independent voter to choose them. not impossible, t hard. fascinating to see what's going to happen in iowa. the final takeover of the party of lincoln by all that he opposed. that's hardball now. the last word with lawrence o'donnell starts right now. the first big week of the presidential campaign so david axelrod joins us to discuss the re-election strategy. >> you came here to listen to people. >> i came here to speak. >> mitt romney emerges from the mittness protection program. and now we know why he was hiding. >> mitt romney giving as good as he got. >> heckler taking it to mitt romney. >> hold on a second, i'm not going to raise taxes, that's my answer. >> you see mitt romney starting to engage a little bit. >> corporations are people, my friend. corporations are people, my friend, human beings, my friend.

>> rick perry removes all doubt. perry's in. >> one of our darkest hours. >> sarah palin rushes to iowa. >> never fear, america, sarah palin has come. >> predictably sarah palin is back. >>tops of cameras and sarah palin showing up. that's so strange. >> heart land fights. >> tired of the inaviativasion privacy. >> this guy is nuts. i can call this napkin a paper towel, but it is a napkin. >> barack obama a one-term president. >> you got to love retail politics. >> the president blames congress. >> the only thing keeping us

back is our politics. >> rooting for the president. >> what can the president do? >> extend the payroll tax cut. call people back early. >> people of the united states of america, your congress is bought. good evening from new york. the top eight declared republican presidential candidates are in debate for saturday's ames straw poll. but texas governor rick perry is now doing all he can to divert attention from iowa. he allowed his spokesperson today to tell the associated press that perry will announce on saturday that he is running for president. governor perry's name will not appear on the ames straw poll ballot but does allow for write-in votes. current republican front-runner mitt romney came out of hiding today and immediately got in trouble with the audience at the

iowa state fair. >> we have to make sure that the promises we make in social security, medicaid, and medicare are promises that we can keep. these are various ways of doing that. one is we can raise taxes on people. >> corporations. >> corporations are people, my friend. we can raise taxes on -- of course they are. everything corporations are, it goes to people. >> where do you think it goes? >> down their pockets. >> whose pockets? human beings, my friend. >> and then there was this -- >> sir. >> we're not going to do that. >> i'm on social security. >> hold on just a moment? hold on for a moment. i'm going to let you speak in a moment. >> you came here to listen to the people. >> i came here to speak and then you can ask your question. >> hold on let me speak.

>> you -- >> i'm on social security. i'm also on medicare. the tremendous -- >> yes, ma'am -- >> you -- >> is that -- when are you going to do to speak to social security, medicare and medicaid without cutting benefits? >> ready for my answer? i'm not going to raise taxes. that's my answer. i'm not going to raise taxes. if you want somebody who will raise taxes, vote for barack obama. i'll tell you what he's doing. he's killing this economy. he's why 25 million people don't have jobs. >> it's not easy being mitt. president obama spoke today at johnson control automobile battery plant in michigan, a state suffering 10.5% up

unemployment. the president put the blame where it belongs for the lack of government action on the economy. >> we've seen the worst kind of partisanship, the worst kind of grid lock, and that grid lock has undermined public confidence and impeded our efforts to take the steps we need for our economy. what i want to say to you johnson controls is, there's nothing wrong with our country there is something wrong with our politics. >> the president then addressed those he recommended that he call congress back to washington before the recess ends on september 6. >> the last thing we need is congress spending more time arguing. what i figure is, they need to

spend more time out here listening to you. hearing how fed up you are. that's why i'm here. >> joining me now, senior strategist for president obama's campaign david axelrod who is in ames, iowa tonight. what are you doing in ames, iowa. >> i came to visit some of our supporters and i came for an event for some of the supporters and i heard something else was going on. so i came around to see what was happening here, lauren. >> yeah, a couple of things you might want to be responding to there. first of all, the front-runner up to today anyway, mitt romney, pretty rough day coming out of what politico has called mittness protection program. did you expect him to have as rough a time facing voters? >> it was surprising.

but i think more than the exchange he had, the substance is what people should pay attention to it, lawrence. he's clung to the position that tax cuts are more valuable -- tax cuts for corporations, tax loopholes are more valuable to this country, to our economy, to our future, than is education. and is certain development and social and medicare and this exchange underscored it. he had the strange formulation that corporations are people. i guess the next time you see a corporation, you should take them out to lunch. but i thought it was very reveal egg. the thing about running for president is, i went all over this country with barack obama for two years. whoever you are, whatever you believe, people get to know it. through these kinds of exchanges, you get to know where someone stands and what they're

about. he was explicit about his views there. it goes to the whole debate we're having as a country. >> david, a "new york times" report a month or more ago saying you have three names up in the board in chicago as your likely opponent. it was mitt romney, tim pawlenty, and maybe mitch daniels, someone else, not sure. who are the top three names on the board in chicago now? >> i've always said romney was a weak front-runner. i still believe that to be the case. obviously governor perry is now emerged on the scene. he could be a very formidable candidate. one thing i learned, you saw an example of it today. you don't know people are going to perform in the presidential campaigns until they're out there, until they're handling questions and dealing with situati situations. and up in of us have seen governor perry out there.

in some places, lawrence, it doesn't matter who the nominee is. every single one of them have now embraced the dogma of the tea party right. you saw it in the discussion about debt in which some of them actually urged default as a strategy and all of them embraced the notion that these tax cuts for the wealthy and tax breaks for oil and gas companies and for corporate jets were more important than things that could get our economy moving. more important than education, more important than research and development and more important than social security and medicare. that is the line all of them are towing now. so in some ways the personalities are different but the argument appears to be the same. >> david, if you were allowed one question in the republican debate, what would that question be? >> it might be -- it might be

that. it might be in a world in which -- in which we know that education is going to be so important in term of our economic well being in a world that our innovative and technical edge is so important in a country that prizes fearness, how do you prioritize those kind of tax cuts and how do you -- ahead of the things that you know we need to do to move together guard together as a country. i pride this motion somehow walking away from our obligations as a country and defaulting on our debt for the first time in a long history for our country were somehow a strategy for economic success. i would like to hear the explanation why. >> you and the obama team ran a

brilliant campaign last time around navigating the primaries. you don't have the primaries. you don't have the excitement that you can generate from things as strong as a straw poll, the caucuses, the primaries coming up. debates, primary debates, you won't have any of those. as a strategist, how do you run an incumbent campaign when all of the excitement is going to be taking place on what's happening now in the republican campaign suddenly here for republican rick perry. selections on the other side? >> well, of course, that is a challenge. that's why we're working so hard to communicate with our supporters all over the country. we've had a tremendous outpouring of support all over the country. people organizing in the absence of primary activity. i was here today, as i said, speaking to a group of

activists, i'm going to speak to more people tomorrow in des moin moines. they find the republican race pretty exciting. they're paying close attention to it. they understand they're going to face a stark choice in november of 2012. that's motivational to folks who have a -- a much different view than the views that are being articulated here behind me tonight. >> i want to read you something maureen dowd wrote on saturday. she said the white house is counting on the katherine bigelow and mark bowles big screen viewing of bin laden to counter obama's growing reputation. the movie is expected to open on october 12, 2012. perfectly timed to give a home stretch boost to a campaign that's grown tougher. is the obama campaign relying on hollywood to save it in the end? >> you're no hollywood guy.

you know that would be a bad strategy to hitch our wagon to that. the truth is i didn't know about this movie until i read about it in maureen's column. maureen is a great friend of mine and a really talented writer. she pays a lot of attention to that stuff. i don't. the thing that's going to animate this campaign is when you have a choice. the choice is between candidates with starkly different views about how we build a better future, how we secure the middle class in this country. i don't think those who value that in our country are going to find much comfort in what they hear in this building tonight. and i look forward to the debate. a great debate. it can win because a majority of americans share our view on this. >> back at 11:00 with live reaction to the debate tonight. quickly before you go, have you

spoken to the president, do you know his thinking on why he's not calling congress back to action during august? >> he spoke to this -- i think you had it in your piece to the top. he spoke to this today. there's something to be gained by letting congress go home and spend time with their constituents and hear the sense of outrage people feel about the brinksmanship they saw and t prioritization of politics helping the country move forward. he's happy to let them get an earful, let the constituents marinade in that for a while. and come back and address an aggressive set of steps we can take together to move this economy forward. having them come back to the hot house of washington and to have another sort of partisan a andoloand id

logical tap truck is not the way to go. what we want is for them to listen to their stitch whens and come back to work. >> david axelrod, thank you for joining us. good luck handling all of the republican crowds tonight in iowa. >> got my gym shoes on just in case. >> okay, thank you, david. >> see you. >> bye. come up up, steven colbert is back in the rewrite for what he's doing with his filthy journey superpac money and after we caught him not telling a lie about i. but first, more on mitt romney's very, very bad day after he faced off with angry iowa voters over social security and tacks. taxes.

coming up, the same day "the washington post" has a headline reading a wiser romney returns to iowa, romney does something

wicked unwise. that's ahead. and rick perry big foots the republicans in iowa by putting the word out today that he really, really, really is running for president. ♪ [ male announcer ] you never know when a moment might turn into something more. and when it does men with erectile dysfunction can be more confident in their ability to be ready with cialis for daily use. cialis for daily use is a clinically proven low-dose tablet you take every day, so you can be ready anytime the moment's right. ♪ [ man ] tell your doctor about all your medical conditions and medications and ask if your heart is healthy enough for sexual activity. don't take cialis if you take nitrates for chest pain as this may cause an unsafe drop in blood pressure.

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a new report by politico's ben smith today reveals that when romney was governor of massachusetts, he lobbied s&p to raise the state's credit rating because massachusetts raised taxes. that provoked this. >> you closed tax loopholes on big banks to raise revenue and balance the state budget. if you were elected president, would you to the same thing and look at the revenue side of the budget to balance the federal budget? >> as governor of massachusetts, i closed loopholes on big banks abusing our tax system. would i do the same as president? oh. >> let me describe what's a loophole and what's raising tax taxes. in my opinion, a loophole is someone who takes advantage of tax law in a way that wasn't intended by legislation. in my state, we had a special provision for real estate enterprises.

provided real estate and lower tax rates. banks figured out by calling themselves real estate companies they could get a special tax break. we said no more of that. we're not going to game with the system. so if there are taxpayers who find ways to distort the tax law and take advantage of what i call loopholes in a way that are not intended by the congress or intended by the people, absolutely, i close those loopholes, but, there are a lot of people who use the word loophole to raise taxes on people. that's what i do. i will not raise taxes. >> joining me now from ames, iowa, politico ben smith. that questioner had read your article today before going after mitt romney. take us through what you found on how romney appealed to s&p using massachusetts' increase in taxes to keep their ratings high. >> his answer to some degree is

the point. he -- in asking the s&p to consider raising the massachusetts rating, which it did. he said look how balanced the budget is. and through the recession of 2001 and the recovery after, you know, the tax revenues went down. and the legislature in 2002 raised $1 billion on new taxes on capital gains and cigarettes and ended in income tax cuts. we balanced the budget. look what great shape our vnss are in now. s&p agreed, raised the rating. he said i never raised taxes. that's true. he opposed the 2002 tax hike which is before he took office. the fact is he wants the numbers to add up. when the numbers add up, that's what he'll point it to. >> when he's drawn in the discussion like that, what you're hearing -- i think the voters, what they're hearing is this big businessman who is out there kind of working the system in whatever way he could find an advantage. it's not the best image for a

candidate to have? >> no, i think a lot of people who supported him saw a technocratic businessman, governor takes what it takes to get it done. that's true on fiscal issues too. the managers were mad at him. a lot of the loopholes he said he closed a lot of them that didn't consider loopholes. in that presentation in s&p, he bragged about raising fees quite a bit as well, a revenue measure which drew a lot of republicans in massachusetts at the time. >> closing loopholes the way he's talking about there is the way grover nowhere quist opposes. they won't let you close a loophole unless you reduce a tax by the same amount. he's got trouble ahead on that one.

generally, how has romney's perception been. now it looks rough in iowa. >> you got heckled by democrats, got as good as he got. he opened it pretty well. he put together -- the corporation is a person, you know, certainly arguable. you see what he's getting at. not the best thing to say if you're trying to shed an image as a pollute-acrat. >> do you expect that we'll hear anybody using any of the things that romney said against him. or is it going to be another one of those we're all friend, we're just against barack obama debates? >> you want to take romney down. they want to kill each other. for tim paw lepty, michelle bachmann, a tough choice of which contrast they want to draw. >> the biggest thing that can happen in the debate is to score some points that can move you

forward. a lot of people pay defense in the debate. who has to score in the debate? >> the most pressure here is on tim pawlenty whose whole strategy revolves around doing well in iowa and at this point is boiling down to doing well and it ends day after tomorrow. he's the one with the most at stake here. just to sort of come out of here looking like -- looking like a serious presidential candidate who his activists can get excited about and choose. >> ben smith of politico, thank you for joining me tonight. >> thank you. coming up, texas governor rick perry decides it's high time that the republican presidential primary had a gun-toting cowboy boot-wearing candidate. his spokesman announced when perry will announce. and sarah palin figures she can make one more desperate claim for attention in iowa before the presidential campaign leaves her behind. introducing the schwab mobile app.

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still to come in this hour, the real reason rick perry's people let it slip today that perry is going to announce his run for president on saturday. and in the rewrite tonight, we know what steven colbert says he's doing with that dirty filthy pac money he's raising but our last word investigation found today about what he's really doing with that money. every day, all around the world,

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in tonight's spotlight, all over but the announcement for rick perry. the governor allowed his spokesman to say that perry has decided to run for president. perry will make that completely clear on saturday in what is now perry's obvious attempt to update the straw poll that will be taking place at the same time perry gives the speech in charleston, south carolina. joining me now, msnbc analyst and huffington post reporter alex wagner. alex, perry is in. >> he's in. >> pretty exciting. >> we've got news to play with? >> we do, we do. this is perry's attempt to toss a ten gallon hat over the state of iowa. but it comes as his campaign was denied their plot of grass at

the straw poll. so lest any opportunity go by to pick a cowboys' spur in the race, they made the announcement today. >> it's designed to specifically kind of preempt in certain ways the debate tonight? >> sure. >> and so they they -- but going forward here, what -- is the -- is perry going to come in to iowa or is he going to go full force everywhere? >> you've got to think that, look, he has major conservative support. this is his wheel house. he's going to play in iowa. he'll be in waterloo on sunday. he's ramped up against the machine that he knows that michelle bachmann is holding a slice of the pie he wants. you've seen sabre rattling on both sides. there's a new pac established for michelle bachmann.

now perry has one against bachmann that's make us great again. it's less filling, taste great. >> it's going to be fun. perry sat down with mark hall prison and talked to him about the thoughts of how he approached the decision to run for president. >> i went from got the best job in america to today being fully engaged in this process of making a decision. the issue of is this what i want to do was dealt with about 45 days ago in a conversation with my wife. prior to that, no, being the president of the united states was not on my radar screen from the standpoint of something i want to do. >> so start to finish. i love when politicians who are

not president of the united states say i have the greatest job in america. always the prerequisite. then this lie 45 days ago. get out of here, the day you decided to be a politician is the day you wanted to run for president. >> his wife's blessing. she was telling him it was his duty to serve and he had to leave his plum job and do something for the country. that's the campaign line. >> combined with mitt romney's very bad day in iowa talking to actual voters, which is not romney's strength, perry, now, you would think that there's more interest in perry among republican establishment people looking for a winner. because every day romney looks like less of a winner. >> there's not a lot of excitement about romney except for the fact he's a

front-runner. it bodes very, very well. how it plays out, it's giving the romney campaign pause. >> it's not the unanimous welcome to rick perry. mike huckabee who lost the 2008 straw poll, won the caucus had this to say. >> he may decide he's not going to play iowa at all. maybe that's what this decision by announcing on the day of the straw poll is about. i guarantee you the other candidates will beat the daylights out of him for not respecting the straw poll, so will the iowa republican party. out there the conversations on the streets will be it's bad form to make the decision when it's in iowa. >> i love how he refers to the streets -- the streets of iowa will rise up against you.

>> a very strong conservative base in iowa that will play well for whom rick perry is going to play well. whether there's going to be fist acuffs, he's overplaying how much of a tactical error this may be. >> thank you very much for joining me tonight. >> thanks. rick perry was not the first person to think up ways to draw attention away from the debate, guess whose butts just rolled in to iowa? that's coming up. but first, steven colbert is using fear mongering to raise dirty money for the dirty super pac. the last word investigation will reveal what colbert is really doing with the money. that's in "the rewrite." [ male announcer ] members of the american postal workers union

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iowa state fair amid media attention deficit disorder. but first, stephen colbert's newest act for his candidate of choice. that's in "the rewrite." run more smoothly by helping remove deposits and cleaning up intake valves. so when you fill up at an exxon or mobil station, you can rest assured we help your engine run more smoothly while leaving behind cleaner emissions. it's how we make gasoline work harder for you. exxon and mobil. when you switch your car insurance to esurance. i could save 'em 522 smackers. you talkin' dough? bread. benjamins? scratch. greenbacks. moolah. cheddar... simoleons! don't try to out-save me. [ female announcer ] any way you say it, $522 is the average amount saved by people who switched to esurance. 522 bucks! [ female announcer ] to find out how much you'll save,

call 1-800-esurance or visit esurance.com right now. that's 1-800-esurance or go to esurance.com. time for tonight's "rewrite." when i go around the country giving inspirational speeches to boy scout troops, girl scout troops, and 4-h clubs, i'm often asked for life advice. i tell kids in america the same

thing -- the most important thing i've learned in all of my years of trying to make this country greater? maybe the only thing i've learned, never trust a man in makeup. i mean, how can you trust a guy who won't let you even see what his face really looks like? which brings us, of course, to the second night in a row to stephen colbert. who wears makeup every day. in show business every day of course means four days a week. there is no man in makeup less trustworthy that stephen colbert, except for that one time when he testified to congress about immigration. and it is not just coincidental that he has never worn less makeup than when he was testifying to congress. last night in this space, we did a report on exactly how stephen colbert is wasting the dirty filthy campaign money he's

collecting for his dirty filthy super pac. colbert raises money for his super pac by flooding the internet with manipulative e-mail that are beneath the dignity of the worst nigerian spam scammers. he begins one with the salutation -- dear future victims. he comes right out and calls the people he's trying to trick out of their money victims. nigerian spam scammers at least accord their victims the respect of never actually calling them victims. never demeanoring them that way. but colbert's meanness knows no bounds. here's how he scares people into handing him their money. under the subject, "spiders in your hair" in his e-mail he writes, "dear future victims, they're doing it again and we have only second to stop them

before you, your pets, and everyone you love could experience whatever it is you're most afraid of. exclamation point. and don't forget, earlier i used the phrase, "spiders in your hair." send me $25 to make a difference or send me $100 to make four differences or just let the bad guys win. your choice. quick, look behind you! stephen colbert." this rank fear mongering is colbert's key fundraising technique. while making fun of rick perry. and unconventional campaign ad to say the least. you can go to our website to see the entire ad in case you missed it last night. the ad is so ridiculous that

after thinking about it after the show, i realized, hey, wait a minute, no iowa television station is going to accept this ad. it was so obvious to me that colbert was lying about buying iowa tv time for the ad. i mean, what respectable iowa tv station would sell him time for that? it didn't make me feel any better to think that the rest of the news media fell for his lie because i'd really gone for it. i went for it hook, line, and sinker. i read the colbert super pac press release accompanying the ad word-for-word. i've never read a press release word-for-word on television before. so i put last word producer nick ramsey on the case since he produced last night's segment about the colbert super pac. i was ready to let him take all of the blame for showing a colbert ad that wasn't running

on iowa television. nick's first call was to an nbc affiliate in des moines, iowa, who-tv. he asked a guy who picked up the phone in the newsdesk if anyone there happened to notice the colbert super pac ad running on our affiliate or any other iowa station. the guy at the newsdesk said, immediately, quote, yeah, it ran during our 5:00 newscast yesterday. now, this does not mean stephen colbert is to be trusted. it means that we here at "the last word" have now proven that stephen colbert has told the truth exactly once in his life. well, two if you count his testimony to congress which, as viewers of this show already know, i was really impressed with. but because colbert told the truth about his super pac wasting its dirty filthy super prk ac money by putting a silly

ad on iowa tv, colbert has earned the privilege of us, once again, showing a colbert super pac ad. it is, like the first one, an ad for rick perry. or against rick perry -- or against super pacs, or against political tv ads in general. or maybe even against iowa. and america. it's an ad like you've never seen before. unless you saw the first one. and, remember, to prove that it is not coordinating the spending of its dirty filthy super pac money with the rick perry campaign, the colbert super prk -- pac spells perry with an a. >> iowa, a land of good people who can make up their own minds.

but outside books like jobs for iowa super pac are trying to pander to iowians with pro-perry ads featuring pornography so your kids can see just so you'll vote for rick perry as the ames straw poll. but americans for a better tomorrow tomorrow believes that iowians deserve better, and we're going to give it to you. we're getting all up in those niblets. on august 13, write in rick parry, that's parry with an a for america, with an a for iowa. americans for a better tomorrow tomorrow is responsible for the content of this advertising. oh!

sarah palin is restarting her one nation publicity seeking bus tour rolling in to the iowa state fair in des moines tomorrow, just in time to grab some of the attention being paid to the republican presidential candidates while mitt romney, tim pawlenty, michelle bachmann and the others debate and compete in the ames straw poll, palin will be, quote, her words, restoring all that is good and strong and free. and she'll be doing that at the iowa state fair. she also said i'm also excited to try some of that famous fried butter on a stick, fried cheesecake on a stick, fried twinkies, etc. i'll join them in honor in spite

of people who would rather like to just make us eat our peas. they join new hampshire on the day romney would announce his candidacy. and sarah palin also happened to be in iowa to attend a premiere about the documentary about her entitled "the undefeated." the paul simon public policy institute at carbondale and former chief political columnist for the des moines register. thank you for joining us tonight, david. >> good to be with you. >> has iowa caught on to the palin publicity bus tour this is all about getting attention for sarah palin? or are some people in iowa, some of the good people desperately hoping she's going to run for president? >> no, i think more and more republicans are not happy with her. the ones i talked to, what is

she doing kind of thing. i think early on, they were willing to give her the benefit of the count. but there doubt. there's a point if you're serious, the saying out here is you have to fish or cut bait. by flitting around with this thing, it does start to take on the aura of publicity to her when in fact when she wants to run for president, she needs to be doing events, doing some retail politics. and they're not seeing that yet. >> doesn't perry's move allow his spokesman today saying he'll announce on saturday to say he's running for president, doesn't perry getting more serious even highlight how unserious the palin publicity tour is? >> well, you're talking about two different potential candidates here. i think governor perry is real. but like sarah palin, you know, he can -- he's got to get in this thing in a big way if he expects iowa republicans to take

him seriously. a lot of respect for governor perry. i think that -- a lot of people want to see him run. and, you know, at some point, you have to get out of the jet and start doing the retail work that goes into winning an iowa caucus campaign, like the other candidates are doing. and so i think -- i don't think he -- at some point, he's got to start slogging it out with all of the rest of the candidates. >> it seems to be that he's going to say in effect in no uncertain terms on saturday that he's going to run for president. and then there's some indication that he may be flying to iowa as soon as sunday. if he does that, and he gets -- he starts getting serious in iowa as early as sunday, will it be forgiven that he did not participate in the straw poll and he didn't get started earlier? >> yes, i think it will be forgiven. one of the effects that happens in iowa in both parties, lawrence, when candidates get in or get out is it unsettles the race. so if people like governor perry

and sarah palin decide to get in the race, republican activists are not going to automatically sign up for them. they're going to move to undecided. most of the caucus-goers are professional undecideds, they're preferences, enthusiastic supporters. these are people, they want to see all of the events. they want to see the candidates. the same phenomenon in new hampshire as you know. if governor perry gets in this, he'll unsettle the race for a while. and there'll be plenty of time for him to do the retail work that he needs. he's got to start doing it. that's my point. >> tell us how to watch the straw poll on saturday. it has produced in the past some results that had absolutely no meaning going forward in the campaign. but also it gave the win to george w. bush. when he was running for president, he ended up with the nomination and the presidency. what do you do for saturday? >> for better or worse, the

straw poll as brewer said gives iowa two bites at the apple. it takes on the same trappings of the caucuses themselves. it will do two things. one, it can potentially knock some candidates out of the race. if they do poorly, governor pawlenty and gingrich, some of the others -- herman kahne, i think some of them will have trouble raising money. that's happened in the past, it's not the candidate or the race. the other thing it can do is elevate candidates. a lot of media attention and publicity. even with all of sarah palin and governor perry buzzing around the thing, a win is a win. it will be a headline. it will elevate some candidates. those are the two things that i think this straw poll will do. >> and the -- the front-runner of the front-runner up until the perry entrance in the campaign, mitt romney, who has been largely ignoring iowa, what kind of price does he pay for doing that? >> well, you know, i think mitt romney is trying to have a little bit of both ways.

he's made a huge investment in the state in the past. he spent $10 million. he spent a lot of time in this state. he's well known to activist republicans. he's led in some of the early polls here. but what he's trying to do is make sure that the national media doesn't label him a front-runner in iowa in case somebody comes along and beats him. so it's called tamping down his expectations. but he's here. he's moving around. he's got people who are trying to do things on his behalf. and so i think romney is trying to have it both ways. but politicians who run for president always do that. >> they do. the former chief political columnist for the register, now the director of the paul simon public policy institute at southern illinois university carbondale. thank you for joining me tonight. >> thanks, lawn rens. >> -- lawrence. >> have the last word on line. follow my tweets @lawrence.