under president obama, but also turning that against mitt romney in particular. and, it should be noted, implies mitt romney, who had a deferment has five sons, five able bodied sons constantly with him on the campaign trail, none of whom served in the military, unlike jon huntsman sons, serving in the navy. jon huntsman does not overtly make that case but it's there, and they have just made an ad out of it. so who knew. after jon huntsman's launch, he's running a capital c campaign, super aggressive, turned super aggressive in the last few minutes, essentially, before the new hampshire primary. he has the endorsement of the boston globe, a strong reach and highly populated southern new hampshire, endorsement the concord monitor the most influential newspaper inside new hampshire. is it too late?

maybe it's too late. but after months of not making a ripple, this is what the crowds look like right now when jon huntsman turns up at an event in new hampshire. [ cheering ] >> joining us to tell me i have this all wrong and jon huntsman is going nowhere is karen tumulty the national correspondent from the washington post, who was in manchester tonight. karen, thank you for being with us. >> thank you, for having me, rachel. >> tell me how wrong i am, tell me how huntsman is still puttering along and appearances of an upswing are just -- are not true. >> well, at this point there is still such a margin, it was pretty clear for instance in iowa that rick santorum was poised to completely close the

gap a couple days before. but i had a really interesting conversation today with a very prominent republican here in new hampshire and he was saying one of the problems with huntsman's whole message, for instance i served my country, he never closes the circle, he never explains why he left the obama administration, what it was that he saw from inside that administration that really convinced him that he could do things better than barack obama is, and i think that the appetite right now among republican voters is for somebody who will take the fight to barack obama, and that is what i think probably jon huntsman has not conveyed and has yet to convey. >> is the fight within the -- within the republican electorate turning to obama already or are people looking for somebody to distinguish themselves as an anti-romney candidate? >> there is almost a desperate feeling among some parts of the republican base, for instance

social conservatives to find somebody other than romney, but until one or two of these guys gets out of the race, they are are finding it almost impossible to console i date enough people to slow romney down much less beat him. >> in terms of the different types of opposition to mitt romney talking about social con conservatives conservatives, that is not the ground jon huntsman is trying to appeal, also not the ground ron paul is trying to appeal. ron paul and huntsman seem to be at the top among non-romney candidates in new hampshire. are ron paul and jon huntsman essentially competing for the same group of people are ron paul supporters unreachable by any other candidate? >> i think ron paul supporters are just so unique and if you think about jon huntsman has a very strong foreign policy message, it is about as far away -- it's all about engagement, specifically smartly engaging the chinese, that is as far away

as you can get almost from ron paul's message, so i really don't see a lot of overlap there. one thing that i think could happen hunts man or some other non-romney candidate is just the number of verbal gaffes that we have seen out of mitt romney in the last couple days, you know whether the pink slips or saying how much he enjoys firing people. i do think there is the potential that some republicans could look at this and say oh my goodness is this another massachusetts politician keep sticking his foot in his mouth. >> why do you think rick santorum didn't get more of a bump in new hampshire after iowa? seeing him on the campaign trial, a little bit myself, i felt new hampshire voters even if they were just didn't like him very much, i wonder what your perception is why santorum hasn't gone further with the

iowa performance. >> it's interesting because the friday before the iowa caucuses, i did an interview with santorum, i asked him, i said a lot of people think you're kind of nuts to be going to new hampshire you should go right to south carolina where you have a social conservative message that is really going to resonate with the base. he was insisting he could come up here, people would relate to him as a northeastern kid who grew up in a steel town. i think he's talking about income and equality in a state that has been hit pretty hard. it just isn't clicking and again, i think there is going to be a lot of rethinking of that decision to come here rather than doing what rick perry did and head straight for south carolina. >> karen tumulty, thanks for joining us tonight. appreciate having you here. >> thank you, rachel. speaking of rick santorum, after we finished our show on friday night, we did our show live from where karen is sitting up in manchester, on friday

night, after the show ended, i finally did get do meet rick santorum face-to-face. i spent the day chasing around both rick santorum and jon huntsman, didn't speak to either of them. after the show i did meet rick santorum i got to talk to him and i got him on tape and that's [ merv ] thanks, other merv. mr. clean magic eraser extra power was three times faster on permanent marker. elsewhere against dirt, it was a sweep, with scuffed sports equipment... had it coming. grungy phones... oh! super dirty! and grimy car rims... wow! that really works! ...all taking losses. it looks like mr. clean has won everything. the cleaning games are finished? and so are we. okay, but i just took a mortgage out on the cabinet. [ male announcer ] clean more, work less, with the mr. clean magic eraser extra power. car insurance companies say they'll save you by switching, you'd have, like, a ton of dollars. but how are they saving you those dollars? a lot of companies might answer "um" or "no comment." then there's esurance. born online, raised by technology,

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i spent friday trying to get candidates to talk to me. i ran after jon huntsman in concord. a producer did get a question to governor huntsman in even though

the campaign told me there was no chance for me to talk to him. then we drove an hour to dublin, new hampshire to stand in the overflow room at rick santorum event and get a clear picture how i was get nothing where near the this supposed rick san forum surge. i went one for two talking to candidates. did speak that night. after we finished the show, wrapped up at 10:00 eastern, right at the end of the show, somebody told me rick santorum was in the hotel where we were staying right at that very moment, right then, right above where i was sitting, in fact. on the mezzanine level of the hotel, we found rick santorum. he was a special guest on wbz 1030, a big powerful news radio station, hosted by dan ray, great host, running the rodeo, fielding the calls, keeping people on point. i think once senator santorum realized we were there he wanted to keep taking calls on wbz all night.

sooner or later you have to stop at least for the ads. >> on the contraception issue, do you think the country would be better off if there was les contraception? you talked about the liberty people should do --. >> i talked about the brookings institute study that said 2009 study said if you do three things, you're almost guaranteed not to be in poverty, those three things are number one work, makes sense, work. number two, graduate from high school. number three, if you're a man, get married, if you're a woman, get married, don't have a child before you're married, get married and don't have a child before you're married. if you don't do one of those three things, the poverty rate is 74%. and the chance of being a $50,000 more income is 4%. so i would just make the suggestion that things that

would cause the likelihood of any of those three things not to happen would probably not be beneficial to you from the standpoint of living a life where you can pursue and have economic success. and of course, engaging in sexual activity, even with contraception, there is a good chance or there is a chance, not a good chance, a chance to become pregnant. >> contraception was more effective you wouldn't have an opinion. i got the commercial break running out. but, rick santorum saved by the bell there. that was during a commercial break which ends and you go back live on the radio. that was my time with rick santorum. asked whether the country would be better off with less contraception use. mr. santorum as you saw sort of ran out the clock talking about things other than contraception use. fortunately, we do know what rick santorum thinks about contraception. he's on the record on the matter. back when nobody took him all that seriously, in terms of his presidential prospects, rick

santorum made his position on contraception, very, very clear. >> one of the things i will talk about that no president has talked about before i think the dangers of contraception in this country. the whole sexual liberty idea, many in the christian faith said well that is okay, contraception is okay, it's not okay. it's a license to do things in a sexual realm that is counter to what how things are supposed to be. >> president santorum's america, birth control is a sexual libertine idea. the moderators tried to nail the contraception issue down. that effort was mostly derailed by mitt romney purporting not to understand the question. he was asked whether states can ban birth control if they ought to make birth control illegal.

>> do you believe that states have that right or not? >> george, i don't know whether the state has a right to ban contraception, no state wants to. the idea of you putting forward things that states might want to do that no state wants to do and ask if they can do that is silly. >> what is this birth control issue, silly. and so on. mitt romney like rick santorum went on like that for a long time, sort of running out the clock rather than talking about his views on birth control, specifically, fortunately, we know mitt romney's position on this. because back in october, he was asked about a constitutional amendment like the one mike huckabee was pushing in mississippi so-called personhood amendment, which everybody agrees could make hormonal birth control like the pill illegal. >> would you have supported the constitutional amendment that would have established the definition of life at conception? >> absolutely. >> absolutely, mitt romney says he's absolutely for an amendment

like the personhood amendment that mississippi voters said no to this year. he's absolutely for an amendment that surprise, could have the effect of outlawing the most popular forms of birth control. i know rick santorum wants to be the number one anti-romney candidate there is not much policy difference on whether or not a state can infringe your right to have birth control. it's remarkable a candidate can be considered a top tier candidate. it's even more remarkable that mitt romney, the overwhelming front-runner, also can take a public position of opposing birth control, the most popular kind of birth control. what is most remarkable, most remarkable about this year's republican field, the thing of opposing popular forms of birth control is the majority position among the entire field of candidates. five of the hopefuls signed a personhood pledge from a group called personhood usa. of the candidates still in the

race, rick ran tore rum, newt gingrich signed on, mitt romney saying he absolutely supports the idea. even ron paul libertarian ron paul says birth control should be legal, even ron paul signed the personhood pledge, that could make the most common birth control illegal in this country. birth control has been legal in the country in every state of the union for almost half a century since the supreme court said states had no right to ban it. half a century your right to birth control has been the law of the land. now comes the republican field. it's 2012. joining us is cecile richards, president of the planned parenthood federation, thanks for being here. >> good to see you, rachel. >> has there been a major party primary in modern american history where being against contraception is the position of anybody other than a fringe candidate? >> never seen this, used to be the republican primary the question was whether you wanted

to overturn roe, everyone is into ending access to birth control. mitt romney wrote his own editorial saying he would end the national family planning program that now serves five million women. >> whether you have a right to it you won't be able to get it that is the means by which they get contraception. >> absolutely. showed a clip, when asked when governor romney was asked about his position on the right to privacy, the reason married couple got the right to birth control, he said he didn't believe in the right to privacy. if you look at the supreme court express he will put into judges now that agree with scalia, thomas, looking at actually for the first time absolutely entertaining the idea of making birth control illegal in america. >> rick santorum has been very open in the past, as you saw in that, in the past, in october about his feeling that birth control is wrong, that it is --

that it makes for the wrong kind of society and that he also believes that states have the right to ban it. now he's being taken more seriously, he said he doesn't think states should ban it. mitt romney saying he would support a personhood amendment would allow a state like mississippi to ban abortion, mitt romney says that he also doesn't think that states should do that. what do you make of the candidates parsing the could and should of this issue? >> i think you can't trust them. in fact it's interesting because you look at mitt romney in particular, it wasn't that long ago he was asking for planned parenthood's endorsement when he was running in massachusetts, when he was politically ex-paid. he wants to defund planned parenthood, he's wishy-washy, women can't trust him, what he says about the issues. >> do we have the pdf of the

plant pa planned parenthood. this is 1992 running for senate? >> no, 2002 less than ten years ago. >> he's running in massachusetts, filling out the planned parenthood questionnaire, seeking support essentially from the pro-choice community. >> endorsement from planned parenthood. >> does the distance he has travelled over these past ten years, is that a mitt romney distance or is that a republican party normal distance. does this represent the republican party? >> only mitt romney can tell you why he is on every different side of the issue. i know women can't trust what he says now. i do think to your point in the beginning, we are seeing a republican primary that is absolutely a race to the bottom for women, where they are trying to outdo themselves on who would be the worst president for women. >> michele bachmann is it a loss

for women that she dropped out of the race, because republicans aren't considering a female candidate or because they have anti-female policies? >> we should have more women running for office, we didn't agree with her on any positions, that said i wish there were more women running. i mean i think what is going to be interesting when we look, rachel, in november, the majority of voters will be women. and they will be paying attention to how candidates stand on women's health issues, i was in new hampshire as well, republican women who support planned parenthood are very, very disturbed about the extreme nature of the republican primary wondering where they will go. >> i will say it was striking to see campaign signs on corners all over new hampshire, to see planned parenthood signs among the candidate signs. you're behind that, well done. cecile richards, thank you for

coming in. >> great to see you again. there is a struggle going on for the future of the republican party, on the one hand people making six figures a year, on the other hand, people making eight figures a year. that is just ahead.

the day after the iowa caucuses last week, president obama announced he was recess appoints richard cordray to run the consumer financial protection bureau making the appointment over the opposition of congressional republicans.

today on the eve of the new hampshire primary the president announced he's replacing his white house chief of staff, bill daley heading home to chicago after a year on the job to be replaced by jack loo, the budget director, he was also budget director for president obama clinton. served as number two official as the state department under hillary clinton. we do not know if the timing here is designed to insure that this announcement is overshadowed by other political news, but the timing here does in fact insure this announcement is overshadowed by other news. one thing to note here, as the white house taken a much more confrontational tone with congressional republicans the past few months, jack lew, the chief of staff, he has one very prominent congressional republican fan. in the midst of the debt ceiling debacle last summer, house majority leader eric canter said this, no one was more prepared and in tune with the numbers than jack lew, he was polite and

respectful someone i can tell committed to his principles. eric canter likes the new chief of staff. sound the alarms, civility may have accidentally broken out in washington. surely that will be fixed some time soon. hey kev, how about a bike ride? huh? you're not my dad ahhhhh!!! hey honey, back feels better, little dancing tonight, you and me? hey boy, you wanna go for a walk? dr. scholl's pro inserts with shock guard technology relieve different types of lower body pain by treating at the source so you're a whole new you.

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this is george romney, he was mitt romney's father, ran for the republican nomination for president in 1968. he was the governor of the state of michigan. he was the head of the american motor corporation, a major car manufacturer. mitt romney was born his son. to understand his upbringing and start in life and who he was, when he got a deferment from serving in viet nam to be a missionary in france when he went to harvard, where he got law and business degrees, he went in high dollar corporate finance for context, understand whose dad was governor and who ran for president and ran a big auto company. mr. romney, the younger, is himself now estimated to be worth a quarter billion dollars. we know he continues to be paid a share of tro capital.

that is not only where he made his zillions, it's where he continues to rake zillions in from every year. so, mitt romney, zillionaire, son of zillionaire, a man who may have trained himself to put on jeans to campaign for president. he has not trained himself to recognize his life as a zillionaire and the son and father is not the way most people have lived their lives. >> i'm just saying you were for individual mandates, my friend. >> you know what, you raised that before, rick. >> it was true then. it's true now. >> rick, i tell you what, 10,000 bucks, $10,000 bet. >> i'm not in the betting business. >> i happened to see my dad run for governor when he was 54 years old. he had good advice to me. he said mitt, never get involved in politics if you have to win election to pay a mortgage.

if you find yourself in a position when you can serve you ought to have a responsibility to do so. >> it was the private sector we were pulling ourselves up by our boot straps. >> we could raise taxes. >> corporations. >> corporations are people, my friend. we can raise taxes of course they are. corporations money earned goes to people. where do you think it goes? >> it goes in your pockets. >> human beings, my friends. i know these are tough times. they are tough times in america. i know what it's like to worry whether you'll get fired. there were a couple times i wondered if i would get a pink slip. i should tell my story i'm unemployed. mitt romney, common man. a time magazine reporter how strange it was to be in the room when he was asked a benign question by a little kid about why he wanted to be running for president in order to explain how much he cared about the future of the country, mr. romney started a riff how difficult it has been for him to

decide who to leave his fortune to. >> i remember i sat down with an attorney, i said if i have a will i want to make sure and pass along my whatever i have to my sons, and she said well, what do you want to give to your grandchildren? i didn't have any then. i said nothing, i'll give to it my boys, they bill give it to their children. she said you'll change your mind. i said i don't think so. well now i have grandchildren, i saw this lady lawyer of mine i saw her on the street i said by the way, i don't want to give anything to my boys, i want to give it all to my grandchildren. >> the heart warming story about his fortune and the wacky run-ins with the lady lawyer. he told that story at a campaign event on wednesday. but the one moment on the campaign trail that the campaign is preparing to never live down, the one that spawned a tag line they probably will never live down came at an appearance today in new hampshire. >> i like being able to fire people. >> the context he was talking

about wanting to fire people who provide service to him. specifically liked the idea of being able to fire who provide health insurance to him. because of how mitt romney made his zillions, i like being able to fire people will live on forever regardless of the context, coming to a bumper sticker near you. pretty much all of the candidates for president are millionaires, just being a rich guy is a distinction without a difference for this field. all the criticism of mitt romney on this score is rather an oblique way of getting at the larger critique of mitt romney and i think people generally assume this would be a left wing critique but it's not left wing at all. it instead is populist. whether fat cats are predatory, whether they are standing on the necks of regular people to enhance their own wealth and status. that is often a left wing critique, mostly a populous one. it's not always left wing. >> governor romney enjoys firing people. i enjoy creating jobs.

>> i have no doubt that mitt romney was worried about pink slims, whether he would have enough to hand out because of his company, bain capital i'm sure he was worried he would run out of pink slims. -- slips. >> more ruthless than wall street. for tens of thousands of americans, the suffering began when mitt romney came to town. >> you certainly have to say bain looted a company leaving behind 1700 unemployed people. >> mitt romney may have complained about other people saying mean things about him, but newt gingrich has never been more in his element, has never seemed to be enjoying himself more than when he has been destroying mitt romney over this stuff. for this past week or so. a casino billionaire, according to forbes, made the largest donation known to have been made

to any pac in this election so far. a $5 million lump sum donated to pro newt gingrich pac, which by all accounts seems intent on using the money to air material not just from this ad that you saw, but this ad is actually a trailer for a much longer ad, the when mitt romney came to town idea, it's actually a 30 minute anti-mitt romney corporate raider attack. remember in the 2004 election the swift boat veterans ads aired by a pro george w. bush group, the made to look like news story ads, pro gingrich group has one of those on mitt romney, 30 minute attack ad masquerading as a documentary targeting him as a soulless corporate raider who pillaged americans lives to make himself rich. joining us now the guy who wrote the book on greedy bastards, dylan ratigan, author of the new book, greedy bastards, mr. ratigan, thank you for joining

us. >> the way you tell a story, rachel, by the end of that thing you're concerned. listen, okay, you offer this critique, can i critique your critique? >> sure, please. >> i would be very rare i would do this but for having written the book, obviously, being so flattered to be in your company, i wouldn't want to be inappropriate. but i think there are two commentaries i would offer on your commentary. you can afford to be more brutal as to the destructive nature of the apparatus not only mitt romney but newt gingrich who took millions from fannie mae, participants by a large number in the democratic party as well who are attached to this system, and that system which we're seeing protested, whether through the occupation or tea party is precisely the system you were just describing, i

think a lot of the frustration is not hard to figure out why mitt romney is the extractionist. my dream come true, what are you talking about, mitt romney, study him that is extractionism. i think that we do ourselves a disservice when we play too much to the heroes and villains, the destruction or ascendancy won't save you and me. >> that is the question. attacks on mitt romney are motivated by one thing, people not wanting him to get the nomination. are those attacks because they are about his time at bain a moment for the count try to learn about extraction? >> yes, the brilliance of the monologue you did on prime time and national television, explanation as to the difference in a business model, one seeks to collaborate, rachel and dylan want to sell cups, do you have five bucks, okay, great let's sell cups. will they buy the cups, you make a couple bucks, that is america.

the other thing is rachel says hey dylan has a cup i think i can borrow somebody else's money from dylan's retirement to buy his cup from him and sell his cup to somebody else cheap so you get a lot of money and i'm left with no cup. that may sound that is what we're to a 5-year-old, what's the system? how do the grownups make decisions in america? what you have to tell them is we don't differentiate between rachael and dylan decide to collaborate to make something. or whether rachael or dylan are able to exploit one another through some particular breech of visibility, integrity or choice where i withhold information from you or whatever it may be. there are these things we do in our personal relationships and

our systematic relationships as a country and we're paying a we lost the nobility with compassion. i've been yelling and screaming problems. it's wrong. it hurt me. i gained weight, i started smoking. it's not health become angry about what's in this book. and somebody who wrote it originally angry. >> but are we -- >> it's compassion. >> are we more precise about awhat free enterprise is? >> it's amazing. it is so -- the revelation of discreet data and the ability to identify the excrete data and then adapt to it which we saw first with crime fighting in new york. where is the crime? put a punch of cops there and go do that. that was celebrated in this country. william bratton and all the improvements and new york's police department and all this, at least certainly in its relative, proportional behavior. in this book we talk about dr. brenner and cam den, new jersey. the most interesting place to do

health care research in this country is in the poorest cities because nobody cares. and so you have dr. brener in camden, new jersey who realized, what percentage of all the health care costs in camden, new jersey, are being created by what percentage of the people? 1% of the people in camden, new jersey, account for 30% of the health care spending mostly because they're not taking their diabetes medicine and not going tore a walk around the block. so he sets up a preventative team and they reduce their costs by 50% and the overall health care costs in camden collapse. it's that intelligent discreet decision making on how not how much that is determining our future as a people and as a country. and it's a decision we have to make to seize nobility again not through the grandiose aspirations of mythology but the realistic assessment of our own best interests. >> dylan rad began, "greedy bastards."

thank you for coming in. >> thank you. i'm sorry to carry on so much. thought it was a privilege to get to talk you to. >> dylan -- >> i want to smoke a cigarette snou. >> carrying on what why we come you to. >> i wore this scarf for you. i only wear it after 9:00 at night. the only second time it's ever been out of the closet. >> rachael maddow show now with more smoking. >> light them up. >> we'll be right back.

tomorrow is the republican primary in new hampshire. governor rick perry of texas is not in new hampshire today. governor perry is in south carolina even though the south carolina primary is in the for another two weeks. and with rick perry ostentatiously ignoring new

hampshire, you want to know who is beating rick perry in the polls in new hampshire right now? buddy romer. buddy romer surging ahead of rick perry in new hampshire. you may remember we had buddy romer on the show friday night. he had a major campaign announcement planned for saturday. his major campaign announcement on saturday is he is staying in the race. and now in the latest suffolk university poll, rick perry has 1%. buddy romer has a whopping 2%. in this ppp poll taken over the weekend, it shows buddy romer with a commanding lead over rick perry, 3% to 1%. mr. roemer's campaign manager making sure that everybody noticed his candidate's rise in fortune. >> what i would be happy is coming ahead of rick perry. >> one, two, 3%, threes not giant numbers. they do not mean that buddy roemer is the next front runner in new hampshire. that makes him feel like he has to answer his critics who are asking why he is still in the

race. but if he is polling at 2% or 3% is enough to lap rick perry in new hampshire, forget what buddy roemer has to answer to. when does rick perry have to answering why he's still in the race? we'll be back tomorrow night at