john tower got some interest. >> we have a greg in ohio. i'm up because i have no life. but i've been on facebook looking at lizards indigenous to honduras. >> the second part of your statement confirms the first, you have no life. yes, if you're for honduran lizards on facebook. what else you got? >> we've got a mark who writes the fire alarm went off in my building, way too early, couldn't get back to sleep. >> that's a common one. whether it's the garbage truck with the reverse siren on. loud noises waking people up. >> this is annie in texas. i'm waiting for willie to reveal his secret for waking up so early and looking so fresh. >> yeah, good question. wake up at about 3:00 in the morning and what i do is no botox, that's ridiculous. i fill a syringe with red bull and fire it into the side of my head. tightens up the eyes and gets the juices flowing every

morning. time for "morning joe." what do you actually think of him personally as a man? >> i don't. >> you have no view? >> i have no view. he is a competitor, he's somebody who i think was unnecessarily negative and who ran -- who knows that some of the things he ran were not true. but that's his decision. that's how he wants to play the game. >> you said that character is very important for whoever worships this nomination, yet you won't tell me what you think of mitt romney. what do you think of his character? >> i don't have an obligation to answer any of this. >> could you imagine ever working for him? >> no. but why -- what does that have -- he couldn't imagine ever working for me either. >> wow. all right. here we go. good morning. >> no. >> it's thursday, january 12th. we're back in new york city. hi, willie. with us onset, we have the

executive editor at random house and pulitzer prize winner jon meacham. and reverend al sharpton. good to see you. you're back. how are you feeling? >> i'm feeling okay. newt has done a little back and forth. >> yeah. >> i was talking to the romney people on tuesday night, and they were concerned about these bain attacks. >> right. >> and they said, what do you think we should do? because i've talked to all of the campaigns. i'm down with the kids that are running these things. >> you're in the mix. >> i'm in the mix a little bit. and i said don't worry, newt's going to get hit from conservatives and he's going to pull back. and that's exactly what he did yesterday. they may run the ads. but newt said yesterday on the campaign trail i shouldn't, you know, i think you're right, i shouldn't talk about this bain

thing. >> but then he pulled back from that. >> i know. >> he said, no, i didn't say that. >> but he said that. that's the thing about newt, he'll pull back from the pull back's pull back. >> it's fascinating, reverend al. you sitting there as a democratic activist licking your chops. you've got to love this. republicans like rick perry -- >> don't take the bait. >> what do you mean don't take the bait? >> nothing. >> he sounds like a stoned nyu grad student calling it vulture capitalism. >> well, i'm not licking my chops. >> you're licking them. >> i'm licking the buttered popcorn as i watch -- >> the blueberry pie. >> trying to get the blueberry pie off of their face, that's what i'm enjoying. there's nothing for us to do but -- >> just sit back. >> wise man once told me if you

see a man going over the cliff, give him room, don't turn a suicide into a homicide. >> that's very christian. >> i was just going to say -- not exactly the good samaritan. huh, meacham? >> on the other side -- >> i think they -- the fact -- >> no, we know what you're saying. you don't have to explain. the good samaritan. >> and south carolina's more than a week away. >> let's go to south carolina, shall we? it all -- >> and by the way, if he turns around and grabs at you, just give him a little nudge. okay. reverend. so let's go through the news, there's a lot of news here. >> yeah, it all could come down to south carolina where the republican candidates are in a final sprint to the january 21st primary, and what may be the last best chance to stop mitt romney's momentum. the candidates descending on the stage this morning with over a dozen events planned today.

those rallies are backed by a wall to wall media blitz and campaign ads blanketing the air waves. for mitt romney, at least, the money iso front-runner raised $24 million during the last month of 2011. that number is expected to dwarf the war chest of republican rivals. newt gingrich may not have as s much cash in the bank, but his supporters do and they rolled out a new movie yesterday devoted entirely to tearing down romney's business record. the film features testimonials from workers who say romney's former company destroyed their jobs while he and other executives took home millions. the issue is sparking a sharp debate inside the gop with some conservatives angry at fellow republicans for what they say as an assault on free enterprise. here's fellow candidate rick santorum on this line of attack. >> rick perry, the governor of texas, he's going after mitt romney his record as a venture

capitalist saying he was a vulture capitalist. are you comfortable with that kind of language? >> uh, no. i hate to sit here and be a defender of mitt romney, but to me this is a defender of capitalism. and, you know, i have to say that this is an attack that's probably not warranted. there's plenty of mitt romney's record as governor of massachusetts to attack and go after. but i don't think going after capitalism and companies that in many cases do a public good and saving companies is the way to go about doing that. >> you know, it is. to me, it is an attack on the free market, an attack on capitalism. i understand some consultants are saying don't use the word capitalism, use free markets. i use the word capitalism. capitalism's been pretty good for us from adam smith forward. but it is, jon meacham, it is

amazing that with romney care and the individual mandate and the flip-flops on abortion and the flip-flops on gay marriage and the flip-flops on guns and the flip-flops on reagan. >> you keep going. >> and him saying oh, no, no, no, i wasn't a republican when ronald reagan was in the white house. with all of these things, you've got newt gingrich and rick perry channelling teddy kennedy and using the same line of attack against mitt romney that teddy kennedy did so many years ago. >> yeah. i think to my mind, every primary ends up being less pleasant than people want it to be within the given party. the phone call at 3:00 a.m. being the great -- turns out he's pretty good at the 3:00 a.m. phone call, it's everything else that's a little weak. >> yeah, exactly. >> i think this in particular is -- has a lot of intermural

damage. romney isn't defined. it's not as though people know him and therefore this is one more fact. people don't really know him. >> and let's talk about the effect of the super pacs. newt gingrich gets a $5 million check from a man who is obsessed with one thing. and that is beating barack obama in november. and yet, that man might as well -- and i'm dead serious, he might as well have written a check to david axelrod himself and said use this $5 million for market research against mitt romney and bain capital. >> i don't think there is anybody who really is puzzled about why americans think the whole thing is rigged and the two parties are establishment wings of the same thing. but just the conversation about super pacs that's been going on in the past week or three weeks, i guess, shows that the thing is -- that it's basically reform paint ball.

it's -- this little line about, well, that's romney's super pac, it's now part of the vernacular, and it's another sign that people are right to feel that even the best efforts at reform are rigged against them. >> yeah. >> and i think it's ultimately corrosive effect of the super pacs is going to be even that didn't work. and money -- money and politics is like water, it always finds its way in. and that'll happen. >> no matter what. >> but there's no -- there's not even a chinese wall, there's no wall in all of this. >> you know, it seems like not only you could say even that didn't work, it hurt the party ultimately and they started to eat their own within it with their tactics and help the president. if you were newt gingrich and you have $5 million to spend, would you spend it a different way? >> oh, my gosh, yes. >> how could you salvage it? >> if i have $5 million, i'm

going into south carolina, i know i have to take him down, i would spend $3 million of that money running ads in greenville spartanburg area upstate, the conservative state, bob jones university, where my wife's from. it is the bible belt -- this side of texas. i would do nothing, nothing but run 30-second ads over the next seven, eight, nine days of mitt romney in mitt romney's own words on abortion. mitt romney and mitt romney's own words on gun control. mitt romney in mitt romney's own words on marriage, mitt romney on mitt romney's own words about being embarrassed being identified with ronald reagan and the republican party. this is something that not only didn't play into barack obama's hands, it is something, willie, that guts, guts, guts mitt

romney in south carolina. i would spend the other $2 million, well, i'd spend the other $2 million doing the same thing in the low country. >> i think you're right. i think you're right. >> this is -- this is what astounds me. that with all of mitt romney's words that they could use against him in south carolina, they're going after capitalism. >> and the other thing to say is it didn't work in the state of new hampshire. hep won with 40% of the vote. maybe it's different in south carolina, but people we talk to, we sat outside a polling place for two hours and asked people about the bain capital thing. and they said, no, i don't resent the guy for making money. voters have looked into this, they've read into what bain capital did. they don't resent him and don't believe he took some perverse pleasure in firing people and throwing them on the street. he may not be like them, but

there's not the resentment newt gingrich hopes there is. >> the bottom like is in america, at least in the republican party and among most democrats and most independents, they understand the system. the capitalist system. and again now, we're talking about republicans that are voting in south carolina primaries this next week -- >> i'm very familiar with that. >> they believe in the american dream. they're like my father. lay him off and he's not going to turn against america and the free market. he's going to say you know what? i've got to work harder. i've got to -- >> i think you're right about the ad. and i would -- if newt's people were looking, i would take that clip of what you just said and put that on a bite and end it with and joe married a young lady from these plots and run it through the greenville/spartanburg area. that would resinate there. there's no question. what's very interesting to me is that mr. romney's people have not responded. they've said he provided 100,000

jobs, why aren't we seeing 100,000 or 200,000 of those people saying mitt romney taking ore the company is good for me. i'd love to see somebody come and testify on the other side. i've not seen that. >> just walk into a staples store. >> i think that there's a difference between people being critical of business practices and being envious. i mean, if your father -- you said as an example -- got laid off and said i want my job back, doesn't mean he's envious of the owner, it means he feels that he was treated wrongly in some way. and i think romney's saying that statement plays into those -- >> these are legitimate arguments for the general election. but we're not in the -- for the purposes of newt's $5 million buy, we're not in the general election, and we're not even in maine, we're in south carolina where he's targeting -- >> we're not even in february. >> we're not even in february. and so that's why, again, in my

first campaign, all i had to do was use my republican opponent's words in ads. no commentary, you just run them in the ads and let the words speak for themselves. i'm stunned that none of these candidates have the discipline to just use romney's words. and you do it, you have $5 million, do it for a week and a half, i guarantee you, it'll knock 15 to 20 points off of mitt romney's 40%. >> and you're right about the south in the sense because the other thing about greenville/spartanburg it's an international trade zone. bmw is right there. >> it is the land of carol campbell. carol campbell reinvented south carolina. >> and that generation of southern governors. bill clinton, it was those guys going over to get the japanese plants, the german plants. the joke used to be who really won the war? the second one, not the other

one. >> when you say the war, you're talking about the war? >> i mean world war ii -- >> oh, no, no, no -- >> i'm talking about the civil war. >> you're from the state that would still be part of spain -- >> come on. as meacham likes to call it, the war of northern aggression. but go ahead. >> i just think it's particularly unfortunate if you're gingrich because you have a pretty economically sophisticated electorate in south carolina because a lot of their jobs are coming from global trade. >> you know how you can tell meacham is really a yankee deep down? >> why? >> because when he talks about the war, he's talking about world war ii. >> it's true. >> not the civil war. have you ever even read faulkner? >> i love the south, i hate the south. >> you can read it in south carolina. they still have the confederate flag up. >> don't get us started.

>> as the republicans bludgeon each other in the primary process, president obama is looking toward the general election and a central economic message to his campaign. in a white house speech yesterday, the president unveiled a renewed effort to bring jobs back overseas. also made mention of several key swing states that will be critical to 2012. >> whether you're a small business some of which are represented here or a large manufacturing corporation or a technology company, whether you're a historic brand or a brand new start-up, insourcing jobs is a smart strategy right now. i don't want the next generation of manufacturing jobs taking root in countries like china or germany. i want them taking root in places like michigan, ohio, virginia, and north carolina. so my message to business leaders today is simple. ask yourselves what you can do to bring jobs back to the

country that made our success possible. >> wait a minute -- >> hold on a second. >> alabama and mississippi a and -- >> florida and nevada too. >> he'll say florida, new mexico -- boy, he picked the swing states. >> no, listen -- >> the manufacturing states. >> yes, exactly. >> michigan, ohio. >> listen to some of the republican candidates they talk a lot about bringing manufacturing jobs back. the question is, can it be done? >> i love this strategy and i love this strategy because we're talking about the southern states. you look at what's happening in the south. they are stealing jobs from mercedes benz, from vw, i mean they are -- you've got japanese jobs and german jobs, ref rend, pouring into the south where they've got good low energy costs. we're taking jobs -- i've talked about it time and time again, but i love it because it's a

model. alabama steals jobs from germany, and they're now making mercedes benz in tuscaloosa county, and you actually have protests about outsourcing, but the protests are in germany. i love what the president's saying here because we really can. we can pull jobs back into this country. you know, everybody always talks about, oh, high-tech and apple and yahoo and google. that's great, but we need manufacturing jobs pulled back into this country. and i love the focus. >> well, i think he's right. and i think that -- my mother lives in dalton, alabama. so i know what's going on in alabama. and i think that the -- >> your mother lives -- can i meet her next time i go down to alabama? >> absolutely. >> is she an alabama crimson tide fan? >> you'd have to talk to her about that. >> would she let joe in the house? >> you'd have to talk to her about that. but i -- i'll put in a word for

you. >> that would be great. >> i think the insourcing the president's talking about is good. i don't necessarily agree with you that the way that they're doing their workers in all of those other alabama and other plants are good. because some of them are not dealing with workers on a fair right to organize in terms of labor unions. that's a whole different discussion. >> well, listen, there's a reason, though, the jobs are going to alabama and south carolina. and i'll tell you. and i've talked to trump about it. and i've said to him, hey, instead of just having these jobs go to alabama and south carolina, why aren't they going to connecticut? why aren't they going to upstate new york? what can unions do to get workers back into these factories in the northeast? and he said, hey, we have gone overboard in some of these workplace rules. and we've got to get more

reasonable and responsible. that's the relate that we face. >> no, that's reality. that's the thing we can't throw out, people's right to organize. >> i'm not saying we should throw out people's right to organize. but i am saying if we want to get the shuttered factories in rhode island, new hampshire, connecticut, and maine, you drive through new england, it's depressing, unions will need to come to the table and figure out where the governor and i think the connecticut governor would be a great one to do it since he seems pro-union, and to come up with new rules if they were able to pull jobs from germany and japan and make it more inviting for all 50 states and not just the southeast. >> well, i think you're right, and i think he could do that, and there are those forces in labor that understand that. i also think it's a great morning when we can have joe scarborough outline romney's flip-flops and inconsistencies

and endorse president obama's insourcing. >> that's one way to sum up the first block of the show. >> well, you're loving america this morning. >> i've got to say this -- it's not 7:00 yet. that's when things turn south. but i do have to say, though, talking about loving america and the economy. i cheer for the economy. it's so funny and, willie, we've talked about this, every time, you know, i've tweeted, hey, unemployment rate goes down to 8.6, great news, i get absolutely eviscerated from people. oh, you idiot, what are you doing? cheering for the president? no, i'm cheering for america. as a son of a once unemployed guy, i know the pain that these people go through. and it's, yeah, we can cheer for a great idea that's going to bring jobs back to america. >> there are people, though, on twitter and blogs who can't process that that you -- it's a

complicated thing. coming up, we're going to bring in jim demint of south carolina, tavis smiley, cornell west, and viggo mortensen will be here. well, good morning. welcome back. as far as northern new england goes. that's where the heaviest snow. >> hold on. what's with his voice? >> i brought the sexy voice for you guys. >> you sound like barry white. >> you don't like that? >> you're my first, my last, my everything. >> that's -- i can do it. >> you go ahead, bill. you know what some people say? >> good love, baby. >> go ahead, talk to us. >> all right, joe, everyone's walking into work here in new york and they're drenched and wet. the heavy rain is over central jersey and new york city, if you're traveling outside in the next 2 to 3 hours will be the

worst of it. then we'll clear out, baltimore to d.c., you're improving. thruway north of albany. and your friends up in new hampshire dealing with a little bit of snow. your forecast today, we're going to clear it out, it's going to be warm and windy in d.c., but the cold air will return by the weekend. also snow for you this morning in st. louis. and by the end of tomorrow, 3 to 6 inches of snow in chicago and milwaukee. and that's your first significant snow of the season. you're watching "morning joe" down low. we're brewed by starbucks. [ ma le announcer ] lately, there's been a seismic shift in what passes for common sense. used to be we socked money away and expected it to grow.

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newt gingrich knows baloney when he sees it. >> baloney. >> newt gingrich loves baloney.

>> plain baloney. >> he eats it every day. baloney sandwich, casserole, smiley faces, baloney logs, even baloney cake. but there is one kind of baloney that newt does not like. >> this for me, politics is not a career. >> can we drop a little bit of the pious baloney? >> mitt romney, the wrong kind of baloney. >> i'm newt gingrich, and i approve this message. >> 27 past the hour, time now to take a look at the morning papers. the "new york times" says a campaign of assassinations could make a military strike against iran irrelevant. yesterday, two attackers on a motorcycle pulled up behind the car of a nuclear scientist on his way to work. they slapped a small bomb to his car with a magnet and then slipped away in traffic.

the 33-year-old became the fifth iranian scientist killed in recent years. officials in iran -- >> that sounds -- >> -- the u.s. and israel. >> well, i think that's a pretty valid suspicion. >> the nuke particulclear progr is peaceful -- >> i am not a covert spy for the cia, i would -- so i don't know who does such things. but this sounds awfully advanced for a tribesman from northern -- >> there's a certain -- >> there's a certain -- >> this does have, i think, the hallmarks, the trade craft of a certain intelligence agency based in the middle east. >> in the middle east. you know i've read some books, it's not like i'm ignorant. >> let's go to our parade of papers, joe.

>> somebody -- it sounds awfully advanced, that's all i'm saying. >> the maker of the twinkie is filing for bankruptcy. >> what? >> the company, hostess brands cited several reasons, including needing to renegotiate pension and medical benefits with the workers. the company will continue to produce twinkies while they try to reorganize. i'm not sure who wanted to editorialize in that script, but there's no value in that food. i'm not sure why that's good news. but anyhow. >> you today can make a difference in the lives of american workers. i'm going to ask you to do something right now. i'm going to ask you -- >> no. >> -- if -- well, actually what time is right now? convenience stores are open across america. i'm going to ask you. and if your children are sleeping right now, if you've got one at least 12, 13 years old, the younger ones will be fine. go out to a convenience store right now -- >> and buy yourself a plastic bag of poison. >> buy as many twinkies as you

can. >> eat it and watch yourself -- just feel yourself grow. >> -- there to take care of your diabetes -- >> that literally is right there an akoniconic look -- >>ing the called american exceptionalism. and i don't know about mika brzezinski, but i am not willing, i'm not willing to allow this country to slide. look at that creamy goodness -- >> you're nod worried about the children in america who actually eat this. >> landed on omaha beach. >> for the right to -- for me to eat a twinkie. and i don't need food nazi, mika brzezinski. and by the way, what is that a communist chinese name? brzezins brzezinski? i don't need the red army kicking down my door, going into my cupboard telling me what i

cannot eat. i will not sit here while twinkies are disparaged -- >> why don't you have ten today? >> our freedoms are undermined. >> snowballs. you know the -- >> you have a right to have a gut, i understand. >> i say -- >> a twinkie in every lunchbox. >> ever do the thing where you cut off the edge of it and suck the cream out of the middle? >> i did it this morning. >> you do that and then you can take your lipitor and other things to help deal with the health problems you have. >> you know, i actually slip the lipitor inside the twinkie before -- >> that's responsible eating. >> that is responsible eating. >> let's go to politico, shall we? jim vandehei is here with a look at the playbook. jim, good morning. >> always love your segues. >> was there one? >> here's the segue.

coincidentally, his name is twinkie. now to twinkie vandehei. >> we've got some actual news crossing the wires. the obama campaign and the dnc announcing in the fourth quarter of last year together raised $68 million, that brings their total for 2011 to $222 million. that exceeds the $200 million threshold, i guess, they'd set for themselves, jim. >> well, it's -- the threshold they set internally. i think externally they thought for a long time they could raise upwards of $1 billion for the total campaign. it is a lot of money. if you break out what obama basically raised for himself versus the dnc, i think it was $40 million or so, which is obviously more than mitt romney did in the third quarter. probably almost as much as all the republicans will do in totality. it does show he has a financial edge. the big question is, what happens once there's one republican? does the money come pouring in

from all of those corporate interests who have been frustrated with barack obama? where republicans have either financial parity or financial edge? >> $222 million for the year. >> $222 million in 2011, for the year. >> so, jim, do you think they're going to reach that $1 billion mark this year? or do you agree with it was a bunch of b.s.? >> you know, six months ago they thought it was doable. i don't think anyone thinks it's doable anymore. they think somewhere between $500,000 and $750,000 is possible if you combine outside entities affiliated with obama, the reelect and thing the, dnc. his biggest problem is not going to be money. he'll have more than enough money, probably a lot more at the end of the day than republicans. it's going to be about the economy. whether or not he can overcome that with all of these ads and organization. i do think what we've seen with

these super pacs and what we've seen with the emergence of some of these rich guys getting off the sidelines and putting money into the republican party is there is a chance that frustration inside the business community will this election unlike last election mean a lot more money for republicans to play with outside of the political process. and you can do a lot of damage with that kind of coin. >> the wall street guys very frustrated with president obama. jim vandehei, thank you very much. we'll bring in david remnick who reviews "the obamas." some eye opening numbers out of south carolina later in news you can't use. ♪

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welcome back to morning morning joe. a new espn poll confirms tebow mania a full blown epidemic. determining america's favorite athlete finds tim tebow the winner. trailing him, kobe bryant, aaron rodgers, peyton manning, tom brady. only 11 athletes have held the top spot, and the list that includes michael jordan, tiger woods, lebron james, and now tim

tebow. >> and let me tell you something, i'm not joking here. this is dead serious, it plays into this fact. we've got friends in south carolina who called us up last night and told us that one of the poll questions was when they were trying to figure out what kind of voter you were, question number one, do you like tim tebow. >> is that right? >> first question. >> ridiculous. >> it's not ridiculous. it's defining. tim tebow has become a cultural marker and liberals for the most part -- >> he's a football player. >> they think don't like him. conservative evangelicals like him very much. >> he's also become a ratings magnet. he had the country mesmerized sunday. broncos/steelers, the game was watched by an astounding 42.4 million people, making it the most watched television program since last year's super bowl. only the super bowl had a bigger number in all the year. on twitter, tebow's overtime touchdown pass inspired more

tweets in the united states than any other event in recent history. 9,420 tweets per second. even lady gaga writing, i'm a giants fan, but wow, that's what the "f" a champion looks like. and he did throw for 316 yards. >> 316, 31.6 per yardage attempt. per completion. and did you ever say this? the ratings for the fourth quarter? >> yeah. 31.6 -- >> 31.6. for god so love the world. for god so love the world. reverend, are you a tim tebow fan? >> i am a fan of 3:16. >> see there? he's even a reverend, but because he's a progressive reverend -- >> why don't you like? >> why can't you say you're a fan? >> he's okay. >> i think he's a great athlete. i think that it is -- i think he's got a great image.

i think it's a very refreshing thing for an athlete to be a devout and very public devout christian. >> do you like that? >> i like that. i do. that's one thing you know i am very, very much on. i don't like the images of negativity that allow artists and athletes -- >> for sure. >> you and i agree on that. >> we agree on so many things, you don't like to admit it. i'm more on the good samaritan side of the road. >> i noticed how you were chuckling that good samaritan chuckle when you covered the story of the man's car being bombed. that was very samaritan of you. >> one guy not such a big tebow fan, perhaps like the reverend, ravenstahl of pittsburgh. he dawned a tebow jersey and tebowed for the news media.

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...i flew us to the rock i really had in mind. ♪ [ male announcer ] the citi thank you card. earn points you can use for travel on any airline, with no blackout dates. if you could be any animal, which one would you be? >> if i could be any animal? >> yeah, you love animals. >> probably an elephant. >> why? >> because they have 105,000 muscles in their trunk. >> really? >> yeah. >> it's unbelievable. you want 105,000 muscles in your trunk? >> they're big and they last a long time, and they're smart and social animals. very few things can attack them. >> i like that. >> i'm a little disturbed right now. >> no, i like that. >> no. no.

>> just for a little perspective. they were doing the interview at an animal center in greenville, south carolina. it's not like he just threw it out there. >> no, listen, i've got no problem with political candidates having a little, you know, personality, little color -- >> i don't think that's a problem in gingrich. >> no, i was going to say, that is not a problem that the fact that he actually can tell you that they have however many muscles. i think the bigger problem is just his moving. he moves back and forth. he's not centered. the latest thing with bain capital. he moves away from it, then he moves back to it, then he moves away from it. it's just that lack of -- >> i'm going to go to the must-read opinion pages. oh, look, it's about newt gingrich. this is "the primary primer." to understand newt gingrich you have to envision a mixture of "kill bill" and "carrie" his

only mission in life is getting even with mitt romney and the rich minions who paid for all of the anti-newt ads in iowa. now newt gingrich has roped in a few minions of his own. and romney looks worse than the evil banker in "it's a wonderful life." it's full of heart-tugging former factory workers who used to have happy homes until mitt romney came to town. by the time it's over, you will want to gather up the peasants and march in one of romney's mansions with flaming torches. there is nothing gingrich won't do to get mitt. >> i love gail's cultural references. gail collins, just great. let's read -- >> is it fair? okay. let's do jonah gold. >> is it fair? >> what she's saying? >> i think if gail collins at the "new york times" is accusing of you of demagoguing on bain capital, chances are, you're not going to hit the sweet spot of republican voters in south carolina.

>> this is good. >> romney's authentic inauthenticity problem isn't going away. that's an ominous sign given how much enthusiasm there should be for making obama a one-term president. the mo that calculation always assumed that rank and file republicans will vote for their nominee in huge numbers no matter what. they may well still be -- that may well still be the case, but feels less guaranteed every day. every four years, pundits and activists talk about how cool it would be to have a brokered convention. this is the first time i can remember where people say it may be necessary. wow. harsh. true at this point? do we feel that way after new hampshire? >> do conservatives -- this is -- conservatives have been looking at one flawed conservative candidate after another over the past year.

and so now that the flawed candidates have proven just how flawed they are and have fallen to the side, we're left with mitt romney. and we are staring at a guy who over the course of his political career has moved back and forth time and time again. and, you know, we're ten years past george w. bush running as a conservative and doubling the national debt, exploding the deficits, engaging in military adventurism across the globe, being wilsonian in his reach saying he wanted to end tyranny in all four corners of the globe. mitt romney is not following ronald reagan where conservatives feel they can take a chance. mitt romney is following ten years of big government republicanism and the frustration that jonah is feeling, the frustration that erick erickson is feeling, and i'll be honest, the frustration

i'm feeling is right now you look around and say who's the alternative? where do we go from here? >> we're still asking that question? >> well, of course we are. what has changed? what has changed? that would have us not asking that question right now? and al, as you know, i mean, george w. bush won in 2004 because he was able to draw every last conservative voter out. he didn't go to the middle. he drew every conservative out, and that's how carl rove won that election for george w. bush. >> no, i think buchanan -- >> and mitt romney is not going to pull those people out. >> there's no way that i see a republican win unless you can unite the conservative base, which is clearly not happening. then when you couple the fact you have the ron paul element, it's going to be a very interesting convention. and let's not forget, in the whole trauma of what's going on right now with bain from newt gingrich. let's not forget what mitt

romney did to gingrich in iowa. i mean -- >> right. >> so it's almost like he's sewed what he's reaping now. he went in with a huge air attack through the media. now the same is happening to him. quite an explosion of republican unity. >> well -- >> that's terrific. >> there's no doubt that this is. this is exactly what mitt did in iowa to newt. and nobody's saying newt doesn't have a right to do it with mitt. it's just how he's framing the issue is sort of bizarre for a conservative primary. >> but the problem with brokered convention scenario, you have to have somebody who has won that lot of delegates, and right now it's ron paul. >> willie's news you can't use is next. we're back in just a moment. [ male announcer ] the inspiring story of how a shipping giant can befriend a forest may seem like the stuff of fairy tales. but if you take away the faces on the trees...

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oh, yes, is it time, willie? >> yes, it's time for the news you can't use. >> we need that. >> you may have heard yesterday that stephen colbert actually leads jon huntsman by one point in a poll in his home state. needless to say, colbert made a little hay out of that last night. >> my home state of south carolina is where presidents are chosen and occasionally seceded from. but i mean really who's the option? everyone in the republican field

has already had their "i'm not mitt moment." i just wish there was some fresh face. >> the new poll of likely republican voters in the upcoming south carolina primary has 5% going to stephen colbert. >> the south carolina native colbert is not even officially on the ballot, but still getting 5%. >> oh, my god! it's me! i am so not mitt. look how different we are. i'm the one with the glasses. but wait, wait, wait, that's crazy. these guys have been running for a year now. how could i ever compete with an established candidate like governor jon huntsman. >> have you seen this? >> no. >> look at this. >> now i'm going to be looking for the colbert bump in south carolina. >> i'm sorry, i think it reflected off of you and bounced back to me. this just got real. a major pollster has me at 5%

ahead of the third place finisher in new hampshire. i -- i got to ask, what do you think, nation? should i run for president in south carolina? >> colbert went on to promise on tonight's show a special announcement. tune in tonight. >> oh, i like it. still ahead, senator jim demint of south carolina will join us onset. and next, david remnick. keep it on "morning joe" for david, next. i want healthy skin for life. [ female announcer ] improve the health of your skin with aveeno daily moisturizing lotion. the natural oatmeal formula improves skin's health in one day, with significant improvement in 2 weeks. i found a moisturizer for life. [ female announcer ] only from aveeno. just a second. just, just one second. ♪ what are you looking at? don't look up there. why are you looking up? ♪ get outta the car.

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we do remember when barack obama came to new hampshire four years ago. he promised to bring people together. he promised to change the broken system in washington, he promised to improve our nation. those were the days of lofty promises made by a hopeful candidate. >> yeah, what a jerk, that obama was! oh, i'm going to do this and i'm going to do that. [ bleep ]. i'm sorry, mitt, i interrupted you, continue. >> i will cut cap and balance the federal government, i will make it simpler, fairer, and smarter. i will insist on a military so powerful no one would think of challenging it. >> see, everyone, my promises are realistic. a tiny government, a balanced budget, and a giant invincible army. ladies and gentlemen, i give you new sparta. >> and look at this.

we were just there, but i didn't see snow, did you, joe? >> no, i did not. >> it's so beautiful. welcome back to "morning joe." jon meacham is still with us. and editor of the new yorker david remnick. he critiques the new book "the obamas" written by jodi cantor. did you think it was good? >> i thought it was fun. but it's very hard to penetrate a marriage, i think unless you're a novelist or a psychoanalyst. there's dpreat items, especially about conflict within the white house, which, of course, the white house wants to deny. >> but there always is. >> exactly. like in any workplace. >> i'm not surprised. >> okay. anything else you want to know about the book? >> well, we can talk about it some more. i would really like to get david's insights into the election. let's read some quick news and move that way. >> let's start with south carolina. the republican candidates are in

the final sprint to the january 21st primary there in what may be the field's last best chance to stop mitt romney's momentum. the candidates are descending on the state this morning with over a dozen events planned today. many focused in rock hill and columbia. those rallies are backed by a media blitz. for mitt romney, at least, the money is pouring in. the current front runner raised $24 million during the last three months of 2011. that number is expected to dwarf the war chests of his republican rivals. but that's where those super pacs come into play. we've been talking a lot about those. newt gingrich may not have as much cash in the bank, but his supporters do. and they rolled out a new movie yesterday devoted entirely to tearing down romney's business record. the film features testimonials from workers who say romney's former company destroyed their jobs while he and other executives took home millions. the issue is sparking a sharp

debate inside the gop with some conservatives angry at fellow republicans for what they say see as an assault on free enterprise. here's rick santorum on this line of attack. >> rick perry, the governor of texas, he's going after mitt romney, his record as a venture capitalist. he's saying he was a vulture capitalist. >> you know, i -- i have to say that this is an attack that's probably not warranted. there's plenty of mitt romney's record as governor of massachusetts to attack and go after it, but i don't think going after capitalism and companies that in many cases do a public good in saving companies is a way to go about doing that. >> david, this is surreal. again, with all of the targets that newt gingrich and rick

perry have in south carolina to attack mitt romney's record. they make an attack that would be the democratic equivalent of somebody primarying barack obama and saying you were a big spending, bailout addicted president that's bankrupting this country because of your socialism. >> socialism. that's a word we hear constantly. european as if it were -- >> european socialism. but instead it's republicans channelling the attacks on mitt romney. >> that didn't work. >> i think there's an issue with private equity. >> right. >> and it's not the business of private equity as such they're trying to make into as gail collins said a christmas movie of old. but not to be boring about it, but it's carried interest. >> continue. >> they want to -- but private

equity survives on really, really low tax rate called carried interest, right? that's why private equity is controversial, not as such. people in private equity are fighting like hell to -- and saying they will never do business again. it was a big campaign issue last time. it's unfair and nobody's talking about it again. they're trying to paint newt as the grinch who stole christmas. this is an empty campaign. remember the clinton/obama campaign last time. that was really interesting, a campaign of ideas and personalities, and personalities have been around for a long time. it was really interesting, and by the way, it was a full employment plan for journalists. it went on for months. this is empty. what are they arguing over? what is the issue they're arguing in any substantive way? >> you're right. you need to look at barack obama's campaign from four years ago. hope and change.

i'm like -- i'm trying to figure out. >> it was a really serious debate. they do every time, all candidates are sold like soda and corn flakes, but there was a substance in the debate between hillary and obama on iraq, for example, that was real and went on through -- >> you disagree with that? >> i -- you know, i think it was very easy for barack obama in 2002 to take the position that he took, and i think hillary clinton took the position that she took. >> i don't know if it was easy. >> he was a state senator, it wasn't shocking he was against the war. >> he was running in a liberal district, state senate district. >> but he was about to run for senate, as divided ideologically as the united states itself. you know better than i do, you go to southern illinois, it's a lot closer to tennessee than it is to greenwich village. >> now you're being brought in -- >> greenwich --

>> as everybody knows, you have a mansion and a flat in greenwich village. >> david once went south of maclaine. >> was it okay? >> well, no it wasn't okay. they almost circled around. my goodness. he was like -- >> i'm okay. i swear. i survived. >> so anyway, i get your bigger point, though, and that is that this campaign. >> when has it been serious? about what? european socialists. there's one thing that the republicans campaign has been about. beating obama. who can beat obama? that's the calculation that voters are making and that's why you see newt romney -- newt romney, mitt romney leading. i don't think this electorate has any great passion. he's going to win big in south carolina, and that's kind of

going to be it. >> that's it. there's no question. and i guess, jon meacham, historians when they look back on this race, they're going to realize you look at the numbers, the financial numbers, look at the organization, the people on the ground in all of these other states. they're going to look back at this and see from the very beginning it was a one-man race. a one-person race. mitt romney never had any competition. and i guess the big question is this. what is it about the nature of the political system today of our politics, the way practiced in 2012 that drove off all other mainstream candidates but mitt romney that drove off mitch daniels, jeb bush, chris christie, that drove off john kasich, that drove off main street mainstream conservative candidates. because there are none in this race at a time of historic

opportunity for the republican party. >> true. and i actually agree with david. because i think the -- >> you're just doing that because it makes you feel smart. >> no, it's because -- do you want me to get my new yorker tote bag? that's how i feel smart. >> i bet you take that down with you. >> it's the one place you could. i think the -- when you look back at these races, '76, hugely important, emergence of reagan. you look at '88, which has more in common with this moment than any other analogous year. i think george h.w. bush is a formidable human being and interesting man, the politics of 1988, books were written about how they were empty, it was the twinkie of the end of the cold war. >> wait, why do you hate the american flag? >> '08 was a generational shift. i think there was an interesting

debate about health care. i think obama who ran -- we all kind of forget this now. obama was to hillary's right on a lot of questions, particularly on health care, which is now totally lost in terms of events. but you ask what is it about politics now that does it? i always go back to richard ben kramer on this question. which is you have to be either super human or kind of subhuman. >> well, to run for president requires a kind of slight mental imbalance. >> it's both. >> i do think this particular moment never more so. all the forces are there, they've been exacerbated. and i think that the people who didn't run, i think is a fascinating topic, made decisions that i could totally understand in terms of their personal lives because it means they were saner than others. but it is a question -- i think

an endearing question, whether there's a different moment that's better. >> you have to sacrifice your family. you have to. in 2012, if you run for president of the united states, you have to have a spouse and children who understand that they are going to be chopped up in little pieces. and that's why mitch daniels wouldn't do it. i suspect that's why jeb wouldn't do it. >> or colin powell years ago. >> colin powell in '96, why he wouldn't do it. and it keeps getting worse. and do you want -- i know this personally. my boys grew up looking at a bunch of garbage on the internet where you googled my name, anybody's name, and the trash that they read is -- and then you run for president, and that multiplies, willie, a million times over. >> but joe, are we seeing something else play out here in the republican race? and it's reflected in your

bursts of real frustration with your own party. is that there -- if you could look back 20 years ago at the republican party -- and i didn't necessarily love all of the ideas or like them, but it was a party of ideas. that reagan was inheriting a bunch of ideas that were growing up in a conservative movement and he embodied them and brought them to the electorate. what's happening to the republicans now? it seems emptied out. >> two things have happened, one, the election of george w. bush. a man who claimed to be a conservative but the new republic had it right in 2000. bush was for big government and for big business. the new republic predicted it. i remember the cover of it. and yet conservatives went along for the ride for the better part of eight years. they let him double the national debt without complaining. they let him engage in a wilsonian foreign policy where

he spent his second inauguration about ending tyranny in all four corners of the globe. they remained silent, betrayed their values, forgot everything they said in the 1990s and sold their soul to have power in the white house. and then barack obama got elected, and then they lost their mind. they accused democrats of having bush derangement syndrome, and they did, but what did they get? obama derangement syndrome. it became more about destroying obama, and that's why conservatives stopped focusing on balancing the budget. >> we used to talk about the democrats as a circular kind of firing squad. that they would kill each other in a circular firing squad. >> i think -- personally, what you're seeing is that conservatives have won the essential argument. i believe. >> they have. we live in a conservative nation now. and there is -- that's just the

reality. we are a center right nation. >> and you know, barack obama in my native region doesn't like this or when people say it nor do they believe it. but obama is essentially an establishmentarian president. it's the same essential hymn, different verse. therefore the derangement kicks in. and because there isn't an idea to really push against, there's an image of an idea. so people push against obama and they push against whoever the democratic figure would be. and it becomes, i think -- >> i really disagree on a lot of issues. this is the year of gay marriage being normalized throughout the country. this is an administration that got health care through no matter what you may think of it. i think there are a lot of

issues this is not a center right. there's still rick santorum waving the flag, other candidates waving the flag, but the general -- >> you're talking about gay marriage, though, that is a libertarian strain, that's an american saying get out of our wallets, get out of our bedrooms. >> it was a movement not initiated by ron paul. >> well, it is a movement, let's face it, though, for 80% of americans, it is a movement that 80% of americans don't really want -- care about, don't want to talk about. and -- >> which you could have said about civil rights. >> well, i would not compare it to civil rights. i would not compare gay marriage to people getting lynched and beaten in the south -- >> a big segment of our population, people have been without those rights is, of course, there's a difference. many differences. >> i understand why it matters a great deal to a lot of people. i'm just saying, though. i'm just saying, it is not

really -- that is not where the overwhelming majority of americans are focused right now. i think most are focused -- >> not all movements begin with overwhelming majorities. >> what you said, joe, about george w. bush, the republican party selling its soul in 2000, you see this overwhelming will to get behind president obama now. they're saying we have a weak president with high unemployment, the economy's in shambles and we can't find a guy to beat them. they're grasping at straws hoping someone will come along to save them. >> i've driven people crazy by continuing to call myself a small government conservative. and i do that because i have to because the term conservative has been so misused. newt gingrich calls himself a conservative, mitt romney himself a conservative. so what they may be in their minds. but for small government conservatives, comparing the

bush years and the obama years for me it is the same in this respect. george bush fought two wars, cut taxes twice, created a $7 trillion drug benefit plan and didn't pay for any of it. and so we doubled the national debt. barack obama becomes president, and the debt is what i've been focused on since 1994. barack obama becomes president. we've got $1 trillion stimulus plan. we've got $1 trillion tax cut stimulus plan two years later. we've got a bailout of detroit. we've got a bailout of wall street. we've got health care reform. we continue to fight one war and none of it's paid for. as jon meacham says, none of it's paid for. taxes at 16% of gdp, spending at 26% of gdp, and the national debt keeps going up.

so in that respect, when it comes to debt, there really isn't a dime's worth of difference. >> and the problem is, there's not a viable candidate in the field who meets your criteria. >> or i would say a lot of americans criteria. democrats are concerned about the national debt. independents are concerned about the national debt. i'm telling you, in barack ob a obama -- if barack obama in his state of the union address had said, i'm going to tell you, republicans, i'm going to call your bluff. i've got bowles/simpson here. i'm going to ask harry reid to vote on it in the senate and john boehner to vote on it in the house and if you pass it in total, i will sign it. at that point, the race for president in 2012 is over and barack obama's reelected. there are so many americans who understand -- >> they're tuned into this. >> this is such a great danger. still ahead, jim demint will be here.

as the fight for the republican nomination moves to his state. later we talk about what can be done to lift up a nation's struggling workforce. >> and we can ask them why nobody's talking about the poor in this campaign on either side. r helped us build it. ♪ now i'm a geologist at chevron, and i get to help science teachers. it has four servo motors and a wireless microcontroller. over the last three years we've put nearly 100 million dollars into american education. that's thousands of kids learning to love science. ♪ isn't that cool? and that's pretty cool. ♪

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we can save our economy here at home. because there are a lot of people who are suffering here at home. >> i'll be darned if we're going to allow the men and women to come from the theaters of combat, the front lines to the unemployment lines. >> and when it comes to the economy, my highest priority as president will be worrying about your job, not about saving my own. >> 23 past the hour. live look at the white house. joining us now from washington, the host of the "tavis smiley show," tavis smiley, and dr. cornel west, they are co-hosts of the radio show smiley and west. and together they'll be part of a discussion tonight at george washington university entitled

remaking america, from poverty to prosperity, which will broadcast live on c span. >> i've got to believe, dr. west, i seriously by this point, i thought you would have pushed tavis off the cliff. >> what? >> no -- >> that's not very nice. >> you guys -- you guys are like the -- you are like, you know -- >> reverend al said -- >> we in it together. >> you are the bing crosby and the bob hope of the 21st century. you guys go everywhere together. >> that's nice. i respect you for it, doctor. i don't know how you do it, but i respect it. >> patience -- >> i love him. brother joe, sister mika, love you too. >> thank you. >> dr. west, proving that unlike reverend al sharpton, he does read jesus' word and he knows every day. let's begin with you, tavis. >> thank you, joe. i appreciate that.

>> let's begin with you, tavis. david remnick was talking about the fact, we've talked about it before, politicians and not just on the republican side, on both sides. politicians don't talk about the poor. they don't talk about the truly disadvantaged. they don't talk about the millions left behind. >> look at the numbers, by the way. >> why? >> good morning. good to be back on. the short answer is and doc and i were talking about this during the break a moment ago, joe. in this town of washington where we sit right our, there seems to be, there is a bipartisan consensus that the poor just don't matter we believe it is the telling of truth that allows suffering to speak. and if nobody tells the truth about the condition that poor people are enduring in this country, then their suffering gets rendered invisible. it's not just a poverty of opportunity, there's a poverty of affirmation, poverty of

courage, poverty of imagination in this country right now. what we're doik with our poverty tour last summer, the bus tour we took. we were last on this program last night, and we are determined that we're not going to endure this time what we endured the last time around. in the last presidential race, those three debates between mccain and obama, three presidential debates, the word poor or poverty doesn't come up one time. obama doesn't say it, mccain doesn't say, sadly the moderators didn't ask about it. if we don't raise the issue this time around, these one and two americans who are in or near poverty are going to be invisible. >> i was looking at the number of the new poor, how they've risen in the past few years, it's an issue gripping this country, especially given the economy and the unemployment rate. are any of the republican candidates addressing this in any real, sincere way? >> no, i don't think so.

i think tavis and i are fundamentally committed to the fact that poor people are precious and priceless like anyone else. they are not given a priority. in fact, it's fairly clear big money is in the driver's seat. i think supreme court ought to be ashamed of itself. politicians come through, big money, big business, big corporations are actually running things. occupy movement is right about that. and all we're saying in the legacy of martin luther king jr., our poor brothers and sisters, they ought to be at the center of our policy. but now it's big money, big money, big money, and it's a sad spectacle to see our democracy move into this oligarchy. feeling they don't matter, they don't count. we refuse to believe that. we think americans across the board would agree with us. >> good to see you both again. tavis, let me ask you specifically why we're not talking about this.

you say politicians don't mention the word poor or poverty. is it because there's nothing in it for them electorally? is it because it's better for them to go to fundraisers to talk to wall street ceos? people who can fund their campaigns? why is it precisely they're not talking about the people who need them most? >> i would say amen to everything you've just said. you've answered your own question. there's nothing in it for them and so that poor people end up being as best a political calculation, at worst a political afterthought. they don't matter. here's the problem, though, in the past as everyone around that table in new york knows, politicians look at the poll data, and they are told by their pollsters that you have to find a way to speak directly, willie, to the angst of the middle class voter. but here's the problem this time around, the new poor are the former middle class. >> right. >> so that dog ain't going to hunt this time around. you're going to have to find a way to speak to the crisis that poor americans, the perennially

poor, the new poor, and the near poor, you've got to speak to their angst right now. and joe said it earlier, that is the left, those left of center are too often spineless. and on the right, if what mr. santorum has been saying and mr. paul and my friend newt gingrich, the stuff he's been saying and even romney on occasion, if we're supposed to take from their words on the campaign trail what they would do not for but to the poor, we're in a world of trouble here. >> world of trouble. >> jon meacham? >> it's been 50 years or so since poverty was in any way a central issue for elected officials. about 46 years, i guess. what are you all hearing when you talk to elected officials or aspiring elected officials? are they -- is there an openness to wanting to make this -- put this on the agenda despite the

tactical points we just made? or is it a boy, i'd like to be with you guys, but i've got to win this race? >> depends on who you talk to. you talk to keith ellison, bernie sanders, maxine waters, they say keep doing what you're doing. on the other hand, if you talk to the mainstream, they say, look, we're tied to big money, we know that poor people don't vote therefore they don't have the kind of weight and gravitas. and they reinforce the very establishmentarian orientation as part of our political system. and we know the only way in which poor people will really have a say is when poor people organize, mobilize. it's what people of good conscience -- it's people who are concerned about the future of democracy say we better acknowledge the poor and keep track of these oligarchs walking away with big money but leaving

our precious workers and poor people behind. >> it's true that your job is to push all of the candidates, democratic and republican -- >> that's right. >> i understand that. >> independents too. >> they're not undifferentiated. you have a president in office who had a tough political battle that got 30 odd million in the health care rolls. you may want more, may want single payer. i do too, in fact. now you want the republicans, and even romney who put more or less the same bill in massachusetts is running away from this as fast as possible. many consider it socialism. and why is this undifferentiated to you? why are all the candidates the same in your view? >> oh, no, we don't believe the candidates are the same at all. barack obama is much better than the mediocrity among the republicans. that's not saying a lot. as i said before. >> but isn't it saying something, though?

when you put 30 million people on the health care roll? isn't that part of being poor in america? >> absolutely. >> health care? >> that's an important breakthrough, and i wish it was more. but we had jobs bill in place, that's better than the republicans have to offer. my role is to both to acknowledge him being better but to keep the pressure on him and all politicians because the system itself is broken. yes, go right ahead. >> if i can turn the tables and ask you a question. do you believe that poor people in this country are a priority? >> not at all, that's why i brought it up in the first place. it's not even mentioned. i agree was you 100% in that. >> there is no differentiation. it's that neither party has made poor people a priority. and the only way we can reduce and eradicate poverty is, one, to make poverty a priority in this town. when something is made a priority, it gets done.

iraq, afghanistan -- >> barack obama's a politician, not the prophetic leader of a movement. >> you've got to be pushed. we agree. he and other leaders, not just the president, but leaders in this town have got to be pushed to adjust this. >> dr. west and tavis, thank you, guys, for being with us. and i see a real opportunity for this to take on more of a bipartisan field. and in the past, i've said this time and time again, when i first ran for congress in '94, young evangelicals that wanted to work with me wanted to talk about social issues. by the time i left in 2000, young evangelicals that wanted to work with me came in knowing what matthew 25 meant. talking about giving a cup of water -- >> that's right. >> they wanted to talk about water, aids in africa, they wanted to talk about the things that you guys are talking about. this is a movement, i believe, that is going to become

bipartisan because of what people like you were doing. >> absolutely. >> what conservative evangelicals are feeling. i think the time is coming. >> there is a moral issue, it's a spiritual issue, and has to do with the future of the nation. >> and speaking of spiritual issues. dr. west, again, you will be blessed as jesus said. blessed are the merciful as they have shown mercy and you have shown mercy to tavis smiley. do i get an amen, doctor? >> gentlemen, thank you. >> thank you very much. >> you know what? you know what remnick is asking? what does that mean? >> i'll take care of this. >> you can catch them live on c-span. gentlemen, thank you. >> keep up the great work. thank you. coming up, we'll get the first look at the new cover of "time" magazine.

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38 past the hour. david remnick, before you go, tell us about the "new yorker's"

new political website. >> a new political scene. it's a revamped and restaffed and newyorker.com, with a lot of people who have been on the show, they're terrific and it looks beautiful. thanks for asking. >> thank you very much. the new site is politics.newyorker.com. coming up next, rick stengel is here on "morning joe."

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my goodness, it is rainy and windy in time square. joining us now is "time" magazine managing editor rich stengel. warm and coatoasty with rick whs here to reveal the latest issue of "time" magazine. who is it? >> it's mr. warren buffett and his quite radical contrarian agenda for how to fix the economy, how to repair so much that's wrong with our society. we call it the optimist, in some ways he's the last optimist. he is for buying american, he's for all kinds of things that a lot of people object to. raising taxes on the wealthy. he's skeptical about the idea that innovation and education can get us out of our hole. >> why not? why doesn't he think education and innovation can get us out of our hole? >> in some ways we call him the optimist, but he's a realist. he says some percentage of every population is inevitably going to be poor. and he says in the 21st century

if your iq is on the low end of the scale, it's even worse for you than it was 100 years ago. 100 years ago, there were all kinds of jobs you could've done, and today -- >> only so many tv host shows to go around -- >> morning tv show hosts. >> i know, thank god i got this gig. so, so, does he -- what does he suggest as far as getting the economy back together? >> yes, well he -- look, he's a numbers guy. and that's what he understands. and he thinks tax rates for the extremely wealthy are too low. as you remember a few months ago he pointed out that, you know, he paid 17% tax last year and his secretary paid -- >> okay. we raise taxes on the rich. that's what democrats all say. let's assume we have raised taxes on the rich to 98%. what other ideas does he have? not to be short, but democrats think every problem can be cured

by raising taxes on the rich. let's assume there's a 98% tax rate and we are in 1976 britain. what's his next idea? >> i'm not saying i endorse this, but he thinks, for example, unemployment insurance ought to be greater. that reeducation for people for new jobs needs -- we need to spend more money on that. he wants to encourage entrepreneurship, even though he doesn't necessarily think that's the way out. in some ways he has some radical solutions and some traditional solutions at the same time. >> so job training? what's his idea on job training? >> job training is that, even though he, of course, invests in all of these traditional businesses. his big bets are on the railroad business. he owns stock in ibm, coca-cola, but he does say as i was saying earlier that for those folks who have been left out of the workforce, they need to be retrained to get back into the workforce. >> yeah. >> no, he was -- and we made a

little news yesterday because when the buffett rule that the republicans passed where mitch mcconnell said, gee, if warren buffett feels guilty about not paying enough taxes, we'll create a law that allows him to voluntarily pay more taxes. and buffett's answer is paying taxes isn't something that's voluntary, that's why we have taxes and government. but if any of the republicans want to pay more taxes, i'll match it one to one and if mitch mcconnell wants to pay it, i'll match it 3 to 1. >> but mitch mcconnell doesn't run around saying raise my taxes, raise my taxes, warren buffett does. >> and he does not -- another contrarian thing. everybody says corporate taxes are too high, he says no. >> really? >> he says the economy flourished when the taxes were higher in the '80s and '07870s. >> well, as long as we have the loopholes we have and the largest corporations are paying 0%, then, yeah.

i think corporate tax rates are pretty low. >> have him on the show. >> would love to have him on. and if he wants to give us some of his money instead of the federal government. >> i don't think he does. >> we always hear he has the president's ear. are they really tight? >> i think he's obviously a supporter. he was a republican. his father was a four-term republican congressman. and in the '80s and '90s his first wife sort of converted him to the democratic side. i actually don't think he and obama are in touch very much. i think he's sort of cheerleading from the side. >> what's his message for the president? what does he think the president should say? let me read it to you. we need to tell people the road's going to be long. we've got too many houses. they're not going to go away. the recovery's going to take a long time and the financial crisis has exposed a lot of flaws in our system. >> he is, of course, the prototypical long-term investor. he's not into quick fixes. he thinks all of these things

are going to change. in fact, his big bet on america is based on demographics. that actually for an old democracy, we're a young coun y country. he thinks immigration is one of the strongest parts of our mix. and that basically going forward compared to china, compared to europe, we will be a younger nation 20, 30, 40 years from now than any of those other countries. >> our average age, mika, is 38. >> yeah. >> we're in pretty good shape. >> rick stengel. thank you very much. interesting cover. "the optimist." we need some of that. up next, fighting the entire field in south carolina, we're going to talk about that with new york jets owner and romney supporter woody johnson straight ahead. plus senator jim demint will join the conversation. you're watching "morning joe" brewed by starbucks. [ jennifer garner ] there's a lot of beautiful makeup out there. but one is so clever that your skin looks better even after you take it off. neutrogena® healthy skin liquid makeup.

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welcome back to "morning joe" at 52 past the hour. joining us mitt romney supporter and owner of the new york jets woody johnson. good to see you again. >> this is big. >> we met in iowa and we were talking about your candidate. he did not disappoint when he won new hampshire. that's for sure. >> yeah. boy. kind of unprecedented for a nonincumbent to do what he did especially kind of going away from the pack.

>> what do you like about mitt romney? why did you decide to get so invested? >> i think it's -- i mean, it's really just his demeanor, i think. i went to israel with him, pretty shortly after i met him and saw him in kind of a jet lag environment back to back meetings and how he was so purposeful and steady. >> yeah. >> in reporting from meeting to meeting what happened. they were all interested in the previous meetings. just watching that action and since then increasingly impressed by the way he handles himself and staff. i'm impressed with the discipline. at a jets game wearing a green tie. i saw under the snows of iowa, green tie. i saw him in new hampshire, green tie. see him here, green tie. let's go jets. >> we'll come back to mitt romney. "the new york daily news" you probably saw it had a story out

yesterday where some of your players anonymously just trashed mark sanches. one says he never has to live in fear because we have no backup. he knows he won't be benched. another player said he has regressed year to year. another said we need a new quarterback. >> said he's lazy. >> mark sanches? >> i never heard that. he is the first guy in the building every morning and last to leave so the last thing he is is lazy. >> is he really. >> yes. >> first guy in and last guy to leave. that speaks volumes. >> yeah. he really is. he is an nfl quarterback. that's what you expect of an nfl quarterback. >> by the way, his center put his name to it and said no esthe hardest working guy on the team and the hardest working guy i've ever seen. >> i think everybody is a little frustrated. >> do you feel your team is in a little chaos and turmoil? >> it should be. flor new yorkers don't like losers. even an 8-8 record isn't enough. they want a winner and there is

frustration. that's what you want. >> we love rex ryan. we've had him here. i love him on the sidelines. i love after he lost he was unapologetic and he said yeah and i tell you what? next year i'm going to say we'll win the super bowl too. i like that. that said, a lot of people were surprised, big rex fans, surprised that he let the problems inside the locker room go as long as he did. does he understand he made a mistake? >> i think he does. how do you correct that? that's an interesting alchemy really. inside the locker room is one of those things that every year is a little different. 30% new players. the fact we didn't go to cortland maybe hurt us. every team -- maybe it hurt us a little more than some others. >> you know, we were talking about this before. there's just something about the nfl. they're great -- people who are great successes elsewhere, take steve spurrier. he owned college football.

nick sabin, the guy has won three national championships. that is next to impossible to do. but what is it about the nfl that is so difficult where the jets, one of the best teams in football, one game away from the super bowl for two years. they don't make the playoffs next year. this year they'll probably be -- >> super bowl. >> probably be in the super bowl. what is it about the nfl that makes it so much tougher? >> well, i think the rules -- i think the money and the rules -- the rules prevent you from stocking players or recruiting players and the way you can do it in some of the college systems. >> yeah. >> everybody has the same amount of money to spend. >> yeah. >> so it's almost -- there is a certain accountant factor in being a good nfl owner or manager or coach. >> yeah. >> got a risk/reward you have to look very carefully at. >> are you rooting against the giants? see how that works? >> absolutely. no, no. >> you're not. >> no. >> if i owned the jets i'd be rooting against the giants. >> no. we're rooting for ourselves. we've got a lot of work to do.

>> what do you see ahead for mitt romney? why do you think mitt would be a good president? there are a lot of conservatives like me who like him but are like -- >> not convinced. >> is he really going to be the conservative president we need? >> i think he is. i share your views. you could see in new hampshire in all of the post, the polling after the primary, where the conservatives actually are starting to come onboard and he is starting to be able to convince those conservatives that, yes. he's -- economically he's very conservative and he's -- and pragmatic and experienced in getting, you know, balancing the budget, helping to encourage employment, which is really the number one task. we've got 25 million people either on or under employed which is a travesty for this country. can't continue. >> are you going to south carolina? >> i may. >> will we see you there? >> i may. this is going to be a very, very important event.

>> could be tough. >> and the romney/gingrich ticket rumors? >> that ain't happening. >> yeah. fortunately we don't have to make that decision for a while. >> all right. woody johnson, thank you. >> thank you. >> so great to see you. >> thank you. see you on the road. at the top of the hour, will the assault on mitt romney's business background end up back firing? >> yes. >> much more "morning joe" ahead. >> yes it will. you know when i grow up, i'm going to own my own restaurant. i want to be a volunteer firefighter. when i grow up, i want to write a novel. i want to go on a road trip. when i grow up, i'm going to go there. i want to fix up old houses. [ female announcer ] at aarp we believe you're never done growing. i want to fall in love again. [ female announcer ] discover what's next in your life. get this free travel bag when you join at aarp.org/jointoday.

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>> i have no view. he is a competitor. he's somebody who i think was unnecessarily negative and who knows that some of the things he ran were not true. but that's his decision. that's how he wants to play the game. >> you said that character is very important for whoever wins this nomination. yet you won't tell me what you think of mitt romney. what do you think of his character? >> i don't have an obligation to answer any of that. i'm not going to sit here and play psycho therapy. >> could you imagine ever working for him? >> no. he couldn't imagine ever working for me either. >> good thursday morning to you. it is 8:00 on a rainy east coast as you take a live look at new york city. back with us onset we have john meacham and reverend al sharpton. >> newt has done a little back and forth. >> he -- yeah. >> i was talking to the romney people on tuesday night and they were concerned about these bain

attacks. >> right. >> they said what do you think we should do? i talk to all the campaigns. you know, i'm like down with the kids that are running these things. >> you're in the mix. >> a little bit. >> sure. >> i said, don't worry. newt's going to get hit from conservatives and he's going to pull back. and that's exactly what he did yesterday. they may run the ads but newt said yesterday on the campaign trail i think you're right. i shouldn't talk about this bain thing. then he pulled back from that. >> i know. >> he said that and said no i didn't say that. he pulled back and then went back. >> that's the thing about newt. he'll pull back from the pull back's pull back. >> hum. >> it's fascinating though, reverend al. you sitting there as a democratic activist, licking your chops. you got to love this. rick perry -- >> don't take the bait. >> what do you mean? >> nothing. >> rick perry going out there. he sounds like a stoned nyu grad

student in zuccotti park calling it vulture capitalism. >> well i'm not licking my choms. >> you are. >> i'm licking the butter from the butter popcorn as i watch. >> blueberry pie? >> i love butter popcorn. >> yeah. i like that. >> trying to keep the blueberry pie off the face. that's what i'm enjoying. there is nothing for us to do but give -- >> just sit back. >> a wise man once told me if you see a man going over the edge of a cliff give him room. don't turn a suicide into a homicide. >> i like that. >> oh, well. >> very christian. >> i was just going to say not exactly the good samaritan. >> i think -- i mean -- >> we know what you're saying. you don't have to explain. the good samaritan. >> south carolina is more than a week away. all right. let's go to south carolina shall we? it all -- >> by the way, if he turns

around and grabs at you just give him a little -- okay, reverend. all right. so let's go through the news. there's a lot of news here. >> yeah. it all could come down to south carolina where the republican candidates are in a final sprint to the january 21st primary and what may be the field's last best chance to stop mitt romney's momentum. the candidates are descending on the state this morning with over a dozen events planned just today. many focused in rock hill and columbia. the rallies are backed by a wall-to-wall media blitz and campaign ads blanketing the airwaves. for mitt romney at least the money is pouring in. the current front-runner raised $24 million during the last three months of 2011. that number is expected to dwarf the war chests of republican rivals but that's where the super pacs come into play. newt gingrich may not have as much cash in the bank but his supporters do and they rolled out a new movie yesterday devoted entirely to tearing down

romney's business record. the film features testimonials from workers who say romney's former company destroyed their jobs while he and other executives took home millions. the issue is sparking a sharp debate inside the gop with some conservatives angry at fellow republicans for what they see as an asult on free enterprise. here is fellow candidate rick santorum on this line of attack. >> rick perry the governor of texas, he's going after mitt romney, his record as a venture capitalist. he is saying he was a vulture capitalist. are you comfortable with that kind of language? >> no. i hate to sit here and be a defender of mitt romney but to me this is a defender of capitalism and, you know, i have to say that this is an attack that's probably not warranted. there's plenty of mitt romney's record as governor of massachusetts to attack and go after it but i don't think going after capitalism and companies

that in many cases do a public good in saving companies is the way to go about doing that. >> you know, it is. to me it is an attack on the free market, an attack on capitalism. i understand some consultants are saying don't use the word capitalism. use free markets. i use the word capitalism. it's been pretty good for us from adam smith forward. but it is, john meacham. it is amazing that with romney care and the individual mandate and the flip flops on abortion and the flip flops on gay marriage and the flip flops on guns and the flip flops on reagan. >> you keep going. >> and him saying oh, no, no. i wasn't a republican when ronald reagan was in the white house. with all of these things you've got newt gingrich and rick perry channelling teddy kennedy and using the same line of attack against mitt romney that teddy

kennedy did so many years ago. >> yeah. i think the -- to my mind every primary ends up being less pleasant than people want it to be within the given party. the phone call at 3:00 a.m. being the great -- >> right. >> turns out he's pretty good at the 3:00 a.m. phone call. it's everything else. a little weak. >> exactly. >> but i think this in particular is -- has a lot of intermural damage that could go into the general because romney isn't defined. >> right. >> there is not -- it's not as though people know him and therefore this is one more fact. people don't really know him. >> let's talk about the effect of the super pacs. newt gingrich gets a $5 million check from a man who is obsessed with one thing and that is beating barack obama. >> right. >> in november. and yet that man might as well -- and i'm dead serious. he might as well have written a check to david axelrod himself and said, use this $35 million

for market research against mitt romney. >> yes. >> and bain capital. >> i don't think there is anybody who is really puzzled about why a lot of americans think the whole thing is rigged and basically the two parties are kind of establishment wings of the same thing. but the -- just the conversation about super pacs that's been going on in the past week or three weeks i guess shows that the thing is -- that it's basically reform paint ball. >> yeah. >> right. >> it's just this little line about well that's romney super pac. it's now part of the vernacular. >> right. >> and it's another sign that people are right to feel that even the best efforts at reform are rigged against them. >> you know, it seems like not only you could say that didn't work. you could say it hurt the party and they started to eat their own within with their tactics and help the president. if you are newt gingrich and you have $5 million to spend would you spend it a different way?

>> oh, my gosh yes. >> what would you do at this point? how could you salvage it? >> if i had $5 million i'm going to south carolina. i know i have to take him down. i would spend $3 million of that money running ads in greenville spartanburg area upstate, the conservative state, bob jones university. it's where my wife's from. one of the most conservative evangelical -- it is the bible belt this side of texas-dsht belt buckle of the bible belt. i would do nothing, nothing but run 30-second ads over the next seven, eight, nine days of mitt romney and mitt romney's own words on abortion. mitt romney and mitt romney's own words on gun control. mitt romney and mitt romney's own words on gay marriage. mitt romney and mitt romney's own words on being embarrassed to be identified with ronald reagan and the republican party. this is something that not only doesn't play into barack obama's

hands. it is something, willie, that guts -- guts -- guts mitt romney in south carolina. i would spend the other $2 million, well, i'd spend the other $2 million doing the same thing in the low country. >> i think you're right. >> this is what astounds me, that with all of mitt romney's words that they could use against him in south carolina, they're going after capitalism. >> and the other thing to say is it didn't work in the state of new hampshire. i mean, he won almost 40% of the vote. maybe it's different in south carolina but people we talked to, we sat outside a polling place for two hours on tuesday and asked people about whether or not the bain capital thing mattered and they said no i don't resent the guy for making money. i think voters are smarter than newt gingrich thinks they are. they've looked into this and read into what bain capital actually did. they don't resent him or believe this idea that he took some per verse pleasure in firing people and throwing them on the street.

he may not be like them but there's not the resentment i think that newt gingrich hopes there is toward mitt romney and bain capital. >> as the republicans bludgeon each other in the primary process president obama is looking toward the general election and a central economic message to his campaign. in the white house speech yesterday the president unveiled a renewed effort to bring jobs back from overseas. while the theme was aimed at corporate leaders the president's comments also made mention of several key swing states that will be critical to 2012. >> whether you are a small business, some of which are represented here, or a large manufacturing corporation, or a technology company, whether you're an historic brand or a brand new startup, insourcing jobs is a smart strategy right now. i don't want the next generation of manufacturing jobs taking root in countries like china or germany. i want them taking root in places like michigan and ohio and virginia and north carolina.

so my message to business leaders today is simple. ask yourselves what you can do to bring jobs back to the country that made our success possible. >> what. >> what. hold on a second. >> alabama and mississippi -- florida and nevada, too. >> he'll say florida and nevada and new mexico. >> colorado. >> i love it. he picked the swing states. >> no, listen. >> the manufacturing states. >> yes. exactly. >> michigan. ohio. >> listen to some of the republican candidates. they talk a lot about bringing manufacturing jobs back. the question is can it be done? >> i love this strategy. i love this strategy because we're talking about the southern states. you look at what's happening in the south. they are stealing jobs from mercedes bens. they're stealing jobs from v.w. i mean, they are -- you've got japanese jobs and german jobs, reverend, pouring into the south where they've got good rooms for workers. they've got low tax rates. they've got low energy costs.

we're actually taking jobs. and again, i've talked about it time and time again but i love it because it's a model. alabama steals jobs from germany and they're now making mercedes-benz in tuscaloosa county and you actually have protests about outsourcing but the protests are in germany. i love what the president is saying here. because we really can. we can pull jobs back into this country. you know, everybody talks about oh, high tech and apple and yahoo and google. that's great. that's great. but we need manufacturing jobs pulled back into this country and i love the focus. >> i think he's right. i think that the -- my mother lives in dothan, alabama so i know about what's going on in alabama. >> yeah. >> and i think that the -- >> your mother lives in dothan? >> dothan, alabama. >> can i meet her next time i go down to alabama? >> absolutely. >> is she an alabama christmaston tide fan? >> you'd have to talk to her

about that. >> would she let joe in the house? >> you'd have to talk to her about that. but i'll put in a word for you. >> all right. >> let me say this. i think that the insourcing the president is talking about is good. i don't necessarily agree with you that the way they're doing their workers in all of those alabama and other plants are good. because some of them are not dealing with workers on a fair basis in order to organize labor unions but that is a whole different discussion. >> listen, there's a reason though the jobs are going to alabama and south carolina. i've talked about it and said to him, hey, instead of just having these jobs go to alabama and south carolina, you know, why aren't they going to connecticut? why aren't they going to upstate new york? what can unions do to get workers back into these factories in the northeast?

and rick said, hey, we have gone overboard in some of these work place rules and we've got to get more reasonable and responsible. i mean, that's the reality that we face. >> that's the reality we can't throw out. he was right to organize. >> no. i'm not saying we should throw out people's right to organize. but i am saying that if we want to get the shuttered factories in rhode island and connecticut and new hampshire and vermont and maine you drive to new england and it is so depressing. upstate new york, unions will need to come to the table and figure out where the governor and i think the connecticut governor, malloy would be a great one to do it since he seems pro union, and come up with new rules. if they were able to pull jobs over from germany or japan. >> i think you're right. >> and make it more inviting for all 50 states and not just the southeast. >> well, i think you're right. i think malloy could do that. and there are those forces of labor that understand that. i also think it's a great

morning when we can have joe scarborough outlining romney's flip-flopping and his inconsistencies and his double talking and endorse president obama's insourcing. i think we're off to a great start. >> i love america. >> one way to sum up the first part of the show. >> you love america. >> i have got to say this. >> but it's not 7:00 yet. >> that's when things turn south. >> i do understand. >> i have to say, talking about loving america and the economy, i'd cheer for the economy. it's so funny and, willie, we've talked about this. every time, you know, i've tweeted, hey, the unemployment rate goes down to 8.6. great news. i get absolutely eviscerated from people, oh, you idiot. what are you doing, cheering for the president? no. i'm cheering for america. as a son of a once unemployed guy i know the pain that these people go through. and, yeah.

we can cheer for a great idea that is going to bring great ideas back to america. >> there are people on twitter and blogs who can't process that, that you could actually be fair. >> it is a complicated topic. >> when we come back senator demint joins us onset with his thoughts on the upcoming south carolina primary and can romney lock up the nomination with a win next weekend? also this hour viggo morten seine will be here to talk about his new role playing sigmund freud. >> i love german sports. >> but first let's go to bill karins with a check on the forecast. >> good morning everyone. please excuse my voice. sounds worse than it is. we have active weather. if you're going to be doing any air travel the worst of it is around laguardia, new york city. gusty winds, heavy rain moving out in the next hour. then we'll watch boston possibly with the heavy rain as we go throughout the mid morning. the green on the map is the radar. all of the heavy rain now. folks from new york city northward, extreme northern new england reports as much as 4 to

5 inches of snow just north of albany, new york. many areas of new hampshire, maine, and vermont will pick up 3 to 6 inches later on tonight. so the forecast today, actually mild. the cold air doesn't arrive until the weekend. we'll also watch snow exiting st. louis heading for areas like peoria and chicago. chicago by later on tonight and tomorrow morning you'll end up with 3 to 6 inches of snow yourself. the first snowstorms of the season for you. we have winter weather finally and this upcoming weekend does look a little chilly. that looks like a nice shot. enjoy it while it lasts. you're watching "morning joe" brewed by starbucks. [ male announcer ] for sore muscles use new bengay cold therapy, it's pro-cool technology releases armies of snowmen masseuse who cuddle up with your soreness and give out polar bear hugs. technology. [ male announcer ] new bengay cold therapy. the same technology used by physical therapists. go to bengay.com for a $3 coupon.

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22 past the hour. welcome back to "morning joe." with us now republican senator from south carolina jim demint, author of the new book "now or never" saving america from economic collapse. also with us tom brokaw, author of the book "the time of our lives" a conversation about america. gentlemen, thanks for joining the table. jon meacham is still with us. >> great to see you. we're coming your way in a week or two. what do you think about these attacks against mitt romney? i've got issues with mitt romney about being a bed rock conservative, but what do you think about these attacks from newt and rick perry going after mitt for engaging in acts of capitalism? >> well, i don't know the details of these particular closings or -- but i do know this, that in business if you're

going to stay in business you have to make hard and painful decisions in the short term to save the whole company in the long term. that's what we're missing this washington right now. i mean, we won't take the pain of cutting something or eliminating a program. we won't make the hard decisions in the short term to save the whole country. so this may be a teachable moment for america. we don't need someone who is going to make bold promises they can't keep. we really need someone like a governor scott walker who is willing to take the pain in order to save the whole state. so again, i don't know the details. i can't defend every part of it. >> right. >> i'm really concerned when republicans start trying to make those tough decisions look bad. >> let's talk about republicans and democrats. we were just saying earlier in the show one of the big problems over the past ten years has been the fact that you had a republican president who doubled the national debt. with a republican congress for six years. now you have a democratic president who is going to double the debt again. this past year the national debt with a very conservative house

went up another trillion dollars. >> right. >> what do we do to stop the bleeding? >> well, that's what the book's all about. 2012 could be our last chance to turn this thing around. the only way republicans in the house now can stop the spending is if they shut the government down. and that's a battle they're not willing to have right now. hopefully we don't have to do that. hopefully we can change the senate. that's my whole focus this year is get five or six more conservative senators who will help send the next president good legislation, a balanced budget, and if we do that it doesn't matter which of these republican candidates are in the white house as far as i'm concerned. we need a good congress to send good legislation over. >> i don't want to replay the last campaign but the republicans have to get smart also. you talked about adding -- we lost two senators. >> yeah. >> when we should have had nevada and we should have had

delaware. but, unfortunately, republican voters in those two states and some conservative leaders pushed two unelectable conservatives. >> right. i came into the senate with 55 republicans. we didn't do squat. in fact, i'm not interested in being a majority again with the same people who were in the majority last time. because there's got to be a difference right now and the whole point of the book is it's not so much republican, democrat, right, left. it's really up or down and it's the battle between centralized power and decentralized governance and economics, which is what made this country great. and if we don't win the battle this time when we've got 50% of americans who are on the government dole and 50% are paying for it, we can never win when we have 60% are on the dole and 40% paying for it which is where we're headed. so i'm trying to sound the alarm and if you watch me in the last election, i took on a lot of the republicans in the senate because it's time to have a

party america can trust. i think we're doing that better. we're not there yet. it took more than one election to get us in this whole and is going to take more than one to get us out. >> turning to the presidential race, tom brokaw as we head toward south carolina, i wonder what your thoughts are on what happened in new hampshire and how it's looking for mitt romney as he heads toward south carolina. >> well, i've said on the air earlier today on the "today" show that you've got what appears to be the republican equivalent of the jihad under way down in south carolina with governor perry and speaker gingrich going hard after mitt romney. let me ask you a couple questions. i know you haven't endorsed but i read in the last 24 hours you have said that you expected governor romney will be the winner in south carolina. >> well, that's just what the polls indicate. i'm not saying that i'm picking a candidate and i'm not. what i've said in the last 24 hours as well, i think our nominee needs to listen to some of the things that all of the candidates have been saying, particularly ron paul's understanding that the federal reserve is out of control, that the government needs to be

limited, and individual liberty is the core of the republican principles. the big tent republican party needs to be composed of libertarians and conservatives and that's where i hope the debate will move. >> there is some glee on the part of democrats about what governor perry and speaker gingrich are doing because they say, look. they're setting the table for us come the fall. >> yeah. >> we'll just take their playbook and run that against governor romney. >> well it's a good opportunity for romney and other republicans to figure out how to explain free enterprise to the american people. and it gets back to what i said earlier. i've seen business leaders who are not willing to make hard decisions about letting people go or closing down part of their business to save the whole business. that's why you end up with general motors and bankruptcy is they were not willing to make hard decisions over time and that's what we're doing in washington. that's why we're 15 trillion in debt. we need a president who is willing to take the -- >> do you knows how the tactics that gingrich and perry are using against romney are actually potentially helping president obama? >> yeah. i understand that. but this is something that would

have been an attack on romney if he's a nominee anyway. so he needs to figure out how to explain to america that these decisions sometimes have to be made in business. now i'm not saying there weren't mistakes made or there was not greed involved but i am saying that we need leaders who understand hard decisions and pain and unpopular decisions are going to have to be made in washington. >> would you advise newt gingrich to use these tactics? >> no i wouldn't. i think it is too late to do that. if you wanted to bring that contrast to the american people it should have been done in iowa but now that newt and others do not appear to be in the game, to damage a front-runner makes no sense to me. >> do you think that if lightning strikes and either newt gingrich or governor perry become the nominee, that they could be successful against president obama, given their pattern up to this point? >> well, i think they could. but we really don't know the state of play in november. you know how quickly things

change. but it's hard to tell. i think any of our candidates could win but we need to make sure that we get someone who is willing to make the hard decision. no need to go through another republican president, republican majority if they're not going to stand up and make the hard decisions or nation needs to make. >> here, here. jon meacham. >> senator, you've been in washington now for 12 years. actually more, sorry. >> 13. >> and have things changed in a palatable, tactile way in terms of getting things done from when you came in? >> yeah. i think they are more polarized and it's a contrast i try to make in the book because we really no longer have a shared vision. i mean, i know from business that you have people coming from different directions. they can work together if they have shared goals and a shared vision. but now we've got tension between those who want centralized power, government control of education, health care, transportation, energy,

and republicans who are i think finding their footing around their core principles of we need to deinvolve power out of washington. we need to sen de centralize because that is what makes america work is the bottom up approach. i use this analogy a lot. it's just like a coach telling his team to go out and work with the other guys and cooperate with them. the democrats are there to beat us. every policy that they introduce is to centralize power. they are completely incapable of cutting spending because their constituency is based on dependency on government and those who want more from government. >> jim, our problem has not just been the democratic party. our problem has been the fact -- let's look at the leaders right now. >> sure. >> you've got mitt romney leading. he was basically the author of the individual mandate that barack obama lifted for his health care plan. look at rick santorum who is seen as the great conservative alternative to mitt romney. he supported the $7 trillion drug benefit plan that is going to destroy this country

economically. look at newt gingrich. he also is a champion of the individual mandate. we could go down the list. also a champion of this drug benefit plan. how do we get republicans to understand it's not enough to say i'm pro-life. i like guns. >> joe, you're right. >> i am your kind of guy. vote for me, democrats are bad. then they go in and they spend as much money as democrats. >> they do. and as you know, i've taken a position against a number of my republican colleagues and we've replaced some of them. i write about that in the book. both parties have been part of the problem. there's no question about it. but now we -- at least the core principles of the republican party are more decentralized limited government and what we have to do is elect people who really believe that. i think we've got to the point now where the democrats are true to their principles when they want more government and more spending and so i don't think

we've got a party that americans can trust right now. we need an election where we have the right people step up and run for office, those who will make our decisions. but the only hope i think is with the republican party and the core principles of limited government. and i'm optimistic that we can do it but the book is making a point that i'm not sure that we can go another four years with this senate and this president and expect to have america that we recognize. >> what can you do over the next year before the election to make sure america doesn't go another trillion dollars in debt? >> well, i am going to keep trying to draw the line. i'm not sure we can do it with the president as far as when we have to raise the debt limit. we need to draw a line when this budget is coming up. paul ryan is going to come out with another republican budget. we all need to rally behind it and basically say if the senate and the president won't pass a budget then we're going to stop business until we do. because it's crazy to go --

we've gone three years without a budget and we keep talking about deficit reduction. we have not done anything but increase spending. somehow we've got to communicate to america that this is an urgent situation and we've just got to sound the alarm and tell america we can't go past this election unless we make something -- >> do you support what secretary panetta is doing with the reorganization of the military and the cutbacks and the savings that are possible there? >> we do need reorganization and new vision for it. i don't know all the details so i can't say that i support the whole plan. but we no longer have the budget, the money to police the world and we have to look at a fighting force that can be deployed anywhere in the world but perhaps is less expensive. >> but again that is an issue that has come up in the republican debates. >> sure. >> all the candidates have been very critical of the cutbacks in the military saying we can't cut back there. >> well we're going to have to cut back everywhere. i don't agree with ron paul on his foreign policy but we're all going to end up where he's talking about if we don't have the money to do it. so if we're not willing to make

some cuts in nonessential services essential things like the military are going to go under funded. that's what's happening this year. >> all right. >> senator demint, thank you very much. again, the new book is "now or never saving america from economic collapse." thank you for being with us. >> thank you. >> thanks. good to see you. >> you want to show your favorite barbecue place in greenville? i'm going to be there on monday. >> there you go. >> we want to hear it. where is the best place to get barbecue in greenville? >> i don't think i want to side with one or the other. >> just trying to help him out. >> the political stops are the beacon in spartanburg and tommy's ham house in greenville. >> all right. that's where the best breakfast is. >> when we come back -- >> no endorsement. >> keep it right here on "morning joe."

there is a rumor running around vienna that you've taken one of your patients as a mistress. >> that's absolutely untrue. >> why of course it is. it's what i've been telling everybody. >> what's being said? >> i don't know. the woman's been bragging about

it. that somebody is sending out anonymous letters. the usual sort of thing. bound to happen sooner or later. it's an occupational hazard. >> that was the scene from "a dangerous method." joining us now viggo mortensen who recently received a golden globe nomination for best supporting actor for his role in the film as dr. sigmund freud and he joins us now on the show this morning. good to have you. >> thanks for having me. >> thanks for being on. so preparing for the role, what surprised you the most about looking into presenting yourself as this character? >> well, i think you could see in that clip a little bit that he was a -- had a very sly sense of humor. he was very witty. like a lot of people i thought that sigmund freud was probably a very serious, elderly gentleman, not much sense of humor there but he was very witty and very funny and that helped me a lot. because it's a role where i have a lot of dialogue.

a lot more than i usually get even with david kronenberg movies and i was a little nervous about it, how do i do that? how do i make that interesting? >> how do you prepare for this role? >> well, i think that, you know, when you play an important historical figure you are sometimes in danger of taking it too seriously, thinking, well, this is a person of significance. i have to do this in an important way. if you do that you end up not having as much fun and probably not doing a good job. so we -- fortunately with kyra knightly and michael and david they all have a good sense of humor and we kept it light while we were shooting. you know what it's about. it is a very good script. it is historically sound but just concentrate on the human side of the people. they were very intelligent, they were ambitious. they all are competitive. they wanted to make their mark.

they were also very insecure in a lot of ways. they were very vulnerable to the point of being paranoid sometimes and there's room for humor there i think. there's some witty asides from freud, jousting between particularly young and freud that was fun to play. >> kept it light with freud and jung. that is quite an achievement. the one line, one of the one-lynn descriptions is freud and one of his patients form a bond over their enthusiasm for s & m and light bondage. >> there you go. >> there is a little something for everybody. if you like spanking or cigars. keep going. or attractive, naked people. >> but this -- adorable babies. >> it's a range. >> explain a little bit though this very specific story that involves sigmund freud. it's not a biopic about him but

a story about him, jung, and this woman. >> well, the character that kyra knightly plays is someone that we -- most people don't know a lot about. and to some degree she came between jung and freud. she was someone who pushed the envelope. one of the things i like about the movie is they don't try to smooth over what the times were like, what men and women were like, you know? freud and jung for all their advance thinking and, you know, wanting to liberate people and have them talk about unmentionable things, it was a very restrictive time. you can see in the way people are dressed that is very much the way things were. you didn't talk about certain things. it was very proper in a lot of ways. there was a lot of stuff bubbling under surt fas and people like sigmund freud felt it was important to to talk about the unmentional things, things we fear and desire. what women think about.

people weren't interested, including these guys. for all of those advancements they still were men who were wary of letting a woman get too much credit. you know? sigmund freud did in a footnote fashion credit sabina for some of her ideas but jung never did. even though jung borrowed a lot of ideas from her. one of the interesting things about the movie is that you get to know her character a lot. but i like the fact that kronenberg didn't try to either with music or with dialogue that wasn't proper, you know, wasn't correct for the times, to make them seem more liberal minded than they really were. they still were men and it was a man's world back then. but it was, i mean, i have to say i was watching a little earlier what you guys were, people have been on, and cornell west, tafs smiley, i thought that was very interesting. they, too, are talking about things, especially in this political campaign season, it is

very easy to say things like this is the last chance to save america, turn this thing around. i don't agree. i'm an optimist. i think that some of the unmentionables are not -- obviously were thanks to freud and others liberated in terms of talking about sex and men and women and all that stuff but people don't talk about poverty. it's true. they don't talk about what i think is an unfair structure about who is getting away with murder really. >> right. >> there are people who are powerful economically who get positions in government who get to keep doing what they're doing and it's very easy to blame regular people for being the problem. let's start firing people. >> we actually try and talk about the unmentionables here on the show. we do that here. viggo, thank you very much. the movie is "a dangerous method." viggo mortensen. >> thank you very much. >> congratulations on the golden globe nomination. >> along with tom brokaw and jon meacham we'll look at the new weekly job numbers.

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let's go to cnbc business before the bell. this is huge. tyler, have you ever worked for bain capital? >> no. >> do you like firing people? come on, man. >> i have never been so lucky as to work for bain capital. one of the companies in the news this week is ripple wood capital because it is the owner of the hostess twinkie, hostess brand is filing for bankruptcy yesterday. and that private equity firm which says, hey, we really pulled this company out of a prior bankruptcy now says that they are so burdened by prior union contracts that they have to file for bankruptcy or the twinkie may go away.

>> obviously this is shaking wall street to the core. i don't even ask how the futures are looking right now. what are we looking at as far as unemployment claims this week? obviously there is impact to that. >> absolutely. the essay is -- this one on jobs reports this week did not go in the direction we might have hoped. jobless claims up 24,000 in the most recent week to 399,000. a lot of people expected that because of course the holiday season ended and some of the temporary workers who had been brought on by the walmarts and costcos and best buys and others have now left those jobs and are presumably filing unemployment claims. the four-week moving average up 7,000 to 381,000. the other economic number, folks, that was out this morning also not particularly encouraging and that is retail sales. they rose just 1% in december. weakest showings since may.

when you strip out automobiles which had a great month they were actually down for the first time since 2010. back to you all. >> tom, we look at a lot of numbers and we look at the president's approval ratings and mitt romney versus this candidate and barack obama versus that. at the end of the day if unemployment is in the 7s barack obama is looking great. if it's in the 9s anybody can beat the president. >> yeah. i think it's a combination of both where the numbers are and also where the country's confidence is. it's not just a statistical kind of campaign we're going to be running. it's about do we have confidence to learn from these lessons? where do we go from here? what's the plan for going into the 21st century given the objective conditions that exist? there's a lot of stuff going on, slowing down in china for example, europe is not cured. warren buffet saying he is an optimist. a lot of big companies saying that as well. i think when you go out there at the grass roots level, the real issue for the country is, a, the

economy. will i get a job? and, b, what is this country all about? are my kids going to have the lives that i've had? that is going to be a big factor as well. it's a little harder to quantify that. that's a qualitative question. that will be a big issue and will play out in the course of the fall. >> tom brokaw, tyler mathison, thank you. back in just a moment. >> good morning, dave. >> good morning, dave. [taps on window] dave. >> both: hey, dave. >> hey. >> hey, dave. >> mr. dave... >> dave? >> 'sup, dave? >> dave? dave? >> dave? >> dave! dave? >> hi, dave. >> oh, dave's looking for you. >> [singing] >> hey, dave. >> [loud] yo, dave! >> announcer: in a small business, it's all you. that's why you have us. at staples, we have low prices on everything your small business needs. staples. that was easy. we all have internal plumbing.

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i have the hotels.com app so we can get a great deal even at the last minute. ah, well played sir. get the app. hotels.com. welcome back to "morning joe." time to talk about what we learned today. what did you learn, willie? >> there is so much more to this hostess story than being a reporter in the main stream media. it is not about