tea party rally. >> well, some kids know what they are saying. i think that -- i even know one ever those kids. i will have them on. i joined a civil rights movement when i was a kid. i would rather have a kid trying to do right than adults acting childish in washington. thanks for watching. i'm al sharpton. "hardball" starts right now. perry-scope. let's play "hardball." good evening. i'm chris matthews down in washington. leading off tonight, the real winner of last night's debate. well, yesterday we said the republican debate names in iowa was a tussle between the alternative wing of the party and traditional republicans and the tea party crowd. the answer came in one jarring image from the debate. all eight candidates raised

their hands when asked whether they would reject -- reject -- a budget plan that offered $10 in cuts for every $1 in tax increases. all eight. three conclusions there. one, the republican party today is unwilling to compromise under any circumstances. two, they really don't care about the deficit. all they care about is taxes. three, this is a big one. they're all scared of not looks as right wing as possible. it's the elephant not in the room who may have been the big winner. rick perry stole a lot of the thunder yesterday when he says he's running. he may soon steal their votes once he makes it official tomorrow. the day of the straw poll happens to be the same day. plus, president obama could not have been unhappy with what he saw last night, but he still needs to come up way jobs program himself. a democratic congressman who agrees with me on that joins us tonight. also, has war weariness taken over the right? coming home soon. coming home soon from afghanistan may be one thing

both parties now can agree on, and let me finish with the two women who just climbed the highest peak in africa. we start with the republican debate, and for that we go to iowa. chuck todd is nbc's chief political director and our white house chief correspondent. he's at the iowa state fairgrounds. also the "new york times" political reporter jeff, in des moines. great coverage tonight. last night, i want you all to look at this. during the poll, during the fox news debate last night, moderator brent bair asked all candidates if they'd turn down a deal that cuts 10 in spending for every $1 raced in taxes. look what happened. >> will you raise your hand if you feel so strongly about not raising taxes you'd walk away on the 10-1 deal. that's frightening. chuck, that shows -- i said today and i mean it, like one of those reverend yung sun moon's

wedding, everybody gets married at the same time. did anybody quibble? wait a minute. 10-1? would any member of congress or a senator turn down a deal like that? even jim demint would look twice at that deal, seems like. >> yeah, i had this feeling twofold on this issue. number one is, upsetting that a couple of these candidates will end up backtracking on this at some point. maybe it's not for three months. maybe it's not for four months, but that was an odd moment. you almost -- it was one of those where i'm thinking did they not hear that it was 10-1? did they not hear that that was the ratio? clearly, the democrats, heard david axelrod, president obama's chief campaign strategist, he gobbled that moment up. saying, see, this is, proves the point that the president was willing to move in the middle, and the republican party today is not. but the fact of the matter is, the issue of taxes is what unifies this party. there's a lot of despair coalitions in the republican

party. social conservative, libertarians, isolationists, you name it. the one thing that keeps them together is taxes. chris, i've told you this before. i've had republican pollsters tell me it would break the republican party apart if they somehow split on taxes. >> let me go to jeff on that same point. this was the bicentennial moment yesterday. jeff, to make it, to follow on on what chuck said there. they make backtrack on that, some of them, in three, four months. but none of them asked for a clarification. they immediately, knee jerk response. they all put up their hands afraid not to be with the group. >> no question. i mean, but i think that sort of was a metaphor for the whole debate. they were really focused on at least most of candidates on the stage were focused on the here and now, which is the iowa straw poll.

they're worried about sort of being not on the same page as michele bachmann, perhaps, or ron paul, perhaps, but i think chuck's right. in the long-term view, i'm not sure they will have the same point of view. i could see perhaps jon huntsman once new hampshire comes along give a slightly nuanced answer to that, but i think that signified the whole thing. these candidates are afraid to alienate the most activated, energized set of voters in their party, and that is one thing, perhaps one of the only things, that's a bright spot for this white house, is that they think this field of candidates is veering so far right they won't be able to correct. i'm not so sure that's the case. at the end of the day i think someone would perhaps have a window into becoming slightly more pragmatic here. >> look at u.s. congresswoman michele bachmann saying she was right when she voted to let the government default. remember her vote. she wasn't going to vote for any deal, anything to deal with the debt ceiling. going to let the thing happen. listen to what she said last tight. >> we just heard from standard &

poor's when they dropped -- when they dropped our credit rating what they said is we don't have an ability to repay our debt. that's what the final word was from them. i was proved right in my position. we should not have raised the debt ceiling and instead we should have cut government spending, which was not done. and then we needed to get our spending priorities in order. >> well, a little complicated to me on that. senior director of politico said the down it grade last week happened because "people in the political arena were even talking about a potential default. that the country even has such voices albeit a minority is something notable here. this kind of rhetoric like bachmann's is not common among aaa sovereigns." interesting, chuck. an alternative universe here where bachmann can stand up

there with confidence and ignore the fact her willingness to face a default, to take any step that would actually lead to one, was, in fact, somehow proven flight her universe. >> you know, i think this is the most important overlook part of this debate last night, which is, i think that tim pawlenty, while clumsily sometimes in his attacks on michele bachmann put -- forced her to say some things and expose some weaknesses with her that i think is going to eventually make her unnominatable. remember, this morning, on the "today" show, she was asked to clarify on this issue of debt ceiling and she wasn't for raising it under any circumstances. remember, there is a majority of the house republicans in the tea party caucus were okay with raising the debt ceiling, if they got their ball,ed budget amendment. she's not even there. so she's in the minority among some of the most conservative parts of the house republican conference, and i think that that puts her in a precarious place, that if she's trying to jump to the mainstream inside

the republican party, trying to prove to the business community in the republican party that she's nominatable, that they can trust her. those comments on the debt ceiling, i think, ended any chance she had to make that leap. i think it's a very, she put herself in a very tough spot. >> so let's watch tim pawlenty take on michele bachmann and her record last night in that fox news debate we watching. let's listen. >> it's an undisputable fact that in congress her record of accomplishment and results is non-existent. >> when it came to health care i brought tens of thousands of americans to washington to fight the unconstitutional mandate. i didn't praise it. when it came to cap and trade i fought it with everything that was in me including i introduced the light bulb freedom of choice act. >> she's got a record of misstating and making false statements. if that's your view of effective leadership with results, please, stop, because you're killing us. >> you said the era-of-small government was over.

that sounds a lot more like barack obama, if you asked me. >> well, jeff, there you have her, again, arguing basically that her words are what matters, not her effectiveness, and governor pawlenty saying she didn't get anything done. yeah, but i came out with the light bulb freedom of choice. she speaks out as if, with confidence, that that's a significant thing to say on this planet. >> and i think one thing that voters here in iowa, at least, have really been paying attention to this for quite a why. it wasn't last night they started hearing this distinctions, tim pawlenty has been struggling, small crowds. he hasn't attracted as much pop as she has, but the republican voters here who i talk to are beginning, i think, at least some are beginning to understand

that she's the candidate of the moment. she's probably a summertime candidate. actually after this afternoon she had a formal media availability in a town outside of des moines. almost like a presidential press conference. reporters were seated. she calmed on us by name. a little curious, and i asked her about these accomplishments and said what are your real accomplishments? she went back to minnesota. talk about her education, getting a marriage amendment on the ballot. when pressed on these, she knows that she falls up short. the question is, is there enough time for governor pawlenty? what are voters at the straw poll going to do? perhaps an unfair test but he walked into this. so tomorrow, like it or not, it's important for him, and if he happens to do better than her, she has a tough few months ahead. >> and mitt romney's most memorable line yesterday happened hours before the debate. someone in a crowd at an event of his suggested raising taxes on corporations rather than raising taxes on people. let's listen to romney's response. >> corporations are people, my friend. we can -- of course they are.

corporations are. where do you think it goes? people's pockets. human beings, my friends. >> well, chuck, i guess that was made to order. perfect. an activist on the left side progressives raising the point effectively they don't want people taxed, corporations. and corporations right now are pretty cold hearted in terms of laying people off, not hiring people. he win with the argument a corporation making its money on profits, not on giving people jobs is a positive move even among republicans? >> boy, this is a classic case of winning on style and i don't think we know yet on substance. the performance yesterday of him battling with the heckler was something that, when you talk to republicans out here, even some folks that work wore romney, they were relieved. like, wow. he's showing some life. see, we told you he can give as

good as he gets. stylistically a good moment for them and the campaign is trying to fund raze off of it. the substance of it, a couple of moments that you're sitting there going, okay. well, you can see how democrats could exploit that one line in a 30-second ad, but then he was questioned earlier by another quote/unquote heckler who asked him about this issue of taxes versus fees and loopholes and he seemed to struggle here. i think we're going to see over the next six months that rick perry and michele bachmann, she sort of talk and this a little last night. i think we know how they'll try to go after romney. they're try to hit him on taxes, on fees what he did as governor, raising fees, defending the idea of closing some loopholes, that that's okay, that no amount of raising your hand on a 10-1 spending tax increase ratio is going to cover up some of his record as governor and i think perry and bachmann and the romney teams knows it, they're

going to try to exploit that. >> tomorrow's vote, the straw vote tomorrow. with perry looming over this and announcing for president and getting right in the middle of this, who has the most to lose tomorrow and the most to win in terms of straw votes tomorrow night? >> look, i'm going to be crass about this. it's the ricky bobby rule. if you ain't first you're last. because of perry, you know, we're going to have this sort of triple boxes. romney in new hampshire. perry announcing in south carolina. so the winner in iowa, particularly between who wins between bachmann and pawlenty, gets a chance at the spotlight. i don't know if "winning in the top three," finishing a close second is helpful. the wild cards here are ron paul, who everybody quietly thinks might be the guy that ends up winning this thing, and even a rick santorum, who's done all the right things but is running out of resources. >> and last question to you, jeff. who can make the big headline tomorrow? is there any potential resounding headline? seems to me, if paul wins tomorrow the whole thing doesn't

mean much because he won't be the nominee of the party. he's too libertarian. who can make news tomorrow by winning and big time come out of this with fire power? up against the guy who's not in the race tomorrow, rick perry? >> i think tim pawlenty is hoping for the biggest headline. even if he gets it, that headline will be a split screen with perry. what about mitt romney that would draw him back to iowa and make him compete with rick perry. a lot of his supporters want him to do. if he doesn't go toe to toe, head to head with him begin ing from iowa they're afraid this steamroller may start and it might be hard for him to stop in new hampshire. watch how many people mitt romney gets. there's been a quiet campaign to sort of get some of his supporters into the straw poll and vote for him. i don't think he'll win, but he certainly would make a big headline. >> boy, that's learning from the kerry campaign. went out and met howard dean in iowa rather than waiting in new hampshire.

beat him there and the rest of the way. same theory, right, jeff? >> exactly. >> got to be there. >> exact same them, and romney people are thinking about that. >> chuck, last word. >> you win them both, chris. if romney went in and took iowa, it would be over. >> wow. >> done. this race is finished, but, know, that's the rich reward of romney playing for real and doing what he's doing now. >> i love strategic questions. thanks so much, chuck todd. looks like a nice day out there. >> beautiful. >> thank you, jeff. coming up, the winner of last night's debate wasn't even onstage. we'll talk to him. the most interesting guy, rick perry, announcing tomorrow, he could about nightmare for romney, could get in the there and beat him's in iowa and challenge him up in new hampshire and take him in south carolina and win the whole thing. he could challenge the president, too. people wonder. if he could be it. that's next. you're watching "hardball." only on msnbc.

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the teat party emerge add winner last night. which major candidates do the tea party think would make a good president? a new fox news poll found that 59% of tea partiers say there she is. michele bachmann would make a good president. om 27% say she wouldn't. bachmann's 32-point spread is highest in the poll. the next highest spread goes to rick perry, getting all the action. 48% say he'd be a good president. only 19% say he would win. that's a 29-point gap. mitt romney the spread is 14 points. 51% say a good president, 37, percent disagree. sarah palin in negative territory. 45% tea party say a good president, but more, 48%, say she wouldn't. what's happened there? we'll be right back. really? no. it comes with a hat. you see, airline credit cards promise flights

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back to "hardball." the gloves came off at last night's presidential debate. the real winner of the debate was not onstage. rick perry is getting all the action, dominated the latest news cycle. hess announcement tomorrow he's getting in the race is threatening to overshadow the ames straw vote, which is tomorrow. joining me, co-author of "bush's brain" and republican strategist todd harris. speaking of bush's brain, thanks for joining us. what's larger? the brain of karl rove or the brain of rick perry? >> i'd put my money on karl rove, but i think people dismiss rick perry. this man is quite possibly the fast, most instinctive politician texas has had since lbj.

he's a horrible governor, chris. no mistake about that. his instincts are good. embracing the tea party helped him defeat kay bailey hutchison here in texas, despite we're pretty much a train wreck economically. >> looks like a clown when you watch in the pictures. they can be totally unrepresentative. he dresses very fancy. there's something about wait he puts himself together. doesn't look authentic. he looks like a wax figure pretending to be a governor. i can't get. something doesn't quite add up. maybe it's the texas b.s. and boots and tuxedo thing think do down there. why does it work? outside of texas -- let me put it this way. it doesn't travel very well, but why does it work down there? >> well, i think that, you know, he got re-elected simply because the democrats completely messed up. there were three candidates running against him. kiki friedman, carol strayhorn,

and chris bell, a pretty darn good candidate, but the trial lawyers put their money behind someone other than the more logical candidate, and rick perry got re-elected with only 39%. a straight up one-on-one contest i actually don't think he would have won. he was fortunate in that regard, but he plays the texas thing up. he place the mythology up, and it plays, has a good appeal in texas and it resonates with a public fed up with washington. >> but he's just -- historically inaccurate. when texas came into the union for the republic of texas into the union, there was a provision. break itself into six states to get 12 senators. why get something as important as that wrong, or do you believe he deliberately crafted this cessation thing to make him look like a real cowboy? >> number one, the public, as you know, doesn't pay close enough attention to these people as we're starting to parch them as they run for public office.

number two, i don't think rick really understood what the constitution said about breaking into five states and he knew that the message of secession was going to be wildly embraced by those tea party folk. guess what happened? he was down by 5 points to kay bailey hutchison when he went out and spoke to those people about recession and a week later the guy is up by ten points over her and easily defeats her. >> what a strange world. take a look. most of the candidates had not even talked about rick perry. >> governor perry has a great record of job creation in texas. i think he's a very formidable person. >> there's room in the race for governor perry, sarah palin. >> welcome to the contest, from my perspective, it doesn't bother us or my campaign. that's just one more politician, and that makes this business problem solving stand out that much more. >> i hope if he does get in this race he broadens and expands the dialogue about job creation.

>> i'm very pleased he's coming in because he represents the status quo. >> i don't know what to make of that. anyway, straight talk from you. this guy, is he as good as he looks in terms of the fact that he clearly looks good to the right? >> here's the rick perry balance sheet. on the plus side you've got a definitiveness and assuredness that supporters see as real strength that they think is going to contrast beautifully with what many republicans view as the weakness of president obama. >> i get it. >> people -- >> swagger started -- >> saying it's swagger. his supporters say that it's strength. on the flip side, know, jim was pointing out, perry's record in texas while certainly will make for an outstanding 30-second commercial for him, there's also enough in there to make a pretty good 30-second commercial against him. whether it's the trans texas corridor, where the state

actually went to seize about half a million acres of private property. issues whether or not he raised taxes. issues around the state debt. whether you're mitt romney, tim pawlenty or any of the other candidates in the field, there will be enough in perry's record to fire all kinds of bullets, but jim is right. he should absolutely not be dismissed. >> what about the good old texas battle down there, the hatred of bush. what's that based on? >> well, it goes back to the bushes getting behind kay bailey hutchison. one of the big reasons, because karl rove ran that campaign. remember, it was karl who made rick perry go from democratic to republican when he was in the statehouse and then when he ran for lieutenant governor, perry was on the verge of a very tight race and perry wanted to go negative, but karl wanted to run the number up so that george bush would look very good and presidential and held rick back from going negative. antipathy on political direction

and then very bad water recently with the primary campaign against kay bailey hutchison and the bushes always been with karl and karl always with the bushes. >> trying to knock down perry's appeal. his record on jobs. here's david axelrod on gma this morning. lelgs r let's listen to david. >> a specific reason texas has done so well and that's because the oil industry has done so well in the last few years, and the military has grown, because of the -- because of the challenges that we've had overseas. he's been the beneficiary and had little to do with it. what's happened to health care in that state. it's a record of december nation, not of progress.

>> back to his strengths. what we do here on "hardball." ignore everything substance, right or wrong, left or right. how good a candidate will he be? timed everything exactly so far. a bigger story than anybody that wins tomorrow, looks like. looks like he's going to give sarah palin, reading the tea leaves. seems to like him. said so. she could jump in and look close. he's doing pretty good. she comes in, gives him a booster rocket. he wins the iowa caucuses. he guess on and does really well with the whole thing. looks to me like that's the timing set up here. any thoughts? collaborating, those two? >> i don't know whether they're collaborating. they certainly have a relationship. when thor tine republican establishment, virtually the entire establishment was backing kay bailey hutchison in her primary challenge, sarah palin came to texas, campaigned for him, drew huge crowds, and gave him -- >> could do it again. >> she could do it again. no question. he is probably the most gifted

natural politician, my guess, of anyone in the field. he's going to have one hell of a message when it comes to talking about job creation, and the fact is right now he's playing the media like a texas fiddle. he's getting them to write exactly what he wants. >> i can see this. wrap do you make of this? maybe you don't know this much. can you project, where he's the candidate, she's the kingmaker. she's sort of riding shotgun on this guy and they go all the wait. can you see that happening, or too much fantasy? >> i actually predicted it two days ago. people dismiss sarah palin as their peril. rick will have to run back to the center and talk about jobs, but the tea party folks can be animate and remain very excited if she were on the ticket with him. let's face it, there's a reason she draws huge crowds. she charges large speaking fees and she sells lots of books and she's very, very popular with the animated forces with the primary process right now. i wouldn't be the least bit surprised to see her on a ticket with him. >> i can see her doing it, she

can't be hit that way. she becomes the shotgun guard of that campaign. annie oakley riding along, beside the sheriff. hell of a cowboy image. >> up next, why were dogs around the country getting riled up by the republican debate? what a strange event that was. hearing doorbells, these dogs. next on the "sideshow." you're watching "hardball," only on msnbc. [ man ] behind every bs is a "what if." what if we designed an electric motorcycle? what if we turned trash into surfboards? whatever your what if is, the new sprint biz 360 has custom solutions to make it happen, including mobile payment processing, instant hot spots, and 4g devices like the motorola photon. so let's all keep asking the big what ifs. sprint business specialists can help you find the answers. sprint. america's favorite 4g network. trouble hearing on the phone? visit sprintrelay.com.

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back to "hardball" now for the "sideshow." first up, there may be no clear answers to who, if anyone, came out on top in last night's gop debate. some of the most heated reactions to the events of night may have been sparked by an unlikely group of spectators. dogs. each time a candidate timed response ended a bell went off. >> recommended -- [ bell ] >> sound a lot like a doorbell. doesn't it? turns out a shocking number of the nation's pet dogs thought so, too. twitter exploded as viewers radio counted what went down each time that bell sounded. one person tweeted, "every time the bell rings in the republic debate our dog barks. no, lola, mitt romney is not at the front door." and, the debate moderators rang the door pell to stop a runaway

answer. andy came bounding out of the kitchen barking his little schnoodle head off. it could have been a republican talking. how do you know? earlier candidate mitt romney turned heads yesterday when he pointed out that, you know, corporations are people, too. to come to his defense, senator rand paul of kentucky seemed to reverse the comparison entirely. listen. >> i think we're all corporations. so the corporations, like someone else -- all of us are corporations. you think about, you know, do you have a retirement fund, do you have a 401(k)? everybody who has a 401(k) owns parts of corporations. i think a lot of times people want to vilify corporations. and they're these other rich people. they're us. >> a stretch. when was the last time someone referred to themselves as, oh, i'm a corporation. i don't know what they're

talking about these days. up next, president obama needs to come up with plan now. we'll ask what keith would like to see the president do. jobs is the democratic answer. a wanted to see it spelled out. you're watching "hardball," only on msnbc. [ male announcer ] this is the network. a network of possibilities. excuse me? my grandfather was born in this village. [ automated voice speaks foreign language ] [ male announcer ] in here, everyone speaks the same language. ♪ in here, forklifts drive themselves.

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i'm milisa. here what is happening. convicted serial killer was sentenced to death for murdering 11 women wp. prosecutors say he buried their bodies around his property. casey anthony has to resurface to l florida for check fraud case. a investigators found

training wheels near the area a 3-year-old was last scene. a top cop is heading to london to help crack down on rioters trashing the city. there was a personal request pr britain's prime minister. a week of trading with more ups and downs than the pedals on lance armstrong's bike, the week ends almost where it began. down less than 2% overall. now back to "hardball." now back to "hardball." welcome back to "hardball." saying it all week, actually. that president obama needs to announce a jobs program and get people back to work. now the country's behind the idea of creating jobs not cutting the deficit or cutting the debt even as what's important now.

look at this cbs news/"new york times" poll. two to one, americans say creating jobs should take precedence over cutting spending. couldn't be clearer. here to talk about it, a man with his own jobs prom, democrat keith ellison of minnesota. let me talk to you, congressman about the politics of this before we get to the your substantive program. seems to me the president and progressives and democrats don't know how to play old style politic. the way you get people hired, you say there's a job that needs being done. not that people need a job. never heard anybody getting hired because somebody needs to give somebody a job. they hire somebody if they need a job done. that's the way people think. if you want to sell people getting hired, sell that something needs to be done and hiring them makes sense. show that a bridge is below code. that roads have potholes, sewer systems are deteriorating, dilapidated, same with water systems. show them the basic utilities they're depending on are going to hell and somebody better fix them soon or you're in trouble. infrastructure drives me crazy,

stimulus which means nothing to anybody when they ought to be saying wouldn't you like your kids when they go back to school this september it drive over a bridge when the school bus passes it or get on a highway that's not going to hell or whoever, but talk about need before you talk about jobs need, and talk about the job that needs to be done. that's my p.r., that's how politics works and the jam to republican politicians showing them the bridges these damn members won't support. put it on their shoulders. don't beg, gee, would you give me job. say, this is a job that needs done in your district. >> i agree entirely with every word you said, but here's the thing -- our country has over $2 trillion worth of needs to fix up infrastructure, you know, probably not the best, most -- most communicative word, but you know, bridges are falling down. we need fiber optic cables,

transit roads and we need people to do this work. all right. we've got school buildings that are crumbling and are in bad shape, and we need people to fix them up so we can have a real 21st century infrastructure. we're driving on the highways that are eisenhower highways. a bill that would do just that. help provide services the people really do need. massive cuts for public services across the country. people are suffering because of the loss of them, and i'm talking about cops, i'm talking about teachers, i'm talking about -- >> how do we do this, congressman? >> more robust in advocacies. speak out. when i go around my community in minneapolis and surrounding suburbs, saying we've got to get people back to work to deal with the problem -- >> you're already --

congressman, all due respect, you've already got your vote. go in the suburban areas and talk about the schools in those areas or roads going out and get the congressmen, heat up their butts. force them to vote your way? why don't you go on the attack instead of playing defense? >> well, you know what? i agree with you again. that's why we in the progressive caucus had a 12-city jobs tour talking about rebuilding america. putting america back to work, putting the american dream back in people's grasp again. we went to pittsburgh. we went to milwaukee. we went to detroit. we went to minneapolis, talking about how we fulfill the needs that america has to make sure things are doing right again. >> i'm interrupting you, because you're going to circles. those are democratic districts. you already have those votes. go to the districts you need votes. 218 votes to get a bill in the house. go into areas of republican control and force those people to play defense?

why don't you go on the attack? >> that's what we should be doing, chris, and i can't tell you anything other than i agree with what you're saying. see, we've got to get an organizational push really going. we went into some of the districts where we already know people know they need jobs, but you're right. we've got to be able to talk across party lines. you know what? people without a job, or people in foreclosure don't care about this party stuff. we want to get back to work, make sure he don't have potholes that will break the axles on their cars. you're absolutely correct and this is the way we're taking it. this is the direction we're going in and talking to people not about politics but rebuilding america, putting the american dream back in their grasp, because people have an anxiety america is losing its place in the world. that's why we're pushing things, like an infrastructure bank bill which can really help, really finance some of these regionally important programs. >> when are you going into boehner's district? >> you want me to give you a

date, let me tell you -- >> i'll be impressed. go into his district and show his bridges are going down and we'll do something on that that night. >> we'll bet you. we'll impress you, chris. wait and see. >> go on the attack, sir. keith ellison, great to have you on. this seems to be a party, needs to stop plays defense and play the other guy the game. up next, the right grown tired of the war in afghanistan. not the same party anymore. for the first time in a long time republicans are running for president and they're down on war. interesting. any new war might be the rarest for both parties right now. actually they both agree on it, getting rid of a war. this is "hardball" only on msnbc. , whenever you want. one log in lets you monitor all of your balances and transfer between accounts, so your money can move as fast as you do. check out your portfolio, track the market with live updates. and execute trades anywhere and anytime

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[ female announcer ] something unexpected to the world of multigrain... taste. ♪ delicious pringles multigrain. with a variety of flavors, multigrain pops with pringles. we're back. is the republican presidential field more leery? >> we have helped the people of afghanistan establish freedom

from the taliban, but now we're at a point where they're going to have to earn and keep that freedom themselves. this is not something we're going to do forever. >> in terms of where we are now, ten years reproved, i was there last summer with governor perry, by the way, and met with general petraeus. he thought it would take about two years from last summer to have an orderly and successful wind down of our mission in afghanistan at least in terms of significant troop withdrawal. president obama accelerated that faster than either general mullen or general petraeus recommended. i would have accepted their recommendation. >> i say a polls of piece is free trade stay out of their internal business, don't get involved in these wars and just bring our troops home. >> big applause for congressman ron paul, huge applause for his anti-war stand. what's going on with the republican party, once dominated by the war hawks? robin wright, longtime foreign correspondent. latest book "rock the casbah."

i saw that book on somebody's desk today. let me ask you about this. republicans used to be the hawk party. long before the other the got involved with president bush, the cold wear, fight, fight, f the communist, fight, fight, fight the terrorists. now last night, ron paul leading the band. >> you have an enormous spectrum among the republicans, you had michele bachmann and rick santorum and ron paul, a dove. huge spectrum, rather disarray among the republicans, but it was striking that both pawlenty and romney were talking about getting out of afghanistan but at a slower pace than president obama. and so this is where you see the republicans beginning to side with the generals, take the military point of view, we need two years rather than one year. >> why did he seem like he was complaining about war fatigue and at the same time you say technically he wants a slower

withdrawal. that seems dishonest. >> it is a bit, they want it both ways, seem to be catering to public mood. the fact that we may be in afghanistan longer than the soviet union was and maybe with the same outcome, yet doing it in a way that sides with what the generals recommended. >> let's talk about the division you mention a moment ago, which is when it comes to afghanistan, most americans say enough is enough, but this weird kind of christian rite, if you will, very much tied in with the israeli right is pushing for some kind of action against iran. are they clear about what action they think would work? israel seems they are not clear. >> israelis are clearly leaving the military option on the table. >> but it's on the table. it's not in use. >> that's right, and in fact, there were those predicting

something would happen earlier this year and it hasn't, but last night you saw rick santorum say we need to take every possible step from preventing iran from becoming a nuclear power and ron paul saying who cares, soviet union had thousands of them and we managed to coexist and have diplomatic relations and in the scheme of history it didn't matter very much, so he wasn't even endorsing sanctions. >> there's a lot of opinion and policy options between go to war, mad dog them right now, hit them hard, and the difference between ron paul -- nobody i know says it doesn't matter that iran has a nuclear weapon. it matters, it damn well matters, it affects immigration in israel, affects our options in oil production over there and oil delivery and everything else. >> i think this is where he may lose support. this is something a wise spectrum of americans, democratic or republicans, are

concerned about. >> let's take a look. majority of americans say we shouldn't be fighting in afghanistan right now. 55% say the united states should get out. that's strong. even among republicans, 1/3 say the war in afghanistan is a bad idea, but it's more than 1/3, 39%, getting to be almost 50/50. i'd say within the year that's even money. >> money is actually the issue to some extent, we're spending $10 billion a month in afghanistan at the time you have such a rocky stock market and debt crisis, the affect of afghanistan becomes an issue as well. this is something that will pop up more and more over the next year. >> as an expert of that part of the world and afghanistan, we are a much more front-leaning campaign over there, we lost incredibly gallant people when the chinook went down the other day because of the rpg shot,

lucky shot, are we exposing our troops more than we should be? >> i think there's actually within the administration some questioning about whether the surge was a smart move, that a lot of the troops were deployed in areas where they are hard to remove, and it would have been nice to go in and mop them up and pull them out, but it's not proving as easy as we anticipated. troops are going to be in there for awhile or we basically leave and turn them over to the locals. >> why are we fighting the taliban? why don't we let the government of karzai? >> because the afghan government is not capable. this is a very, very different situation than in iraq. troops or people you can train, in afghanistan you have a problem with basic literacy, reading and writing. >> i hear we are not recruiting to fight the -- that's a

problem. >> also who controls which areas of the country. >> what a war. anyway, thank you, robin wright, when we return, let me finish. name of the book? >> "rock the casbah." >> two women climbed the highest peak in africa. we'll talk about it when we come back on "hardball." [ male announcer ] heard this one? listen to this. three out of four americans don't get enough vegetables. so here's five bucks to help you buy v8 juice. five bucks. that's a lot of green. go to v8juice.com for coupons. you can count on us. i know you're worried about making your savings last and having enough income when you retire.

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let me finish tonight with a dazzling story of spirit and excitement, my queen kathleen has just returned from another conquest, this one, mount ki kilamanjaro, all 19,000 feet of it. they are up there at the summit up at roughly 4,000 meters. it took them seven days and six nights of camping and what plummeted to 20-degree weather. what can i say? i have a wife and daughter who do this kind of thick. kathie's is the vp of executive international, caroline has landed a job with google, which is like getting to be a road scholar these days. anyway, the two of them made it to the top climbing. as you can see, mighty steep slopes. they did it with determination, ambition, and somethi