ayn rand. michael shure, "the young turks." have a great weekend. [♪ theme music ♪] good evening, i'm eliot spitzer and this is "viewpoint." the obama administration makes a modest reduction from 10 to 5. and romney god a modest bump at best for putting ryan on the ticket. ryan was in glenn alan virginia, attacking the president's handling of the financial crisis. >> undoubtedly, president obama

inherited a difficult situation when he came into office, the problem is he made things much worse. >> the question for ryan did he make things worse for the gop ticket. when he denied knowing he accepted stimulus funds, claiming and i quote . . . meanwhile, mitt romney's attack on the president's cut for medicare providers triggered this response from the obama administration. >> the ryan plan aarp says it would undermine medicare and the voucher plan could cost retirees more than $6,000. >> and he tried to raise

political costs for his refusal to release his tax returns, and i quote . . . >> but rhodes brushed him off, writing if governor romney's tax returns are the core message of your campaign, there will be ample time for president obama to discuss them over the next 90 days. so how has the ryan pick worked out? romney lead the president by a point among registered voters before the announcement and by two points shortedly after. in wisconsin a cnn polled obama leading 49 to 45%, and in pennsylvania, had mr. obama ahead of romney 44 to 38

president, and michigan had the out in front as well. according to the financial times business executives worldwide found president obama would be better than mitt romney. with that let's go to craig crawford. >> would ray ryan was more of a blimp than a bop, certainly not a bounce. >> we'll have to see what that is going to turn into. we got a statement from somebody senior in the romney campaign saying we don't want to put out specifics, because specifics just get campaigns just get in trouble. >> it's actually pretty good

politics particularly for a challenger. and speaking as a political analyst, thought the romney campaign has done a pretty good jeb of keeping it vague but they have blown that up now with picking ryan because here is a guy that is known for his specifics, and now they have spent the last week talking about the details of medicare in ways that i can't imagine. >> if romney they were committing fraud because it was all double talk with ryan it is fraud because the numbers just don't add up. facebook numbers were better than this. >> maybe not get us does tracted with the new release of ryan's shirtless photo. >> well, there is no question there is going to be good for the economics of whatever

workout group he has been marketing. but the romney ryan ticket can't talk specifics, but they gave us one number this week 13%. how do your taxes compare to that? >> i think it's about double. i pay whatever my turbo tax tells me to. i think it's about 27%. at 13% romney's tax rate is almost as low as ryan's body fat percentage. >> that may be the knew percentage he is setting for people with income over $100 million. but how does this play does 13% stick in the craw of most voters who say wait a minute this guy is worth zillion dollars, why am

i paying more than he is. >> well there is pretty strong evidence that this tax issue for romney hurts among women, lots of women, who see it as suspicious. >> hum. >> he does find it aproblem among women. >> i haven't quite taken that gender gap analysis, but we'll have to think about that one. you are also from florida. you grew up in florida. obviously the medicare issue plays differently with seniors than with other groups. has florida become a real battleground in your perspective as opposed to a state that democrats said we'll fight for? >> when we talked last friday, it turns out we didn't know hours before ryan was picked i said it wouldn't happen. and one of the big reasons i thought is i couldn't believe they would want to risk this

whole medicare debate like we have had for the last week in florida, and even in the poles that show a little bit of a blip for romney it is not showing up in florida and there you have a lot of medicare retirees who were leaning towards romney. romney has given up a niche of voters where he was doing well among white retirees. and while they like some of the rhetoric about cutting government, when you start talking about actually entitlements that affect them, that gets to them. and then you hear this rhetoric if you are over 55 we're not going to touch you. they are saying, we're not going to touch you, they are going to screw your children and grandchildren. >> right. they are republicans, they might think people are that selfish. they are basically saying throw

your grandchildren under the bus. >> right. >> political blogger craig crawford, thanks for coming on the program. >> good to be here. >> joining us nate silver who writes the 538 blog for the "new york times." thanks for coming by. >> thank you. >> your numbers are the best out there. i don't know how you do it. how do you evaluate this has ryan helped, hurt or not discernible yet? >> the betts way to look at it is apples to apples. if you look at the polls, romney has gained about a point on average, some cases more some less, there is a lot of variant fiscal noise in the polls. but it has not been a huge earthquake. often a vp will give you a larger bounce, so the public has

a lukewarm reaction. >> as one who was a candidate at one point in my career when you get polls back and you move one point, you are right, that's is more background noise. but for wisconsin the republicans are saying wisconsin is in play and they hope to pick those up do you see that? >> that's probably the one thing you are guaranteed is you will do better in a home state. one thing with paul ryan he represents one congressional district, and obama won that district in 2008 but he is not necessarily that well-known in agree bay or other parts of wisconsin.% so it's important, but maybe -- >> but not the whole nation. >> yeah. >> but one of the things -- and i look at a bunch of the numbers when they come out the gallup poll has romney doing better than other polls. how do you make sense of that?

>> even the best polling firms are only getting about 10% of the people they want to get on the phone. most people don't take pollsters phone calls, we have better things to do -- >> i don't mean to be critical of you, you and people calling to sell us things over the phone are probably equally viewed -- >> well, i'm not a pollster. >> right. >> the technique that different pollsters use vary that's why you want to take an average of different firms. gallop's case's assume we will have fewer electorates. so there's assumptions of what is going to turn out. >> you get raw data and then impose on that data a series of assumptions. and if your assumptions are wrong, your outcome is going to

be wrong. >> of course. you don't just randomly pick up the phone and dialing numbers. so it's part art and part science, but it's pretty difficult. we have been lucky, the last couple of election cycles the polls have been pretty good. one of these years we're going to probably is a big disaster, but that's why -- talk about a one-point move in the polls, we're not even sure that is statistically significant. >> and one of the things that is making it harder these days is the advent of cell phones. people are less likely to answer the call and we don't know if that is different. >> some polling firms don't even bother to call cell phones at all. so right now about a thir of american voters only have cell phones. another one-six or so have land lines and basically use them to

filter out spam calls and everything else. so if you are missing cell phones now, you are not really taking a scientific survey. >> right, and presumably they are younger and may be more democratic. >> yeah, if you look at the average of polls that didn't include cell phones, and bomb bomb is doing a little bit better in ones that aren't doing them. and cell phone users tend to be urban and younger. you can try to connect for it but it doesn't work perfectly to go so. >> there is another whole market, the republicans have marketplace where people beth on the outcome of the election. it's called in-trade. >> right. >> and they are coming up with a pricing system to predict the outcome of the election and their number for mitt romney is like 40 -- mid-40s. am i correct? >> about 43%. it bounces around by the minute but it's above 40%, where it but

below 40% just a couple of days ago. >> and there is a divergence there -- what do you think it is? >> i think romney has about a 30% chance to win this direction. the fact that right now, which should be a good period for him, the fact that he's tied now kind of indicates, well at his high water mark it's even money. if he receives it all, obama seems to have enough of an edge where you may have to have an obama screw up. >> so do you think the market is more conservative -- >> i personally it this eats good to have money on the line. it makes you more accountable potentially. but we're all trying to look at the same set of information, we're getting fewer polls than we had four years ago. people trying to make guesses about what the economy will do. the one thing we do know is that

obama has been ahead in most of the polls, and i don't think from ws the early returns with ryan we'll see much of a change. if obama polls back ahead after his, then we're kind of back in think same holing pattern. >> right. i think it's not until after the conventions that things settle back to normal that we'll get a real read. >> that's, that's usually the first read. a week and a half after the democratic convention look at that number, that's maybe the moats honest we will have gotten at that time so far. >> all right. nate silver also good to have you on the program. >> thanks, eliot. stick arou

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i don't when it comes to public approval when it comes to public approval, congress has dipped to a low 10%. but our number of the day isn't ten, it's a nine. to begin with, president obama's last approval rating was 50%, five times higher than that of congress. but mitt romney's approval rating is 40. even bush 43 our least popular president, coincidently has an

approval rating of 43. and the president of pakistan. really? a nation blighted by bombings and food shortages, his abysmal ratings were still twice as high as our construction. even the banks and financial institutions beat congress by public opinion. all right. you can't please everyone. 16% of americans said they didn't even like the olympics. but that means disapproval of the olympics is still six points higher than approval of congress. the legislator even got beat think the long island power authority. and you are not going to believe the last one the transportation safety administration that's right the people who stop you from taking mouthwash on an airplane even they have a

higher rating. they probe people and pat them down but leave us with more dignity than congress. m05065

[ ♪ theme music ♪ ] >> eliot: the hot issue right now, medicare. who is doing what to it and why. according to the recent tracking poll 73% of american adults think medicare is extremely or very important. ranking it highest among the

healthcare issues. there is another issue out there that we should be talking about just as much, if not more, medicaid. because unlike the medicare reforms in paul ryan's budget which kick in years from now the all the on medicaid start immediately and could have devastating affects. ryan's budget starting in 2013, that's right. next year, would cut $1.4 trillion from medicaid. the government's health insurance company that primarily serves low income individuals. it would block grant dollars to the states, consequently leading to the measure of nonpartisan universally respected budget office a minimum of 14 million people being dropped from the program. this does not include the 11 million people who would be dropped from medicaid if the romney-ryan plan to repeal healthcare reform is up employmented. folks would be dropped from medicaid are going to be incapable of insurance. the vast majority would go without health insurance at all.

without health insurance they will get vastly inferior healthcare usually with little preventive care. the choice between the president's program which will lead to 17 million gaining coverage and the ryan plan which would lead to 25 million losing coverage could not be more stark. play the scenario out a bit more. what will happen when these 25 million low income americans need care? sure, some of it will be paid throughout out of pocket payments but an awful lot will be deemed charity care by providers. that cost will be picked up by everybody else. through higher premiums and private insurance payments to state government that is used as charity payments to the hospital or to direct charity. why explains why the president expanded medicaid and the mandate. it may not be fashionable these days to much we insure the social safety net gets torn in too many

places but the ryan budget tears a gaping hole in the very is center of that net. it's good that we're talking about the medicare issues in the campaign. let's spend a few minutes talking about medicaid as well. that's my view. >> this court has proven to be the knowing, delighted accomplice in the billionaires' purchase of our nation. >> and you think it doesn't affect you? think again. so, you guys grew up together. yes, since third grade... what are you lookin' at? not looking at i anything... we're not good enough for you. must be supermodels? what do you model gloves? brad, eat a snickers. why? 'cause you get a little angry when you're hungry. better? [ male announcer ] you're not you when you're hungry™. better. [ male announcer ] snickers satisfies.

>> eliot: it was revealed this week that paul ryan has next to no body fat. most of us known for a while that he was devoid of any chris o'donnell's business

return to an imac theater near you if you live in tampa down the street from the rnc. and romney and ryan will balance the budget. just don't ask them or their advisers when. >> how many years would it take for the romney budget to result in a balanced budget? >> um, well, i'm not sure of that myself. i'll get back to you and i'm sure it's on our website. i should know it. i'm embarrassed that i don't have that number at the top of my head. >> eliot: that's okay. the candidate does not have the answer either. we look back at now member of the current team john fugelsang. thanks as always for joining us. >> thank you. >> eliot: chris o'donnell. i long for those days. what is i coming back for. >> he's very good at promoting herself. i've had the pleasure of meeting her and working with her. >> eliot: working with her? explain, in the convent of some

sort? >> we were together on politically incorrect with bill maher a couple of times. i had the pleasure of meeting her. the first time i met her we had a heated conversation. i told her that my parents were ex-catholic clergy. she said that she broke up with a catholic boyfriend because he wasn't sure he was going to heaven when he died and she knew that she was going to heaven. if a muslim said i know i'm going to paradise no matter what, people might be a bit skittish in parts of this country. >> eliot: you and she did not get along. >> no, we butt head, but then we met up again a few weeks later and i made nice. >> eliot: did they explain to the certainty? she's holding on to this herself. >> i'm half brooklyn and half southern. which means i'm bilingual >> eliot: or some might think

you don't speak any language. >> it's the y'alls, as spending my summers down south i used to see a bumper sticker that said, christians are not better. just saved. which is a nice way of saying they're better. they're not roasting in hell. and to believe that your country is the best because you were born in it. this is the essence of christian fundamentalist. it's the team, the tribe, not the one-on-one teaching of jesus who was a raging liberal. >> eliot: when is she going to be doing. >> this is going to be a fascinating event that c-span will document. she'll be there speaking on the tea party side. there will be special guests, alan grayson on the occupy side or michelle bachmann or allen west will be there on the tea party side. something from both hemispheres. >> eliot: on c-span, i don't know if this is going to be world wrestling federation,

fascinating personality. >> and its happening at the imax theater down the road. >> eliot: more exciting than the convention. >> i think people need to watch current tv's coverage of the convention. >> eliot: we'll cover both. let's move on to paul ryan. he may not be doing well, but this workout tape he's promoting, it's going nuts on tv. >> it's a shame. he would make a great gay porn star. oh come on, if you can't make a gay porn. >> eliot: i hadn't heard of that. that's great. >> i made a lot of eddie munster jokes last week about ryan, but i don't do that again because i look like kd language. they were talking about their partnership and how awesome they are. two men who are opposed to gay marriage and looking like one. a precious week. >> eliot: i'm more interested in my p 90, and.

my buddy stephanie miller did it. look at that right there. i'm like a before picture next to that. we hear politicians and sometimes their spouses talking about-- >> eliot: that's really paul ryan? that's not a body double. >> like lee harry oswald. >> eliot: now i'm getting jealous. >> these guys will talk all day about fitness. they never talk about the crap we put in our bodies. you hear politicians talking about the importance of being physically fit. they won't talk about the fact that most of the food that comes in boxes is garbage. >> eliot: are you complaining about the wine you buy. >> pardon. >> eliot: the wine you buy. >> i get wine in a juice box, kid size. >> eliot: does he have an investment in this company? the thing everybody is talking about is the work out. >> no, he is a guy in his 40s and he looks great.

the flipciness of his budget. >> eliot: don't guess serious on us. >> i won't. this guy voted for tarp. he voteed for "no child left behind." he voted for the stimulus, he voted for the iraq war but he really hates government spending. paul ryan has a great chance to teach all of our conservative friends. >> eliot: but he has good abs. what is more important. >> what is with the abs. >> eliot: i'm going home to work out. >> i have posture pediatric abs. firm with cushion on top. i don't. >> eliot: the number of the week romney, do we shut up paying 13% should he be paying more. >> he should pay more. our loved ones who pay 24% and this guy who pays all off interest that's income. people who work for a living deserve to pay a higher

proportion of their income don't work work for a living. he doesn't talk about income. he talks about taxes and his wife as well. if you're watching mitt romney speak and you want to have a drinking game, a few words you don't want to make your drinking game. bush bin laden, or income or you'll be the guy driving everybody home. >> eliot: he wants to reduce the tax on his capital gains almost to zero. >> yes, mitt romney is a millionaire at birth who is a very wealthy man who is asking working class conservatives to give tax cuts because the rich have had it tough for a very long time. who was the last president to ever balance a budget? >> eliot: eisenhower. >> nixon. eisenhower was the last one with a surplus. >> eliot: john fugelsang, thanks so much as always. friday gives us what the week is all about. >> t