tv The Last Word MSNBC February 23, 2012 7:00pm-8:00pm PST
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i endorse him. it sounds less convincing when you put it like that. that does it for us tonight. we'll see you again tomorrow night. now it's time for "the last word with lawrence o'donnell." have a great night. it's simple. if women turn against you, you cannot win the presidency. but don't tell republicans that. >> about the republican debate last night, what happened? >> mitt romney and rick santorum clash in arizona wednesday night. i thought somebody was going to get stabbed in the thigh, under the desk. >> you're misrepresenting the facts. you don't know what you're talking b. >> the moderator asks the questions, they answer the questions. >> you get to ask the questions you want, i get to answer the way i want. >> he didn't answer the question. >> if voters were to vote against candidates who didn't answer questions in the debate, nobody would win. >> he looked bad. it was a bad note to end the debate on. >> the issue of kcontraceptives
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being put on the table. >> which candidate believes in birth control, and if so, why? >> too many ob-gyns aren't able to practice with women across this country. >> gone are the days when the republican party used to put forward big, bold, visionary stuff. >> i'm not sure right now the republican brand is helping itself. >> all four of those candidates on that stage said the bailout was a bad idea. >> it's outrageous. it's in excusable. >> i think it was a good night for president obama last night. >> there is even a chance president obama could win virginia. >> whoever wins the virginia presidential election, that party's senatorial candidate will win. >> describe yourself in one word and one word only. >> cheerful. resolute. >> there's only one word for
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that. that's extreme. >> the republican contest has become a binary choice between two similarly miscast candidates. you know what? i think i need my glasses for this one. the tone sort of lends itself to a more scholarly look. mr. romney is not attracting people who want rationality lenned by romance. he is wanting politics with reasonableness. mr. romney looks like a formidable candidate for november. you know that's not me. that's not my voice. that's not me talking. that was george will's latest column. and george will is the brains of the republican party. and that's why i had to use the glasses, because you always look a little smarter, a little more thoughtful, in fact, a little more like george will if you put your glasses on.
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george will may have the only functioning brain left in the republican party. he doesn't just want the republican candidate to be formidable in november, he wants the republican candidate to beat president obama and beat him decisively. so what you just heard was an elegant writer's version of panic. george will and every other professional republican who knows how to read polls, they're all near panic now because of the whole purple strategies conducted of likely voters of the 12 battleground states most likely to decide the presidential election. forget the national polls, forget the california poll, it's the 12 battleground straits that matter. overall, president obama leads mitt romney by 47%. there is a robo poll that shows
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the president now leading mitt romney by 6 points and leading rick santorum by 8 points. earlier this month, virginia voters favored romney over obama by 3 points, and santorum was scoring 4 points ahead of president obama. the virginia poll released today was taken after virginia's republican governor bob mcdonnell indicated he would sign legislation that would require women to receive a transvaginal ultrasound before undergoing an abortion. as protests mounted over that highly invasive government action, the governor who has an eye on the presidential slot yesterday began his retreat. mandating an invasive procedure is not a mandatory thing.
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no woman will have to undergo a transvaginal ultrasound involuntarily. but for virginia republicans alienating women and last night's presidential debate spending more time on contraception and senate procedure than it did on the economy, president obama today couldn't resist a bemused reference to the republican candidates while addressing rising gas prices. >> since it's an election year, they're already dusting off their three-point plan for $2 gas. and i'll save you the suspense. step one is to drill and step two is to drill, and then step three is to keep drilling. well, the american people aren't stupid. they know that's not a plan. especially since we're already drilling. that's a bumper sticker. while there are no silver bullets short term when it comes to gas prices, and anybody who says otherwise isn't telling the
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truth, i have directed my administration to look for every single area where we can make an impact and help consumers in the months ahead. >> joining me now, alex wagner, the host of msnbc's "now" with alex wagner and chris hayes with "up with chris hayes." we've seen now that george will is disappointed in the republican prospects and candidates at this point. i want to listen now to rush limbaugh's take on last night's republican debate. >> i cringed when i heard him say this. santorum is getting cringed for the team player comment. romney is immune to any criticism. he hasn't done anything at the federal level. he is outside it. santorum, newt, paul all look like insiders, and of course in every primary season, they claim
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to want an outsider. this is an observation that rebounds to romney's favor if anyone is watching it in that context. >> alex wagner, when george will, the most thoughtful republican public commentator, and rush limbaugh, the least thoughtful republican public commentator are both frustrated, the republican party is in trouble. >> it is, and i don't have a pair of glasses to make me look erudite in saying that, but absolutely, what good has come out of this race so far? nothing but numbers for barack obama. last night's debate across the airwaves as you said from george will to rush limbaugh from george petacky to mark mckinnon, everybody agrees this was not a good debate for the republican party. the word jobs was mention the six times, the word birth control was mentioned eight times. i don't understand what the priorities are, but they seem to be like rabid dogs with a bone. they just can't let go of this. this is in a week when you have
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the leading presidential candidate talking about the crushing of the judean christian faith by the president and the satanic versus invoked frequently and repeatedly throughout the week. i don't know what the republican party is doing. >> chris hayes, in that battleground state purple poll, they ask the question, is the nominating process strengthsening the nominee or weakening the nominee? 23% think it's strengthening the nominee, and 53% got it absolutely right, saying that it is weakening the nominee. i don't know how the nominee can get much weaker, whoever he is, than where they were last night. >> well, i think what's interesting is that there's two things that are happening. one is that as the economy improves, the republicans need to completely recast the strategy by which they're going to go after the president, and now they're banking on gas prices rising in the summer, they're trying to get out ahead of that. there's been a turn to our
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social issues, although i think there was a huge strategic miscalculation where a lot of the republican parties thought that would go down to the republicans, and it has not, so when it was brought up, the republicans booed. they were booing the thought that it was even brought up because they realize it is no longer good for the republicans. and what alison was saying about the dog with the bone, they all said, this is silly, let's not talk about it, and then they talked about it. they talked about it at great length. another thing you saw last night that really hurt the republican party is wrestling with the bush legacy. that's why i think rick santorum's turn as front runner is so interesting. so far george w. bush has been entirely absent from these debate. rick santorum has to essentially answer for the bush record because he was a senator during the bush years and he owned the reason the debt ceiling and the no child left behind and the
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increased deficits, and the party doesn't look very good when it sits and meditates for two hours on the record of the previous presidential administration. >> i want to talk about one of the peculiar performances last night, and i'm going to have a lot more to say about him later in the show, ron paul. there is the developing theory that ron paul has become an ally of mitt romney, which is fascinating that the kind of, in a certain sense, most rightward of all the candidates, the so-called libertarian ron paul would be trying to help the most moderate and historically, in the past, liberal candidate mitt romney. we had the santorum campaign congressman paul and governor romney what they've got going together. they're really complaining about it now at the santorum campaign, and then rand paul was asked today what he would do if he was offered the vice presidency by mitt romney, and he said rkts i don't know if i can answer that question, but i can say it would
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be an honor to be considered. alex, are we getting closer to a clue of what this ron paul performance was all about? >> ask not what ron paul does, just go with it, lawrence. i think they are interesting bedfellows. i use the term romance lightly, but i think that's what's happening here. we know that their wives get our friends, we know mitt romney has offered the use of his private jet and summer home to ron paul, who graciously declined. i think there is some strategic calculation here in terms of a path for rand paul. i don't think he wants a position in mitt romney's administration. i think mitt romney gains support here, because we know supporters are incredibly young and enthusiastic. they're part of a base that mitt romney has not resonated with at all, but i'd be highly surprised if they go and be mitt romney
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supporters. >> what i find a musing, though, is rand paul is the one who could attack mitt romney, which romney wants to pursue. romney is not the good one to deliver the message about kbi a purity. ron paul was doing that very well last night. >> i have a conspiracy to offer to ron paul supporters. they love conspiracy theories, so they might want to think about this one. ron paul serves to support the event wal nominee by taking a position on the right on many issues that drains off some attention of the santorum support. last time around, he did it, and eventually helping to get nominated of all the candidates, john mccain. he's doing it again in an effort to help get nominated, the most
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moderate of all the candidates, mitt romney. historically moderate, anyway, they all seem to be trying to outconserve each other today. it seems to me that's the deal with ron paul's republican party. you guys let me get on stage, you guys let me get my 10% of the vote, and i will not interfere in any way with your nominating process of whoever you guys have decided is next in line to get this nomination. chris, do you think i can get any takers on the ron paul conspiracy theory? >> that strikes me as a fairly simple interpretation. it seems to me there is some bond of personal affection in the case of romney, and also ron paul -- santorum is the first person he's gone after that he genuinely seems to dislike. it was evident last night how much he was relishing going after santorum, which of course ron paul took the wrong side on.
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>> if you listen to any accounts of ron paul's, quote, unquote, character, this is like a sermon he's given for decades. his voting record on all these issues is fairly consistent, and i don't know that he cares about any electoral votes, he just believes in this message. it is conservative for the mitt romney campaign, however. >> he is the libertarian who will not allow women to make their own choices about their own reproductive rights and choices and medical options. so the consistency, when he said that word consistent and then said, in effect, oh, by the way, i'm a libertarian who opposes abortion in any form, he loses some consistency points there. alex wagner and chris hayes, thank you both very much for joining me tonight. >> thank you, lawrence. coming up, the republican governor of virginia is retreating from his crazy position of requiring an in v e
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sieve pre-abortion figure. last night, people said ron paul is a fake. but i will show you how much of a fake ron paul is. and jonathan capehart had a run-in with chris christie. jonathan will get the last word on that later. you don't cough, you don't show defeat. give me your war face! raaah! [ male announcer ] halls. a pep talk in every drop. without the stuff that we make here, you wouldn't be able to walk in your house and flip on your lights. [ brad ] at ge we build turbines that power the world. they go into power plants which take some form of energy, harness it, and turn it into more efficient electricity. [ ron ] when i was a kid i wanted to work with my hands, that was my thing. i really enjoy building turbines. it's nice to know that what you're building is gonna do something for the world. when people think of ge, they typically don't think about beer.
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using mitt romney's comments from last night's debate. the democrats are obviously trying to preserve 67% of the latino vote that president obama won in 2008. joining me now are joe klein, a columnist for time magazine, and e.j.deon, a senior fellow at the brookings institution. joe, the cover of your magazine this week, it's the first headline you've ever had in spanish, yo decido, i decide. it says why latinos will pick the next president. there was a time when they thought candidates should be going after the latino vote. what happened to that idea? >> the thing is, you play to what you've got, and what the republicans have are an awful lot of scared white people in their party, and one of the things they're most scared about is people of different colors and ethnicities and, you know,
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backgrounds polluting their white picket fence sense of america. carl ro-- these were religious conservative catholics and a lot of strong businessmen and strong family people. it would make sense except they're doing the best they can to offend latinos and women, and pick your category. >> e.j., texas politicians, republican texans, seem to get this. george w. bush understood it, tried to go for immigration reform. rick perry got booed by trying to tell republicans to maybe consider having a heart about this when he was a candidate. and we're at the point now where a univision abc news poll shows that 72% of latinos now say that
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the republicans either do not care about their support or they are hostile to their communities. so it seems like whatever chance they had of moving into president obama's latino support so far, they have lost that chance. >> you know, we are really missing the very liberal rick perry from this campaign. it's really astonishing. you know, george bush showed that you can get the latino vote up to 40%, some polls showed it even got a little bit more than that. among other things, he focused on evangelical latinos, about a third of the latinos are evangelica evangelicals, and they went very strongly for president bush, and then something happened. republicans went, as joe suggested, really, really conservative on the immigration issue or even restrictionist. it's not clear what conservative and liberal is on that issue. and they kicked him away.
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so john mccain, who had actually been very pro-immigration, had worked a lot with the latinos, suffered not because of his own position on immigration but because of where his party is. and i think what you have is a texas model and the california model. remember all the way back to governor pete wilson where they had prop 187 which denied public services to illegal immigrants, the latinos took that as a great insult, and the latino vote was lost in california for a generation. the bush model in texas was much more open. the national republican party right now is pursuing that california model, and i think it's going to have the same result. >> joe, have you heard any credible cases made by any of the republican candidates and their staff and talking to you in the campaign trail about how they intend to invade the obama vote of 2008 and strip away voters in any categories? have they identified any categories where they think they
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might be able to go in there and take some obama voters away? >> well, they're still kind of obsessed with the so-called reagan democrats. and the truth is that their best argument -- by the way, you didn't hear anything of this argument last night. their best argument has to do with jobs and the economy. things haven't really been going so well in that regard, but they don't talk about it. it is amazing to me that rick santorum and his appearance on "face the nation" last sunday and last night didn't mention once his manufacturing plan which is kind of unique and creative and might actually win him some of those votes. but he doesn't talk about it. >> e.j., where do you think the republicans could go hunting for votes? and we have to factor in they need more -- if they've already, in effect, written off trying to invade latino support for president obama, they have to
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pick some other place. independen independents, for example, younger voters. is there a place for them to go where they can make up what they're losing and what the latino gap was last time or what the gender gap was last time? >> well, i just want to pick up on joe's point. going for michigan voters and not saying how pro manufacturing you are is like going to hollywood and not saying you're pro movie. it was crazy. because he's got real credibility on that, even though there are a lot of problems with his plan, he's a blue collar guy. >> do you think he got distracted last night? do you think santorum sitting there beside romney got thrown some pitches where it just distracted him and he lost direction of where he should be going? >> i do. i think he was getting punches from romney and then punches from ron paul, the romney surrogate. i think that was causing him trouble. i think there were two targets for the republicans, really, the white working class where obama lost them by 18 points, had inflated a little bit because of
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the white south, but the democrats lost him by 30 points in the democrat elections. the democrats needed closer to minus 18. oe the other group i think they want are upscale social moderates, they want them to vote on higher taxes. downscale whites vote on economic and inequality, and upscale social moderates vote on the social issues. the republicans would like the down scale voters to vote on social issues and discontent and the upscale voters to vote on taxes. i think the way this has worked out, all the upscale voters are thinking how right wing they are on social issues, and the down scale voters are thinking how rich romney is and they can't get to him. they have to turn this thing around and they're not doing a very good job right now. >> i do think they're making serious progress with young people who are opposed to contraception.
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>> yeah, they're doing great with that. joe klein and e.j.deio, thank you very much for joining me tonight. >> good to be with you. >> good to be here. coming up, we know newt gingrich has women troubles, but so does the once-married rick santorum and the once-married mitt romney, because they are doing everything they can to drive women voters away from their candidaciecandidacies. ron paul calls rick santorum a fake last night, but i'll show you why ron paul is a fake libertarian. later, jonathan capehart will get the last word on his fight with chris christie this morning. oh! [ baby crying ] ♪ what started as a whisper ♪ every day, millions of people choose to do the right thing. ♪ slowly turned to a scream ♪ there's an insurance company that does that, too. liberty mutual insurance.
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last week a holocaust survivor joined me for the mormon practice of bap titizinge dead. frazell reported to him that the mormon church assured him it would never happen again. he was followed in the program by helen radke, a fellow mormon, who showed him that the mormon practice is continuing. they report that helen radke reported r reports that ann frank was baptized in the mormon church for the tenth time.
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still to come, mitt romney has a big problem with women. and fake libertarian ron paul has an even bigger problem with sex, which is what makes him a fake libertarian. and jonathan capehart had to fight to get a word in with chris christie on msnbc this morning on marriage equality. jonathan will get the last word tonight.
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coming through! [ male announcer ] introducing spark the small business credit cards from capital one. get more by choosing unlimited double miles or 2% cash back on every purchase, every day. what's in your wallet? . governor romney, both senator santorum and speaker gingrich has said during your tenure as governor, you required hospitals to provide morning-after pills to rape victi victims. governor, did you do that? >> of course not. there was no requirement in massachusetts for the catholic church to provide morning after pills to rape victims. that was entirely voluntary on their part. there was no such requirement. >> after that statement last night, the boston globe corrected the record today. in december 2005, romney's public health official ruled
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that they gave the catholic church the right to opt out of the new law on religious or moral grounds. the ruling sparked criticism, and romney's legal counsel reversed course and concluded that the new law did not provide a religious exemption. among women voters who make up more than half of the general electi election electorate, obama has a 65% better when it comes to women. asked if mitt romney cares about the needs and problems of women, only 34% of women voters said yes. 41% of all voters said yes, and 40% of independents said yes. joining me now is maggie
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hagerman, a senior writer for politico. maggie, it seems that senior politics will be with us for a while. now we have another state saying they're filing suit challenging what they say is president obama's final compromising position on requiring employers to provide contraception insurance in their health care plans. this will certainly keep the issue alive no matter what the republican candidates say about this. do you think the republican candidates would prefer a world in which they get to decide when they might want to shut up about this and have it go away? >> i think this certainly has not played out well for the republicans. i think there is a general sense that the republicans, especially congressional republicans, really overplayed their hand about this. there is a video of carolyn maloneie from new york, a councilwoman, asking, where are
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the women on this topic? i think this is something republicans have lost some control of in the narrative. i don't think it's perfect for democrats, either, but i do think republicans would like to be talking about the economy. i don't think social issues is necessarily where they want to be. it is dragging the party much further to the right than a lot of members would like to be with, as you said, women voters in the fall, a key swing bloc, who a lot of independent women, a lot of suburban women, don't president obama ended up with a 13-point lead with women. if he maintains a 13-point lead with women going into this election, is there any mathematics in which the republicans can take that victory away? >> i think there are, but i think it becomes challenging. i think this is very much an election that will be about 2 or 3% margins in terms of specific voting groups.
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you'll have hispanic groups in certain states. you'll have fewer voters, you'll have women voters, you'll have independent voters. that would be a very high margin. it would depend on where it is spread out, but i think again, this is not an issue right now. there is a reason why democrats are so excited about watching rick santorum. granted, rick santorum did connect better with white voters who president obama has had trouble withov over the last several years in terms of reclosing the sale after doing well in 2008. but i think ultimately there is a feeling that santorum jimmys up the base with voters. mitt romney, as you heard his language last night in the debate, is attacking further right because he's in a party that's in the middle of a hard right moment. >> maggie, let's listen to the way elizabeth warren suzie i is
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this on the rye adio on her campaign in massachusetts. >> i'm elizabeth warren. a few days ago, i watched a congressional hearing about birth control where the panel of experts did not include even one woman. wow. washington really doesn't get it. now, the senate is about to vote on a new law, proposed by republicans, that allows your employer or insurance company to oris new law threatens access o contraception, mammograms, even maternity care. it's just plain wrong. >> it's not a permanent but semi-permanent shift in the electorate but i do think that's employing to be a compelling ad. i think it's going to work with certain segments of the voters. on the other hand, you also have a lot of catholic voters in massachusetts. so it is a bit dicier in that
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particular election. but i do think overall, the way that hearing played out, the way that issue played out has been, generally speaking, better for the democrats than the republicans. >> politico's maggie haberman. thank you very much for joining me tonight. >> thank you. jonathan capehart took on chris christie on the morning joe. tonight jonathan capehart gets the last word. ron paul did an entire thing about having sex. he talked about having sex while trying to prevent pregnancy is an immorality. that makes ron paul a fake libertarian. ♪ ♪ [ male announcer ] not everything powerful has to guzzle fuel. the 2012 e-class bluetec from mercedes-benz.
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it's time to rewrite who was the fake in last night's debate. >> congressman paul, you questioned the fiscal conservative credentials of all of these gentlemen, but particularly this week, senator santorum, you have a new television ad that labels him a fake. why? >> because he's a fake. >> i'm real. i'm real. >> that was fake libertarian ron paula could you seeing rick santorum of being a fake. now, we all know ron paul supporters love him, just love him. and i don't have to tell you, love is blind. it is also deaf, especially when ron paul is talking. when ron paul talks about legalizing drugs, the beneficiaries of that idea get so high on ron paul love that they don't hear anything else he says. when ron paul offends most of the people in his republican debate audiences with his
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consistent principle defiant stance against war making, anti-war voters like me are thrilled. and when ron paul says he wants to cut the size of government more than any other republican candidate, the anti-tax and anti-government spending crowd loves him. and all of those points are consistent with the libertarian philosophy of governing. but when ron paul talks about his unyielding opposition to a women's right to choose, when ron paul says the government should prevent all abortions, the standard republican party line, the libertarian lovers of ron paul simply do not hear him. they don't seem to notice that fake libertarian ron paul takes the most anti-libertarian position on women's reproductive rights. the fake libertarian does not dare say a word that violates the republican party line on
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abortion. not one word. and last night, fake libertarian ron paul did a little notice full santorum on sex. now, what is the libertarian position on sex? okay. that's something of a trick question, because, of course, libertarians have no position on sex as in government should make no law on sex among consenting adults. all of the libertarians that i know are -- how should i put this -- well, let's just say they are extremely sex positive. anything goes with them. everything goes. well, you know, i think i've probably gone as far as i can on a family show in describing libertarians' attitudes toward sex, true libertarians. but fake libertarian ron paul? that dude is every bit anti-sex
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as the sex-obsessed, sex hater rick santorum. >> as an o.b. doctor, i've dealt with birth control pills and contraception for a long time. >> now, when he said that, i got ready for another great ron paul moment. here comes ron. he's going to take these nuts to school about contraception, finally. you know he's going to cut through all that republican bull. you know he's going to -- and then ron paul said this. >> but sort of along the line of the pills creating immorality, i don't see it that way, i think the immorality creates the problem of wanting to use the pills. >> "i think the immorality creates the problem of want to go use the pills"? sex creates the problem of wanting to use the pills.
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ron paul just equated sex with immorality. he just said wanting to have sexual intercourse without wanting to have a baby are immoral. listen to his words again, quote, i think the immorality creates the problem of wanting to use the pills. so if you're an anti-war ron paul supporter or a legalized drugs ron paul supporter and you had sex last night after the debate and used birth control pills, your candidate for president thinks you engaged in immorality. that's his word for what you did. immorality. >> it's the morality of society that we have to deal with. the pill is there, and it contributes, maybe, but the pills can't be blamed for the immorality of our society. >> okay, so ron paul is not really a republican. and he's definitely not a
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libertarian. so why does he pretend to be a libertarian? >> because he's a fake. because he's a fake. because he's a fake. in the works package, we change the oil we change the filter... tire rotation, suspension, we make suspension checks... what we have here is the multi-point inspection. every time a vehicle comes into a ford dealership you'll be presented with one of these. we check the belts, hoses... brakes. tires and the pressures... battery, all your fluids...
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the president and the justice department have made it clear that they believe the so-called defense of marriage act is unconstitutional. they're not supporting it in any of the court cases going through the federal court system. would you support that? governor christie, would you support that? >> jonathan -- first of all, i used to be a prosecutor. i don't know if you did, too, but i'm not going to be cross examined by you this morning. >> i'm having fun trying. >> and you're going to lose so
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let's just move on. >> i would love for you to answer the question. >> auhere's the answer to the question. let's have the president get some courage, come on this program and state his position. he won't because he wants to have it both ways. >> that was governor chris christie refusing to answer the question of my next guest, nbc political analyst "washington post" columnist jonathan capehart. jonathan, you had a rough ride there. joe did all he could to try to moderate that thing, but i know you had more to say. >> yes. >> and since you had that engagement on "morning joe," the maryland state senate has passed the marriage equality bill there, which it already passed the house so it now awaits governor o'malley's sitting. he has said he will sign it, that the legislative process is good for him. but to christie's refusal, he got away with refusing to answer your question about the constitutionalality of doma, and
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if he were president of the united states, what would he want his justice department to do regarding domo. we never got an answer to that. >> no, i didn't. and because he kept cutting me off, i wasn't able to get to the three points i wanted to make. one, on paper, president obama and governor christie do indeed have the same position on same-sex marriage in that they both support civil unions. but that's where the similarity ends. president obama, as you showed in the clip, has deemed that -- through the justice department that he believes, and the administration believes, that the so-called defense of marriage act is unconstitutional. and, therefore, the federal government will no longer represent -- will no longer defend this law in court. that's one. two, the president has gone on record saying that he supports s-598, which is barbara
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feinstein's bill which is a bill that would appeal doma. so the president is going on record to appeal the so-called defense of marriage act. and he's been openly supportive in new york, and i think he'll be equally supportive in maryland when they send a bill approving marriage equality and the governor actually signs it. here's the difference between chris christie and president obama. lawrence, you know this well. we live in a representative democracy. we are not in a monarchy and we certainly are not in a dictatorship despite what republicans say. so unless congress sends the president of the united states a bill appealing doma or legalizing same-sex marriage, there is nothing the president can do, other than saying flat out, which is what governor christie wants, i support marriage equality.
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meanwhile, governor christie, when the duly elected representatives of the people of the state of new jersey passed in the house and the senate sent him a bill legalizing marriage equality when he, as governor, had the ability with the stroke of a pen to do exactly the thing he's criticizing president obama for not doing, he didn't do it. he vetoed it. and now he's putting the civil rights of a minority up for public referendum, which is republic reprehensible. >> and you got him to agree that in the south in the 1960s, he would not have wanted to put african-american civil rights up for a vote in alabama. he thought that would not be a good way to do that. to try to pretend there is some difference here is something i don't understand. >> yeah, i don't understand it, either. it could be that governor christie is trying to have it both ways, vetoing a marriage equality bill but then sending it to the people to have a vote, maybe hoping that they don't
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approve it. but here's the silver lining in all of this. the state legislature has until january 2013, i believe, to overturn his veto. and the state senate leader, who is a democrat, has said that he is going to do everything he can to try to overturn governor christie's veto. so there is a long time, there's a long window here for that action to happen. >> and jonathan capehart, you just got the last word on marriage equality on msnbc in this programming day. thank you very much, jonathan. >> thanks a lot, lawrence. thank you. you can have the last word on our blog. you can follow my tweets at lawrence. tomorrow night don't miss semper fi, always faithful. i have the honor of hosting. it's the story of a father's quest to find what caused his daughter's deadly and rare
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