tv Jansing and Co. MSNBC March 8, 2012 7:00am-8:00am PST
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♪ good morning. i'm chris jansing. kansas, mississippi, alabama, the republican race rolls on and four men are still competing to be the nominee. of course, mitt romney's got the delegate lead, but is still trying to show he can win in the south. so now he's pouring time and money into southern states. meantime, supporters of rick santorum are arguing repeatedly that newt gingrich needs to get out of the race, but it doesn't look like anyone is dropping out. >> i'm not saying i don't want him to get out. if he wants to get out, i'm all for him getting out, i'm for everybody getting out. i wish president obama would hand me the thing. >> i'm staying in the race because i believe it's impossible for the moderate to win the general election. >> i'm prepared to fight all the way to become the nominee. >> well, joining me now from
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"new york times," gentlemen, good morning. nick, what do you think the chances are newt gingrich drops out? >> immediately, very, very low. and, you know, he -- there's a real incentive to stay in. not because he's going to win the nomination, but because it gives him leverage. it gives him influence and future speaking gigs. and this is -- you know, this is his business model down the road. >> one of the spokes people said he has to win mississippi and alabama and if he doesn't he should get out of the race -- or he will get out of the race and then they started to back off on that. interesting that, you know, one thing and then somebody obviously said, well, don't be so sure about that. >> i mean, both gingrich and santorum have had experience of being expoliticians where nobody pays attention to you. nobody calls you. it's so much more interesting i think being on the campaign trail and having real influence. >> i mean, you make a good point about that.
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meantime, mitt romney, perry, is trying to use the math argument. his campaign argues he needs to win 48% of the remaining delegates but santorum needs 65%. gingrich needs 70%. one campaign aide says it will take some sort of act of god to get to where they need to be in this nomination prize. do you think that's the right argument for mitt romney at this point? >> i think it's the right argument, because the audience he's really trying to influence right now is not really in some ways the voters, but trying to get republican -- the republican hierarchy to force santorum and gingrich out of the race. they make the case over and over again, this is damaging the party, the primary is the end. he's making the case as much to the elites as to the voters. that's why he's using the math argument. the problem is that the tea party voters who are voting for santorum and gingrich don't care what the party elites think and it's not going to think them. romney might lose the next three primaries and it's hard to drop
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out while i'm losing primaries at the same time. >> and in virginia, i can win in the south and he was basically unopposed. he ran against ron paul there. rick santorum wasn't too pleased about the act of god stuff. let me play for you what he said. >> what won't they resort to? to try to bully their way through this race. you know? if the governor thinks he's now ordained by god to win, then let's have it out. i feel very, very good that we're running a race, energizing people. you know, we're the man versus the machine, and, you know, they've got the machine. they have got the insiders and the big money and we've got the people. and i like my chances. >> well, at least up until that point i like my chances, i think, nick, he has the point. you cannot argue with the disparity, money and machine which is all on the side of the front-runner and on the other side you've got rick santorum
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who has been getting some money now, but has been running this much smaller campaign. but if newt gingrich doesn't get out, does he have a chance at all? >> i really don't think that either santorum or gingrich has much of a chance. i looked at the betting site before i came on, and they have romney with about an 85% chance of winning the republican nomination and santorum with a 4% chance. you know, that feels about right. i think the big question is, you know, not who is going to get the nomination, but how much damage does this to romney when he receives it. >> let me bring in the national communication director for the santorum for president campaign. so let me get you to respond to that little piece of information from in trade. a 4% chance for your candidate. what say you? >> this election, it's still very early in the process. i know a lot of the punditry class like to say it's over.
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but i'm very certain that mitt romney would have loved to have gone down to the field at halftime at the super bowl and proclaimed his new england patriots the winners. the problem was there was a second half to play and we know that eli came back and brought the giants into the victory. you know, we've got a second half the opl half to play. we won't let mitt romney or anybody else say the race is over. >> let's talk about the states geography. to really make the argument that gingrich should get out of the race, you have to win the upcoming primaries. >> are you asking me, chris? >> yes. >> i wouldn't say that. look, i think that newt gingrich has been in this race a long time. people know who he is. you know, we have obviously surged past him, heading up against mitt romney and the issue we'd like to do is make this a two-person race, between us and mitt romney. we think we can do well in the southern states. i mean, you can tell from my accent that i know a little bit about the south. in fact, i went to ole miss, so
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i'm happy to be in mississippi yesterday. but the fact of the matter is, his message on the social issues resonates with the south. but also rick santorum, some of the small rural towns were built around -- and it's resonating. >> and he's getting the under $100,000 income voter, but the problem is the electability issue. if you look at the exit polls, people don't think he can beat barack obama. >> electability, our guy is running with a tenth of the money that mitt romney is. mitt romney ran this campaign three years ago. if anyone in this race is not electable it's mitt romney. >> well, let me ask you about the money. is it still coming in? you have been significantly outspent. "the new york times" says that mitt romney's small donor total exceeds rick santorum. i think he raised $11 million in february. is your money coming in? >> very well. we raised $9 million in the month of february with over
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100,000 unique donors around around 130,000 donations in just the month of february alone. so the track and trend is moving up for us in the donation -- in the donation line. we keep raising more money every day. we have the most web traffic of the entire campaign during our speech on tuesday night when we were winning tennessee, oklahoma and of course north dakota. we saw a spike in our web traffic as soon as santorum went on and delivered his message of freedom and a positive message, the web traffic went through the roof and so did the donations. we're doing very well in that respect. >> i don't know if you have a monitor there, but there's a chart that they put in the gallup daily tracking poll. at this point, rick santorum has peaked and now he's going down and mitt romney seems to have troughed off and he's on the way back up. again, as i said those key exit polls would indicate that mitt
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romney has a better chance against barack obama. what do you do to get that enthusiasm to a point where -- and it is a number's game as you know, it's a number's game, but you can win that high number of delegates. >> all right, well, it's a numbers game to a point, but it's also a movement game. you have to decide, are you pushing the mathematics or are you pushing the movement? we have a messenger who we believe can take that vision to the american people and that's what people have been rallying around from the get go. people have counted us out from the beginning. we spent $30,000 in iowa and won it. we won every single county in missouri and i think we won every single county in tennessee. so it's very of course we're not just a regional candidate. we don't just win in our home states even though we might have five home states. like we don't have five home states like mitt romney, but the point is we can win in the south. mitt romney cannot win in the south. he has a problem there and did in '08 and does in this election as well.
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so instead of focusing on message with that campaign, all they do is trot out negative attacks and now we find out that mitt romney and newt gingrich are throwing up negative advertising against us in the south. if mitt romney is so secure in where he is in this process, why is he trying to spin everybody and have everybody else get out? if he has every pundit and accomplishment member on his team, what he's so worried about? >> hogan giddily, thank you for coming on. to your point, nick, they're spending so much time and he's getting so beaten up that the longer that rick santorum and newt gingrich stay in the race the harder it is for him. and they're having a little bit of fun with this, perry. listen to david axelrod on the conference call with reporters. >> he continues to grind out a kind of a tactical victory and,
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you know, tactical victories in a death march here. >> is death march the right way to describe this? >> it does seem like a long march and romney is not gaining anything from it. his numbers among independents are going down, a lot of the polls are going down as well. let me jump back to one thing the guest said about the one challenge that santorum has to say in it being a two-person race, he's had the opportunity, in ohio and michigan, he had a two-person race and romney did beat him easily at the end. so santorum has to prove he can do well in a two-man race. >> i want to play what howard dean had to say on "morning joe." i think this is an interesting take on what the two-man match-up would look like. >> i fear santorum more, not because he's a right wing extremist, because he is, but because he can connect with
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people. i think he's much tougher than i thought. >> do you think he really means that? >> i sure don't buy that. i think obama would be much better off running against santorum. but i -- >> against santorum -- >> i mean, much better off against -- obama -- santorum is much easier to defeat. i think romney in many ways would be a reasonably strong candidate. other than the fact he's been so wounded. i think jon huntsman would have been the strongest in the republican field and romney the second. i think there's a certain amount of complacency right now. it's a long way to november. >> danger, danger, warning signs don't get complacent. >> a lot go wrong. this is less about who the republican candidate is and more about the economy in november.
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>> come see us here in new york some time, perry. thanks. a scientist by the way if you have been following this, they're watching for signs of a gigantic storm that can disrupt gps and airlines over the next few hours. and scientists say it's the largest such storm in five years. in the past, solar flares and storms have affected power grids and communications devices.
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you know, i thought i couldn't be surprised by the campaign anymore, but these are staggering numbers on campaign ad spending. 2012 can see nearly $10 billion spent dwarfing $7 billion in 2008. about half of that is expected to come from the unlimited super pac money. and of course that means you'll
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be seeing more of this. >> since barack obama's inauguration, the gas prices have doubled. the gingrich $2.50 slashes gas prices by increasing production. >> i'm joined by howard bragman, vice president of reputation.com and chairman of 15 minutes of public relations. i found that ad interesting because here's a guy who's really struggling to be relevant anymore. but he's got one message and he's pounding it home. on the stump, and in his ads. is it a good strategy? >> it probably is. it's very herman cain reminiscent of the 9-9-9. he's staking his own ground in relation to the president, and i think for him that's probably a pretty good strategy right now. it's separating him from the pack. >> well, let's talk about the
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guy leading the pack certainly on spending, mitt romney. what should be his approach do you think now that we're post super tuesday? where do you do the balance between warm and fuzzy and the attack ads? >> well, he hasn't had a balance between warm and fuzzy. 90 some percent of his ads have been negative. and there's one word that we use in marketing and the most important word and that's authenticity. with his moniker as a flip-flopper it's hard to do authenticity. when you're criticizing other people, it's hard to claim authenticity. we need a morning in america, we need a ronald reagan moment where he says here's who i am. you know, i heard somebody talking yesterday. tuesday night is this great opportunity to give these amazing speeches. boy, he's not a really good speaker and there's not a warm, fuzzy connection. >> i have to tell you the connection thing has really helped rick santorum. some of my favorite ads over the years, probably have not been the most effective. but when they take little snippets out of speeches, when
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the candidate is really on fire, really connecting, and you see that sort of personality, that really makes you feel that they could really change the world, i love those ads. i wonder if you went through all of mitt romney's speeches if you could find enough of those moments to put together -- >> if you can't you've got bic trouble. they need to change the mix a little. yesterday they were talking about inevitability. i don't think inevitability is the right message yet. i don't think it's fair because he's the party insider. the two party outsiders have no reason to drop out. they're well funded. they're having a great time. and what everybody wants except mitt romney is for romney to go to the convention with less than the number of delegates he needs to win. as long as they're not dead, they're staying in the race. as long as romney doesn't have enough votes to clinch the nomination, they're happy and they have won.
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because anything can happen then. >> let me show you one of mitt romney's ads because he's taken some heat from latinos over this spot. take a look. >> rick santorum voted for the confirmation of judge sotomayor which put her on the path to the supreme court. >> romney seemed to point out that sotomayor was a liberal judge. could that hurt him with latinos? >> it's hurt him. his positions on immigration have hurt him. they have to understand that sotomayor is the first latino on the supreme court. as a hero, an icon to latinos. like criticizing martin luther king in the african american community. >> does somebody raise their hand and say, that might not be the best idea? >> let me tell you, they're so focused on winning this primary right now they will do anything to win it. but they're going to win at the cost of really risking the general election. because it's -- when they go to
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the general election, they need the latino vote. they need the women's vote where they have been talking about contraception and things that are going to hurt them. it's a really bizarre alice in wonderland kind of primary season. >> last night, i went to see the movie "game change" and they had real clicks of barack obama. you remember how powerful he was on the campaign trail in 2008. now his campaign has released a 17 minutes of minidocumentary. let me play a little clip. >> the entire national security apparatus was in that room. now we had to make a decision. go or not go. as you walked out the room, it donned on me, he is all alone. this is his decision. nobody is standing there with him. >> yeah, you wonder if they take 30 seconds out of that and turn it into the tv ad.
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>> it's brilliant. >> the 17 minute, who watches that, what role does it play in the overall ad strategy? >> it becomes a positioning piece and really a piece for the heavy base. you use it on his re-election website. the biggest is supporters. it really sets the tone for the other advertising and he looks one thing that nobody else does and that's presidential. >> yeah. and decisive. and got rid of osama bin laden. all right, thank you so much. come back because we know they'll start heavy ads in some of the southern states. hope to see you soon. thank you. guess who's the richest man in the america? yes, bill gates. only $8 billion away from being the richest man in the world. forbes has the world's billionaires. mexican telecommunications carlos slim is on top. $69 billion, then bill gates, $61 billion. warren buffett, $44 billion.
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so what's next for dennis kucinich? he's not exactly sure. >> many of you are -- weren't on this planet when i started my career in politics but let me tell you something. i have actually -- this is the eighth time that i have lost an election. eighth. there's always a tomorrow. >> and the first lady is coming back here to new york city. no, not jump ropes or jumping jacks. this time she's bowling. it's a campaign event that the invitation describes as family fun. the price of hanging out at chelsea piers is 150 bucks and up. if she does bowl, let's hope she does better than her husband on the campaign trail in 2008. he got ripped a lot for throwing that gutter ball. and vice president biden talking about the 2012 field to
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telemundo. >> on the fundamental issues that affect the american people, the people are struggling. there's no difference among them. they're basically the same -- the same position. so i kind of look through all their personal squabbling and their characteristics and personalities and look at what they're saying. there's no fundamental difference. >> and the star studded red carpet for the premiere of "game change" last night. here's a picture i tweeted last night. that's julianne moore. this is on the facebook page. some friends and i were having a good time. taken by the one and only thomas roberts. and speaking of tweeting, so imagine it's just a typical day and you find out that rush limbaugh has again set the twitter world on fire talking about you. you'll meet rush limbaugh's latest female target next. ♪
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here's a look at other stories people are talking about right now. nbc news is getting an amazing and unpress departmented look at a japanese ghost town. that massive earthquake triggered a tsunami and a meltdown of the fukishima power plant. it was on "rock center" last night, so before we talk about it let me play a little part of it. >> this drugstore has been like this since the earthquake struck. all of the bottles thrown on the floor. a moment frozen in time. entire times abandoned. no one is coming back. the only sign of life here, herds of feral cattle, abandoned by their owners. >> a bull in there, watch out. >> people left in a hurry,
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leaving clothes behind at a laundromat. >> unbelievable images. tell us about that experience. what was it like one year later? >> it was haunting. i have never been to a place that has been completely destroyed. made uninhabitable by accident by mankind. it was one of these almost extinction level events. nobody is there. nobody can live there for decades, and it was done by us. it was caused by nature, but by science that we didn't contain properly. and if you go to a war zone or you go to the natural disaster zone, there's a lot of grief and there's a lot of horror. but you can eventually bury the dead and mourn them and rebuild. and move on. this you can't do that. and it's gone, and it's going to be that like for a long time. i hadn't seen anything like that. it's so -- >> and you had on a mask and a little -- was that safe? >> the radiation -- i had a
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misinterpretation. who knows? you know, people don't -- you don't really know. even the people who live there don't know safe it is. the suit help, these are safety precautions. because what you have to worry about is the dust. i thought it was like a microwave oven, but instead it's the dust you have to worry about. the tiny particles get on anything. you don't want to kick the particles up, you don't want them in your nose, eyes or ears. that's why so many people left, because the particles settle on the houses, the land, they get into the food and the water. those cows you saw running around, they eat the grass which is covered in the particles so it gets into the cows. they can't be sold, be butchered. nothing. and that's the problem. that these tiny radioactive particles infiltrate the entire
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food chain, the entire system and can't get out. the exclusion zone around the plant, i think it should be a warning to what can happen and that the idea of a clean-up which sounds great, oh, how's the clean-up going? in this area there really isn't a clean-up going because it's not possible. >> some of the fascinating stuff you can see on "rock center." i know you're off to a far flung part of the world, but good to have you. the opposition minister has defected to the other line. if it's confirmed to be him, he's the highest ranking member to abandon bashar al assad's regime. and leon panetta says it doesn't make sense for u.s. military action in syria despite calls from some lawmakers including john mccain. whitney houston has left her entire estate to her daughter,
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and her money will be put into a trust for bobbi. she'll be able to access some at 25 and the rest when she turns 30. we're still waiting to find out whether defendant dharun ravi will take the stand on his defense. jurors did hear a tape of a police interrogation that was played and the defense showed a text that ravi sent to tyler clementi saying he had no problem with him being gay. today is the 101st women's day and today it was marked with a warning. >> today, a shadow has been cost over this day of celebration by efforts to turn back the clock here in washington, d.c. and across the country. efforts that we all must fight back against. >> tennis legend billy jean
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ings is joining the democrats all the waites, quote, some cal my tennis match against bobby riggs the battle of the sexes but republicans right now are waging an epic battle against women's healthcare choices. this battle extends beyond capitol hill. it's also being waged in state houses across the nation. we asked msnbc's richard louie to look into that. >> good morning to you, chris. democrats warn here that 2012 is the war on women and states hold the battle flag tight. 430 reproductive related bills surfaced in the first two months in state legislatures. at the current rate, we could see 1,170 bills by year's end. that would best 2011 when 1,100 bills surfaced said the guttmacher institute. that resulted in 92 laws in 24 states being enacted. three to fuhr times the numbers
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passed a year before. 2012 could be a record. oklahoma as you just saw there, its senate approved a bill tuesday requiring doctors to tell women they can listen to the fetus' heart beat before an abortion. also this week, three abortion bills made it out of committee in mississippi despite earlier protests. those bills there, the author is saying it would stop 90% of abortions in the state. then in texas, the state cut women's health services funding by two-thirds last year. and an additional $35 million could be lost if republican lawmakers get their way. many democrats believe these state fights could end up challenging roe v. wade. what would america look like without roe? only seven states would protect abortion rights and 24 would make or have the intent to make abortion illegal. this is what that would look like. ohio state senator nina turner scoffs at this picture saying what's good for the goose is
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good for the gander. her bill says that men wanting viagra should be seen by a sex therapist. i'm joined by the host of "now by alex wagner". good morning to you both. alex, 1,170 bills potentially by year's end. what do you make of this? >> it's staggering, chris, because i think we have gone from the debate over abortion which as you know has been incredibly heated to an argument over a real -- i use the word war because i think if you look at what's happening in the state houses across the country a war on women's health. we are talking about defunding not just planned parenthood, but organizations that provide abortions. cl clinics that offer breast exams and they're under assault in state houses pause that i -- it's almost mccarthyism from the
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right. if you're associated with abortion providers you will get no funding. >> michelle, the democratic congressional committee has raised a million dollars over the sandra fluke controversy. do you think the republicans have handed them a gift in rallying the base? >> absolutely, they have handed the democratic party and barack obama and -- a very, very early and wonderful christmas gift. if you're a democrat in congress and if you're president obama, you know, historically we have an enormous gender gap in this country. more women than men historically vote in presidential elections and more women, more often than not vote democratic versus republican. going into the primary and into the general election in 2012, the women's vote we are seeing is more and more important. now, obviously we know that women are not a monolithic voting group. most women are not single issue voters, but this is not an issue
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that just boils down to abortion rights or reproductive rights. all women believe in individual liberty. they believe in individual freedoms and this is an assault on the very essence of what it is to be a woman. whether we are talking about defunding planned parenthood, to whether or not we can legitimately ask and i think it's a very legitimate question to ask do the republican candidates running for president right now care not only about women, but care about low income women because these are the women who are -- >> i thought it was very instructive the silence when rush limbaugh said what he said about sandra fluke. again, unlikely support from bill maher who said, i hate to defend rush limbaugh, but he did apologize. and also, hate discrimination by sponsor pullout. does he have a point? >> bill maher -- look, i don't know. if we're talking about sort of
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party lines and the deafening silence from the gop contenders on this, rush limbaugh is almost a de facto spokesperson for the republican party. this was a moment for mitt romney and rick santorum to come out and i really say mitt romney because he's the one that's sort of more inclined to be the moderate on this stuff and come out and give a vocal, vocal defense of women's rights and women's health care. you heard nothing. you heard nothing from gop party elders. so when you have somebody like rush limbaugh dominating the media space with hate-filled and i think derogatory, misogynist commentary. >> and rush limbaugh said what is it with all the young, single white women overeducated, doesn't mean intelligent. the woman he was talking about is tracie mcmillan, the author
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of the new book "the american way of eating." good morning. >> good morning. >> he also mocked the fact that you won the 2006 james aaronson award for social justice journalism. what did you think when you heard what he was saying? >> right, you know, i didn't realize that anybody would ever have a problem with me working really hard getting through school and doing my job, so i'm a reporter. so i did my job as a reporter. i went and talked to working families about how food works in their lives. i did my job and i have no idea why rush or anybody else, you know, thinks it's wrong for someone to go to college and do their work. >> yeah, overeducated with your bachelor's degree. i guess it's not a good thing to win an award for social journalism. maybe he doesn't like the idea of having a social conscience. but you believe rush limbaugh
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doesn't think women count. do you have a sense and you have been out and you have been working in jobs and different parts of the country to write this book, do you have a sense of this sort of backlash against -- i don't know what else to call it, a modern woman? >> i have to say, you know, i have worked in a lot of working class jobs in the last year and also growing up. there's always some guys that are jerks and clearly don't respect you just because you're a female. and there's a lot of men that really appreciate and love and respect women. so i don't think it's a blanket problem, you know, with working class men in america. but, i think my dad has a really good line on this, which is like, well, there's always going to be someone who's a real jerk and who talks too much and doesn't think about what he's saying. so i sort of feel like, you know, we're sort of engaging with that here. a lot of men i have to say like are intimidated when there's an intelligent woman that can take them on. so i think there might be something going on here with that. >> that do you think is going on here, michelle? i don't want to pretend that you're channeling rush limbaugh,
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but what is the point? >> i'm so perplexed i can't begin to fathom what could actually be going on. i don't know if he believes what he is saying or whether he is entertaining his audience. i just -- i don't know. but what i can tell you that i strongly feel is regardless what his true believes are, this is hurting the republican party. alex was right when she talked of the silence being deafening. it is time for one of the republican candidates who is running for the highest office of our land to tell us do they believe that women count? do they believe that women are important? do they believe in individual rights? this is a question of character and of morality and one of them needs to speak out. >> you know, we have said for a very long time, alex, that in the end this is really about the economy. but i do wonder given that not so long ago, not so many months ago a lot of people were saying there is not going to be enthusiasm for voting this year. that the excitement that barack obama created is gone in 2012. but i wonder if this is an issue
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that will get those suburban soccer moms who have frankly, you know, changed a lot of these in suburban philadelphia, in suburban columbus, ohio, who have changed the outcomes of elections to get back involved. >> look, this is hot topic stuff. this is red meat. i think it will motivate the women. we look at the exit polling from ohio. rick santorum does very well with married women. mitt romney does very well with unmarried and working women. there's going to be a divide there. i think doubling down though on this rhetoric, if we talk about sort of the course we are on as a country is a bad thing for america. and i think at the end of the day, i sound like a politician here, but my bet is with the american people really caring about the substance of what's going on. that's the economy. that's foreign policy. this stuff is a distraction. legislatively and locally and on the state level there's a lot happening, and to that extent much more needs to be paid
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secretary about the 17-minute film released today making the case for his re-election. is "game change" fact or fiction? sarah palin's camp is slamming it. we'll have one of the writers on to talk about it. and will the biggest solar storm in five years take your gps off line? and then chely wright will join me. she's fighting for marriage equality. that and a whole lot more. thank you. a massive increase in the number of anti-government militia groups in the u.s. since president obama was elected in 2008. the southern poverty law center says there were 149 such groups when president obama took office. today, there are more than 1,200 an increase of 755%. joining me now is mark poetalk with the southern poverty law center. good morning. >> good morning. >> before we get into why the number of groups is growing, tell me first how do you define
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a militia group? >> well, militia groups are groups that see the government -- if federal government as being the primary enemy. more than that, they are groups that engage in really wild conspiracy theorizing. basically, what these groups believe in one form or another of the following. they think the government is engaged in the plot in which they intend to impose martial law on this country. then to seize the weapons of all americans. to throw any who resist into concentration camps that have been secretly built by fema and ultimately to force the united states into the kind of socialistic one world government -- the so-called new world order. they're basically conspirator l conspiratorial. >> yeah. and the report identified 604 of
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them, and last year, more than a thousand of them. what do you think is behind the big increases? >> well, for the first seven or eight years of that long, steady rise of hate groups, it was really the exploitation of the issue of illegal immigration by hate groups. it was remarkable how we saw klan groups drop about their propaganda about the evils of black people and gay people in order to concentrate on the illegal immigration. it was successful because that was an issue with broad resonance in the american public. and it allowed them to recruit fairly successfully. in the last three years, both hate groups and especially the patriot groups have risen astronomically. i think that has a lot to do with our first black president, really what he wants, which is a changing racial demographics out there. the census bureau has predicted that america will lose its white majority by the year 2050.
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so there's a lot of kind of anger and angst associated with that. people feeling this not the country my forefathers built. that sort of thing. the economy has also been very, very important. and of course the economy went south at precisely the same time, in the fall of 2008, that obama appeared on the scene. so those i think are the major factors. >> and it is an eye opening report to read. go to the website, i assume the southern poverty law center, people can learn more about this. thanks so much for coming on the program. we'llright back. named a 2012 iihs top safety pick. not...that... we'd ever brag about it... turn right. come on, nine. turn left. hit the brakes. huh? how did that get there? [ male announcer ] we can't hide how proud we are to have nine 2012 iihs top safety picks. so we're celebrating with our "safety in numbers" event. that's the power of german engineering. right now lease the 2012 passat
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