want a lot more if their side gets in. and that's "hardball" for now. thanks for being with us. the ed show starts now. good evening. tonight live from minneapolis. one week until the iowa caucuses and it's still a free for all. ron paul has a slight edge in the polls. but still has questions coming up about his racist news letters. newt gingrich backed off his pledge to stay pleasant. and mitt romney's team think he's going to be the nominee. this is "the ed show." let's get to work. couple of weeks ago i was a distant third in iowa. you just don't know what's going to happen in this process. >> the first vote in the 2012 presidential election is just seven days away in iowa. ron paul still holds the lead. but romney is making a last-minute push. and the undecided loom large. sam youngman of reuters and dave weigel join me with the latest

of what to expect in the home stretch. the mitt romney campaign disinformation continues. this time it's on jobs. we'll fact check the governor with ezra klein. simply put, it's time to move on. >> conservative democratic ben nelson of nebraska is stepping down. i'll tell you why this could be a win for the middle class. i can't go back in time. now all i can do is move forward. >> were you on track, governor? >> yes and no. >> the effort to recall scott walker is going strong. but the governor is worried that mickey mouse is signing the recall petitions. wisconsin state senator is here to tell us why walker is in fantasyland. good to have you with us tonight, folks. let's start with iowa where all the political action is taking place. and basically iowa is up in the air. the first caucus in the 2012 presidential race happen one week from tonight.

and the republican party still has no clear direction. the latest average of multiple polls in iowa show ron paul with a lead. the real story is mitt romney mounting a comeback in iowa while newt gingrich has really taken a tumble. romney's plan to focus on new hampshire has been put aside. romney is spending more time and money in the state of iowa. the romney campaign thinks the nomination for him is in the bag. an unnamed romney strategist told a new york magazine, the dynamics couldn't be better for us. i don't see any scenario where we're not the nominee. that's confident. romney supporters, they might feel the same way. here's how a romney campaign volunteer addressed the candidate during a breakfast in new hampshire today. >> anyone have -- yeah, please. >> mr. president. >> a little premature but i accept it. >> he mocked gingrich for not

getting on the ballot in the state of virginia. >> i think you compare that to pearl harbor. i think it's more like lucielle ball at the factory. >> newt gingrich isn't having it. >> all i'd say mitt, is if you want to run a negative campaign, be man enough to own it. that's your staff and your organization. those are your millionaire friends paying for it. you are a moderate massachusetts republican who, in fact, is timid about job creation. >> just minutes before attacking mitt romney for being a massachusetts moderate, gingrich played the role of mr. nice guy. >> i'm going to stay positive. the ads we put up are on jobs and economic growth. we're going to talk about leadership in jobs and economic growth. i think the people in iowa have a great opportunity in caucus to

send a signal to the country that negative ads written by dishonest consultants on candidates do not deserve getting votes. >> so which is it? are you an attack dog or are you going to stay positive through this? one of the reasons for gingrich's mixed messages could be his total inability to mount a real campaign in iowa even when he was leading in the polls. gingrich, what has he done? he's cut his bus tour in half. he doesn't have the money to spend on advertising like the rest of the candidates. gingrich's campaign and related super pacs, they've spent less than $700,000 in iowa compared to the millions spent by other campaigns and pacs. the most surprising thing could be rick perry who leads all candidates in iowa spending $6 million. perry's campaign is using an all or nothing approach in iowa. and his poll numbers, you've got to admit have moved back into double digits. he was out in iowa making a sales pitch today.

>> if we replace a democratic insider with a republican insider, you think we're really going to change washington, d.c.? no way. >> the other candidate competing for the outsider vote is ron paul. he's getting dogged by racial and homophobic statements appearing in his news letters from the 1990s. he spent the week saying he didn't know about the content but reports from texas newspapers in the mid-90s paint a very different picture. according to the houston chronicle in 1996, paul said his comments on blacks contained in the news letters should be viewed in the context of current events and statistical reports of the time. newt gingrich, the guy who says he's running a positive campaign is ready to pounce on a wounded ron paul. >> he's attacking me for serial hypocrisy and he spent earning money for ten years out of a news letter he didn't know. he has to come up with straight

answers to get somebody to take him seriously. >> so with one week to go, this is where the republican party finds itself. the inability of the party to get behind one or even two candidates has left them with an uncertain situation heading into the final stretch before the first vote is cast. they better hope 2012 doesn't turn out the way 2011 ended. get your cell phones out. want to know what you think. tonight's question, who will win in iowa next week? one week out, that's our question tonight. text a for mitt romney, b for newt gingrich, c for ron paul to 622639. i've got results coming up later on in the program. joining me tonight is sam youngman, the election 2012 correspondent for reuters. sam, good to have you with us tonight. i want to address this mood, this attitude out of the romney camp right now. so confident they would be

overheard by a reporter they think they got it in the bag. what do you sense on the ground in iowa? is romney making a comeback? >> i think that is the sense that they have right now. i just came from an event with governor romney. his first in this bus tour. looks like he's going for a knockout punch. they believe with all the disarray they can make a move here and wrap this up sooner than they thought they'd be able to. >> the republican rnc chair, he said they think they'll have a candidate faster than what most people think. paraphrasing there. but is the romney camp really out saying to people and do you get this confidence coming off of them that they really think they have this in the bag before the first vote is cast? >> well, certainly not officially. but you do this long enough you learn to read between the lines. this event i came from, there was no mention of speaker gingrich, no mention of ron paul

or other candidates. the only person mitt romney had his sights on tonight was barack obama. he's back to running sort of a general election campaign. maybe a little heavier on the red meat than a general, but he's back to running the campaign he was a few months ago before we saw surge candidate after surge candidate. i also heard mitt romney's people say that a month ago. we're preparing to go all 15 rounds. i think that's before newt's star was tarnished. now they think they can knock this out quickly. >> let's talk about that. gingrich's star is dropping in iowa polls are dropping for him. he's canceling campaign stops. is he finished? >> some polls don't bode well for him. and not getting o then ballot in virginia. that's a problem. especially as voters here think who can beat barack obama? if they see one who can't get on

the ballot in his home state, they tend to cross that person off. that being said, we've crossed him before and he's come back to surprise us. iowans will have the final say on this. >> he said he's going to be the nominee. now it's a different ball game. sam youngman, thanks for your time. let's turn to msnbc contributor and political reporter for "slate" magazine. dave, great to have you on. has the news letter controversy hurt ron paul? he still has a slight advantage. what is all this controversy doing to his campaign right now? >> things like this take awhile to percolate and show up. i think it was helpful to paul that this story was resurrected right in the christmas period when people were writing about politics but people weren't paying as much attention about it. that's not to say paul handled it particularly well. i mean, i think there is an expectation that ron paul could

give what newt gingrich was referring to. there's an explanation he could give which is probably like the one in the '90s. instead of that he's hoping we stop asking questions. i think that's harmful to people who like ron paul. he has independent support. a lot of caucus support. one of the reasons i like him is they don't think he's a politician who slips and slides and makes things up. >> what about the undecided number of people? that's in double digits as well. what do you make of that? and how this might play out for the front runner ron paul in the polls. >> that's been true all year. the caucus -- anyone watching this network needs to have it explain how the caucus is different than the primary. especially if the weather holds up and you have a fairly balmy day on january 3rd. it's a very self-selected audience. there are a lot of late deciders.

but i'm kind of flashing back to 2004. you had undecided people who wanted to vote. it was easy to vote and stay out that night and they broke for john edwards and kerry at the end. there was nothing negative they heard about edwards and kerry. romney has been able to avoid attacks. some of the super pac ads on romney's end have been dishonest. you're only hearing negative attacks from ron paul, gingrich. you're seeing this wild swinging at the cocktail party from rick perry. he tightened up a bit. kind of attack everyone. >> dave weigel, great to have you on. thanks for being with us tonight. remember to answer the question at the bottom of the screen. coming up, mitt romney has come up with a clever strategy. just lie about president obama's

record on jobs. there needs to be some serious pushback on that, i think. and just one week away from the iowa caucuses, republicans are still crying for an electable republican to jump into the race. stay with us. we're right back.

coming up, mitt romney claims the president hasn't created any new jobs. he's wrong. we'll show you the facts next. nebraska senator ben nelson says it's time to move on. amen to that, ben. he says he's not going to run for re-election next year. i'll tell you exactly why that's good for the democrats. wisconsin governor scott walker tries to discredit the recall effort on fox news. state senator lena taylor will join me later on in the hour. you can tweet throughout the show using the hash tag ed show.

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welcome back to "the ed show." mitt romney has come up with a hard-hitting way to talk about president obama's jobs record. just lie about it. he does it all the time, doesn't he? romney whined to "time" magazine about democrats going after him. i know the democrats will try and make this a campaign about bane capital, he said. 25 million people are out of work because of barack obama. so i'll compare my experience to the private sector where net-net we created over 100,000 jobs. i'll compare that record with his record where he has not created any jobs. can we hold the phone there, folks? 25 million people are out of work because of president bush.

but romney pushes this lie about president obama not creating any new jobs at all. well, here's the jobs chart. obama's policies have created 2.3 million new jobs since march of 2010. jobless claims have been dropping ever since the stimulus started taking effect. this is about romney's lies versus obama's record. i don't understand why there isn't more of a pushback coming from the democrats on this. lies have a way of taking hold, do they not? let's turn to msnbc policy analyst ezra klein. ezra, let's go right to it. has president obama seen job creation since he's been in the oval office? >> let's go to the record. in 2009 he comes in, we lost 5 million jobs that year. it's hard to say that in obama's first year of office in a massive recession, that he deserves all the blame for that.

most of his policies hadn't begun. in 2010 which is the first year you can fairly only partial i attribute to him. obviously the president isn't the only thing. we gained jobs. i don't think anybody would say the job creation is going at the pace we'd want it to, although i think i and others would argue because in part we have not had the cooperation from congress. to say he caused it is beyond a stretch. it simply is not true. >> the candidate romney says he wants to go out and make the case that president obama hasn't created jobs. and he has. a net of 100,000 when he was at bain. is that accurate? >> i don't know where that's coming from. bain is a private equity firm.

he would borrow money against the assets of a company he thought was undervalued and take them over and turn them around. what he did at bain, what they do is try to turn a profit for investors. sometimes it means you get a company to help. sometimes it doesn't. of the companies bain took over, four of five of them went bankruptcy. in the three or four cases depending on the numbers which you believe in which the company had to shed all of the workers. are romney and his team made a profit. so he might have a net job creation record. i'm not going to rule that out until i've seen the numbers there. but his point was not job creation. a lot of times he made decisions that cost significant numbers of jobs while enriching him and his team. that's going to be tough to defend in the campaign in this economic circumstance i think. >> i'd like to see the obama team come out and compare how many jobs and say it if he's got

a net increase of 100,000 jobs, admit it. but show how many jobs he's shipped overseas. that is the number that can be tracked. and also this is tracked pretty well, that in the state of massachusetts they were ranked 47th out of 50th when he was governor. now, is this just red meat to the democrats? >> yeah. that's not going to be the easiest one for romney to defend. but it should be said massachusetts does not have a very high unemployment rate. part of the reason is they're a pretty advanced economy. they have a low unemployment rate. so far as the states go. you prefer to be in massachusetts and texas. massachusetts nevertheless has a lower total unemployment level. that's why they're not as quick on job creation. look, i think romney did have competent job in massachusetts when he went dealing with the massive recession. but his record is not appealing to his party and barack obama stole the main parts of it. of the single signature achievement that vaulted him into national competition was his health care bill. which barack obama raided and now mitt romney can't run on it. he's trying to run away from it. he can't explain why it's not

his anymore. he's going to have a tough time with that record. >> i mean, i have heard president obama talk about creating jobs in the energy sector. i mean, this is where our big -- our job growth can be. i've never heard mitt romney talk about how he's going to create th basically he comes from a paper shuffling, financial services kind of industry. but where -- what is his plan? has he stated where he's going to create these jobs? >> i think mitt romney would say it's not for the government to pick winners and losers. he's got this 59 point jobs plan which makes it sound more impressive than it is. a lot of the points are minor. it's a lot of energy drilling, lower taxes though not a shuffling, financial services kind of industry. but where -- what is his plan? has he stated where he's going to create these jobs? >> i think mitt romney would say it's not for the government to pick winners and losers. he's got this 59 point jobs plan which makes it sound more impressive than it is. a lot of the points are minor. it's a lot of energy drilling, lower taxes though not as low as gingrich and perry and cain proposed. it's the sort of consensus conventional wisdom on how to move forward on the economy.

and i think that folks looking back to the bush years where we did lower taxes quite a bit where we did go on a tear are going b to have trouble looking at that and saying man, that was a great time in the american km i. >> we should also point out that since the payroll tax holiday has taken effect, we have added over a million and a half jobs. it seems romney has been coy about saying whether he would support that or not. any sense from the romney camp about saying whether he would support that or not. any sense from the romney camp what exactly -- it would seem to me if something is working, they would support it. because it's on president obama's watch they seem to be coy about it. >> i think mitt romney's clear. he both does and does not support the extension of the payroll tax. that's been the general point. he's a republican. he's a tax cutter in theory. but this is barack obama's tax cut so he doesn't want to

support it. but he doesn't want to oppose it. and the health care plan, it's barack obama's now and he doesn't want to support it. another problem for the republican party going into next year is they have a lot of solutions in the 2005, 2006, 2007 era that the democrats then in trying to compromise with them took on things themselves. and now they've sort of abandoned those and made big theoretical arguments about why those types of solutions shouldn't be implemented. that's left them without credible solutions. george w. bush had a stimulus bill in 2008. now mitt romney can't quite say you do anything in particular for an economy in 8.6% unemployment. that's a tough spot to be in. >> so there's no question that mitt romney is way off the mark when he says the obama administration is not creating jobs. ezra klein, good z to have you on. >> thank you. another riding off into the sunset. i'll show you why ben nelson

departing is a good thing and he won't be missed. members of congress are getting richer. that's right. their net wealth is going up while their constituents are struggling to make ends meet. my commentary on the income inequality coming from the house. that's coming up later. stay with us. you're watching "the ed show" on msnbc. fmf]n]

welcome back to "the ed show." let me do this segment tonight from the very liberal persuasion, if i may. because that's what i am. ben nelson, he's calling it quits. i've always known him as the back stabbing democrat. he put out this video today and said this. >> it's time for me to step away from elective office, spend more time with my family, and look for new ways to serve our state and nation. simply put, it's time to move on. >> can i wave the pom-poms on that one? nelson is the seventh senate democrat to retire before the 2012 election harry reid might have a hard time finding a good democrat in nebraska. i'll talk about that in a moment. but it would be really hard to find a worse democrat. these are the facts. in nelson's 12 years in the senate, he voted for the bush tax cuts, the iraq war, and big pharma. in 2003, nelson was the deciding vote on the second round of the bush tax cuts. how'd they work out?

in return what did nebraska get? nebraska got millions of dollars in moemland security money. was it a sellout? you be the judge. nelson is one of the only democrats to sign on to grover norquist anti-tax pledge. who does he caucus with? the democrats? the bottom line is nelson hatz done everything in his power to water down financial reform. he voted against the president's jobs bill time and time again. and nelson was really a road block to the public option in health care. i used to call him and i still do, senate mutual of omaha. he always protected his buddies in the insurance industry and voted the way they wanted him to. nelson's retirement will make it harder for the democrats to hold on to the senate, but the real democrats will never miss this guy. but here's the thing. i believe that democrats can win anywhere, even in nebraska. nebraska folks, maybe you should

ask yourself the question since you're so down according to the republicans in nebraska, that this health care bill was so bad. are you really against young people being on their parents' policy? are you against the advantages that it gives to seniors? are you in favor of people losing their health care when they get sick? and how about when people are denied? are you foror against that? no, i think democrats can win in the middle of the country. i think it is a good thing as far as a generational change to see ben nelson go. because he caved in time and time again to the republicans and was in washington in my opinion to just knock down the obama agenda. which definitely has helped a lot of people in this country. see ya, ben. a major voice in the conservative movement wants republicans to toss out the 2012 field and start over. sam steinman and joan walsh will join me. also scott walker won't apologize for waging war on unions. but he is sorry he didn't just

sell it better. john nichols and wisconsin state senator lena taylor will visit with me later tonight to recall all of that. stay tuned.

welcome back to "the ed show." one week from the iowa caucuses and republicans, they're just still not happy with their choices. this was supposed to be the year for republicans that they would put up the best they had to offer. but those candidates, they're nowhere to be found on the republican field, are they? this isn't me saying it, folks. it's the republicans. a prominent republican office holder told rich lowry we don't have our a-team on the field. he's not alone. thaed bill crystal encouraged others to jump into the race. it is a moment for others to reflect on whether they don't owe it to their country to step forward. this is the guy who used to think sarah palin would be a good candidate for president. if the current republican field doesn't meet a low bar like

that, you know there's a problem. but where is chris christie? where is jeb bush? where's mitch daniels? these republicans that have money and name recognition. if obama is such a bad guy and easy to beat and he's a communist they've been calling him for years, you'd think all the good candidates would be jumping at this thing because it would be easy to unseat president obama. don't you find it interesting? i do. they've spent so much time hating this man, they haven't come up with a real solid candidate that has conviction of his or her principles. they're always waffling, aren't they? let's bring in "huffington post" political reporter sam stein and joan walsh. always a pleasure to have you with us. just -- where's all the beef so to speak? joan, why is it that there are so many, i guess you could say good republicans in the eyes of republicans that did not jump into this?

here we are a week out and they still haven't decided no one can point their finger on who's going to be the winner in iowa or the winner of the nomination. what do you think? >> well, i just think you're right. this is a party that has one thing in common. it's they hate barack obama. you know, the people that you talked about mainly christie and daniels and the former governor jeb bush, have governing records. it's kind of hard to get elected. it's hard to build a real primary base for people who are actually out there doing things. i mean, christie's really new. you know, he would have had a lot of problems. but they've created a party and bill crystal has created a party, frankly, that's all about their fox news commentators and they go on book tours. he's got himself to blame. so i enjoyed that piece today. i'm glad he's suffering. >> what do you think sam? >> i think part of the problem is that you'd have to be

clinically insane to run for president. your personal life is scrubbed over. everything about you becomes hoping to the public. for these people with mitch daniels specifically it was a case of i don't want to put my family through that. and that's a reasonable thing to say. on the other hand, you know, i think there is a lot of republicans who are looking at the field right now or looking at the possibility of unseating president obama right now and saying wow we have a good opportunity. economy's in the tank. this president approval rating hasn't been that great. why can't we get someone who fits our dreams more? and they look at the field and see flaws in every one of these candidates. i think there's buyer's remorse in some respects. >> well, the economy is getting better. we are adding jobs. 21 months of private sector job growth. the unemployment rate is now at 8.6%. some economists are saying it's going to be even better than that. joan, is it possible the republicans just don't want to give president obama any credit?

he's going to be a tough guy to beat. >> he may be. i mean, i think it's early to say the economy is really on the mend in a way that we're going b to feel next november, ed. but it does seem to be going in the right direction now. as you and i have talked about, the president also really seems to have given up on that idea compromising with people who don't want to compromise and is depicting himself and is fighting for middle class and working class people in a way that not only the base but even independents seem to be responding to. so that's a very positive trend in itself. >> can i add one thing on that, ed? >> you sure can. >> one thing that's going to make obama really tough to beat and i think has sort of been illuminated this week, he has an organization in a way that is far and better than any of the republican candidates in the field. when you have newt gingrich missing the virginia ballot deadlines. obama has more offices in iowa than any of the republican presidential candidates.

and they're actually competing for the nomination. he's not. so you have a president who is organized, who can get out the vote, and knows how to wage a national campaign. i think we tend to understate that. but that could be a huge factor in the months ahead, i think. >> well, when these republican candidates go out in iowa. i'm going to be in iowa following ron paul's campaign. people show up in the hundreds. they don't show up in the thousands. when barack obama and hillary clinton and john edwards were going through iowa, people were out in the thousands. and so now we've seen the romney campaign make a shift here in the last 48 hours. last week they were not advertising plans they were going to be in iowa. now they've shifted some advertising. what do you make of this? they smell blood in the water with the sharks? what do you think, joan? >> yeah. i think romney sees himself as competitive now and thinks he can show that and he's got the best campaign organization. sam is right. we really underestimate this

president and his organization and his campaign at our peril. and he's also got a formidable ability to raise money as well. so all these things do line up for the president very well. >> i think what i'm hearing from both of you tonight is that man, the president, has been focused all along trying to get the economy turned around. it is better. they've spent so much time hating this guy they haven't put together what they need to put together to even get on the ballot in some of the states they want to be president of. it's just amazing. >> gingrich is trying to sell books. come on. he doesn't have times for ballot signatures and stuff like that. truth of the matter. one other important point to make is for the past three months, obama's been very fix sated on one thing which is jobs. obviously the message was there. what you've heard from the republican party is how do we defeat the jobs bill or continue to reduce the deficit? obviously you look at any public opinion poll. one message resonates more than

any other and that's jobs. that's what's contributing to the president's turnaround. that's why you see the republicans stagnant in the polls. >> sam stein, joan walsh. always a pleasure. great to have you with us. republicans have all these hecklers out there. nobody wants to jump in of any significance. members of congress, you know what they're doing? they're getting richer. but their constituents, they are not. that story and my commentary is next. coming up, my commentary

coming up, my commentary next on the growing gap between members of congress and the people they represent across america. later in the program, scott walker attacks unions pouring into the recall efforts. but does it mention the money he's collected from outside groups? don't forget to tweet us during the show using the hash tag ed show. we'll be back.

congress has the lowest approval ratings in generations.

they can't seem to get anything done, can't seem to agree on anything. and the frustration of the american people, i think could bring a face change in 2012. first citizens united. this has become the thorn in the side of the little guy across america. now there is a report saying that the net worth of congressional members is widening from the people they actually represent. the income gap in america is real. this is the chart we use often here on "the ed show." i think it tells a distinct story. congress is getting closer to the red line, not down there with the workers with the blue line. in fact, over a 25 year period between 1984 and 2009, median net worth for members of congress has gone up from $280,000 to $725,000. that's excludeing any real estate. is it fair at this point to say

that congress is disconnected and really has no clue how average americans actually live and what's facing them on the kitchen table? the economic experience of america, who is suffering. the economic experience b in this country is so different and the money in politics has delivered really a country that has a society now -- a society of the voiceless. there are many americans out there who don't feel they have a piece of the rock anymore. in fact, american families have actually lost financial ground in the last 25 years. you know, with all these charts we put up and all the stories out there about income inequality, i find it really interesting that the obama team is saying that their small donations are up. it seems to me that the folks out there who feel they don't have a voice, they certainly want to exercise their right in having a voice and maybe this guy named obama who everybody vilifies from the right is actually still their hero.

it's going to be interesting. next up, scott walker knows he's going to have a tough time surviving a recall. so he goes on fox news and of course he's begging for help. john nichols, the nation magazine and wisconsin state senator lena taylor will join me for the discussion. stay with us. [ male announcer ] what makes you trust a company?

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mitt romney. 6% of you say it's going to be newt gingrich. and 68% say ron paul. i'll be in iowa tomorrow at newton, iowa, where ron paul will have a rally. i want to talk to his supporters. what is the fascination? we'll have the story for you tomorrow night on "the ed show." coming up, the latest on the recall efforts in wisconsin. and lena taylor will join me. stay with us.

after waging war on unions and killing jobs in wisconsin, scott walker can't run on his record. instead he's attacking the recall effort. and once again, he's turned to fox news for some help. earlier today walker tried to discredit the recall tribe by claiming fraud. >> the whole process is unusual. we had one of the local affiliates here do a story about someone signing it saying they signed 8 l 0 different petitions. the law says you should be able

to sign it once and only once. and it should be for a legal citizen. and to me, you're going to protect the integrity of the process. not only for who have the right to sign it but those who don't want to sign it. their voices should count as well. >> did you catch the beginning of that sound bite there? he says the whole process. meaning there isn't anybody with any passion or desire that is going to sign these petitions. actually, you have to be crooked to sign these petitions. that's basically what he's saying. walker makes no apologies for killing collective bargaining. he just wishes he'd done a better job selling it. >> i looked at it like a small business owner. i thought here's a solution. go out and fix it. should have laid the ground work making the case over and over again. >> while he's raised millions to save his own job, wisconsin has lost thousands of jobs over the past five months. in fact, the state leads the nation in job losses. walker promised to create

250,000 jobs over four years. but admitted today that the state is not on track to reach that goal. >> we had 16,000 net new jobs versus 150,000 lost. we said if you break that down every month, no it's not on track. but if you look forward, we figured it would compound. go back to the sports analogy. if you take over a 1-15 team, they're not going to go to the super bowl the next year. but if you have a four year plan, they are. same thing's true with us. figured it would compound. go back to the sports analogy. if you take over a 1-15 team, they're not going to go to the super bowl the next year. but if you have a four year plan, they are. same thing's true with us. >> here's another sports analogy. nothing left in the playbook. joining me now is senate lena taylor. and responsibility for "the nation" magazine joe nichols. great to have you. scott walker has had a failure in communication, political strategy. and now of course he's using fox news and any other favorable media he can find to turn it around and he's vilifying the

recall efforts saying the whole process is fraudulent. what's your response to all of that? >> i find that hypocritical. scott walker came in to the county executive position through a recall. he loves recalls. at least that's what he said then until they're being used for him. and the other thing that i think is really an important factor is he suggests that this is outside. you know, efforts, making the recall happen. no. more than half a million signatures came from individuals in wisconsin. and although he wants to use one example where someone said that they may have signed a number of times, he knows as well as we know only one signature will count for an individual. and we will have more than the 500-plus thousand that we need. i'm certain we'll be around the 750,000 number figure of signatures to help to get him recalled. >> john nichols walker is out there talking about fraud.

is this a myth or have there been problems? take us down that road. >> there really have not been problems, ed. this process has been organized from the start. remember. wisconsin requires a one-year wait before a recall can go forward. and so the people who have wanted to recall scott walker has been preparing for this for months. they did trainings. they set up an elaborate system to ensure there are not double signatures. to ensure no fraudulent signatures. the petition garters have been trained meticulously. i have to point out. governor walker is being just extremely dishonest in this statement. because he knows that a week ago, a full week ago, the government accountability board issued a statement in which they said they would not count fraudulent signatures and that they would review the petitions carefully. they would work with the

campaigns to call out any ig legal signatures. and finally that they would aggressively prosecute or organize the prosecution of anyone who put in a fraudulent signature. so the governor knows the fail saves are in place. >> ed, one other thing. >> go ahead, lena. >> one other thing. i wanted to say this. when the individuals came and start stealing petitions and, you know, going up and saying they were collecting signatures and they were throwing those petitions away, the government was silent. now, that was fraudulent. that was taking individuals' right to want to see him recalled and really throwing it in the garbage can. those were individuals who supported him. the governor was silent on that discussion. and when it comes to voter fraud, they're constantly overreaching suggesting that there's voter fraud when there's only been seven cases in wisconsin. none of them have been situations where the type of

overreaching voter i.d. bill he's done that's one of the most restrictive in the nation would even address. so the governor is really not honest as mr. nichols has stated. >> yeah. he says he's just wishing he would have communicated it better, this attack on workers and collective bargaining. walker also spoke about the money spent on this summer's recall elections. here it is. >> those sorts of successes and abuses are things we tried to fix. but we didn't lay the groundwork for it. so when we did it, bosses came out and spent literally millions of dollars attacking us. they did again in the supreme court race. they spent tens of millions of dollars attacking state senators recall elections. this is our first chance to tell the other side of that story. >> he didn't mention koch brother money. what about that? have the unions really had more influence and more influence than the money from the right

wing? >> well, the governor's statement is a complete false construct. he talks about not having tried to explain himself early on. the first advertisements that went up with regard to this controversy were put up in february by americans for prosperity, a koch brothers' funded group. they blanketed the air waives. and they talked about how the other side has ad up now. the fact of the matter is the governor has been flooding the air waives with ads supporting his agenda whereas the democratic party, the unions, these groups do not have ads up now. pretty much it's the governor and his allies that own the air waives at this point. so for him to suggest that he's somehow having a hard time

telling his story is -- it's a fantasy. the reality is he's told his story. the wisconsinites just aren't buying it. >> what do you make of these constant media appearances? he's getting more attention than any other governor in the country. he constantly goes on fox any time a negative story comes out. what i say is just the truth being reported about the nurnls. what do you make of him fighting back the way he is? >> well, this is exactly what he normally does when he was the county executive, he made it a point to start ahead of time running his race for the gubernatorial seat. he's trying to get ahead of any candidate that's going to be out there in the recall election trying to fix it. he and his wife are on the air saying let's put our differences behind us. no, you've gone too far governor. and the people of wisconsin are like angry badgers and they're coming for you. and i think the bigger thing that i want to say to you, ed, is this. walker is not going to be honest