victory or death bring it ♪ >> today has been awesome, girl! the october jobs numbers are out. and the economy added 80,000 new jobs. the unemployment rate falls to 9%. we'll have full analysis, and hear from the white house. herman cain says the charges against him are fabrications, but one of the women accusing the republican front-runner of past sexual harassment could make a statement today. new polling shows the scandal isn't hurting cain much. at least not yet. and he's the richest american in one of "forbes" magazine's five most powerful people in the world. chuck todd talks about doing business in america, and whether the president deserves re-election. it's friday, november 4th, 2011. and this is "the daily rundown." we begin with breaking news this hour. the headline is that

unemployment fell to 9%. but just 80,000 jobs were added last month. less than expected. 13.9 million people are still out of work. mark zandi is chief economist of moody's analytics and joins us now. mark, good morning. let's get -- obviously, the numbers just out. your first analysis, your first read on what this tells us. >> i'm encouraged by the numbers. as you point out, the 80,000 job game was on the light side. but if you look at the other elements of the report, hours worked, the revisions to the previous data, the fact that household employment increased, the daily unemployment rate declined, it all suggested that the labor market is at -- at the very least, is stabilizing. and i suspect it's beginning to reaccelerate. so good news. and mark, let me ask you a layman's question. >> yeah. >> less jobs created than we expected, but the unemployment rate drops. why? >> well, it's -- here's a geeky answer. sorry. either based on two different surveys. and a lot does depend on how

many people come into the labor force. so there's a lot of moving parts here. but it's not uncommon for these numbers to move in different directions. >> and what do we expect -- i guess what we're all looking for is, is there a trend in this data? as you mentioned, revising upward the last two months. does it look like we may finally be pulling the economy -- the economy kind of pulling out of that station that we're moving in the right direction or still too soon even with the revisions and these numbers to say that? >> too soon. you know, just to give you context, we need to create 125, 150,000 jobs per month, just to maintain a stable rate of unemployment. on a consistent basis. and i think if we're going to feel really good about the way things are going, we're going to need job growth that's north of 200,000 per month. so 80 k is good. it's -- particularly relative to the much diminished expectations you but clearly not good enough. i wouldn't conclude that the coast is clear. and a lot does depend in the

next few weeks, couple months on what policymakers do here and in europe. sknchts just quickly mark, i just want to clarify, the 200,000 jobs that we would need to grow every month would get us what in terms of the unemployment rate? because i just always think these things in terms of political, as well. political terms. you know, 8%, 8.5%. how would we get to a number like that by november 2012 in terms of what would would he need per month job growth? >> to get to 8, 8.5% by november 2012, we would need 250,000 per month, probably a few months of 300 k to get there. something like that. >> and that's -- we would guess that's relatively unlikely, correct? >> that seems unlikely at this point, yeah. >> okay, mark. mark zani at moody's thank you so much for bringing your expertise. we appreciate it. >> thank you. herman cain insists sexual harassment allegations against him are both politically and racially motivated. in a new poll, it shows at this point, it hasn't hurt him in the eyes of the party. according to the "washington post" and abc, less than 40% of

america republicans say the sexual harassment allegations are a serious matter and 23% say it will make them less likely to support cain. the controversy makes no difference to them at all. mark murray is the man i turn to to tell me what it all means. so mark, we focused on this, we and everyone else in the political world focused on this for the last five days since politico posted the story last sunday night. the poll suggests that at least yet, people -- republicans who are going to vote on this don't think it's a big deal. surprising to me. surprising to you? >> so far, so good for herman cain. the question is, what ends up happening in the next few days? every single day that's gone by, we have seen new details, new allegations, and so i'm more interested to see where we are next week and the week after than we are actually today in the polling. >> and i was going to say, to your point, i think part of this is that for us in the media and political world, this is a story

that has been full-bore all of the time for the last 96 hours. for a lot of people, my parents in connecticut, they don't have power. they're still recovering from the snowstorm last week. it's just not -- it takes time to permeate, i guess, to your point. and so we can say good for now. but maybe not good for always for him, right? >> and in some ways these sexual harassment allegations are kind of just the tip of the iceberg on herman cain. he has had some other problems, whether it's his foreign policy views, his mentions on china not being a nuclear power. other things -- >> your story this morning about the ties with his campaign americans for prosperity and funding for the campaign. >> hits 9-9-9 plan. there's a lot out there. >> i talked to our pollster john cohen to get the numbers. among the people who do see the charges against cain as serious, we asked them the head-to-head question. they said mitt romney, 31%, rick perry, 17%, herman cain only 13%. so if that number suggests that if -- if people start to see

this as more serious, there's trouble there for herman cain. >> right. so we've had now five full days of coverage on this. chris, what happens if it's 10 or 15? what do those numbers look like? so this is an early snapshot on what the situation is. i don't think any of us know how it's going play out. >> herman cain has reacted a lot of different ways to this. he's blamed the media, he's blamed rick perry, he's blamed a lot of people. here's him yesterday on sean hannity's radio show. let's listen to that and we'll come back and talk about it. >> they are trying to attack me to intimidate other blacks, conservatives, to not go public, or to not think about looking at ideas on the other side of the spectr spectrum. that's the other objective of all of this vicious liberal attacks on me. because they can't control me. >> so obviously playing the race card there. smart? strategic? or something else? >> he's gotten a lot of blowback

from some conservative commentatorses commentatorseses, jennifer reuben, and we heard him there saying he was blaming liberals in the media. just a day ago, the rick perry campaign. who is actually the ones behind this? >> and you know what's interesting too, mark, it's not just herman cain. there's a group supporting herman cain who is up with an ad. i want to just play that too. because this is, again, along the lines of -- we'll hear the language. let's play it. a lot of racial overtones. let's talk about that and we'll talk about it. >> now we're getting the high-tech lynching of a beautiful man, herman cain. >> this is a circus. it's a national disgrace. it is a high-tech lynching for upitty blacks, and it is a message that unless you kowtow to an old order, you will be lynched, destroyed, caricatured. rather than hung from a tree.

>> strong stuff, the clarence thomas comparison which had been made kind of obliquely being made very, very obviously there. can this kind of strategy work, or is herman cain just taking on more -- it feels like he's -- it's so scatter shot with the blame. and it's race, it's rick perry, it's the liberal media. how does he sort it all out? can he get -- figure out who is actually to blame? >> you and i have talked about this. this is a short term strategy to distract from everything going on. is it the rick perry campaign, is it race, is this a comparison to clarence thomas and a high-tech lynching? we're talking about this now, but we're not talking about the real story, these accusations from women. we actually might end up getting a statement as early as today, or soon from one of these accused women. that's the real story, chris. i mean, this is a short-term distraction. and it's good strategy for them in the short-term. in the long-term, i'm not so sure. >> isn't the real problem here that it didn't just stop with these two women? we had a third woman as the ap

reported. we've got chris wilson, the republican pollster going on the radio in oklahoma saying he saw herman cain. it looks like a pattern of behavior, it feels like a drip, drip, drip. not a one-off -- you know, the politico says herman cain says that, right? every day there feels like more. >> remember what happened to anthony weiner, it wasn't the first revelation or the second or third. it was the fourth and fifth. and you mentioned this drip, drip, drip. that's what's ultimately going to be damaging to him. and that's what often hurts a political candidate. if it's one story, you can get by. if it becomes 10 or 12, that's way too much. >> and it seems like it's already become way too much. but i would say, herman cain, they have pointed out they have raised lots and lots of money already in the last couple days. his polling numbers seem strong, still in a tie, so to be continued. >> next polls to come. >> indeed. and we will be looking for them, including the one in the "wall street journal" mark murray,

coauthor of "first read" which i read first every morning. president obama has a packed schedule today. and the european debt crisis is dominating the conversation. our own chuck todd is covering all of the latest developments from con. so chuck, what's on the agenda? >> well, chris, sometime today, we expect the big announcement from the g-20 about what they're going to promise europe in this ongoing attempt to try to fix this european system right now. not only to bail out greece, but to be prepared to bail out in italy, portugal, spain, ireland, all of these other countries that have these high debt problems and these high issues. and what we expect is that the international monetary fund, the imf, is going to get more resources. that a lot of countries, perhaps australia, perhaps china, perhaps in india, perhaps in brazil, are going to promise larger donations to the imf. there's one country who says they are not going to give

anymore money to the imf. that's the united states. the obama administration has insisted, while all these calls are there, look, we have quadrup quadrupled the resources of the imf over the last two years. it's not about us adding more money to that, they say. and they say europe has the money to do this. but expect that announcement there to be added to what they are calling their version of t.a.r.p., a firewall. it's going to be over $1 trillion bailout fund of sorts that will be there for the governments and financial institutions in europe that need it. and, of course, this is all priority one in trying to see if they can settle and stabilize the world economy. chris, back to you. >> thanks, chuck. still ahead, we'll get team obama's take on the october jobs report with white house economic adviser gene sperling. and up next, chuck goes one-on-one with bill gates. what does one of the world's richest men want from world leaders and top economies. and herman cain in crisis mode. after a tough week of trying to

get his story straight, where does his campaign go now? but first, a look ahead at the president's schedule. lateral with the president of argentina. i've got the press conference at 10:15 circled. right now you're watching "the daily rundown" only on msnbc. [ male announcer ] humana and walmart have teamed up

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for the first time ever, a businessman has been invited to address world leaders at the g-20 summit. microsoft chairman bill gates flew to france this week and sat down with chuck for a wide-ranging interview. so chuck, what did you learn? >> reporter: well, it's not often you get to sit down with one of the world's richest men.

bill gates was at the g-20 to present a report about how all of these emerging economic powers, not just the old economic powers in the united states, in japan and these powers in europe, but the new ones like brazil, russia, india and china, can start becoming participants in giving money, working with the private sector, in development aid, to get these poorer countries up into a level and raise them out of poverty. and he believes he's got some business acumen to add to this. and so we talked about his report. we also talked about the state of the u.s. economy, is it a good place to do business still? what he thought about occupy wall street, and what he thinks of the president. mr. gates, thanks for sitting down. so you just made a presentation to the g-20, which, of course, is not just 20 countries, it's a whole other entity, and it's this partnership you're trying to create. but walk me through it a little bit, of what exactly you're trying to -- what commitment you were trying to get today from these countries. >> well, the host here of the g-20, president sarkozy, asked me to come and present.

so i wrote a report that focuses on how do we bring everyone in the world into the world economy. how do we raise their health, their nutrition up so they're both providing products and buying products. that will give us food security, it will give us stability. and so i pulled that together, and it focuses on how aid and innovation really can achieve that goal. >> and we've had this -- the emerging economies, the bric countries, brazil, russia, india, china. but some other ones here, the noneuropean, the nonold g-7, g-8 countries have not been giving a lot of aid. are you seeing that change? >> certainly these high-growth countries, which are now middle-income, are very good news. because those countries used to be aid recipients. korea, for example, got a lot of aid.

now it's a substantial aid donor. china received aid, but now is aid-neutral. and even india, although it has a lot of poor people, if you look at a -- probably a 15-year time frame, they'll be able to sustain all their own activities. and so what we have now is more countries giving to a smaller group of countries that are the really tough ones. but because of that, i think we can even lift those up. >> poverty rate in the united states gone up. there are going to be some people watching that says, you know, we should be worrying about global poverty, but we should be worrying about domestic poverty. >> certainly, if the tradeoff was spending an equal amount to help someone outside the united states is inside the united states, we would focus domestically. the question is, if it costs 1% as much to save a child's life,

given that aid in the u.s. budget is less than half a percent in the budget, are we going to move to balance our budget by withdrawing the aids drugs that save lives, withdrawing the bed nets that save lives. where those are so effective, and actually help those countries be far more stable, get them on a path to sustain themselves and contribute to the world economy. >> are you worried about the income inequality that's growing in the united states? >> the world at large is becoming -- there's less income in equality, because the poor countries are getting richer faster than the rich countries are getting richer. so that global equity, i think that's a positive thing. within individual countries, including the u.s., there's some tiering. it's obviously a political question, how much used tax policy to offset the way the economy has rewarded some people

who are lucky enough to have particular skills. >> what do you make of the state of american politics right now? >> well, i don't have a broad view of that. the -- i think it's important that we fix the education system. and i hope that doesn't become a partisan issue, where, you know, you have the divisiveness. they're working to update the federal education legislation, and, you know, it appears there is some chance of bipartisan progress there. >> there's a lot of talk about what government could do for business. either get out of its way, or help produce it, and there's sort of different philosophies. the role of government in getting your business off the ground. was it an impediment, was it something you didn't think about at the time? >> well, the government is fundamental in creating a system in the united states where somebody can start a business,

you know, based on copyrighted software. >> sure. >> hire people who spend a lot of their time in a public education system. you know, trust that there's not going to be corruption. you know, be allowed to hire lots and lots of people. and so i was a huge beneficiary of the entrepreneurial support that's provided in the united states. and it's still, with all of its challenges, the best in the world, letting people pursue new ideas like i did. >> you would still say the united states is the best place to do business, or are you one of those that says, you know what, china is a pretty good place to do business too? >> it's certainly true that people are looking at what the u.s. has done well. having strong universities, investing in basic research. they have seen the good stuff. and they're coping that. but still today if i was going to start a new business, the u.s. would be the best place to do that. in fact, people try to come to

the u.s. and do that. it's often the immigration rules and things that makes that hard for them to do it. >> president obama. think he deserves a second term? >> you know, the voters will decide. that's a purely political issue. i know on education he's been good. on pushing for foreign aid programs so that the areas that i have expertise in, he's lent his voice to those things. which has been great. >> as you can tell, mr. gates a rather cautious individual when it comes to delving into politics too much. he's got two passions these days. and that is education and with this new program in trying to raise the standards of health and the economies around the world. >> thanks, chuck. up next, we'll get a check on how wall street is reacting to today's jobs report. and the turmoil with greece. and still ahead, jenny sanford, sticking up for herman cain? the real story behind her op-ed piece that goes after cain yet

particulars. plus, in our friday politics panel, breaking down the battle grounds. president obama battling a bad economy, and a lack of enthusiasm among democrats. but first, today's trivia question. the legendary capitol hill office where house speaker sam raburn and his confidantes would drink bourbon and play poker was known by what euphemism? a., the viper room, b., the alamo, krcht, the board of education. you can tweet me at dailyrundown. the first correct answer will get a follow friday from us. what better way to start your weekend? that answer to the trivia and much more coming up on "the daily rundown." my contacts are so annoying.

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the october jobs numbers are

in. let's take a look at wall street. good morning, bertha. >> good morning, chris. three minutes away from the opening bell. and that headline number on the october jobs number disappointing. a net 80,000 jobs added. that compared to a 100,000 job exception. the unemployment rate did particular town to 9% with the 400,000 folks discouraged. the revisions were the strong points. september job creation was revised from 103,000 to 158,000. and august remember was that big fat zero? now it's been revised up to 103,000 jobs. we're also watching europe as the g-20 grapples with the debt crisis and greek prime minister george papandreou may step down. former u.s. senator and new jersey governor jon corzine, officially resigning from mf global this morning, saying he's not going to seek any severance

pay. the brokerage is under investigation for improperly borrowing customers' funds to make its own trades, which included very big bets on european debt. carl couldn't kneea, one of our anchors said it's a tough week for papandreou, corzine and cain. >> a quick follow. the corzine news is big news for a political junky like me because he's a former senator and governor. big news on the street, as well? is that something that moves markets or just a point of interest? >> it doesn't move markets, but it's definitely something everyone is talking about. corzine, to some extent, to some on wall street was seen as a trader. had been at goldman sachs, one of the kings of the hill on wall street. then he came to washington as a crusader for the people, and a lot of people felt as though he was one of those people who talked badly about the fat cats. and so there is a bit of shodden

freud on the street to not only see him lose the gubernatorial election and try to make his come back and now things have gone terribly badly. >> ah, shaddenfreud. thank you, bertha. "the daily rundown" will be back in 30 seconds. bottom of the hour now. here's a quick look at what's driving the day. president obama will head back home tonight after a full day of meetings in france. he'll speak alongside president sarkozy on the sidelines of the g-20 summit.

the national restaurant association will decide whether to lift a nondisclosure agreement that bars a former employee from discussing sexual harassment allegations she made against herman cain in the 1990s. and a california jury will go behind closed doors today to deliberate the fate of dr. conrad murray who prosecutors say delivered a fatal dose of propofol to michael jackson. other stories making headlines this friday. if you have plans to travel over the holidays, be prepared to pay up. the major airlines are raising their minimum prices. in some cases by as much as $10 per round-trip. airlines are also cutting down schedules to keep flights full. and mission accomplished. this was my favorite story of the day. after 520 days, a team of six international scientists emerged from a steel isolation chamber in russia this morning. the team was simulating a mock mission to mars to see how the human mind and body would handle a long journey to the red planet.

how do you volunteer for that duty? whew! jon huntsman is in south carolina today, trying to drum up attention for his presidential bid. he's competing against several better-known candidates there, including herman cain, who is getting a very public show of support from the state's former first lady. nbc news campaign alley weinberg is in column bbcolumbia, south . what can you tell us? >> good morning, chris. governor huntsman is here today. he hasn't been to the state since mid september, and, of course, he's trying to make up some headway between himself and some of the more popular candidates here, including, of course, herman cain, who, by all accounts is still the front runner in the state. and herman cain did, in fact, get a pretty big assist the other day from former south carolina first lady, jenny sanford, who is also the ex-wife of governor mark sanford. he of argentinean mistress note

righty. ms. sanford wrote an op-ed, clarifying it wasn't an endorsement, but praising herman cain in an op-ed that ran in the "charleston post and courier" a few days before the allegations came against him with regard to the sexual harassment charges. however, that carl ran again a few days later in a different newspaper in the "state" newspaper. the editors there offered ms. sanford the opportunity to amend the article to reflect the new charges that had arisen against mr. cain. and it does, in fact, appear that she did so, referring three times, in fact, to the allegations that surfaced against him. now, i want to read for you one of the differences in one of the same paragraphs that she wrote that reflect the changes and the new references to the allegations. first in the october article that appeared in the "charleston post and courier" she reads,

quote, pay attention to the negative ads but pay closer attention to the groups behind the ads. and remember, they may be fighting to maintain the status quo. small steps and small ideas won't bring about real change in this nation. now listen to the difference between that paragraph and the one that appeared in the "state" a few days later on november 3rd, several days after the sexual harassment charges arose. quote, pay attention to the negative ads but pay closer attention to the groups mind the ads, as they might want the scat us quo. here's where it changes. look for proof of personal allegations and know there is someone pushing that charge to protect his own political interest. ms. sanford never got anymore explicit than making illusions to the allegations against mr. cain. but it is pretty clear that is, in fact, what she was referring to. chris? >> ali, that's great reporting. there is a lot of confusion about when she was supporting him, whether she was supporting him. so thank you so much. say hello to gervais street in

columbia, where every political consultant in south carolina works. allegations, as ali mentioned, against herman cain continue to build. today we may get a statement from one of the women charging cain with inappropriate sexual conduct. meanwhile, cain was on conservative radio yesterday, telling sean hannity that the charges against him are false. >> this is absolutely fabrication, man. i don't know what else to say. how many more ways can i say? this stuff is totally fabricated. i didn't know there were so many women named anonymous in america, to be perfectly honest with you. because they keep digging up others, okay? >> jennifer paulmary is a former white house press secretary and now president of the center for the american progress action fund. ramesh primu, and susan berry. well so let's get to 2012 and

herman cain. i wanted to get -- susan, i want to get initial reaction on the jobs numbers. kind of -- you know, the unemployment rate dropped from 9.1 to 9. 80,000 jobs less than what we thought the 100,000. total number of unemployed still 14 million. what's your first cut? >> well, the rate is going in the right direction. it's going down, not up. but this is disappointing, i think. the number of jobs created, just not enough to really indicate we're into a recovery that americans will think feels like a recovery and still no signs that in the next year that this jobless aggravate going to get enough better to boost -- >> mark zandi said 250 or 300,000 jobs created a month to get the rate to 8.5%. so ramesh. >> this remains a recovery in name only. americans who are looking for relief -- >> rino. just thought of that. another month. to be continued. >> and if the white house is looking for good economic news, it's going have to wait for

another month, too. >> jennifer, as someone who is in charge at some point of selling things like this as good news, what has this been that we're going here? what -- if you're a democrat, let's say you're in the white house, what do you look at -- >> three things. one is that the numbers are not good enough, but trending in the right direction and you had the numbers from the previous months, you know -- >> revised. >> right and then the economic growth numbers from gdp going up as well and investment in business. and then two, you see that the president, i think, handling very well in terms of making the -- making his own case, pushing -- you need to push for the jobs act and then that's going public. but more importantly, doing -- taking executive actions, as well. so we can't wait. so the public sees him not talking about jobs, but they see him actually doing something on housing and other things, student loans, to help the economic recovery. and then the third thing that's good, you don't see any of the republican presidential candidates talk about creating jobs. mitt romney is talking about cutting spending even more below

what he has been when -- this is like even lower than the budget plan. so i think those three things are trending well for the white house. >> we'll be back. we'll have gene sperling. up next, the obama administration responds to the just-released jobs number for october. director of the national economic council joins us. and coming up this sunday on "meet the press" the meet the candidate series continues with former utah governor and ambassador to china, john huntsman. but first, the white house soup of the day. roasted chicken posole. it's a stew. everyone knows that. thank you, google. you're watching "the daily rundown" only on msnbc. the employee of the month is... spark card from capital one. spark cash gives me the most rewards of any small business credit card. it's hard for my crew to keep up with 2% cash back

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. hundreds of iranians finally overran the embassy compound,

seizing 90 people, mostly americans. the hostages, men and women, were blindfolded and herded into the embassy's basement. >> daily flash back to this day in 1979, when the iranian hostage crisis began. the students, supporters of the ayatollah were demanding the return of the sha. the sha never returned and the hostage crisis would last 444 days. let's bring back our panel. okay. let's start -- "the washington post" has very interesting numbers about herman cain out this morning. i want to start. we asked sexual harassment charges, are they a serious matter or not among leading republicans, people we think will vote. 39% serious, 55% not serious. ramesh, surprised by those numbers or not? >> i guess i need to know, was the question, are the sexual harassment allegations against herman cain a serious matter, or is it -- is sexual harassment a serious matter?

>> i think -- i believe it was sexual harassment charges against herman cain. >> i don't think it's that surprising, because it's been such a vague allegation so far. i'm not sure that that number -- i mean, i suspect that number would rise if we got more specifics about what exactly cain may or may not have done. >> if the women talk. >> that's right. an initial charitable impulse of people not to rush to judgment. and that's buoying up his numbers. >> interesting. and jennifer, impact of these charges on the likelihood that you would support herman cain, right? now they're trying to get at the same thing. >> right. >> 4% said it was more likely. >> who are these people? >> very good question. those people really don't like the media, apparently. who knows? 23% less likely. and the biggest one, 69% said it made no difference. now, the question i keep coming back to, mark murray and i talked about it earlier. is this just that it hasn't permeated out or are we misreading this? is this something people don't care about? >> i think there's probably two things.

one, if we actually see the face of these women and hear their stories, that's going to be -- then it's going to be a different matter. and then i think there are some people -- he's doing well, but he's still, you know, like a quarter percent of the vote. and i think some of those people might just, you know -- i don't know that he'll ever drop that far, but i think some of the people might always be with him. it's not as if there aren't other things that are controversial about him that they have already come to terms with. >> i always say this is true about people who support ron paul. you could say literally anything about ron paul and those people -- it's unshakeable. maybe that's what's happening with herman cain. now, susan, i obviously love polls. but i want to switch gears to another poll. this is "usa today" and gal up, you wrote this morning, fascinating. 12 swings states. you did national but also the swing states, because that's where the race is going to be fought. i love connecticut, but i don't think connecticut is going to be a swing state, no offense, mom and dad. you asked, are you better off than you were three years ago. great question. yes, nationally 44 said yes.

in the swing states, though, 37%, a little over a third of people in the state that we think are going to decide the presidency. got to be concerning for this white house, right? >> we found people in the swing states that, as you say, in our electoral college system, are the important states to watch. are feeling worse than the nation as a whole. not that the nation as a whole is feeling so great. but on things like are you better off, or on obama approval. obama's approval we found in these 12 states, 40%. nationwide, 40%. it's going to be concern to the white house. >> and the thing about it, i feel like, susan, you're talking about, we always look at national poll numbers. remember, the obama campaign reminded us relentlessly, this isn't a national election, this is a state by state election. they were right, won iowa and ended up winning the presidency. but we're talking about places like ohio, pennsylvania, florida, colorado. these are places that in had 2010 acted very republican, acting -- after acting pretty democratic in 2008. the trend line, at least right

now, does not suggest it's a good thing for this president. >> that's right. he needs to get -- compared to what? so if -- are you better off four years ago? may not be as relevant a question as do you think you're going to be better off with barack obama or with mitt romney, who is pushing for policies that are more radical than what bush did, than are more radical than what paul ryan is pushing. >> fair point. we'll come back and talk about it. i want you to hear this too. the white house perspective. we have gene sperling, adviser to the president. gene, i know you are a busy man this morning. thank you for making time. unemployment rate down to 9. 80,000 jobs, almost 14 million people still unploeld. tell me where there is reason for optimism in this report for you guys. >> well, i don't think there's any question that on one hand, it shows we are making progress in private-sector job creation. we have the -- the economy has created 1.5 million private-sector jobs this year.

almost 300,000 over the last two months. that's obviously progress. that's a better job recovery by almost a year than we had after the last recession. but make no mistake about it. we are coming back from the worst recession, the worst downturn since the great depression. and when you inherit that type of hole, that type of difficulty, this level of job growth or growth is not even close to good enough. it's not good enough for the american people, it's not good enough for the president. that's why we are waking up every day, seeing what we can do to help pass the american jobs act, or as many components as possible. because this is not politics. this is about whether we're going to inject enough demand and spark into our economy so that we can see what private sector's forecast as an extra 1 to as high as 2 million new jobs next year. that could make a significant difference in whether we're getting unemployment down,

whether we're providing momentum to the economy. so there is some progress here, but it's not nearly good enough. that's why we have to do more. we certainly cannot sit on our hands and for example, let the payroll tax cut that the president signed last december that's putting $1,000 more in average families' pockets expire. how could it possibly make sense to raise taxes on tens and tens and tens of millions of american families next year. the president is out proposing cutting payroll taxes in half for every worker and small business getting infrastructure investment. it's just hard for me to understand, with this type of unemployment, why anyone in washington would be opposing this basic old effort by the president. >> gene, you mentioned the american jobs act. i want to play you what mitch mcconnell had to say about it. obviously, it's wenting its way through congress. i want to come back and get your reaction to it. >> the democrats have deliberately designed this bill to fail. deliberately. designed the bill to fail.

so the truth is, democrats are more interested in building a campaign message than in rebuilding roads and bridges. >> their goal is to do everything they can to drag down this economy, to do anything they can to focus attention negati negatively on the president of the united states, in hopes that he can get my job, perhaps. >> so, gene, deliberately designed this bill to fail. what say you? >> i would say that the minority leader is somewhere between flat wrong and dead wrong. somewhere in that margin. there's no truth to that at all. the president put forward this plan because we've got 9% unemployment. how mysterious is this? he put forward this plan because we're projected to have weak growth next year. and if we don't do something significant here, we're going to let our people hurt, we're going to let unemployment stay higher than it should be. and my question to the minority leader, mcconnell is, the republican leader of the senate, the following. if you have a better idea, where's your plan?

what is it that you are proposing, that top forecasters, independent forecasters would say would have a significant impact on creating more growth, more job creation? right now, there is only one jobs plan, the president's. if they do not like it, if they oppose it, they should come forward and say, here is a plan. like ours that we're willing to let independent forecasters judge that would do something bold and immediate over the neck 12 to 18 months. that right now is a null from the republican leadership in the senate. and i think it would be an absolutely constructive thing for them to come forward with an equally bold plan, and then maybe we could move forward. right now, you have the president pushing the american jobs act, and you have the republicans in the senate just voting no in uniform, each and every time. now, how is that leadership? >> gene, question, though. how do you -- we just -- you know, we heard from mcconnell, we heard from senate majority leader harry reid. that seemed to look a lot like

politics and very little like policy. how do you -- and i put democrats in this too, gene, because some senate democrats, including some people who are going to be in targeted races didn't vote for the american jobs act, the democrats didn't the whole package. how do you get beyond politics where we're about a year away from the november election. >> i tell you how you get behind politics. you have a signing ceremony with speaker boehner and mcconnell, and we all say we have come together with a major american jobs plan. check that only, don't take

my word for it. speaker boehner, minority leader mcconnell have all supported cutting payroll taxes. the president did put forward a plan that was bipartisan. that was a bipartisan proposal. that's about half of the entire plan. when i was here in the '90s until president clinton, every single infrastructure bill was bipartisan. both believed that we could create jobs by rebuilding roads, bridges and highways. if there's politics here. where does that come from? we would like nothing more of a bipartisan package of a strong act. we'll share the political credit that anyone wants to have, but let's do something for workers. how can people sit on their hands and do nothing? the president put forward a detailed plan, $447 billion, projected to create up to 1.9 million jobs. when that failed, we put forward piece by piece. what have the republicans done

other than say no? so let's absolutely come to the table and work together on something bold and significant. bold and significant. gene sperling, thank you for your time. we'll get reaction from our panel on all that gene sperling had to say, just ahead. but first, trivia time. we asked -- the legendary capitol hill office where house speaker sam ray burn and his confident dance was known by what euphemism? the answer is -- where's my drumroll? the board of education. we'll be right back. you're watching "the daily rundown" only on msnbc. ♪ let's go ♪ ♪ cruise like a norwegian ♪ britta olsen is my patient.

i spend long hours with her checking her heart rate, administering her medication, and just making her comfortable. one night britta told me about a tradition in denmark, "when a person dies," she said, "someone must open the window so the soul can depart." i smiled and squeezed her hand. "not tonight, britta. not tonight." ♪ ♪ [ gong ] strawberry banana! [ male announcer ] for a smoothie with real fruit plus veggie nutrition new v8 v-fusion smoothie. could've had a v8.

most schools would not be allowed to do what we do. >> kenney believes in social justice through education. her passion has paid off. her organization has received the new york state education department's high performing designation. this msnbc "profile in progress" is brought to you by capella university. matter. the unemployed especially -- >> it's been a packed daily rundown. we only have time for a quick shameless plug.

>> 93 years old. he was the king of washington when republicans and democrats actually talked to each other. >> that was a long tame ago. >> economist david beckworth and i have an article at the new republic, what the left and right get wrong. >> my friend and new, hats a profile in "the washington post" style section. >> written by the best profiler jason horowitz. that's it for this edition. monday on the show, rick santorum joins chuck. coming up next on msnbc, chris jansen and company. then at 1:00 p.m. don't miss "andrea mitchell reports" with me.

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♪ we're centurylink... a new kind of broadband company committed to providing honest, personal service from real people... 5-year price-lock guarantees... consistently fast speeds... and more ways to customize your technology. ♪ good friday morning. i'm chris jansing. for the first time in four months, the unemployment rate has finally moved lower. new numbers show 80,000 jobs were added last month, slightly less thanec