina in january. listen to what he said last night. i want your take on this. >> there are lots of rabbits that runs. i'm the. >> terry: to-- i'm the tortoise. i just take one step at a time.

>> okay. then we get this tweet that i'm going to look over that just came in. it is gratifying -- this is from newt gingrich. it is grat tieing to win my home state so decisively to launch our march momentum money bomb. donate now. newt.org. what is the next step for gingrich in order to catch up? >> well, these victories in georgia and south carolina do show his strength in the south. now we're going to the deeper south in alabama and mississippi followed by kansas and then back to louisiana. we've got texas looming now in late may. not april. that's 155 delegates just in one day. proportional delegation. and i think that the fact is that there are 27 states, zoraida, where the voters have not yet spoken. they have a right to voice their opinion as to who should be the nominee. and that's why newt is in this race. santorum is staying in as well. that combined with the fact that as the calendar gets deeper it gets worse for mitt romney.

>> let me ask you this. alabama and mississippi are coming up next tuesday. if gingrich does not win there, does he drop out? >> if he win there's, he should keep going. i look to reverse the question, also. >> but if he doesn't. >> i doubt it because we're going to texas and california. we're on the ballot in every congressional district here in new york where the delegates for the delegates filed for santorum and romney have both been challenged. if they could have been challenged, they would have been. these big prizes still loom large. texas, california, new york, for example, new jersey in june with 50 delegates. that's inwinner take all. most delegates have not been awarded and someone can be the front-runner an money and infrastructure. romney's negatives have gone on significantly among independents because of all this negative advertising. he outspent everybody 5 1/2-1 in ohio and squeaked by. people like a real contest. so these states are all very different. the voters all make up their own

minds. they won't be told whom to vote for. we're excited. >> we see that. kellyann, i want to ask you something different here. rush limbaugh has gotten more fallout now after he called sandra fluke a slut and proos t prostitute. 20 spons sors have pulled their ads from their show. soledad is going to speak to the company's ceo in the next hour. here's my question to you. did rush limbaugh's comment affect the republican brand with women voters, do you think? >> well, first, let me make sure my husband did not tune in to that interview given the man's services. look, what rush limbaugh did was apologize and it takes a very big person to do that. people don't like to say they're sorry these days. i think we should take him and his apology the way we took harry reid's for making very disparaging comments about barack obama in the "game

change" book. i don't think it hurts the, quote, brand among republicans because i think republican women are smart, women are smart and savvy. >> you don't think women are offended by that? >> yes, and i'm offended. i also believe that rush limbaugh probably talks about a million words a week and most matter very much and most of them are spot on, the message. he apologized for the two words. he wrote this woman a letter, not an e-mail or a tweet or a text. it doesn't mean they are single issue voters. women will have jobs, economy is the number one issue. and they look at individuals and ideas and the big voter and spare it up and make a decision. i think the left is really overplaying their hand on the contraception issues because they are insulting women. we republicans want to talk to the heard, head, mind, body and soul and not just their wombs. >> thank you for joining us this morning. >> 20? >> advertisers now, 20 have dropped? >> yeah. >> man.

>> the latest number. 46 minutes past 6:00 a.m. on the east coast. time to get you caught up on top stories this morning. six out of ten for mitt. mitt romney had a super tuesday but it wasn't super enough to close the deal he wanted to close. even though he won the nail biter over rick santorum in ohio but he pulled off three other states, good ones, too. newt gingrich took a big fat one for georgia, the most delegates of the night. both vowing to stay in the race, or should we say all three of this rivals because ron paul is still there, folks. he's still kicking around. collecting delegates. now, let's move on to this. look at that picture, look at it closely. a bridge collapsed into water. look at the man with the gun. syrian rebels were pounding rebel held towns this morning, blasting that bridge because refugees, women and children, were trying to escape across it into lebanon. if that doesn't make you sick, it may be why former u.n. secretary general kofi annan is

traveling to syria on saturday to beg president bashar al-assad to stop this. stop these bombs. stop the assaults. stop the murders. back here in this country, joe the plumber is in the running to become joe the congressman. it is official. joe's real name is samuel and he won his gop primary in ohio last night. he became famous back in '08 when he challenged then presidential candidate barack obama from the crowd. challenging him about taxes. it is 6:48. still to come, putting war heroes back to work. veterans are having a tough time. big unemployment numbers. more than the rest of us. why? don't we owe them? shouldn't we be doing a lot more? you're going to meet someone who said, yeah, you bet, and he's doing something about it. ♪[music plays] ♪[music plays]

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soledad o'brien joins us now

with what is ahead on "starting point." >> good morning, ladies. wo we're going to continue our analysis. this morning we're going to chat with the minnesota governor tim pawlenty. also, you know, of course, he was in the gop race at one time. alice stewart will join us. she's with the rick santorum campaign, press secretary. rnc chairman priebus will join us. joining our panel is new york's mayor cory booker. plab he wants to give up this whole political thing and join me as i coanchor on the show one day. also, we'll talk to day roach, director of that controversial movie called "game change." sarah palin slammed it. talked to senator mccain who also slammed the movie as well. we'll ask him about that movie and much more ahead on "starting point." back to you guys. >> all right, thanks, soledad. appreciate that. looking forward to it. here's a number you don't want to hear, 800,000 vets are unemployed in this country.

that's a higher jobless rate than the rest of us. in january, the unemployment rate for the vets out there, 9.1%. that's versus 8.3% for folks overall. not fair, you say? well, then you need to meet our next guest because here's a guy who is about to announce 30,000 job listings. john is the ceo of america wants you from los angeles this morning. john, first of all, a, i can't believe i'm reading this statistic that veterans have a tougher time than the rest of us getting a job and, b, i'll thrilled there's someone like you out there. who are you and what is this? how do you have access to post 30,000 jobs for vets? >> i don't really have the action. what i do is i have the mission. and we have had the most extraordinary support. we announced this initiative actually 15 days ago. and this initiative is all about one thing, we have one mission and that is to get jobs for the

the men and women who serve our country and keep us free and safe. and the support we have gotten from the grass roots level have been beyond outstanding. >> so, john, maybe get me up to speed on why it is that america isn't thanking veterans every chance they get by hiring them. why are they having a tougher time than the rest of us getting a job in i would think they would have a leg up. >> i think it's very difficult after serving this country in two or three war tours to come back and try and reintegrate yourself into society. i think they come with a bit of a disadvantage. there is a transitional period by which you have served and now you come back and you try to reintegrate into an economy that is badly damaged right now. we have an extraordinary problem with unemployment. and america wants you basically one thing, we're mad as hell and

we want to do something about it. >> i'm looking at pictures of probably pari paratroopers in training. while may they not have the same job skills as other people, they have remarkable job skills. way more than the rest of us would hope to have. isn't that valued out there in the job market? >> i think it is valued but i don't think it's understood. i don't think that the men and women who can actually provide jobs understand the type of individuals that are coming back. they are well trained. they are computer savvy. they work in all aspect of industry. and they are incredibly dedicated employees. and i believe it's the responsibility of the men and women who occupy the corner offices to say, hey, we're going to give you a break. >> i free. >> we call it cocoa. >> i hear you. as fellow americans, we owe them. thanks for doing what you do.

i'm going to read out your website. americawantsyou.net. if you're an unemployed vet, go there. and john pike has a mission to help you all. john, thanks very much for that. and we will be right back. man, i'm glad aflac pays cash. aflac! ha! isn't major medical enough? huh! no! who's gonna help cover the holes in their plans? aflac! quack! like medical bills they don't pay for? aflac! or help pay the mortgage? quack! or child care? quack! aflaaac! and everyday expenses?

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you know, normally this is the time when we say it's over, but it's not over yet. >> peyton manning. they called a news conference at 12:00 noon eastern. we suspect they're going to be talking all things mr. peyton manning. >> that's the bad news. maybe it's good. >> maybe good news for us. >> exactly. this is the right time to send it over to soledad oi brian with "starting point." >> all right. good morning, ladies. thank you. it was not exactly a super as he hoped that mitt romney does not deliver the knockout blow he was hoping for on super tuesday. the race is tight though with rick santorum hanging in. the critical state of ohio. newt gingrich won georgia. that was no surprise. he is still a survivor. listen. >> when it comes to this economy, my highest brirtity will be worrying about your job, not worrying about saving my job. i stand ready to lead our party and i stand ready to lead our na t